CHAPTER 9
She stared at the clock on the garage wall.
It was one of those digital ones, with bright, red numbers.
Arlowe had been the one to suggest it, telling them years ago that it would help her stay on task and on time.
Violet rarely looked at the thing, leaving it for Arlowe to worry about and change a couple of times a year with daylight saving time, but after her strange and intriguing encounter with Stella at the café, she couldn’t get what Stella had confessed to her out of her mind.
Stella Ross had wanted to sleep with her when they’d been back in school.
Violet would be lying if she said she’d never thought about that herself, but it had only been once or twice, and it had been one of those normal, ‘she was away from her girlfriend, and there was a pretty girl around,’ kind of fantasies where it hadn’t mattered who it was.
It was just that she had needed some inspiration, and Stella had been there.
She’d returned home and back into the garage without the drinks that she had promised her friends, and while they hadn’t asked her why she’d gotten home so quickly, she had offered an excuse anyway.
“The place was packed, so I didn’t even bother getting in line for my own drink. Then, I felt like I might as well save some money and have coffee here.”
Thankfully, she’d finished her own coffee on the drive home and had left the cup in her car to toss out later, so there was no evidence of her lie.
She had gotten back to work, but just barely, because she couldn’t exactly call checking email and otherwise staring blankly at the document on her screen actual work.
When Violet thought back to that time in her life, hindsight being what it was, she could easily see how she should have seen her ex-girlfriend as the cheater that she was.
She’d always wanted a text before a call, citing the time difference and her class schedule.
Sometimes, there had been sounds in the room that her ex would explain away as being one of her roommates in the three-bedroom apartment that she shared with two other people.
There had been more, but Violet had ignored all of her concerns, feeling lucky to have a girlfriend at all.
Then, there had been a few instances when her girlfriend hadn’t been up for a call, or she had done something to tick her off, and she’d be out with her friends or just in her own dorm room, staring up at the ceiling, thinking about how angry she was, and Stella’s face would appear to her for some reason.
Violet would think about her instead of the woman she was actually dating, but she had only touched herself to those thoughts once, and while it had been good, she’d felt the guilt hit her after, and she hadn’t done it again.
Now, Violet was thinking about the fact that Stella had thought about them doing that back then, too, and she could picture twenty-two-year-old Stella pressing her up against a wall in a crowded bar in Amsterdam, kissing her neck while her hands roamed her body, and whispering into her ear that they should go back to the dorm.
Violet could even picture herself shoving caution to the wind and going with her.
Of course, that never would’ve actually happened.
She wouldn’t have gone back to Stella’s dorm, and they wouldn’t have had sex.
She’d had a girlfriend, and she never would’ve cheated on her.
Stella was also not at all her type, and that was still clear to her today with how cavalier Stella had been about admitting something so personal to a woman she barely knew.
“Hey, what do you guys want to do for dinner?” Enya asked. “I was thinking about the Indian place.”
“They don’t deliver,” Arlowe replied.
“I’ll go pick it up,” Enya said. “Violet, can I take your car, though? You’re parked behind mine. It’ll be easier.”
“No!” she half-yelled and turned to Enya. “Uh… I’m not going to be here for dinner.”
“Okay, weirdo,” Sarai said. “Why are you acting like a zombie today?”
Violet was thinking about the coffee cup and the lie that came with it, and she didn’t want Enya asking why her usually perfectly clean car had an empty to-go cup in it when she’d told them that she hadn’t been able to even get in line.
“And it’s after seven. You’re not hungry?” Sarai added.
“Also, where are you going?” Enya asked.
“I have plans tonight.” Violet stood up from her desk. “I’m not allowed to have plans?”
“You can have plans, but you never do,” Arlowe replied. “Why are you acting so cagey right now? This isn’t an interrogation.” She leaned over. “Did you kill someone earlier or something? Hit them with your car? Is that why you didn’t get us coffee?”
“What? No!” Violet shook her head. “It was just busy there, and I was too lazy to stop anywhere else. I’m going to get ready, but I’ll talk to you all later.”
“Well, yeah – you live here, where we also live,” Sarai said.
