Fallon

I brought a notebook to the restaurant with me.

It’s a little embarrassing, but so much has happened this year, I started taking notes back in January. I’m also a neat freak, so Ben is lucky in that regard. He won’t have to do much research on me, because it’s all here. All four guys I went out with, all the auditions I went on, the fact that I’m speaking to my father again, the four callbacks I received, the one (very small) role I actually landed in an off-Broadway play. And how as excited as I was about it, I miss the community theater more than I expected to. Maybe because I enjoyed everyone wanting my advice. Now that I’ve got a small role in a slightly larger production, it feels different. Everyone is trying to climb their way to the top and they’ll crawl over anyone to get there. There are a lot of competitive people in this world, and I’ve discovered I’m not really one of them. But today I’m not going to dwell on what is or isn’t going right in my life, because today is all about Ben and me.

I have our entire day mapped out. After we eat breakfast, we’re doing typical touristy things. I’ve lived in New York for two years now and I’ve still never been to the Empire State Building. After lunch, though, is the part I’m the most excited about. I was walking past an art studio a couple of weeks ago and noticed a flyer for an event called “The life and death of Dylan Thomas. But mostly the death.” He’s brought up Dylan Thomas’s name a couple of times, so I know he likes his work. And the fact that the event takes place in that studio today of all days isn’t nearly as fascinating as what else I learned from the flyer.

Dylan Thomas died in New York City in 1953.

On November 9th.

What are the odds? I had to Google that information just to make sure it was right. It is. And I have no idea if Ben even knows that about Dylan Thomas. I’m kind of hoping he doesn’t so I can see the look on his face when I tell him.

“Are you Fallon?”

I look up at the waitress. She’s the same waitress who has refilled my Diet Pepsi twice. But this time she has an apologetic look about her . . . and a phone in her hands.

My heart sinks.

Please just let him be late. Please don’t let him be calling me because he isn’t coming today.

I nod. “Yeah.”

She pushes the phone at me. “He says it’s an emergency. You can bring the phone back to the counter when you’re done.”

I take it out of her hands and pull it to my chest with both hands. But then I quickly pull it away, because I’m afraid he’ll be able to hear my heart pounding on his end of the line. I look down at it and inhale a slow breath.

I can’t believe I’m reacting this way. I had no idea how much I’ve been anticipating today until the threat that it might be taken away from me. I slowly lift the phone to my ear. I close my eyes and mutter, “Hello?”

I immediately recognize the sigh that comes from the other end of the line. It’s crazy how I don’t even have to hear his voice to recognize him. That’s how embedded he is in my mind. Even the sound of his breath is familiar.

“Hey,” he says.

It’s not the kind of desperate greeting I wanted to hear. I need him to sound panicked—late. Like he’s just walking off the airplane and he’s terrified I’ll leave before he has a chance to get here. Instead, it’s a lazy hey. Like he’s sitting on a bed somewhere, relaxed. Not at all in a panic to get to me.

“Where are you?” I utter the dreaded question, knowing he’s about to give me an answer that’s almost three thousand miles from New York.

“Los Angeles,” he says. I close my eyes and wait for more words to come, but they don’t. He fails to follow it up with any type of explanation, which only means he feels guilty.

He’s met someone.

“Oh,” I say. “Okay.” I try not to be transparent, but my sadness is audible.

“I’m really sorry,” he says. I hear the truth in his words, but it does little to comfort me.

“Is everything okay?”

He doesn’t answer my question immediately. The silence grows thick between us until he sucks in a rush of air.

“Fallon,” he says, his voice faltering on my name. “I don’t even know how to say this gently, but . . . my brother? Kyle? He uh . . . he was in a wreck two days ago.”

I cover my mouth with my hand as his words rush through me. “Oh, no. Ben, is he okay?”

More silence, and then a weak, “No.”

The word is spoken so quietly, it’s as if he’s in a state of disbelief.

“He um . . . he didn’t make it, Fallon.”

I’m unable to respond to that sentence. I don’t know what to say. I have absolutely no useful words. I don’t know Ben well enough to know how to console him over a phone, and I didn’t know Kyle well enough to express my sadness over his death. Several seconds pass before Ben speaks again.

“I would have called before now, but . . . you know. I didn’t know how to reach you.”

I shake my head as if he can see me. “Stop. It’s okay. I’m so sorry, Ben.”

“Yeah,” he says, saddened. “Me too.”

I want to ask him if there’s anything I can do, but I know he’s probably tired of hearing that. More silence engulfs the line and I’m angry at myself for not knowing how to respond to this. It’s just so unexpected, and I’ve never experienced anything like what he must be going through right now, so I don’t even try to fake empathy.