Chapter Thirty-Seven #2
Mari’s eyes were wide and dancing, and she let out a whoop as she hung her purse on the back of her chair.
We’d picked a new place and it was busier than expected, so we’d grabbed the only two open spots at the end of the bar.
I’d told Mari we had something to celebrate and she’d said fine, as long as I wasn’t going to make her drive across town to that strip mall Thai place again.
I’d only done that twice. And if it had worked, and we’d found Niall that way, it would’ve all been worth it.
“I did agree to an end date a month out, and to train my replacement if they could find one by then,” I said.
Mari tilted her head back and forth, like eh. “Well, nadie es perfecto,” she said. “Still, I’m glad you’re getting out. It’s about time. Do you have any idea what you’re going to do?”
I knew Mari meant specifically for my job, but that part I was still thinking about.
I had enough savings to get me by for a while, but I also didn’t want to blow through it all.
There were always legal assistant openings, and I knew I had enough experience and knowledge to try for one of those, even if technically on paper I’d been a receptionist for the last ten years.
I would love to find a way to do something with my art degree, to get back to painting, but I had to think about what that would even look like.
“There’s a watercolor workshop at the library I want to sign up for.
” I bit my lip, my instinct to hide how excited I was about the idea, even though I didn’t know why.
If anyone would be thrilled for me, it was Mari.
“I thought about what you said. I do want to travel, even if little day trips around the state. I do want to have more fun. I was thinking I’d like to start going dancing sometimes, if you’d be up for it. ”
“Oh, you know me,” Mari said. “But can you handle it, that’s the question.”
I thought back to dancing in the club in Temple Bar, not just with Eamonn but with those girls from Georgia.
Most of my waking introspection focused on him, I couldn’t help it, but there had been other parts of that two-day dream sequence that were important to me.
My conversations with that woman at the bus stop, the couple who lived in Eamonn’s childhood home, the man at the beach.
Dancing with those girls had unlocked something in me, reminded me that there was no reason to feel self-conscious about something that my body enjoyed doing.
What did I do with my hands, my arms? Who cared.
Was I too old to start going out? Genuinely, who gave a fuck.
The bartender came to take our drink order, and at the last minute I changed my mind and ordered a Guinness in addition to my water. Mari raised her eyebrows, which I knew came as much from her being a nurse as her being my friend. I wasn’t supposed to drink while I was healing.
“Just a couple sips,” I told her.
Her face still registered some misgivings, and I realized she was also probably thinking, Oh no, not this Ireland fixation again.
She’d been nothing but supportive of me since the incident, but I could tell she didn’t know what to do with all the dream stuff, and so I’d mostly stopped talking about it.
She must’ve been thinking the same thing, because there was that hesitation in her voice as she grabbed two coasters off the stack for us, where I knew she was about to say something but thinking how to phrase it. “What about dating?” she asked. “You feeling ready to put yourself back out there?”
If I told her that I needed more time to recover, that I was feeling shaky and unsettled from the mugging, the resultant health scare, she’d drop it in an instant.
And that was definitely part of it. But if before I’d sworn off dating because I’d been so sure that there was nothing out there for me, no point to even trying, now my situation was even worse.
Because I knew there was someone out there for me, and for one brief magical weekend I’d gotten to feel what it could be like to have him.
Love was an out-of-body experience, it turned out, and I hadn’t all the way returned to my body. I didn’t know that I wanted to.
Luckily, the bartender came with our drinks then, giving me time before I had to answer. I took a sip of my Guinness only to almost reflexively spit it back out.
“Jesus,” I said. “This was so much better in—”
My dream. Or else it had been better in its country of origin, a foreign place that I’d never even officially been to.
Or else it had been better when I’d had Eamonn watching me drink it, gently teasing me and encouraging me to take a bigger sip.
However I finished that sentence, it wasn’t going to help me convince Mari that I really was doing just fine.
“I’m not used to dark beers,” I said, holding up my glass for her to clink hers against. “But here’s to quitting my job.”
“And art classes, and dancing,” Mari said. “I’m not going to let you forget.”
I smiled. “And having more fun in general.”
“And allowing yourself to want things,” Mari said. “Including a relationship whenever you’re ready.”
I thought about what Eamonn had said to me, while I was driving his car. I like the way you see the world, he’d said, and then he’d started to say something else. It made him think. What did it make him think about? It killed me that I’d never know.
“I do want things,” I said to Mari now. “And I’ve decided it’s one of my favorite parts of myself. I have a hopeful heart. It’s been through a lot lately, it’s been hard to see what my future might look like. But I’m really excited to have a future, whatever it holds.”
“Adventure and romance,” Mari said. “In our everyday lives.”
“I’ll drink to that,” I said, taking another sip of my Guinness, the last I would allow myself. It might not taste quite as good as I’d remembered, but it still felt like a step in the right direction, just to try something new.