“Do you need to talk?” Enya asked. “You seem anxious.”
“I’m fine. I just need a night out to myself.
It’s been a little crazy around here recently, and I love you all, but I feel like I’ve been locked up in this house for the most part.
I’m a thirty-two-year-old woman with three roommates, and we all live and work together, so I could use a night out to myself. That’s all.”
“Okay. Well, drive carefully, I guess,” Enya replied.
“Thanks. I will,” she said and hurried out of the garage, leaving her laptop there, plugged in to charge.
She went to her bedroom, closed the door behind her, and tried to gather her thoughts. She had nowhere to go tonight, yet she’d said that she had for a reason she didn’t get until just now.
“No,” she said to herself. “Just tell them you’ve changed your mind, and you’ll pick up the food instead,” she added and sat down on her bed. “You do not want to go to that bar. You do not want to see her.”
She had no idea when Stella would get to Buddy’s, and Stella had told her that she was meeting someone, which probably meant that it was a date.
Violet didn’t want to crash someone else’s date, but there was something about hearing Stella admit that she’d thought about taking all of their anger and tension out on one another in the best possible way that had her standing up and moving to her closet to find something to wear that would show that she didn’t care but also that she did at the same time.
◆◆◆
Violet parked around the block and just sat in her car, looking down at the coffee cup that she needed to throw out.
She could toss it into the trash can outside of the convenience store to her right, go in there to shop around for a few minutes, and head home.
She could walk around the block a few times and do the same.
She could also go to the pizza place down the street, sit down at a table by herself, and order a slice, but instead, she was staring at the red brick wall of Buddy’s Bar.
Around the corner, there was the door to the place, and she could walk in, sit down somewhere, order a drink, see if Stella was there, and leave whenever she wanted.
Of course, this was all ridiculous because Violet could just call, text, or email Stella whenever if she decided that she wanted to talk further about Stella’s revelation. She didn’t have to spy on her and a possible date in some bar.
Violet sighed, turned the car off, grabbed her purse, the cup, and got out of the car.
Her self-control was manageable, she thought as she threw the cup away in the nearest trash can and walked aimlessly on the sidewalk.
She could do this. She could turn around, grab some pizza, and go back home.
Right as Violet was about to do just that, though, someone opened the door to the bar, and she could hear the usual bar sounds flowing outside from within: laughter, music, people talking, and maybe a game on the TV.
She bit her bottom lip, grunted, and her body turned on its own, with her hand grabbing that door just as it was about to close.
Violet held on to it for a moment before committing to actually going inside, but then, she was taking steps.
Her feet carried her into Buddy’s and planted themselves in front of the door.
Her eyes flitted around the bar, looking for Stella, praying that she didn’t see her because this move was an obvious one, and she knew it.
Stella had told her that she’d be here, giving her an easy way to avoid her, so Violet being there meant that she hadn’t been able to resist seeing Stella again after what she’d said to her only a few hours ago.
She found Stella sitting in a booth in the corner, with a woman with long blonde hair sitting across from her, facing away from Violet.
Stella was laughing at something the woman had said, which made Violet glare before she could stop herself.
She didn’t care for Stella laughing at something another woman had said.
She made her feet move and carry her over to a table that would not only give her a view of Stella, but it would also give Stella a view of her if Stella looked away from the woman who was currently still making her laugh.
Violet knew she was being obvious now, but there was something in her that didn’t care.
When she’d first gotten to Amsterdam, she’d wanted to have fun, be a normal college student, not worry about school as much because she should be able to hold her own in the program, and while she’d still wanted the top GPA to brag to her parents about, she hadn’t expected that to be a difficult thing to achieve.
She’d wanted long nights at bars and clubs, dancing, drinking, and even the hangovers the next morning.
She’d wanted a woman or two to flirt with her, even though she never would’ve done anything with them because she’d been taken.
Violet had wanted to feel normal for the first time in her life, blend in, and not be the richest kid anywhere she went, including at a university with a lot of other rich kids.
It had all been too much to ask of herself because that wasn’t her, but now, ten years older and wiser, Violet wondered if maybe it could be.
