It’s a lie, of course. Even having never kissed him—beyond the quick, soft kiss at our sham-of-a-wedding—I know I would be worse off if I had him for a week and then lost him. My heart would be warped afterward, like a wool sweater loaned to a body too big and growing misshapen until it doesn’t fit quite right anymore. Who knows, maybe I came to Oliver misshapen to begin with. But unlike every boyfriend I’ve had—a couple of weeks here, a month there—Oliver never seems to poke at the tender spots, needing to know every detail. Instead he’s collected my details as they’ve been offered.
Maybe it’s why he’s still so close to me; I haven’t yet had the chance to ruin it by clamming up exactly when intimacy is needed.
Our first night, while our best friends were breaking headboards in Vegas hotel rooms with their libidos, Oliver and I walked up and down the Strip talking about work. About writing and illustrating, about the portrayal of women in comics, about the books we were currently reading. We talked about Razor Fish, and about his store—vaguely; I didn’t even know early on that he would be moving to San Diego.
It was so easy being with him, like a tiny taste of something delicious I want to keep eating until I explode. Somewhere at the tail end of the chaos on the Strip, I’d grown brave enough to stop him mid-step, and, with a tentative hand on his arm, turn him to face me.
“Our rooms are probably being used,” I started, staring at his chin, before forcing my eyes to his.
He smiled, and it was the first time I realized how perfect his teeth are—white and even, with uniquely sharp canines that made him nearly wolfish—how smooth his lips are, how blue his eyes are behind his glasses. “Probably.”
“But we could . . .” I trailed off, blinking to the side.
He waited, watching me, eyes never betraying that he knew exactly what I was going to say.
I looked back up at his face, finding my bravery: “We could get a room for the night, if you wanted. Together.”
His expression remained exactly the same—Oliver’s amazing poker face held that gentle smile, that nonjudgmental, soft gaze—and he very politely declined.
I was mortified, but eventually got over it, and we’ve never spoken about it since.
Later, when I discovered he’d moved here and we had these people in common, and this passion for comics in common, too, we saw each other all the time and the awkwardness of that rejection dissolved. In its place came sort of a perfect friendship. Oliver doesn’t judge, he doesn’t mock, he doesn’t push. He doesn’t mind my quiet moods, where all I want to do is bend over a scrap of paper and draw. He doesn’t mind when I get worked up over something and babble for an entire hour. He’s honest in this completely easy way when I show him new story ideas. He plays weird music for me and makes me sit and listen because, even if I hate it, he wants me to understand why he likes it. He can talk about everything from Veronica Mars to Gen13 to NPR to car repair, or he can just as easily not talk at all, which I sort of love, too. He listens, he’s funny, he’s kind. He’s entirely his own self, and that easy confidence is only part of what makes him nearly irresistible. The fact that he’s tall, gorgeous, and has the most perfect smile doesn’t hurt, either.
Two months after our marriage and annulment, I brought him over to meet my dad, Greg. That night, sometime over barbecued chicken and a bag of chips with salsa—and while I was off in the backyard trying to capture the sunset with oils—Oliver heard the rest of my story.
Dad came home from his third tour in Afghanistan when I was twelve, and he was a complete mess: he went from being a celebrated triage nurse to being an honorably discharged veteran, unable to sleep and hiding OxyContin in the kitchen. Mom couldn’t even take a month of it before she left in the middle of the night without anything as formal as a goodbye. To either of us.
I tried to pick up Dad’s pieces, Dad tried to pick up my pieces, and we muddled through for a few years until we realized we each had to carry our own pieces. It wasn’t good, but it got better, and my relationship with my father is one of the most cherished things I’ll ever have. I tell him nearly every thought I have, no matter how small. It’s what allows me to keep them mostly inside the rest of the time. I’d rather lose the sun than him.
I never knew exactly what Dad said to Oliver, but after that night, instead of ever asking about it, Oliver just folded it into the Lola Canon and let it be. Little details would come out in conversation—the shorthand that so far I’ve only ever had with Harlow and Mia—showing me that he knew more than I’d ever told him.