Charming Like Us (Like Us 7)

I want you to kill my saudade.

I want you to kill this longing feeling inside of me.

“I feel like I’m breaking up with the guy,” I admit to Farrow, tipping the beer to my lips. “And all we’ve done is flirt like kindergarteners.”

“Man, what kindergarteners do you know that understand blow-job euphemisms?” he asks in a rising wiseass smile. “You’re more like middle schoolers.”

I grin. “Yeah, you’re right. Your husband is more like the kindergartener.”

He goes to shove me in the pool, but I careen back and laugh.

Farrow raises a hand in surrender. “You’re not going in the water, only because of that.” He points at the phone, referring to my fracturing heart. “He text you back yet?”

“Yeah.” I show him the text. “What time can I stop by tomorrow?” I chose the penthouse as the meeting place.

“Pick anytime, Oliveira. The door is always open.” He tilts his head back and forth, reconsidering. “More like, partially ajar for you.”

“Aw, fuck you,” I say in a grin and text Jack.

Morning. 8 a.m.

I press send, hoping it didn’t sound too curt. But I can’t exactly attach a bunch of heart emojis. He’s giving me enough mixed signals to power the sun, and I don’t want to add to that.

I set my phone aside on the gray stone.

“I think it goes up like this. Oh, wait, fuck, no the other way,” Sulli says in the water, setting up a pool volleyball net with Luna and Jane.

Banks and Akara jump in the water to help them. Akara’s hair has grown a little longer this summer, the black strands wisp over his ears and brush his neck.

All of SFO is on the rooftop hanging out together. The penthouse is a mega-upgrade from the 900-square-foot Rittenhouse-Fitler townhouse that burned down. We’re not all cramped together, for one. For another, it’s a fucking penthouse. 33rd floor. Philly skyline views.

And three floors below, Akara, Banks, Donnelly, and Quinn moved in together. Fucking expensive, but Kitsuwon Securities pays for housing, and I’m sure our pay-cut helps afford my Hell’s Kitchen studio and the 30th floor apartment.

Whenever I’m off-duty, I like coming here.

Just to be with the people I’m missing.

Thatcher Moretti is grilling burgers and sausages, the smell making my stomach growl, and my gaze drifts over to my baby brother.

Quinn has been doing sit-ups and planks. Thank the Lord he hasn’t wanted to rip my head off the past couple of weeks. Just what I need, a war with my brother while all this other shit is happening.

“Horses are walked,” Donnelly calls, coming through the sliding doors and unclipping leashes on the two Newfoundland puppies.

“Thanks!” Luna shouts from the pool. Orion is her hyper dog, and he’s chasing his tail in a circle. I reach for my two paperbacks that I’m in the middle of reading and notice Farrow looking bummed at the sliding glass door.

Donnelly isn’t who he wanted to see.

I laugh into a grin.

“Shut the fuck up,” he says into his swig of beer. “Weren’t you just sending cry-face emojis to Jack?”

I’m still grinning. “Says the cry-face emoji next to me. Don’t worry, Redford, the Husband will be back. He didn’t drown in the toilet. He knows how to swim out of shit.”

Farrow shakes his head but he’s laughing. “You’re one of the wittiest fuckers I know.” I have a quip for that, but his features turn more serious in a beat, and he tells me, “I’m almost mad at him. You deserve so much better than the mind games he’s making you play.”

“I don’t think it’s intentional,” I defend. “It’s Jack. When has he ever been cruel to anyone?”

Farrow nods a couple times.

I nod back, understanding that he’s looking out for me exactly how I’d look out for him. Farrow and I don’t have to dive into the weeds in order to get deep. With few words, we reach that place, and we both drink our beers and bathe in the hot summer sun.

I’m glad to have good friends that’ll be with me when I crash and burn.

Besides my job in security, it’s about the only thing I have going for me right now.

I decide between my paperbacks I’ve read countless times: The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck and Laura Esquivel’s Like Water For Chocolate. Choosing the former, I find the dog-eared spot, and I don’t get far before Farrow and I talk about our clients.

How Maximoff and Charlie seemed more like actual fist-bumping friends at the lake house last week. They sat on the dock talking for about an hour. All of us on SFO theorized about what:

“Religion,” Banks guessed.

“Sports,” Thatcher said.

Akara nodded. “Sports.”

“Dingle-berries,” Donnelly said.

Everyone laughed.

“Plato, probably,” Farrow threw out.

“Ditto, add in Confucius,” I said.

“Who’s Confucius?” Quinn asked.

My baby brother. He should’ve gone to college. I bit my tongue from saying that one because that definitely would’ve ignited an Oliveira Civil War.