22. Felicity #2
“Make yourself useful,” she said. “Start dicing onions, please.”
“This is supposed to be a day of moping and napping,” I complained, dragging my feet over to where she’d set up the cutting board. “Why are you forcing me to work?”
“Because I want you to be too busy to feel sad. The only tears you should be crying today are because of those onions. Now, dice!”
“Okay, okay,” I laughed.
Meanwhile, Bridget fumbled and charmed her way through the movie, and we yelled out lines about stuff like well-timed blow jobs.
Focusing on the work of peeling potatoes, mincing garlic, and chopping carrots was indeed a great way to not think about the way Cameron had drop-kicked my heart the day before.
Before long, our cozy apartment was filled with the scent of a homecooked meal.
Nina and I sat on the couch and watched the final few moments of the movie with tears in our eyes.
“Ugh,” I smacked the couch. “Why doesn’t real life turn out like that? Kissing the perfect man in a swirl of snow, with Van Morrison crooning in the background?”
“In your zebra-print undies,” Nina added.
“It’s not fair,” I pouted. “I really thought it was happening for me. Under the most unusual circumstances, of course.”
“Hey, fake dating is a thing in our world. How many romances have we read with that plotline?”
“Those are fiction,” I fired back at her. “And that’s where that whole idea should have stayed. Now I know better than to believe it can happen for me. I’m not that lucky.”
“So, let’s focus on what can happen,” Nina replied. “The shop!”
I rolled onto my stomach and balled up a pillow under my chest. “Oh, I love thinking about that.”
“Same! The dream we’re making a reality. Everything is falling into place!” Nina paused to frown. “Well, everything but the location. We’ve got our work cut out for us finding a place.”
“It’ll happen, I feel it in my bones.”
“What’s the timeline looking like for you?” she asked.
I frowned and dropped my head to the pillow.
“I’m not sure now. Everything was on track for me to have saved up enough in another few months, thanks to Veritique and all the bonuses, but I feel like there’s no way I can keep working there.
It’s too messy. And I’m not sure how it would be seeing Cameron every day. ”
I sniffled, because even just saying his name brought all of the dark feelings back.
“Listen, don’t make any snap decisions right now,” Nina cautioned. “Don’t do something you might regret, like deciding to quit. I mean, you have to admit it’s a pretty sweet gig.”
“It was a sweet gig,” I corrected. “Until my boss and fake boyfriend broke my heart.”
“Aw,” Nina said. She leaned over to rub my shoulder. “You know, what happened kind of reminds me of that scene in Betting on the Baron.”
I frowned at her. “That’s a Regency romance. Cameron’s hardly landed gentry.”
“No,” she drew out the single syllable. “But he does run an empire his family founded. And just like Baron Bartholomew Segrave, he lost his shit in front of a huge audience. The Baron, in front of the ball attendees, and Cameron in front of, well…”
“The whole world?” I added helpfully.
Nina giggled. “Yeah, I guess.”
“I forgot how that one ends. Is the baron the one who bought all of those horses for Lady Alva?”
She shook her head. “No, Baron Segrave won back the plot of land that used to belong to Alva’s great grandparents. The ancestral grounds her family had to gamble off. He gifted it to her and wanted nothing in return. But you know what she gave him?”
“Her virginity?” I laughed.
“No! They had sex the night of the big snowstorm. Did you even read the book?” Nina sniffed at me.
“Lady Alva gave him the freedom to be himself. To make mistakes. He was held to such an impossible standard that it was hobbling him, but the woman he loved allowed him to be fully human, fuck-ups and all. Now that’s what I call romance! ”
I sighed. “It’s like the definition of love. Accepting someone for who they really are.”
A silent tear slid down my cheek.
“Oh no. I’m sorry, we shouldn’t have gone down this path. Let’s talk about alien sex! Vampires! Werewolves!” Nina poked my shoulder. “Yeah?”
“Yeah,” I agreed. I rubbed the tears out of my eyes. “I want our romance section to be no-holds-barred. All love accepted, no kink-shaming.”
“Exactly!” she cheered. “And no ‘guilty pleasures.’ If you like it, it’s a pleasure.”
“I’m in,” I cheered weakly.
The post-stress fatigue was settling in my bones. I just wanted to sleep. I closed my eyes.
“Oh no!”
I woke up with a startled snort when Nina’s voice echoed out of the kitchen. I hadn’t even realized I’d dozed off. Nina was in the kitchen clutching the pot lid, staring at the barley soup.
“What’s wrong? Did it burn? It doesn’t smell burned.”
I hurried to the kitchen and joined her, staring into the simmering pot. My jaw dropped open when I saw what had set her off.
“Neen…are those potatoes …”
“Purple?” she said. “Yeah, they are.”
She stared at me.
“But…how?” I asked.
“The beet dye I made,” she moaned. “I must not have scrubbed the pot as well as I thought? The white potatoes picked up the remaining color. Oh my god, I ruined it! All that work!”
“No, no, the rest of it looks fine,” I said. I grabbed a wooden spoon from the jar by the stove and spooned out a potato. “And it smells amazing.”
“Careful, it’s steaming,” Nina warned.
I blew on the light purple potato, then took a cautious bite. Nina watched me chew with a worried expression.
“And?”
I chewed. “And, it turns out leftover beet dye is more decorative than flavorful. It tastes great—no hint of beets at all!”
“Are you serious?”
She grabbed the spoon and dug a potato out of the mix, then blew on it.
“Oh my gosh I’m so relieved,” she said as she chewed with her mouth open, because she couldn’t wait until the potato had cooled off. “It’s yummy!”
“I guess life does imitate art,” I said, nodding toward the TV.
Nina frowned at me for a moment, then realization spread across her face. “Bridget’s blue soup!”
We laughed together even though I knew deep down that life didn’t imitate art in the important ways.
There was no cinematic happily ever after waiting for me.