The Honey-Don’t List by Christina Lauren
Part of me is relieved to see the lights fading away as we leave the Portland city limits. But the other part is anxious about what’s ahead: we’ve essentially been banished until the first season of Home Sweet Home airs.
The four of us are on our way to a cabin in the middle of nowhere, meaning the gloves can truly come off. With every mile we move farther from civilization. I’m not one hundred percent sure where we’re going, but I know one thing: nobody can hear the screams from this far away.
It’s absurd, really, that we’re still expected to chaperone this nonsense, but my assumption is that everyone is worried that, left to his own devices, Rusty would rather catch a cab home and leave Melissa behind than stay sequestered with his wife in the woods. Just as I’m about to quietly run this theory past Carey, a crash comes from the back of the bus, and Melissa storms out of the lounge, throwing herself on one of the couches toward the front of the cab. Breathing heavily, she closes her eyes and rubs her temples. They’re not even trying to pretend anymore.
“I swear to Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,” she hisses. “That man—”
“TJ and Kelsey.” Carey calmly reminds her boss of the two most important reasons why Melissa can’t murder her husband. “Also, you’re building a house in Aspen that is going to be gorgeous. You can’t decorate it from a jail cell.”
Melissa takes a few deep breaths and then opens her eyes to smile gratefully at Carey. What the hell would Melissa do without her?
My phone lights up with a text sent to me, Carey, and Ted from Robyn. It reads simply:
Everything’s set.
Carey grimaces at me and types up exactly what Ted can do with his getaway, before erasing it all.
She slides her phone onto the bus bench between us, gives me a half smile, and leans her head back against the cushion. The metaphorical handcuffs have been clicked into place.
I grew up in the Southwest, and I’m familiar with Jackson, of course—obviously it’s where the Tripps are based—but I’ve never traveled the almost four hundred miles to Laramie. The size of the sky out here blows my mind. Half of the circle of my vision is a clear, startling blue. The other half is an explosion of green: hills, grass, plains that go on forever.
We drop off the tour bus in Laramie and, with as little fanfare as possible, we’re done. We say goodbye to Joe and encourage him to schedule a long vacation. He takes a final look at the Tripps and wishes us luck—their mutual silent treatment commenced as soon as we got on the bus, and we’re all tired of breathing such pressurized air.
Also ready to be rid of us, driver Gary ushers us from the bus into a sleek black sedan waiting nearby. I’m sure these two are about to get very, very drunk. I don’t know what happens to our bags, but the car is pulling away from the curb before I have any sense that things have been moved; it’s a Secret Service–level transfer. Ted apparently does not fuck around.
With Rusty in the front, and Carey situated between me and Melissa in the spacious back seat, we leave Laramie proper and drive about a half hour into what can best be described as the middle of nowhere, where houses become spaced farther and farther apart, the soft rolling hills so green it seems impossible that they’re real. I’m grateful for the silence, because the view is unbelievable. The Laramie River winds its way through the landscape, glittering in the late-afternoon sun like a trail of jewels.
Our driver turns down a series of increasingly rustic dirt roads before pulling up in front of a sprawling log cabin set only about forty feet back from a wide bend in the river. I peek down at my phone: no cell service. I doubt Wi-Fi is robust here, either. Good news, bad news: Melissa won’t be able to see reviews, tweets, or Instagram photos of her from her bad side, but we also won’t be able to easily check in with the outside world. We are a good half-hour drive from any stores, and—I note with some degree of trepidation—at least as far from any hospital.
Rusty climbs out and disappears around the back of the cabin, muttering something about needing some air, and I note that Carey and I both relax a bit when we only have one Tripp to manage at a time. Maybe if they don’t speak to each other for an entire week, everything will blow over. One can hope.
Melissa stares up at the hulking cabin and lets out a long-suffering sigh. “I guess it’s big enough.”
I can’t tell if she’s trying to be funny, or if the woman who helps families fit into the shoe boxes they can afford has genuinely become that spoiled: the home in front of us is easily big enough for twenty people.
There’s a dusty old sedan parked along one side of the house, and I’m hoping the keys are inside. As we approach the front door, I see our bags are waiting for us on the porch.
