Читать книгу Iris Has Free Time - Iris Smyles - Страница 14

That August, as I did every summer, I left for Greece to visit my family. Day after day, I’d lie on the beach, sweating under the sun with my eyes closed, my face covered by a straw hat, imagining what it might be like were Lex to visit. I’d pick him up from the airport in our old limping Mercedes, and after passing through the brush and pulling into our gravel driveway, presided over by clay replicas of Grecian statues, I’d introduce him to my parents.

My father wouldn’t like him at first. He’d be put off by his tattoos and would hate him as a matter of course—clearly a disc jockey wasn’t good enough for his only daughter. But then, convinced by the strength of Lex’s love for me, my father’s disapproval would melt away and the two men would eventually shake hands and laugh. Looking out at the sea in front of our house, they’d go on talking wisely about life, about the future, about Lex’s with me, both of them agreeing solemnly that I ought to be treated with care.

When I returned to New York a month later, Lex finally confessed his love. For that girl—he pointed her out. The girl he loved was seventeen, a soon-to-be senior in high school, and because of her age, because she had school the next morning, harder to get than I ever could be. Lex had mentioned his crush on her before I left, but I had assumed it was like his crush on so many others.

It didn’t bother me when he’d spoken about them or her, because they were passing fancies, while I was the one that stuck. Because his feelings for me ran so much deeper, I had been promoted from crush to best friend. I understood: Lex was a lifelong playboy who could never love only one girl. But as he enumerated all the ways in which she was different from the rest, I realized I had understood nothing. He just didn’t love me.