“What can I get you?” a waitress asked, placing a napkin down on her table.
“Oh, nothing. I’m driving.”
“You just want to sit at the table at a bar? You have to order something.”
“Bottled water?”
“Sure. Whatever.”
Violet returned her attention to Stella after the waitress walked off, and when she did, she noticed that Stella was now staring back at her.
Stella smirked when she noticed her looking at her, and Violet forced her eyes to remain on Stella’s.
She would not be the first to pull away.
She would be confident and show Stella with her eyes that she had understood what Stella had done earlier by telling her that she’d be here tonight, and she’d come here to spite her regardless.
When Stella licked her lips, though, Violet nearly lost her resolve.
Stella then picked up her beer and took a drink, keeping her eyes squarely on hers, and Violet almost looked down at the table, but she hadn’t.
She held Stella’s challenging gaze, and when Stella looked back at the woman across from her, Violet felt like she’d won their battle.
“I can just go,” she mumbled to herself.
She’d done it. She had challenged Stella right back, so she reached into her purse, found a ten-dollar bill, placed it on the table for the bottle of water that she’d ordered, and stood up.
She didn’t look back at Stella to see if she noticed because that would be admitting that she cared, and Violet wasn’t going to admit that to Stella.
She hurried out of the bar and rounded the corner to get back to her car.
“Violet!”
Violet snapped her head at the sound of her name and noticed Stella jogging toward her.
“What the hell was that?” Stella asked when she caught up to her and stood a few feet away from Violet.
“What was what?”
“Come on. You know what.”
“No, I don’t.”
“God, you are exhausting,” Stella said with a little laugh. “Why did you come tonight and just leave? Again.”
“I forgot you were going to be here, and when I–”
“Bullshit. Just stop.” Stella waved her off. “You came here for a reason. It’s because of what I told you earlier. I was meeting someone here tonight, and you got curious. Just be real for a minute.”
“I have to go, Stella. I’m meeting someone myself.”
“No, you’re not,” Stella said, taking a step toward her. “Do you have any idea how infuriating you are?”
“You don’t have to insult me.”
“You wore a suit jacket out to a bar, and your shirt is tucked into slacks.”
“So? I don’t–”
“You’re wound so tight. You always have been.
” Stella took another step toward her. “I cannot believe I didn’t see how much I wanted to unwind you back then until this week.
Part of me knew I wanted it, I’m sure, but I really get it now.
” She looked down at Violet’s belt and then back up into her eyes. “Did it bug you?”
“What?” Violet asked and swallowed.
“Me being there with another woman. Is that why you stared me down and left?”
“No. Where is your date, by the way? Shouldn’t you be inside with her right now, buying her another drink?”
“It wasn’t a date. She’s just a friend. And you didn’t answer my question. Why did you feel the need to come to Buddy’s tonight, give me that sexy stare-off, and then run away?”
“Sexy? I–” Violet stopped herself when Stella’s hands moved to her hips.
Then, Stella was moving her over to the red brick wall behind her, and Violet swallowed yet again, recalling her vision that was more a fantasy at this point.
“Will you just admit it? If not to me, to yourself? You wanted me back then, too. It’s why we hated each other so much.
The difference is that now, we’re both here, older and wiser.
We’re no longer competing for grades and, apparently, plaques.
As far as I know, we’re both single right now. Are you single, Vi?”
“You’ve never called me Vi before.”
“I am about to be really bold and kiss you, so I felt like I could maybe use a nickname.”
“You’re–”
“Yes, I am.”
Stella cupped her cheek then and waited.
Violet knew that this was the moment where she could tell Stella that she didn’t want this.
She could remove herself from the situation, get into her car, and drive home.
She also knew that when Stella had moved into her, her legs had betrayed her and spread a bit on their own accord to let her in closer.
Stella felt really good there, pressed to her body, and her heat warmed Violet in the cool, night air.
Her lips were just so close now, her eyes were staring into Violet’s, and she looked like she wanted to devour her.
That realization was about as much as Violet could take.
“Unwind me,” she whispered.
“Thank fucking God,” Stella replied before she leaned in and kissed her.