Chapter 18
“They went out to golf?” she asked her mother over the phone. They had started talking every day now she was back in Concord, at least for a few minutes, sometimes for hours.
“Yes, and he went back to the club and hung out afterward,” Meredith told her.
“You’re kidding.” Muriel couldn’t believe it. The friendship she had been pushing all summer had finally come to fruition. “I’m so glad!”
“Ginny even invited him to the Queen Bees,” Meredith added.
“Is he going to go?” Muriel loved this.
“If Ginny can wear him down,” Meredith said.
Muriel could see Ginny persuading Max. “Have you seen Oliver?”
Meredith made a low humming noise on the other end of the line.
“What?” Muriel asked.
“Oh, nothing,” Meredith said.
“Then why the hum?” she asked, suddenly defensive. She knew her mother had something to say but wasn’t saying it.
“Well, the first thing you asked about was Oliver,” Meredith said.
“He was not the first thing,” Muriel said.
“Okay, then the second.” Meredith made another humming noise, but this one came out low and slow. “Look Muriel…”
“Uh oh.” Muriel didn’t want to hear her mother’s unsolicited advice. “I know you thought you wanted to get married, but that was before coming here. Just make sure this is what you still want because you have the right to change your mind.”
“I know I do, Mom,” Muriel said. “I love Zack.” She did. “I want to marry him. I’m just friends with Oliver.” Just friends. “I should get going.”
Did her mother have a point? She did want to know what Oliver was doing. He still texted her about things happening around Blueberry Bay. He sent a photo of the students kayaking, then one of Sadie surfing, and now their grandfathers hanging out. Muriel had complete FOMO. She wanted to be there with them. She wanted to go kayaking and surfing. She wanted to see how adorable the grandfathers were and help arrange more playdates for the two of them. She wanted to hike to the lighthouse and look out at the world. But mostly, if she was honest with herself, she wanted to hang out with Oliver. She had felt so free with her life in Blueberry Bay.
Now, back in Concord, she was stuck in a small apartment with roommates she didn’t really know after living there for three years. She had a job she was passionate about, but not a lot of colleagues she looked forward to seeing again. Her presence didn’t really matter in the scheme of things. They’d easily find another teacher to replace her if they had to.
And now with Zack, she still hadn’t moved into his apartment. Instead, he declared they would move in together when they found a house, but after a weekend of house hunting, things had stalled, and they hadn’t looked since.
She missed everyone. Concord was over five hours from her family in Blueberry Bay. Over an hour from Cora in Boston. Living here with just Zack felt…lonely.
She opened her social media. Her aunt had posted pictures of a family hike. She opened the group of pictures and scrolled through. Matthew already looked older, more mature. It hadn’t even been three weeks, and he was already looking more like a man each day. Then there was Sadie. She had taken a selfie with her friend Gia and the two looked darling together. But then, she saw something. There, in the background, she saw someone. Squinting her eyes, she suddenly recognized him. “Oliver.”
And then she saw the last few pictures and recognized the place right away. They had all hiked the island to the lighthouse.
A pain hit her harder than she could have ever imagined.
She closed the photos and got up, grabbing her keys. Even though she wasn’t moving in with Zack, she had ended up taking the dirty brass key to his apartment. She’d meet him after work for a nice surprise dinner, and maybe she’d stay for a movie.
She half expected Zack to have changed. She didn’t know why. She hadn’t talked to him about the things she wished he’d work on with their relationship, like making time for her. Making her a priority as much as work. She had hoped for more than work, but she understood he needed to commit.
She dialed his number on her car speakerphone.
“Hey,” he answered. “What’s up?”
His words were brisk, as if to tell her he was busy, or like her dad, he had more important things to do. “Hey, I’m headed to your apartment to make dinner for tonight.”
She was about to rattle off the list of things she was going to the grocery store for, but Zack interrupted her.
“Don’t bother. I won’t be home tonight,” he said. “I’ve got to finish this proposal for one of the partners here. It needs to be done before court tomorrow.”
“Oh,” she said, thinking about the last time they’d had dinner together. Was it two or three nights ago? Should she even bring that up? “Are you around tomorrow?”
He grumbled, and she could hear the tapping of keys. “I’m pretty swamped right now, Muriel, I’m sorry. I have a ton of work I need to get done for Clay, the accounting partner who likes me so far. Then I have to study all weekend.”
