The Upside of Falling

No. But I’m starting to believe in like.
Shut up, brain.
“I believe in love,” I said, “I just don’t think it’s worth the risk. Like when
you’re dating someone, you’re either going to end up marrying that person or
having your heart broken. It’s a fifty-fifty chance. And even if you do marry
them, there’s another fifty percent chance you’ll end up divorced. At what point
do people realize the odds are always stacked against them?”
“Isn’t that what makes it so special when you find the right person? The fact
that you two were able to beat the odds?”
“Sure, but there’s still so many downsides to falling in love. Reading,
however,” I said, pointing toward my glorious bookshelf, “gives you all the fun

---

without the pain. A great alternative.”
“I may have to borrow a book or two if my parents’ marriage goes to shit.”
I hit him with my elbow. “Don’t say that, Brett. You don’t know what’s
going to happen.” I mean, I kind of did know what was going to happen, based
on my parents’ track record and simple statistics. But I was holding out hope for
Brett’s sake. He deserved that.
“I can make a pretty good guess,” he said.
This distraction technique was not working.
“You know what?” I hopped out of bed and grabbed my laptop, tossing it to
him. “I’ll be right back.” I ran to the kitchen and grabbed a tub of cotton candy
ice cream from the freezer, assured my mom we’d leave the door open (cue eye
roll), then raced back to my room before she could say anything else equally
mortifying.
Brett took one look at the ice cream and said, “Don’t tell me you actually
like that crap.”
“Cotton candy ice cream?” I asked, completely appalled. “It’s my favorite.”
I made a big show of opening the container and scooping out a huge
spoonful, then ate the entire thing. I even licked the spoon for good measure.
Brett looked like he was trying not to gag.
“Got any jelly bells?” he asked.
“Nope.”
Ignoring his horrible ice cream taste, I sat back down on the bed and opened
my laptop to Netflix. “I realized,” I said, “that everyone thinks we’re dating and
we haven’t even gone on our first date yet. That’s not acceptable.”
“Completely unacceptable,” Brett agreed.
“So it only makes sense—”
“Only makes sense.”
“—if we declare this as our first official date. And stop mocking me. What
movie do you want to watch?” I scrolled through all the different genres.
“Something scary,” he said quickly. Suspiciously quick.
“You should know I love scary movies,” I said. “So if you’re expecting me
to get all cuddly, it’s not going to happen.”
Brett pouted. I chose the movie. It was about a family who moved out of
their haunted house only to move into a new house that was also haunted. Really
unique, groundbreaking stuff.
I ate my way through the entire ice cream carton within the first half hour. I
choked on it a few times from laughing so hard. The movie wasn’t funny. It was
Brett. He was jumping and shrieking at every little thing. He even covered his
face with a pillow at one point.

---

To make it worse, I held out a spoonful of ice cream to his face. “Want
some?”
He pushed it away, pretending to throw up.
A few seconds later he mumbled, “I can’t believe I have a crush on a girl
with such horrible ice cream taste.”
My whole body tensed. I was warm all over. I could feel my heart trying to
burst free from the cage I had it locked in. And for a single, tiny second, I
considered it. I glanced at Brett. He was staring at the screen way too intensely.
Okay. So I guess we were both pretending he never said that. Plus, this whole
thing was fake. So he was just acting. There was no way he meant that . . .
I hid my smile behind the spoon.
When I woke up the next morning, Brett was still lying in bed beside me. We
must have fallen asleep during the movie. I sat up quickly, tensing when I heard
the thump! of my laptop falling off my bed. Then I noticed the plate at the foot
of the bed with jelly bells on it. There were two pieces of paper tucked
underneath. One had Becca scrawled on it in my mom’s signature cursive. The
other read Brett.

