Love, Life, and the List

“Maybe you should learn his story,” he said.

“I thought my list wasn’t a matchmaking opportunity but a growth opportunity.”

“I thought one of the items on your list was to fall in love.”

I choked on my own spit when I sucked in a quick breath. “Shh,” I hissed between coughs. He had said that so loud. The guy looked over, probably because of my coughing fit, not because of my grandpa’s loud declaration, but it was impossible to know. We took a few steps closer and I realized I knew him. Relief poured through me.

“Hey, Abby,” Elliot said. “I don’t see you for a month and then we see each other twice in two weeks.”

“I know, what are the odds?”

Elliot looked at my grandpa and I said, “Oh, Grandpa, this is Elliot Garcia, Elliot, Grandpa.”

“My name is Dave,” Grandpa said, extending a hand.

“Right. I always forget you have a name,” I said.

“My granddaughter is sarcastic.”

I smiled. “Don’t get all self-righteous. I learned it from you.”

Elliot laughed. “Nice to meet you.”

“Isn’t it too hot for soup?” I asked, nodding to the cans in front of him.

“My mom’s out of town and my dad cooks like . . .” He paused for a moment before he finished with, “Someone who doesn’t know how to cook. I was going for a really cool comparison there but couldn’t think of anything.”

“A monkey in an apron?” I said.

“An angry porcupine?” Grandpa suggested.

“A porcupine?” I asked. “The comparison has to have opposable thumbs so that it might actually have the ability to cook. Like a monkey.”

“An angry porcupine. I thought it could use its quills like skewers.”

“Oh. Right. I see what you were going for now.”

Elliot smiled. “I know who to come searching for when I need similes now.”

Speaking of weird idiosyncrasies, my grandpa and I had just proven my mom wasn’t the only one who had them. “Well, we’ll see you around then,” I said, taking hold of the cart and steering it around Elliot, feeling the need to escape any more embarrassment.

“Abby,” he called after me.

“Yeah?”

“Are you going to Lacey’s Fourth of July party?”

“Yes, actually.”

“Cool. I’ll see you there.”

Maybe Cooper was right. Lacey was just inviting whatever random people she ran into.

“Well, there you go,” Grandpa said after we were out of hearing range (thank goodness). “You can all but check the fall in love item off your list.”

“Funny,” I said. “And no.”

“We don’t like him? He seemed great. And he found you amusing too, which is a good sign.”

“You just like him because he found you amusing.”

“That didn’t hurt.” Grandpa took control of the cart from me and pushed it toward the registers. “We better get going.”

I hooked my arm in his elbow, my mind wandering back to our produce-section talk. “You’re not too worried about Mom, are you?”

“She’ll be fine.”

“Are you sure?”

“As sure as the sunrise.”

I furrowed my brow. “Is that an old-person saying?”

He grunted. “That is the saying of a person who has lived a lot longer than you.”

“Exactly.” A thought came to me. “You are a genius!”

“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.”

“No, you just gave me the best idea for my list. I can do it first thing tomorrow.” And I’d force Cooper to join me.

THIRTEEN

It was an unearthly hour and my body screamed at me along with my alarm the next morning. Who set their alarm in the summer anyway? I thought about hitting snooze and forgetting my plans. But I knew I couldn’t. I was already behind in completing my experiences if I wanted to finish my list before Mr. Wallace picked the final artists. And since I hadn’t found a stranger to accost the day before, I needed to do something else from the list to stay on track.

It was four in the morning, still dark outside. Cooper would probably kill me if he knew what I had planned. Or not come. That’s why I wasn’t going to text him. It would be easier for him to refuse a text. I would just show up at his house. I left a note for my mom on the counter and quietly lifted the keys off the hook by the front door.

Nobody in Cooper’s house was awake either. The porch light was still on and all the windows still dark. I decided it was best to let myself in through his window like I sometimes did. I hoped he hadn’t taken to locking it. He had a window facing the front of the one-story house. A fact his parents really should’ve been more concerned about, knowing Cooper. However, they apparently still hadn’t even noticed there was no screen. That had been taken off two years ago, when he set up a middle-of-the-night game of parking-lot bowling with Justin and a couple of other guys from school. I shone my phone light on the window and slid it open. Unlocked. I took a breath of relief before I became irritated. Any criminal could just waltz up here and have instant access to his house.

I hefted myself inside. It had been a while since I’d done this, and my knee scraped along the casing, scuffing my skin. I sucked in some air, and one foot found the carpet. My other leg, while swinging in, found a baseball trophy on his nightstand and knocked it to the ground. I cringed, but Cooper didn’t stir.

I turned on his nightstand lamp and sat on the bed next to his shirtless body. When had he started sleeping without a shirt? I really should’ve just texted him. I shook his shoulder. “Hey, wake up.”

He grunted and turned onto his side, away from me.

“Cooper,” I whispered, running a finger along his back.

“I’ll clean my room later,” he said.

I shook his shoulder harder. “Wake up. It’s me. Abby.”

“Abby?” he asked, rubbing his eyes and squinting against the light.

“Yes. I thought of a way to check another item off the list.”

He sat up, his eyes finally coming into focus. He glanced at the window over my shoulder. “You’re right, waking up before the sun is a huge fear of mine. Go ahead and check it off.”

“Nope. This doesn’t count for that.”

He lay back down and pulled the blankets over his head. “Then let me sleep.”

“Seriously, Cooper. Wake up. I didn’t account for this taking fifteen minutes. We have a time constraint here, and if we miss the window, I’m going to be back again tomorrow at four thirty.”

“It’s four thirty?” he asked in exasperation.

“We are going to see life come into the world.”

“Someone is having a baby right now? Who?”

“Of course not.” I pulled off his covers. “Get up. Put a shirt on. Brush your teeth and meet me outside.”

I quickly averted my gaze as he climbed out of bed, boxer shorts and all, and pulled on the pair of jeans that were in a crumpled heap on the floor beside his dresser.

“I hate you so much right now,” he said.

I smiled and headed for the still-open window. “I’m okay with that.”

“This better be good,” he said when he came out through the front door and joined me outside five minutes later.