Page 63 of Tanner

With Aaron, I was so upset with him. He’d lied and cheated and not thought it was a big deal.

With Tanner, I’m only upset with myself. I felt alive with him. It’s strange to say that because it’s not like I’d felt dead before I met him. I now realize I wasn’t living.

Every day with Aaron, we were living his life, with his friends, and I was just there to make sure he was happy. With Tanner, it seemed like he was there to make me happy. And I shit on everything all because of the way things were perceived.

Tanner made me see how amazing nights could be. He taught me adventure. He taught me how to let go of my anger. He taught me passion.

I might never see him again, and I’ll probably never meet anyone like him for as long as I live. However, it turns out that I know I’m going to be okay.

I’m a little stronger, having met Tanner.

A little livelier.

A little more … me.

Instead of going home, I take the train straight to the library. I could go to the local one, but for some reason, I head downtown and get off at 42nd Street.

The lion statues greet me as I climb the steps and head inside the iconic library. I search through the classic section for the book Chéri by Colette, the one my dad told me about. Luckily, it comes in English. It’s only about a hundred and twenty-two pages, so I take a seat in one of the heavily carved wood chairs and open it.

The story is about an aging courtesan in Paris who embarks in an intense love affair with a playboy half her age. They fight their intense connection before parting ways … never getting their happy ending.

Well, that’s not how I was hoping it would end. I guess this will be our story, too.

I check out the book and head toward the subway. Call me a glutton for punishment, but I find myself back uptown and standing outside Tanner’s building.

His lights are on, and music is pouring out the open window. I contemplate trying to get into the building and knocking on his door, but he’s made it clear that he doesn’t want anything to do with me, so I set the book down on his doorstep. I pull a simple piece of stationery out of my tote bag and pen a note., leaving it with the book.

I ring the buzzer for his studio and then walk away, hoping this is the best way to say good-bye.

14

TANNER

Colette.

French literature.

Fuck me.

I look down the block and don’t see a sign of anyone I recognize. I don’t have shoes on; otherwise, I’d run downstairs to see if it was Harper who rang my bell and left a book on the stoop of my building.

I want it to be from her just as much as I don’t want it to be.

I’ve had to stop myself a few times from returning her calls this week. I have to keep reminding myself that she left me—twice. I have many faults. My maturity isn’t one of them.

When Harper said she was thirty, I was taken aback. From her dress to the way she carries herself, I knew she was older than me. My assumption was twenty-six, but it wouldn’t have mattered if she’d told me she was in her forties.

I’ve slept with older women before, and I find them to be more sexually heightened than women my age. Harper’s sexual prowess was proof of that. I had plans for us—both in and out of the bedroom. It didn’t matter that I’d be leaving in a couple of weeks. All I wanted was to explore whatever this thing was between us.

Or rather the thing that was between us.

But she threw the age card at me. I never would have thought she’d do that.

I will forever be the baby. For the first fourteen years of my life, I was my mother’s baby. The one she had to tell my brothers to look after and protect.

“Tanner’s too young to go to the mall by himself. Bryce, will you give him a ride and wait for him in the food court?”

“Tanner cannot join the football team. He’ll break. Edward, tell him he’s too fragile.”