She listened to his regular speech. “Yes, sorry, I just wanted to make dinner.”
“Here we go,” he said. “I can never do anything right.”
She closed her mouth, trying to hold back. This would be the third time they had gotten into an argument, which, before she’d left for Blueberry Bay, hadn’t happened often. But Muriel hadn’t often expressed her feelings about things before.
“Why can’t I make you dinner and hang out while you study?” she said. “I have a ton of planning I could do for school.”
He sighed heavily into the phone as though she “just didn’t get it,” which he’d said to her the last time they had argued about hanging out.
“I just can’t study around others,” he said. “It’s just the way I am.”
She pulled the car over. She didn’t need to go to the grocery store if she wasn’t making dinner.
“Fine,” she said. “When will I see you again?”
“Stop being dramatic, Muriel. You know this is what you signed up for.”
His words were short and cutting, and it bothered her. It reminded her of her father’s small quips, so sharp and quick that you didn’t notice the pain they inflicted at first.
She almost spoke but held back, letting Zack finish the conversation on his own. “I have to study. I just don’t have time to even sit down and have dinner. Plus, if you cook at my place, you’ll be interrupting, asking where things are, then I have to travel back and forth. I don’t have all my studying materials.”
She stopped listening and waited for him to stop.
“Good night, Zack,” she said. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”
“Maybe tomorrow we can have dinner,” he said, as if he were sacrificing so much to be with her.
“That’s okay, I get it,” she said, because she did. Zack didn’t have time. She did sign up for this. When he had proposed, she hadn’t asked for him to change into the guy she wanted him to be—someone who wanted to spend more time with her. “You study. I’ll figure out my own plan.”
And she took off.
There was a restaurant in Concord she had wanted to go to for a long time. A small little farm to table on one of the side streets. Zack hadn’t wanted to go, so tonight she’d cross another item from her bucket list: take herself out to dinner.
She had never gone out by herself. She had never sat in a restaurant or even a quick fast-food or a coffee shop by herself. She worried people would think she was a loser or feel sorry for her or think worse things. But she had wanted to go to that restaurant for so long and hadn’t been able to convince Zack to leave his cheeseburgers behind. So, she’d take herself out.
She didn’t get dolled up, as Gordon would say, but she did make herself look nice. Before she left the apartment, she almost texted Zack her plans but decided against it. He’d probably think the whole thing was weird.
“You’re going out to eat by yourself?” Hannah looked sorry for her. “Where’s Zack?”
“He’s studying,” Muriel answered her roommate. But the sympathetic look in Hannah’s eyes didn’t bother Muriel. In fact, it invigorated her. She was doing something for herself and no one else. She didn’t have to get anyone’s permission. She could dress for herself and no one else. She would order what she wanted and stay as long as she’d like.
As she walked to the restaurant, not in high heels like the night she’d thought Zack was proposing, but in comfortable sandals, she thought about those friends. Their group of friends were a mix of law students from all different parts of the country. No one necessarily said negative things about Muriel working as a teacher, but she’d felt her career choice had been dismissed among the group. No one bothered to ask her about teaching, all they did was spend time talking about the law school. Professors, classes, other students, and anything to do with their lives.
The other noticeable difference between Muriel and the group was that she and Zack were one of two couples in the group. The rest of their friends were single. When they would all go out, they’d meet up at ten or eleven, and if they met on the weekdays, Muriel would have been long asleep by then.
As she stepped inside, she froze. Off in the corner of the restaurant, she saw Oliver. He was sitting with a woman. His back was facing her, but she could see enough of his profile to know it was him. What was he doing in Concord?
The woman stared into his eyes. Her head tilted as she listened contently to what he was saying. Her long brown hair hung over one of her bare shoulders. The woman was stunningly beautiful, even from the distance she was standing. Then the woman placed her hand on top of his, and that was when it came to her. He was visiting Amy.
She slipped out before he noticed her and walked in the other direction as fast as she could. She didn’t want to see him when she was all alone.
Or, she could just explain that it was on her bucket list. Oliver would understand. She could explain how happy she was with Zack. That he was studying for the bar on a Friday night. That she chose to take herself out. That she was perfectly happy with her decision to leave Blueberry Bay.
“I’ll just head to another place,” she said to herself as she walked to one of her and Zack’s favorite local taverns. The Barley House always had great food, good people watching on a Friday night, and she could sit up at the bar by herself and not look completely out of place.
