Chapter Six #3
“And somebody’s had a few already.” Lizzie laughed. She moved to the counter and got herself a glass. “Stevie? Want one?”
“I don’t know.” Stevie feigned a pout. “I’m still reeling from the betrayal.”
“Oh, please,” Rowan said, giving her a playful shove out of the way as she got a glass for her.
“The key to the Margarita Rowan is the salt,” Jazzy informed Becca. “She makes it a little spicy.”
“Why are you whispering the word ‘spicy’?” Becca asked her, clearly amused.
“Because it’s a secret,” Jazzy said, whispering again.
“It’s adorable that you don’t think we all already know this,” Becca said, kissing Jasmine’s temple.
Before long, everybody was back from whatever adventures they’d been having, and some mixing, some blending, and some pouring later, everybody had a drink.
Stevie raised her glass. “To the Margarita Rowan. Oh, how we’ve missed thee.”
Cheers of agreement went around the room and everybody sipped. Rowan’s grin was probably goofy. She could feel it.
“You guys,” she said, and everybody quieted down, gave her their attention.
She cleared her throat. “I just want to say how glad I am to be here. Right here with all of you. It’s been a…
” She took a breath and blew it out in a soft raspberry.
“It’s been a rough couple of months. And while there’s a lot I don’t remember, I have confidence it’ll all come back eventually.
And even if it doesn’t, I know how much I’m loved.
” She felt Stevie, standing next to her, put an arm around her shoulders and give her a squeeze. “So thank you. I’m having a blast.”
A rousing cheer went up, and Rowan met Evie’s soft smile from across the room. Evie raised her own glass in a silent toast, then sipped, and Rowan felt her heart squeeze in her chest, forced herself to look elsewhere.
Dinner was hot dogs on the grill, along with potato salad Justine had made that morning.
Everybody ate, and it was clear that everybody was also tired.
The circle around the fire that night was the slightest bit quieter than it had been the other nights, people sipping their drinks or toasting their marshmallows or simply staring into the flames.
Rowan was in the last group, finding the flickering orange, yellow, and blue of the fire hypnotizing. A couple people were up and moving around for whatever reason, and Rowan was surprised when Evie took the chair next to her.
“Uh-oh,” Rowan said before she could stop herself. “You’re gonna get in trouble for sitting next to me.”
Evie snorted a soft laugh. “I know, right? Fuck her.”
The response surprised Rowan, who scanned the darkness for Claire, found her returning to the fire with a beer, and watched as she clocked where Evie had sat.
Evie was stabbing a marshmallow with a stick, so didn’t see Claire and Rowan have a little stare-off.
Claire finally sat down across the fire. Evie handed her stick to Rowan.
“Work your magic?”
“Happy to.” Rowan took the stick and roasted the marshmallow to golden perfection. For Evie.
She had so many things she wanted to say.
So many questions she wanted to ask. But people were too close and too quiet, and there was no way she could speak without others hearing.
In that moment, though, sitting next to Evie at the fire, Rowan made the decision that she would.
She would find a way to get Evie alone and she’d ask her the things that had been on her mind since Evie’s arrival.
Things she couldn’t remember, yes, but also things she’d observed.
Were Evie and Claire together? Why was Evie being so nice to her?
Why did Rowan catch Evie looking at her?
What was that about? Her brain catalogued a list of questions, filed them away.
She handed over the stick, and Evie took it in her left hand while she opened and closed her right one several times. “You okay?” Rowan asked, looking at her hand.
“Too much paddling,” Evie said with a smile.
“That’ll do it,” Rowan said, nodding. Their gazes held for a beat, and Rowan felt that old, familiar pull, the one she’d always felt whenever Evie was close.
She’d chalked it up to their chemistry, how sitting next to Evie altered her brain chemistry, stirred things in her body.
She didn’t want that to be happening now, but it was. It absolutely was.
“Does anybody need anything?” Stevie asked, looking up from her phone. “Sara’s heading out in the morning, but she can hit a store if somebody’s in desperate need.”
“Losing your partner in crime, Rowan,” Lizzie teased.
Rowan sighed loudly. “I know. I hope you guys are ready for me to just be miserable and crying and lonely for the rest of the week.”
“How did you two meet?” Jasmine asked from her seat next to Becca. They were holding hands, and Jasmine’s smile was curious. “I’ve noticed how close you are, how well you know each other.”
Becca pushed to her feet. “I’ve heard this story, so I’ll be right back. Gonna grab my guitar.”
Rowan waved a hand in Stevie’s direction as if she was presenting her. “Go right ahead.”
Stevie sat up straighter. “Well, my business was fairly new, and Rowan’s parents hired me to landscape their yard. This was…” She looked to Rowan. “Twelve years ago?”
Rowan nodded. “We were such babies.”
Stevie went on. “Rowan was there that day for whatever reason. She came outside and brought me a bottle of water, and I thought, ‘Hey, this chick’s hot.’ ”
Chuckles went around the fire, along with murmurs of agreement, before Becca said, “Just like Stevie, not to miss an opportunity to check out a woman.”
“There’s nothing wrong with looking,” Stevie said in her own defense. “I appreciate the human female in all her many forms.”
“Same,” Lizzie said, and Justine nodded next to her.
“Anyway, my gaydar was pinging like crazy,” Stevie said.
“Might’ve been my baseball hat with the ponytail through the back,” Rowan added with a grin.
“Maybe,” Stevie said. “To this day, I can’t quite pinpoint what it was.”
“The beauty of gaydar at work,” Justine said.
“By the time I was finished with the job, I’d asked her out for a drink.” Stevie stopped to take a sip of her beer.
“You guys were a thing?” Jasmine asked, clearly delighted at the idea.
“Oh, no. I said a drink. It was just the one.”
“Uh-oh,” Jasmine said, sitting forward, obviously riveted. “What happened?”
“We had zero chemistry,” Rowan took over. “None. Zilch. Zip.”