Chapter 23 RIP, Lip Smackers
RIP, Lip Smackers
I sit in Bridget’s front seat, clutching the rolled-up Harry Styles poster to my chest. She insists we keep it as a memento, as if I’ll someday want to look back on my horrific thirty-fifth birthday: the night my life and sanity fell apart at the seams.
It’s raining, because of course it is, and I stare out the window, watching the downpour.
Bridget nudges me. “Ruby? Did you even hear me?”
“What?”
We’re parked outside my apartment building. She looks toward the lobby, then gives me a sympathetic pat on the knee. “I know you said you’re fine, and that you think it’s for the best. But I wonder if maybe you’re still in shock? About Connor?”
I have several missed calls and seven text messages from Connor, who apologized profusely for sharing his news at the worst possible time last night.
I didn’t reply. Instead, I told Bridget about his New York plans, and she fumed, and we agreed that Connor and I were never really meant to be together anyway. Plus, his cologne sucked.
“This is a big change,” she says, like the soothing kindergarten teacher she is. “It’s okay to be mad. Or scared. Or both. And if you decide to burn all his button-downs, I won’t tell anyone.”
I laugh. “Thanks, B. But I think I’ll be okay.”
Part of me is still frustrated over how suddenly Connor changed his mind, but also, I get it now. I’ve changed my mind, too. Epiphanies really can happen overnight.
Besides, Connor’s not the reason I’m upset.
Bridget turns off the car. “Never mind. I’m coming up.”
“What?”
She slings her gold fanny pack over her chest and sighs. “I’m coming upstairs. We’re going to eat a bunch of greasy food and talk some more shit and watch some bad TV, okay?”
My other love language.
I fling my arms around her, grateful, and she says, “Also, you’re going to shower.”
We lumber upstairs, lugging Harry Styles and bags full of streamers down the hallway. As I push open the door, I pause. “Has our apartment always been so…beige?”
“Yes,” Bridget confirms. “It’s like walking into a sepia-toned photo.”
I set my black bag beside Connor’s briefcase and slide off my boots, setting them on the jute rug, where my other black boots already sit at a tidy angle next to Connor’s crisp, white running shoes. There’s an empty space where his leather loafers go.
If last night had gone differently, I might crumple against this wall and cry over the space he’ll leave behind.
All the abandoned plans, too. But that doesn’t scare me anymore.
I’ve already had time to grieve that loss.
Besides, if I can navigate a fully actualized middle school game land, and falling for my least favorite person, and losing my grip on both realities, then certainly I can handle the hassle of .
It’ll be strange, living on my own, but all that space is room to breathe. Room to grow and figure it out and maybe screw everything up before I figure it out again.
“Alright,” Bridget says, moseying toward the kitchen. “What are we eating?”
She opens the fridge, and we both peer inside. It’s empty, save for some sad-looking Thai leftovers. The pantry isn’t much better: pita chips, pretzels, an iffy banana.
“God.” I groan. “Even my food is beige.”
Bridget orders deep-dish pizza while I shower. It’s surreal, being back in my actual bathroom, and I pray the water will help me wash away the winning combination of deep shame and aggressive yearning swirling around in my chest.
It’s embarrassing, honestly. What Penn and I shared? It was less than two weeks. Nothing. A blip.
Except, I can’t lie to myself anymore. I know the truth.
It was everything.
The shower doesn’t help the way I hoped it would, either. All my lotion is just so sad and scent-free. I miss the Cucumber Melon and the shiny loofahs and my massive vanity full of colorful, questionably effective toiletries.
RIP, Lip Smackers. We had a good run.
I towel off, pruny and pathetic. Still bereft. Because, unfortunately, Penn’s mark on me is as impossible to wash away as that ill-advised body glitter.
It’s probably a bad idea, but I want to reach out to him. Maybe it’ll help to break the ice.
I slip on my biggest, baggiest sweatpants and sit on the bed, clutching my phone in my hands. I type and delete seven messages, and it takes me six minutes to send five words.
Thanks again for last night.
The message sounds more suggestive than I planned, but it’ll do. It’s simple, and the subtext is clear yet subtle: HEY HI SORRY I TRIED TO KISS YOU BECAUSE WE WERE IN LOVE IN ANOTHER REALITY.
Penn’s reply comes quickly, sending my heart into overdrive.
No problem.
Who among us hasn’t fallen after one (1) tequila shot?
Before I can banter back, another text comes through.
Get some rest, Wynne.
It’s a splash of cold water. A whole tub of it. With extra ice.