---

Brett
MY DAD’S FIRST BUSINESS TRIP
happened last year. He got another promotion at
work and took our family out for dinner a town over to celebrate. The restaurant
was Italian, really fancy. It had bottles of wine waiting on the table and dim
lighting. Even the menu felt expensive. Everything was over thirty dollars and
written in Italian. My mom never stopped smiling. I was happy too because they
were happy and we were all together.
In the middle of the meal my dad broke the news. He said with his promotion
came more responsibility. That he’d have to travel through the country to advise
on different hotel locations. He said the company was relying on him and he had
to impress them. He said he couldn’t say no. My mom looked thrilled. Just
another thing to add to our family’s accomplishments. I was sad; it felt like my
heart had dropped. I didn’t want my dad to leave for weeks. I didn’t even want
him gone for a few days. But what was I supposed to do when they both looked
so happy? Beaming at me and waiting for a reaction? So I told my dad that yeah,
that was fine. That I was happy. That being able to travel the country for work
sounded cool. He told me that someday I’d travel too, for football.
My mom ordered another bottle of wine and my dad carried her into the
house when we got home. He left for his first trip the next weekend. It was in
Buffalo, New York. A new hotel had opened right near the border with Ontario
for travelers coming across. My dad packed his bags and they were all lined up
in a row near the front door. He had his briefcase and his new custom-tailored
suit. The taxi came up the driveway and my mom kissed him goodbye. She said
she loved him and he said it back. And it looked like they meant it. It really did.
I could see it in her eyes and the way he held her face in his hands. It was real.
My dad patted my shoulder and told me to watch over my mom while he was
gone. Then he left, got into the taxi and headed off to the airport.

---

That first weekend without him was better than I thought it would be. Jeff
and other guys from the team came over and we ordered pizza. We watched
recordings of our last football game. Coach wanted us to study them, see where
we went wrong and where we could improve. And my mom seemed okay,
lingering around and checking in on us. My dad was gone, but we were fine.
Sure, I missed him, but it was hard to miss someone too much when you knew
they’d be coming home in two days.
When my dad came back, he brought me a new gym bag and some stuff he’d
gotten from the hotel with the logo on it. Water bottles, key chains—those sorts
of things. My mom was thrilled. I was thrilled.
But now I couldn’t stop thinking back to all those trips.
Over the past year, there had been dozens of them. And I kept trying to
remember any sort of detail that would tell me when business trips stopped being
business trips. Was there a day when my mom stopped seeming happy when he
returned? Was there one trip where she didn’t say “I love you” before he left? I
was so excited by the gifts he brought me that I didn’t even think to pause and
check if they were actually from the state he was supposedly in.
I couldn’t stop looking back. I wished the past had been recorded like my
football games. Then I could rewatch it all, rewind to the moment everything
changed.
Then I remembered what Becca said about searching for answers to a puzzle
that could never be solved. That sounded like complete hell. I didn’t want to
look back five years from now and still not know the truth.
I had to know.
I decided to tell my mom.
I had the sinking suspicion she already knew. Looking back on the past few
weeks, there were some signs. The crying. The way she seemed sad, quiet. Her
spilling wine during dinner and my parents’ hushed conversations behind closed
doors. It was all adding up, these little clues I was too busy to pay attention to
before. But now they were there, impossible to ignore.
I hoped my mom didn’t know. Because if she knew about my dad’s lies all
this time and decided to keep it from me, I wasn’t sure how I’d react.
And if she had known all this time and was suffering through it alone? That
would make me feel even worse.
Another part of me hoped that my mom would have some answers. Like
when I told her about seeing my dad with another woman, she’d have a perfect
explanation for all of this and my life would return to its normal routine of
football games and fake relationships. Like maybe it was an old friend of his.
Maybe it was my mom wearing a wig. Not that it would make any damn sense,