“I have no idea what kind of magic was involved in them beating us here,” Carey says under her breath, “but I’m into it.”
There’s an envelope taped to the front door, and I pull it off. Opening it, I find a key and a short welcome note from the property manager. Once I have everything unlocked, Melissa sweeps past her luggage and disappears inside.
A glance at Carey’s hands tells me she’s not having a good day: they’re rock solid, curled into fists, and even when she tries to shake them out I know that carrying even the smallest bag inside is going to be a challenge. How physically exhausting must it be to focus on every movement, to feel like your own muscles are fighting you, I think. I’m suddenly and blindingly furious with Melissa for being so consistently inconsiderate.
But Carey is Carey, and immediately reaches for the closest suitcase. I wave her off, she gives me a tiny, grateful smile, and guilt drills a hole in my stomach. If it weren’t for my encouragement, she would have quit before we got to Portland and would probably be home by now. I remind myself that in a few weeks we’ll both be out of this mess and in a better position. “Go figure out where we’re all sleeping, and I’ll bring these in.”
When she disappears inside, I take a moment to appreciate the masterful design of the property. The porch platform, columns, and cornice are constructed from the same beautiful redwood that frames each window; the finial and valleys of the roof are deep, sharp angles that make my blood sing.
Inside, the front door opens to an enormous entryway: The house is two broad stories and the second floor overlooks the foyer, with a knobby cherry railing lining a circular view down onto the gleaming hardwood floor. There is a huge living room straight ahead of me, a fireplace flanked by twin casement windows with lead glass, from floor to ceiling, that overlook the river. An expansive chef’s kitchen stretches to the right of the front foyer, and a hall to the left of the entryway leads, I find, to a family room, entertainment suite, and game room.
Carey calls from upstairs: “I have Melly and Rusty each situated, and there are ten bedrooms left. How picky are you feeling?”
“I feel like a room with a bed is fine,” I tell her.
She leans over the railing, looking down at me, and I wonder if she feels it, too, that heat that seems to blanket us whenever we’re making contact—whether it’s physical, verbal, or just eye contact like this across an open space. Do I want my room to be next to hers so that we can sneak into bed together in the middle of the night? Yes, absolutely. Is that the best way to make sure this week doesn’t end in disaster? Probably not.
“I’m going to give you the blue room,” she says, and grins. “It’s a nautical theme, so I expect you to speak like a pirate all week.”
“Aye, matey, give me a wee breath and I’ll bring yar duffel upstairs.”
She laughs, and it’s on the tip of my tongue to ask her where her room is, but Melissa comes out of the suite at the end of the hall upstairs and pulls up short, staring at us like we’re breaking a rule by speaking while unsupervised. Carey shrinks back into a room down the hall.
Well, at least now I know where she’ll be sleeping.
The back door opens, and Rusty comes in, tracking mud across the kitchen tiles. I wave my arms wildly and, once he looks up, point to his boots. He full-body winces, like he knows if his wife sees this, he’s a dead man. For the next two minutes, we’re silently and hysterically searching for a mop to clean up the mess. Finally I find it, in a small closet down in the cellar, and I’m halfway up the stairs with it and a bucket when I hear her—the silent treatment has officially ended far, far too soon.
“Are you kidding me?” she says. “Not ten minutes we’re in this house and you’re already tracking in mud?”
“Come on, hon,” he says as I step out into the kitchen. “We’re cleaning it up. It was an accident.”
“You better thank your lucky stars it wasn’t carpet because I am not paying for any more of your messes.”
His reply is probably ill-advised. “Who even puts carpet in the kitchen?”
While they argue, I quietly mop up the muddy footprints and meet Carey’s sympathetic gaze when she comes into the room, probably to find out what they’re yelling about this time.
With the floor clean, Carey and I check out the fridge, the pantry, and the cabinets to figure out where everything is. All are fully stocked.
She looks over at me, eyes wide. “Are we supposed to cook for them?”
I shake my head. “Definitely not. They can feed themselves.”
“Have you seen Melly try to cook?” she asks me quietly, brows up.
“Maybe Rusty … ?”
