We Are Inevitable by Gayle Forman (read aloud txt) 📕

in a chair, unsure if I’ll ever have normal sex or fall in love. But being permanently freed from having to pretend to be a Tyler, man, that was a relief. Because in the end, those guys are so much worse off than me.” He casts a sidelong smirk. “They’re even worse off than you.”

“Thank you?”

He claps a hand over mine. “You’re welcome, son.”

We fall into a friendly silence, the tire treads making a reassuring rhythm against the damp pavement. “Do you really believe all that?” I ask him after a while.

An oncoming truck passes us, high beams briefly illuminating the car. Maybe it’s the intimacy of the dark, or the concentration of driving, but Chad’s face has shed its usual clownish jauntiness and looks somehow achingly real. He cocks his head to the side, as if he means to lean on my shoulder. Then he straightens back up, and, staring ahead into the inky night, admits, “I don’t know, dawg. But I’m trying to.”

The Little Book of Hygge

Sundays the store is closed, and like God himself, Ira takes a day of rest. He doesn’t usually get out of bed until noon. I wake up early no matter what, and back when I still could read about things other than extinct reptiles, I’d stay in bed, nose in book, until Ira and Mom roused me.

This Sunday morning I take advantage of the quiet to replay alternate scenarios of last night, imagining what would have happened if that asshole bouncer had let us in.

Before she kissed me, Hannah had said we’d keep trying. I beat off to the multiple ways we might’ve kept trying. As I wipe up the results with a towel, I suddenly think of Chad and get what he means about the connection between love and desire. And then I feel really weird thinking about Chad as I wipe up my jiz.

This is the rabbit hole I’m spiraling down when I hear keys in the shop door. Is Ira up? I check his bedroom; he’s still out cold.

“Hello?” Ike calls up the stairs. “Anyone here?”

All three of them are in the shop, in their overalls, staring at the empty Mr. Coffee.

“Where’s the coffee?” Richie whines.

“It’s Sunday,” I say.

“So? Jesus say something about not drinking coffee on Sunday?”

“I wouldn’t know.” I turn to Ike. “What are you doing here?”

But before he can answer, there’s a loud crash. I swivel around. Garry has busted a hole in the back wall.

“What are you doing?” I shout.

“Opening the wall.” Garry demonstrates by taking another swing.

“Stop it!” I lunge for the sledgehammer but it’s too late. There’s a gaping hole in the Sheetrock. “What the fuck!”

Garry kneels down, touching the exposed pipes. “This is some really good work.”

“Did your mom really do the roughing?” Richie asks.

I’m caught off guard by the reference to Mom.

Ike shines his flashlight inside. “It’s solid work. Café would practically build itself.”

“Café? Have you been to talking to Chad?”

“I’ve been talking to Angela Silvestri,” Ike says.

“Who’s Angela Silvestri?”

“She was the secretary at the middle school. Just retired. Heckuva baker. She makes a mean crumb cake. It’s got this cinnamon sugar topping, but with crunch. You know what gives it the crunch?” Before anyone can answer, Ike crows, “Life cereal. She puts it in the topping.”

“Ike, I said you could fix the bookshelf. No one said anything about a café.”

“We were talking with your dad,” Garry says. “We think a café really would make the whole space more hygge.”

“What’s ‘huggy’?” Richie asks.

“Hygge,” Garry corrects, pronouncing the word like he’s swallowing it. “It’s some Danish thing about how to make spaces more cozy. My girlfriend got a book called The Little Book of Hygge. Went around trying to make the whole house hygge. We got lots of throw pillows and sheepskin rugs, and she painted stencils all over the walls. It’s nice.”

“A café will make it more hygge?” Richie asks.

“Yep,” Ike answers. “Especially a café with crumb cake.”

“Will you shut up about crumb cake and hygge!” I shout.

“Yeesh,” Garry says. “We’re just trying to help.”

“Help? Is that what you call it?” I look at Ike. “I’ve lived in this town long enough to recognize a Lucy when I see one.”

“Who’s Lucy?” Richie asks.

“From Peanuts!”

They stare at me blank-faced.

“You know. Charlie Brown? Lucy?”

“Oh, Lucy van Pelt,” Richie says. “What about her?”

“She always pretends to hold the football for Charlie Brown and at the last minute she yanks it up and he winds up flat on his back. Well, I’m not falling for it.”

“You’re upset about Charlie Brown?” Richie asks.

“I think he’s mad about Lucy,” Garry says.

“I’m mad about you!” I shout.

“Which you?” Garry asks.

“All of you, but especially you, you!” I jab a finger toward Ike. “We agreed you’d fix the shelf. That’s it.”

“See, the thing is, the shelf’s been keeping me up at night,” Ike says. “It’s been neglected. This whole place has been neglected.” He gestures at the broken bookshelf, the water-stained ceiling, the warped floorboards. “Ain’t no one taking proper care of it. If they were, it wouldn’t have come to this.”

“You cannot be serious,” I say, the rush of anger from last night outside of Bogart’s Ballroom returning tenfold. I am so fucking tired of guys like this.

“Serious as a heart attack. Someone needs to see to this place.”

“Don’t you dare!” I begin, my voice shaking. “Don’t you dare lecture me about neglect.”

“Not lecturing anyone,” Ike says. “Just stating a fact.”

“Oh, you like facts. How about this one? For the past few years none of you, not a single one, gave two shits about us. I mean, where were you when we needed you with your GoFundMes? Or even a casserole. Or just a kind word, a condolence. So you don’t have any right to talk to me about neglect.”

“Well, that’s got nothing to do with this fine wood.”

“Shut up! Just shut up about the shelf! The shelf can burn for all I care.”

Ike recoils at this