“Good evening. How many?” the hostess said at the door.
“Oh, only one,” Muriel said. “I was hoping to sit up at the bar.”
The waitress peeked through to the bar area. “Sure, you can just go grab a seat wherever.”
“Thanks.” Muriel walked toward the bar when she heard a familiar voice coming from a table. She turned to see Zack and some of their friends sitting together with food already.
“Zack?” she said without thinking. “What are you doing here?”
Zack held his burger in his hands, frozen by apparent shock.
“Hey, Muriel.” He put the burger down and wiped his fingers on a napkin. “We just decided to grab a bite to eat before going to study.”
The whole table all looked at her—all law school graduates who were in the final grind before having to take the biggest test of their life. She knew it was important, but why didn’t he have enough time to eat dinner with her?
Her stomach sank. Because he didn’t want to make time.
“Oh,” was all she could think of saying. Some of the others at the table started talking again, looking away at the awkwardness happening between them.
Zack’s shoulders slumped. “I’m sorry. It was a spur of a moment thing.”
So many times, in situations like this, her anger boiled her blood faster than her brain could respond with an answer, and she wouldn’t be able to articulate what she wanted to say to make Zack understand her feelings. She’d either push her feelings aside or blow up.
But this time, she wasn’t surprised or shocked or sad; she was disappointed in herself. For going back.
“I’m going to let you all study,” she said, noticing none of them had book bags filled with books or backpacks stuffed with binders. Not even a computer in sight. “I’m taking myself out tonight, anyway.”
“Join us, Muriel,” Holly said, but only as Muriel waved goodbye.
“Yeah, join us,” said Lana, who sat next to Zack.
Muriel could feel the regret. “I’m good, really.”
She turned to go back to the bar when his friends razzed him. “You’re going to let your fiancée eat all alone?”
“She’s just being dramatic,” she heard Zack say before the murmur of the bar overtook their voices.
A lump in her throat grew, but she wasn’t going to leave. She wasn’t going to go back to being that woman who ran away.
She wanted to be the woman who would take herself out.
She pulled back a stool and sat down, determined to have the best darn night on her own.
“What can I get you?” the bartender asked.
“I’d love your darkest stout,” she decided, “with your house burger, medium, with fries.”
“You got it,” the bartender said.
She pulled out her newest Sophie Kinsella novel and her journal. She opened her journal and wrote the date, forcing herself to stare at the pages and not turn around to see what Zack was doing. She didn’t write anything, just stared at the pages, hoping the lump wouldn’t turn into tears. She couldn’t afford to cry in front of Zack and his friends.
She wasn’t being dramatic, was she? Her first instinct had been to text Oliver. He’d tell her to run over there and give Zack a piece of her mind. She thought about texting Cora, but she’d be even more upset with Zack. If she told her mother, she’d be worried and get even more smothering.
Sitting in a bar by myself.She was about to write how stupid she felt but stopped herself. She didn’t want to put those feelings on paper. She wanted this moment to be the moment on her bucket list. Not the moment that she hit the bottom of the bucket.
She sat up straight, shaking out her hands, trying to get rid of her nerves, and began writing again.
There’s an island in the middle of Blueberry Bay with a red-and-white lighthouse…
She didn’t know what her focus was for that entry—if there was any focus, but before long, she had finished a full page, front and back. She hadn’t written that much in years. When her beer came, she sipped and wrote about her time in Blueberry Bay. When her burger arrived, she put the journal down, and she felt a tap on her shoulder.
“Hey,” Zack said. “I’m headed to the library to study.”
Muriel viewed a couple of empty glasses of beer sitting at his spot on the table. The lump no longer sat in her throat, the weight of being a burden in someone’s life gone. She saw her relationship like a season. He had forced her to grow up and discover that she needed to become a woman on her own.
She got off her stool and gave him a hug, kissing him on the cheek. “Good luck, Zack.”
“I’ll call tomorrow,” he said.
She nodded, but she knew in that moment she could no longer marry Zack. That she wasn’t being dramatic. They weren’t right for each other. She had expected someone who wanted nothing more than to be with her. Zack was a good man, but she didn’t want to come second. Not to someone’s career, or their friends, or the bar exam. It was that simple.
For a split second, she thought about texting Oliver a note. Telling him her feelings. But she kept her phone in her pocket.
Tonight would be about her.