Carey gives me a look that communicates she can’t believe I just asked that, and our attention is pulled away when Rusty opens the fridge and pulls out a beer.
Oh, no.
“Russell Clarence Tripp,” Melissa barks, starting back up again. “It isn’t even two in the afternoon yet, what in God’s name are you doing?”
“Relaxing?”
“We are not here to relax.”
“You gonna make me a fucking honey-do list, Melissa?”
Carey’s eyes are drawn over my shoulder, away from the kitchen, and when she looks back at me, she lifts her chin like, Nearest escape?
I nod. Lead the way.
We find a cabinet full of board games, dominoes, cards, and dice and decide on cards in the family room. We can still hear Melissa and Rusty going at each other, but out here it’s more muted and, after a few minutes, I think we’re both able to tune them out. Carey hands me the cards to shuffle, and then makes herself a little shelf to prop her cards against, using some hardcover books and a ruler.
“Clever,” I say, grinning as I start to deal our hands.
“I’m the cleverest.”
“Well,” I say, teasing, “I’m not sure you’re the cleverest. I had a dog—”
“You don’t think it’s possible I’m more clever than the cleverest dog?”
I hold up a finger. “—who knew how to open the fridge and get a beer out for my dad.”
“Okay,” she concedes, picking up a card, “that’s pretty clever. But could he open it?”
“She could not,” I admit, “but she was still the best dog anyway.”
“We had a dopey old Rottweiler named Dusty when I was growing up,” she says, “and one time we were headed to my granny’s house in Billings, and we were in my parents’ station wagon. I was only four or so—at that age I think my parents just threw me in the back with the dog. Anyway, there was a cake back there and I was supposed to hold it on my lap for the whole drive, but Dusty and I shared it instead. Surprising no one, we both threw up in the car. I was covered in blue vomit from the frosting, my parents had to stop at a convenience store on the way, and I ended up wearing a too-big Iron Maiden shirt to my granddad’s seventieth birthday party.”
“I’m not sure what part of this story I like the least,” I say, discarding. “That you shared a cake with a dog, or that you both threw up in the back of a station wagon. I do like the Iron Maiden part, though.”
“It had that creepy mascot Eddie on the front, so I cried every time I looked down.”
This makes me burst out laughing, and it feels so good to be genuinely happy for a few breaths that I lean back in my chair. When I sit up again, I realize Carey has won this game of gin and is carefully laying down her hand.
“Holy shit, how did you win so fast?”
She shrugs, and it’s a sweet, blushing gesture that sideswipes me in a tender space near my lungs. “I don’t think you shuffled very well,” she says. “You dealt me two aces and three jacks.”
I look down at my own motley hand of random numbers and suits. “I think you just got a lucky deal.”
“Eh. I played a lot with the boys back home,” she says, reaching for the cards to shuffle them. “A lucky deal was when you joined Comb+Honey.”
“Lucky for who?” I ask, grinning.
She taps the cards on the table. “Me.”
I think about her words and her tone and her blush as she carefully cuts the deck in two and lines them up to shuffle them, slowly. It occurs to me, watching her, that she doesn’t hide her dystonia from me anymore. I don’t think she ever would have done this in front of me before this trip.
I wonder who else she’s this comfortable around. Certainly not Melissa, not anymore. Things between her and Rusty are still weird, like a stepfather and stepdaughter who don’t interact much. I know she has roommates, but she doesn’t talk about them often.
“Are your roommates back from their trip?”
She thinks for a second while she shuffles again. “No, I think they were supposed to be gone essentially as long as we were. I bet their trip feels like it’s flying by. Can you imagine?”
I give her a sympathetic wince. “What are they like?”
Smiling, she starts to deal. “They’re cool. Peyton is an insurance adjustor, which honestly cracks me up because she’s so energetic and athletic but chose a job where she’s in an office all day. She plays on like three different rec softball teams and umpires for the local high school league. She teaches yoga and is a really active member of a community garden project. And Annabeth is, like, the total opposite. She’s so sweet and gentle, sort of shy until you get to know her. She’s a flight attendant so they get to travel everywhere and …” She pauses, shrugging. “They’re cool,” she repeats, finally.
