13. The Balance
THE BALANCE
Ravita texts me at noon: Lets have coffee after work? I need to talk to you.
My coworkers are laughing near the water cooler. Someone's birthday is coming up. They're planning a happy hour. They're asking who's coming. I'm nodding along while my phone sits on my desk like evidence.
I read the comments on Marnie's post. Still? They're always somewhere. I saw Jeremy at the grocery store yesterday.
I pack up my laptop and tell my manager I'm leaving early. She doesn't ask why. I've been leaving early a lot lately. I've become someone people don't ask questions about.
We meet at the café near the office. Ravita is already there. She's not eating. Her coffee is untouched. Her phone is face-down on the table. She's been waiting.
I sit down across from her. The chair scrapes. A woman at the next table looks up.
"Hey," I say.
"Hey yourself."
We sit in silence. Right now, the space between us feels suffocating. The barista brings me water without being asked. I don't drink it.
Ravita starts talking first, which means she's been practicing this.
"Before I say anything, I want you to know that I'm not angry. I'm just—I'm hurt, and I want to know why you've been lying to me for months."
“I feel like I’m losing you,” she says. “You bail on everything. You skip lunch. You’re on your phone in meetings. You left before the encore at the last show and then you didn’t come to the acoustic one at all. The RileyStickLovers account—you don’t even post anymore. You don’t even open the app.”
"I know. I'm sorry. Work has been—"
"It's not work." She cuts me clean. "I see you at work. You’re hiding something."
She pauses. Picks up her coffee. Sets it down without drinking.
“I saw this photo recently. It was outside the theatre, the late screening. Rhonda Mars is tagged in it, and the woman she’s with—hood up, glasses, half turned away—Lena, that’s your coat. That’s the coat Marnie and I helped you pick.”
My entire body goes cold.
"That's Rhonda Mars."
I open my mouth and close it.
"Lena." Her voice cracks. "I showed you the photo of Sandy at the mall two weeks ago. You sat there with your sandwich and you said nothing. And the whole time—the whole time you knew Rhonda Mars."
This is the exit. I can taste the words: Yes, I'm seeing Rhonda. It's been three months. I'm in love with her. I didn't tell you because she wants privacy and I've been a coward.
“That’s not me,” I say instead. “Ravita, that isn’t me.”
Ravita looks hurt.
She stares at her coffee. The untouched foam is sinking.
“Okay,” Ravita says at last. “Then look me in the eye and tell me that isn’t you in that photo.”
“It isn’t me.”
She holds my gaze a long moment. I hold hers. I don’t blink.
“Right,” she says. “Okay.” She doesn’t believe me—I can see that she doesn’t—and I can see her decide not to fight me on it.
“I’m not going to force it,” she says. “But I need you to hear one thing and then I’ll drop it. Marnie and I are your friends. Whatever this is, whoever this is, we don’t stop being your friends because of it. You don’t have to protect us from your own life. That’s not what we’re for.”
I don’t say anything, because if I open my mouth I’m going to cry.
“Think about it,” she says. She stands, and on her way past she squeezes my shoulder—once, gentle, the exact opposite of what I deserve—and then she’s gone, and I’m alone.
I go home and sit on the couch, I just want to forget about everything and doom scroll on my phone.
I look at the group chat, still lighting up the way it always does.
Marnie: RILEY SIGHTING. Coffee place on 7th. She’s wearing the green beanie!
Ravita: Rebecca got a new tattoo, it’s on her forearm. Zoom in on this.
Marnie: Okay also?? Blurry, but I SWEAR that’s the Belladonnas drummer at the airport. The rivalry is officially dead. Does this mean we can talk about them now?
Ravita: okay FINE. Btw someone saw the Belladonnas bassist at a farmers’ market with a canvas tote. She looked normal. Disturbing.
I read all of it and say nothing. Again I’m invisible, right off the edge of the frame.
I mute the group chat.
Jani calls that night.
“Okay, sis,” she says, “someone sent me a photo. Rhonda Mars, outside a cinema, with a woman whose coat I’m almost certain I’ve seen on my little sister.”
I close my eyes.
“Jani—”
“I’m confused, and butt hurt, and mostly I just want to know if my baby sister is secretly seeing the bassist of the Belladonnas.”
“It might be,” I say. It’s the most I’ve admitted to anyone. “It might be that. I can’t talk about it yet, Jani. I’m not ready. Please.”
There’s a pause, and then she says, “Okay. When you’re ready, I’m here. And Lena? Whoever she is—if she’s good to you, I don’t care what jacket she wears on a stage.”
I hang up and cry.
That evening, my phone buzzes. A notification from Instagram. Someone has tagged Rhonda in a photo. Rooftop bar. Low lighting. The booking agent from last month standing close. The booking agent's hand is on Rhonda's arm—casual and possessive and intimate. Rhonda's body language is polite.
It feels like a slap I’ve been bracing for and somehow still didn’t see coming.
I zoom in on the booking agent's fingernails—red, expensive-looking—digging into the fabric of Rhonda's sleeve. The sleeve is black. Rhonda wore that shirt to my apartment last week.
I open my messages app and send her a text.
Can we talk?
I call her.
"I saw the photo," I say.
"What photo?"
"The one from the rooftop. You and a woman."
Silence.
"That was nothing," Rhonda says. "She's a booking agent. She was just networking."
"Her hand is on your arm."
"People touch each other at networking events."
"Not like that they don't."
"Lena—"
"You know what? No. Don't Lena me. Being private is one thing." My voice is steady. "But me being invisible is another.”
"I'm not making you invisible."
"Yes, you are. The worst part is that I can't tell you to cut it out.
I can't say that's my girlfriend, back off.
I can't claim you, do you know how much that hurts?
I can't tell people what we are. I can't tell my best friend that I'm in love with someone.
I can't post a photo. Officially, you're single. But for me, I don't exist."
"Lena—"
"That photo is going to end up on someone's story. Someone's going to screenshot it. The music blogs are going to pick it up. And I can't even say anything about it. I can't stake a claim. I can't be the person in that photo with you. I have to sit at home and watch other women flirt with you."
"This isn’t fair."
"What's not fair?"
"You’re putting this on me. I didn't ask her to touch my arm and I didn't ask for the photo to happen."
"I know. But you also didn't stop it, Rhonda. Because everybody thinks you’re single."
"Stop, Lena. I need to be there, I can't fix this on a phone call."
"I don't want you to fix it on a phone call. I want you to acknowledge that what we have, it's broken. You asking me to hide is asking me to lie."
There's a long pause.
"I'm sorry," she says.
"That's not enough," I say.
"I know."
"I don't know what to do here. Nobody knows about me. I can't even say anything because officially we're nothing.”
"We're not nothing."
"Aren't we? What are we, then? Tell me."
She doesn't answer.
"Yeah. That's what I thought. And the worst part is that I chose this. I agreed to this. So this is also my fault and I hate that. I hate myself for saying yes."
I hang up before she can respond.