Page 34 of The Apparent Trap

I turn around to face him, and I almost take him up on it. Because being alone in Lee’s apartment, with his white t-shirt and tattoos and that concerned expression he’s wearing—all furrowed thick eyebrows and no lighthearted dimples—it’s a little bit hard to breathe.

But if I left now, then I’d have to admit I’m bothered. And I don’t want to be. Not by him, not by Carmen, and most certainly not by my dad.

“Nah, it’s fine,” I say as nonchalantly as I can muster. “It’ll get done faster if we’re both doing it.”

We silently take everything into the kitchen. We get into a rhythm—him washing, me drying. A soft playlist of Maggie Rogers I hadn’t noticed earlier is playing on some hidden speaker.

“So are you ever going to tell me what Ezzie stands for?” he finally says, and I snort a laugh. It breaks the rain cloud that’s been enveloping me ever since my dad walked out the door. “Google wasn’t as helpful to me as it was to you.”

“I don’t think we’re there yet,” I reply with a chuckle.

“Oh okay, we’re just secretly plotting and silently brooding but nothing as personal as your government name. God forbid.”

I roll my eyes, trying to play it off when really, I hate when he does this; I hate when he uses his charm on me. All it does is remind me that I’ve been replaying the night in the bar for weeks, while for him, that night was just his normal way of talking to women; to him, I’m not even worth remembering.

“Look,” I say, needing to stop this before I get too riled up. “I get that we’re stuck together in this awkward situation, but it’s fine, Lee. Let’s just clean up and hope tomorrow we’ll come up with a better plan of action. You don’t need to do this.”

“I don’t need to do what?” I’m not even looking at him, but I can hear the challenge in his voice.

I wave my hand, as though it should be obvious. “You don’t have to pretend to be interested in my life or in knowing me. We’ll figure out how to get this nightmare between my dad and Carmen to end. Maybe we double down somehow in Sweden. But we’re not going to be palling around when this is over. You don’t need to ask me questions about my life.”

I keep drying the wet dishes in front of me until I realize there aren’t any more coming. My eyes finally flick toward Lee, and I see he hasn’t moved, the water still running but his hands stopped.

“What?” I ask, frustrated.

“You think I’m pretending?”

I scoff. “Look, I get it. This is all weird, and we’re doing something that feels a little morally gray, so there’s a temptation or whatever to try and buddy up. But we don’t need to be friends here. We’re not friends.” He’s still not moving. “Wash the damn dishes,” I say, without as much bite as I wish I had.

He closes his eyes for a moment, and then opens them and starts washing again. He doesn’t say anything for a few minutes, and we slip back into companionable silence. Wash, dry, wash, dry. Until it’s all done and the drying rack is full of pots, pans, and our four sets of everything else.

“Okay,” I finally say, looking around the kitchen. “I think we’re done here.”

I turn back to him, but my voice catches in my throat, because he’s watching me in that penetrating way that kicks everything up a notch. He’s considering me, but holding something back.

I try to look anywhere but his face, yet it’s all too distracting. I can see the knife tattoo on his bicep—such a fucking chef cliché—surrounded by flowers and vines. That doesn’t make it any easier.

“Ezzie,” he says with a sigh, and it’s pained, like it’s taking all his effort to even get the syllables out. “I hate that that’s what you think,” he mumbles, running his hand through his hair, indecisive, a man on the verge.

I almost don’t reply, because I have no idea where he’s going. Ignoring him is the safer path. I should just say It’s all fine and sweep everything under the rug, the thing I’ve apparently been doing with my dad for more than a decade. I should grab my coat, say Thanks for the wildly awkward and illuminating Thanksgiving, and walk out the door.

But he’s pinning me in place with his eyes. They’re daring me to prod. They’re running through options and stopping and starting again and again. And it’s kicked my heart rate into high gear, that look. I’m back in the bar, aware that he could say anything when he’s looking at me like that. That I want him to say anything. That I’m also afraid he’ll put into words whatever it is that he sees under the shell I assume keeps everyone else out.

“What?” I finally ask again, unable to not crack open the door, even though I know I shouldn’t.

“We could be friends,” he says.

“We could be friends?” I repeat.

“This just got so complicated,” he mumbles again. And that makes all the hairs stand up on the back of my neck.

“What did?” I ask, prickling, wondering.

For a moment, I think he’s not going to answer. But then he says, “I’m not succeeding at embracing the easy.” And my eyes widen.

I’m flooded with the memory that I’ve worked so hard for almost two months to suppress, to not let it play on a loop in my mind. But it’s ringing in my ears now. Maybe I should be embracing the easy instead of trying to make things more complicated.

I should leave it. Nothing good can come from this. Embrace the easy. Easy is remembering he left me stunned in a bar. Easy is believing he doesn’t remember.