I toss my phone aside and collapse back on the bed, my long, wet hair sticking out in every direction.
My vision blurs with tears as I stare at the ceiling.
I’m so afraid I’ll never be able to love Penn the way I want to, and it’s unthinkable.
All those memories from another lifetime will haunt me in my dreams and in songs and in so many quiet, everyday echoes of what we shared, a million tiny tragedies every time I remember his laugh against my skin.
Two small knocks, and then Bridget pops her head into the room. “Oh, good,” she chirps. “You’re still alive. Come eat.”
We put on a wonderfully overwritten TV show for people half our age and sit cross-legged behind the glass coffee table I suddenly hate.
“This is exactly what I needed,” Bridget gushes, tugging at a string of melted cheese. “Thank God we have tomorrow off. What should we do? Teen TV marathon round two?”
“I’m in,” I tell her. “And you can help me write my resignation letter.”
Bridget nearly chokes. “Your what?”
I take another bite while she stares at me, dumbstruck. Through a mouthful of cheese, I admit, “Honestly, I’m not even sure I want to be an accountant. I want something different.”
“Is this because of Connor?” Bridget whispers, as if he can hear us.
“No. It’s because of me. I’m just—I’m not the same person anymore.”
She presses her palms together, gathering herself. “Okay. I’m officially concerned. I get that this breakup was sudden, and it’s inspiring some big feelings, but maybe last night’s fall knocked a few screws loose. This seems like a medical emergency.”
“I’m fine,” I say on a laugh. “I’m just ready for something new.”
“Since when? Who even are you?”
I poke my pizza crust in the air. “Great question. Been mulling that one over myself.”
She props her head on her hand, rubbing at her temple. “Seriously, Ruby. Where is this coming from?”
My instinct is to keep quiet about my unexplainable MASH adventures, but Bridget’s the only person I told about the game when I was there, and she believed me. Having her know who I really was and how I felt saved me, just like it has all my life.
I stand up, grab the MASH game from where I tucked it into my purse, then sit beside her again. “I’ll explain everything,” I start, holding the paper between us. “But fair warning: It’ll sound like total nonsense.”
“Good. I love nonsense.”
“Like, beyond the realm of possibility.”
“Nonsense. Realms. I’m ready,” she says.
“Alright,” I say on an exhale. “That dream I said I had last night? Well, it wasn’t a dream. This MASH game—it came true. As in, I lived it.”
Bridget eyes the page and laughs. “What? You saw your roller-rink restaurant in some kind of drunken hallucination?”
“It wasn’t a fantasy,” I insist. “It was real, Bridget. I know it sounds crazy, but I spent almost two weeks there.” As her eyes widen, I explain, “I was trapped in this world. Some kind of alternate universe or something. I could recount it all to you, right now, in wild detail. Because it happened. And it—” I falter, tripping on the truth. “It changed me.”
She stays silent. I’ve never once seen her speechless.
I point to each section of the game. “I had the mansion, the two pools, the thirteen fish.”
“And Penn?”
I glance at his circled name. I nod. “And Penn.”
“Were you two…together? Like, together together?”
“Yes. Very.” I fight the urge to tell her every detail. But she probably needs time to adjust to “alternate universe,” so, baby steps.
Giddy, Bridget asks, “Was it like A Christmas Carol? Did you get a whole tour of that other life?”
I laugh. “Kind of. But sadly, I never met the ghosts of sleepovers past.”
She pauses, considering. “This sounds kind of terrifying.”
“It was.”
“But also thrilling?”
“That, too.”
Bridget snorts. “Man. Seeing Ryan in capri pants and a scarf would change me, too.”
“The pants were sky-blue,” I tell her, grinning. “And he paired them with a gauzy half-buttoned shirt that he was really, really proud of.”
Her head falls back as she laughs. Then she turns to me again, an awed look on her face. “You really feel like all of this happened. Don’t you?”
“I know it did.”
“Okay, then,” Bridget says, nodding. “If it feels real, then it is, right?”
Once again, I’m taken aback by my best friend’s empathy. I love her for so many reasons, but I especially love her willingness to meet me where I am, even when that place is bonkers.
She sits up, a new perkiness to her tone.
“So, thanks to past us playing a game, you’re quitting your job.
And you’re single for the first time in, what, four years?
This is exciting.” She claps. “This is a whole new identity for you, Ruby. What’s next?
Are we going shopping? Should we vision-board it? ”
I laugh. It is very Bridget to quickly move on from my alternate-universe claims, and even more Bridget to find any excuse to build a vision board.
“You know, I think I already have one.”