---

but it was a lot easier to think about than the alternative.
I made the decision to tell her when I was driving home from Becca’s
apartment the next morning. Spending the night watching her and her mom
changed something in my head. It was like a little bit of reassurance that no
matter what the truth ended up being, there was still a chance my family would
be okay like hers was. It made me realize that I wasn’t going through this alone
either. I had my mom like Becca had hers.
I had Becca too.
Then there was that quietness between us after what I said last night, about
having a crush on her. I wasn’t sure why I said it aloud or what even made me
say it. But then the words were out there in the universe and they felt right. I was
starting to care about her. How could I not after what she’d done for me?
Sticking by my side for all of this? Our relationship was supposed to be fake. We
had a clear contract that began and ended at school. But she’d given me more
than that. She’d given me her weekends and her weeknights. She’d let me into
her home. The girl literally ran over to my house because I needed her. And the
dinner with her mom—putting me before herself like that? How could you not
like someone with a heart so big?
But I knew Becca’s stance on love and relationships. Which was her exact
reasoning for having a fake one. I didn’t know what to do now. How to act
without pushing her too far and scaring her away. I was walking a thin line in all
aspects of my life. And with my parents’ future dangling in front of me, like a
string that was slowly beginning to fray, it felt way too selfish to even dig into
my feelings for Becca right now.
I pulled into my driveway and my entire body tensed. My dad’s car was
parked right there. He was home. And hell, it felt so weird to feel nervous right
now. My dad coming home used to be the highlight of my week and now I was
here, hiding in my car because I was too scared to walk into my own house and
face the truth.
How could one night at a diner change my life this much?
I walked inside. “Mom?” I called, looking around warily.
“Up here!” she yelled from upstairs. I followed her voice into her bedroom,
where she was standing in front of a full-length mirror wearing a dress. There
was a man pulling the fabric around her hips with a tape measure hanging from
his mouth.
“Too tight?” he asked. I watched him stick a pin into the dress.
“That’s great. Can we shorten the length a little? I don’t want it to drag. Oh,
hi, hon. Did you see your father when you came in? He’s somewhere
downstairs.”

---

“No. What’s going on?” I asked.
“This is Carlos. He’s helping me with my dress for the hotel’s grand opening
this weekend.”
“That’s this weekend?”
“Yes, Brett. Didn’t you see your father’s text? We’ve been calling you all
morning. And where were you last night?” Before I could even answer, she was
moving on. “The hotel’s opening this weekend and they’re throwing a party to
celebrate. Your father and I will be there, of course, and you will as well. Go
grab your suit and try it on. If you need a new one, Carlos will need to get started
quickly.”
I didn’t move. I felt like I’d been sucked into another dimension.
“Brett? Your suit.”
They were both staring at me like I’d lost it.
“Can I talk to you for a second, Mom? Alone?”
“After you try on your suit.”
Slightly dazed, I went to my room and put on the damn suit. I kept listening
for the sound of my dad walking up the stairs but everything was drowned out
by my mom yelling my name every two seconds. “Brett! Hurry up!”
“I’m coming!”
It felt completely fucked up to be talking about suits and hotels and parties
and dress sizes when I had this huge secret that felt like it was going to claw its
way out of my mouth any second.
When my mom saw me, she covered her mouth with her hands. “Oh, Brett.
You look so handsome. Isn’t he handsome? Come here. Let me see.”
I stood there while they hovered around, poking and pulling. “Hey, Mom?
Where’s Dad?”
“Thomas!” she yelled, tugging at the fabric on my wrist. “Maybe in the
basement. Do you have a tie to wear with this? You can borrow one of your
father’s.”
It all felt so wrong.
“Mom.” I said it firmer this time. “Can we talk for a second?”
Sensing that something was off, she stopped fixing my suit. Her eyes lifted
to mine and she signaled for Carlos to give us a minute alone. “Something
wrong?” she asked when it was just the two of us.
Now what? Where was I supposed to start? How did I even bring something
like this up?
“Remember when Dad left for New York a few weeks ago?” I asked. My
mom nodded, taking a seat on the bed. “I walked into your room that night and
you were sleeping. You’d been crying, Mom. There were tissues everywhere.”

---

She was just staring at me, not saying a word. “Why were you so sad?”
A long moment dragged by. “You know it’s always hard on me when your
father leaves.”
It felt like a scripted response from a book. How to Pretend Like Everything