I see the cloud start to sweep in, the droop in her shoulders and downward angle of her mouth, and feel like an asshole for bringing up anyone outside of this crazy situation, anyone we know who has a normal life and a normal job and normal attachments.
But the more I think about what “normal” is, the more I wonder why I think my feelings for Carey would be any different in another circumstance than they are right here. I don’t have feelings for her because we’ve been forced together, or because I feel sorry for her. I have feelings for her because she’s frankly amazing: she’s brilliant, humble, beautiful, and resilient.
I open my mouth to speak—honestly, I don’t know what I’m going to say, but I need to barrel past this emotion clogging my chest. I’m just hoping some words come out and they make sense—but she shushes me, her eyes wide.
“What is it?” I ask.
“Do you hear that?”
I turn in a panic, listening for what she means. “All I hear is silence.”
Carey’s smile stretches across her cheeks; her blue-green eyes sparkle like the river outside. “Exactly.”
But then her smile fades at the same time the realization hits me, too: silence could mean someone has been murdered.
We tiptoe into the kitchen—no one is there.
No one is in the backyard near the river. No one is in the game room. But when we peek in the entertainment room, we find Melissa on one giant chair and Rusty on another. No gore or blood in sight, only the sound of two people snoring, with Joe Versus the Volcano playing on the enormous screen at the front of the room.
We stare for a second, shocked at the sight. Rusty’s mouth hangs open; his beer is perched precariously on his chest. I’d bet, even asleep, Rusty could hold on to that thing in a hurricane. Melissa is curled up in a tight ball, like her defenses are up even in her slumber.
Carefully, we back out of the room.
“I’m amazed they were watching a movie together,” Carey whispers, awed.
“I checked for blood.” Apparently my threshold for celebration is lower than hers. Her shoulders come up and she laughs, silently, looking at me like I’m kidding, and laughs harder when she realizes I’m serious.
I don’t even know what to do with myself. We have a giant house, a river, food and games and movies in the middle of nowhere, basically everyone’s dream vacation. But more than anything, I just want more time alone with Carey.
“Want to take the car and go for a drive?” I ask.
Her eyes light up. “Hell yes.”
The gravel crunches under our shoes. In my mind, we’ll be driving around winding dirt roads, hugging the curve of the tall green grasses that race alongside the river. In my mind, we’ll have music playing, windows down. Carey will be singing, eyes closed, her arm out the window, fingers dancing in the wind.
In reality, we don’t ever get that far. I’ve driven a quarter of a mile down the road when I feel her hand on my leg at the same moment I start to brake for a stop sign. The second she touches me, my leg tenses and I hit the brake harder than I planned. We both jerk forward and then back, coming to a silent, abrupt stop.
Turning to look at her, I see that same clarity in her eyes she had after the Boulevard event, but this time it’s lacking the panic just beneath the surface. Her expression is open, hungry. This time, she doesn’t have to tell me what to do.
I lean in and feel the hit of adrenaline the second her mouth touches mine and she lets out the sweetest moan in relief. It is emotion in sound, the direct translation of what I’m feeling, too. My hands come to her face, her hands land carefully on my biceps, and I’m cursing the hell out of us for starting this a quarter of a mile down the road instead of in close proximity to one of the house’s ten spare bedrooms.
I reach to the side, flipping my seat back. With her lower lip trapped in her teeth, she smiles at me, climbing onto my lap. Her smile turns to a growl when she settles over where I’m hard, and I like this version of her. I like how unapologetically greedy she is with me like this. I lean back against the seat, thinking, Take whatever the hell you want.
Lifting her soft cotton skirt, I savor the heat of her legs under my hands. I love the little sounds she makes, how impatient she is with her touch and bite. Her hands dig in my hair and up under my shirt. She takes her time and doesn’t grow self-conscious when she struggles with the buttons on my jeans, doesn’t hide from me when she’s exploring my chest with her trembling fingertips.
We undress just enough—for crying out loud, we’re in fading daylight, but it’s enough—and it seems like we’ve been here for two minutes and two years, like we’ve always been here, and she’s smiling down at me, holding me and the condom from my wallet in her hand, and then we’re moving together with our eyes open, laughing into each other’s mouths.
“What are we even doing?” she whispers.
“Sex,” I whisper back. “I think people call this sex.”
Her laugh is a joyful burst against my lips, and I honestly think I’ve never felt this kind of lightness in my entire life, this much optimism. Maybe it’s a release of stress, or maybe it’s the absurdity of what we’re doing—making love in a car at a stop sign in the middle of nowhere. Or maybe it’s that I’m falling in love with her, and as she moves over me, I know for sure we can find a way out of this, and at the very least we can find a way through it together.
Her skin is soft cream under my hands. I feel the way the blood heats it as she moves, can hear her breaths turn into sound and her sounds turn into tight, hungry silence, and then she’s cupping my neck, biting at my lower lip, growing frantic until she’s falling into pleasure and dragging me right along with her. I would follow her anywhere.
With her eyes closed, she presses her forehead to mine, catching her breath. “I needed that.”
“I needed it, too.” I kiss a path up her neck. “But I also really wanted it.”
She kisses me for that, and it turns into a smile. “Your answer was better.”
“They can both be true.”
Carey sits up, pressing her hands to my stomach. “Is it going to be weird when we get home?”
I groan, imagining the obliterating relief of sleeping in my own bed. “I think it’s going to be blissful to be home.”
She pinches me, lightly. “You know what I mean.”
“I do.” But with her still over me, and my pulse still well above baseline, I’m not sure I’m coherent enough to properly have this conversation. There are so many things she and I have to talk about once we get home—what we want in a relationship, what we want from our careers. I still haven’t told her about my conversation with Ted. And once she has all the information, she’ll need to decide what she wants to do, too. It’s all definitely too much for this perfect, quiet moment.
So I simply say the truth again: “Like I said, I think it’s going to be blissful to be home.”
The air grows cool and dark, and we get dressed as best we can in the front seat of an old car.
I look up at the sound of the door opening and see her step outside, arms above her head and back arched in a delicious, satisfied stretch. Climbing out, I walk around to the front of the car and sit back against the hood, watching her.
“Who was your first love?”
Her question takes me by surprise, but I answer. “Her name was Alicia. We were fourteen.”
She walks back to me, smiling like she’s tipsy, arms loose at her sides.
“Fourteen?” She pretends to be scandalized.
“Ohhh,” I say, taking her hands in mine and pulling her closer. “You mean real love? With, like, wisdom and communication?”
“No, whatever you say first goes.”
“Okay, well, then Alicia. I was totally infatuated. She was on the diving team. I think I just really liked seeing her in a bathing suit.”
I can’t make out much of her face but can see the way her head tilts as she considers me. “Occasionally you have these total Dude Moments, and they delight me.”
I tug her closer until her chest is pressed against mine. “What about you? Who was your first love?”
“Dave Figota. I swear to God he fell in love with me when he saw me take my bra off without taking off my shirt. He looked at me like I was some kind of sexy witch.”
I tuck her hair behind her ear. It’s not curly exactly, but too rebellious to be considered straight. It fits her. “I’ve always found it fascinating how much of a mystery that maneuver is to men.”
“It’s not a mystery to you because you’re an engineer.”
I don’t have to see her face to know what she’s doing. “Why do I get the sense that you’re saying that with an eye roll?”
“I think because I’m … aware of the differences in our education.” She pulls back a little. “Sometimes I feel a little dumb by comparison. I don’t even know what an engineer really does, let alone how a person becomes one. Does it bother you that I never went to college?”
“There are bell-shaped curves everywhere,” I say carefully. “Just because someone goes to college doesn’t mean they’re inherently smarter than someone who doesn’t. Plenty of idiots get degrees. Plenty of geniuses never bother.”
“Are you suggesting it’s possible I’m smarter than you?”
“Oh, I know you are.” I run my nose along her neck, taste the salt on her skin. “Plus, think of all the experiences you’ve had that most people haven’t.”
“Like skinny-dipping?” I feel her smile.
“Rub it in.”
Her fingers move to my hair. “We have time.”
I pull her forward, taste her sweet mouth and her tongue, and a single thought lands and sticks for those long, forever seconds: I want to make her life better by being the best thing in it.
