Chapter Twenty-seven
Elizabeth
“Let us not burden our remembrance with a heavinesss that’s gone.”
The Tempest
I sat on Chelsea’s bed, sipping on a mug of hot cocoa, while she went through her closet like a sales rack until she landed on something. Holding up the miniskirt, she said, “Is it too cold out for this?”
It was officially sweater weather, but I said, “Are you planning on going back out tonight?”
“Not tonight,” she said, tossing the skirt on the bed and returning to the closet for a top.
The Netflix and chill date Bas had negotiated would knock another item off her list: Watch 15 movies. I couldn’t believe she hadn’t checked that one off already. Clearly Chelsea wasn’t above using the pretext to her advantage. It was strange seeing her give a damn about a guy.
“You should bring a change of clothes,” I said.
“No way. I don’t want him to assume I’m going to spend the night.”
“You’re totally going to spend the night,” I objected. “I don’t understand why you play these games.”
“It’s not a game.” She held up a minxy little V-neck and tossed it over the miniskirt. “Do I want to get some action tonight? Of course. But I don’t want him to take that for granted.”
Maybe I should be stealing a page out of her book, playing hard to get to keep Evan interested, but it seemed like too much effort, and besides, what if it backfired and made him back off too? We’d worked too hard to get to a place of honesty.
“Where have you hidden Chelsea’s body.”
She laughed. “Listen. This is not serious.”
“But you like him,” I pushed, gently. I didn’t want her to throw her defenses back up, but I wanted her to realize she was making solid progress.
“I am enjoying him.”
“That sounds an awful lot like you’re using him,” I chided. We’d been over this a million times. “I wish you’d give him a chance.”
“In my own way, I am,” she said.
I sighed, then switched to her favorite topic. “So we need to decide where we’re going in January. What about Ibiza?”
“Oh, inspired,” she said. “Have you managed to add points this week?”
“Maybe. Evan and I were invited to a party tonight. Does that count?”
She scrunched her face, thinking. “Will allow.”
Of course she would—if it bought us a week on the Mediterranean.
I left her to primp. I had my own date to get ready for, but unlike Chelsea, I wouldn’t be trying out sexy date night clothes. She thought she just wanted to get laid, while I wanted someone I could be myself with, sex or no sex. Comfortable. Cozy. Permanent.
Clad in brushed cotton blue jeans, a chunky cable-knit sweater, and my knee-high boots, I sat on my porch, waiting for Evan to arrive.
I was eager to meet some of the people he’d grown up with.
Every bit of information was a puzzle piece.
A picture was forming, and though there’d been some jagged edges, I liked what I saw.
He came walking up the sidewalk, carrying a six-pack of Stella. I met him halfway, flashing the bottle of wine I’d bought for the occasion.
“We’re walking?” It wasn’t that far, but the temperatures had dropped.
He leaned in for a quick kiss. “I didn’t know how much alcohol would be involved tonight. Do you want to drive over?”
I thought about it. We might need an Uber later, and I didn’t want to abandon my car blocks from my house. “No, we can walk. I’ll just steal your warmth.”
He fell in beside me, draping an arm over my shoulder. I sighed with pleasure and awkwardly attempted small talk, saying, “I wonder if it will snow.”
To a meteorologist.
Instead of giving me the actual forecast, he said, “You still haven’t told me about the book you’re writing.”
That was a record scratch. I hadn’t yet found the courage to talk about this with anyone but Chelsea. “There isn’t much to say.”
We reached Ridge Street and waited at the crosswalk. Evan slid his hand into mine, turning to face me. “Tell me what there is to say.”
I took a deep breath, let it out, trying to figure out how to explain it. “It starts out when a woman is running late to work on a rainy day, so she takes the bus instead of walking.”
The light changed, and he started across, hand still firmly in mine. “Oh, it’s a weather story. I’m listening.”
“She strikes up a conversation with a stranger, and there’s an instant spark between them, but at her stop, she says goodbye. A beat later, the man chases after, but she’s gone into the mist.”
“A couple of weeks ago, I wouldn’t have believed such a quick connection possible, you know, except in novels.” He glanced at me, his green eyes reminding me of how I’d felt when I’d first seen him that night, how I’d frozen up because he’d looked unapproachably beautiful.
“To be honest, when I wrote it, I had no idea it could actually happen. I just wanted a strong opening.”
“Do they have a series of near meets? I assume they end up together.”
“They do. But I’ve only finished the first draft.”
“I’m impressed. I wish I could write.”
“You say that as if you don’t walk around just knowing things like calculus and probably physics.”
“I mean,” he glanced up at the darkening sky. “Meteorology is nothing but calculus and physics.” He frowned. “And computers. Computers will replace us all one day.”
“Me, too, sadly. AI is going to eat our jobs. And then the humans, probably.”
We arrived at Kyan’s with the party already in full swing. He directed us to the kitchen and introduced a couple of guys leaning on the counter. Evan clasped hands with one of them, saying, “Hey, what’s going on?”
While they caught up, I went in search of a wineglass and a corkscrew, which I found at a wet bar in the living room. Over on the sofa, the writer guy Aidan was deep in conversation with a brunette decked out in Patagonia.
Back in the kitchen, Evan strangled the neck of a beer bottle. “I didn’t expect so many people to be here.”
Kyan nodded. “It’s become a tradition. You missed our flag football game earlier over in Tonsler Park.”
“Yeah. I was moving into my place.”
“Hey, Spurlock,” another guy said, reaching a hand out for the bro shake. “I saw you on TV. I told my wife I went to school with you. She didn’t believe me!”
Evan’s forehead creased, and I could see him working it out. Maybe if I hadn’t fooled him, he wouldn’t be second-guessing himself with every ghost from his past.
I’d gone to one of my high school reunions, and I could recall how uncanny it was to see people jumped ten years in age, like they’d applied a filter.
I’d had to check the name tags on more people than I cared to admit, mentally peeling back a decade to picture them as they were.
I was constantly asking my actual friends, “Who was that?”
The guy let him off the hook. “It’s Dex. Dex Philips.”
Evan’s eyes widened. “Weren’t we in French class together?”
“Yeah. That’s right. You were always in the honors classes, so we didn’t share the same schedule.”
Evan scoffed. “You were way better at French than me, I recall.”
It was weird observing Evan as an outsider. I could so easily spot all those subtle signs of social awkwardness he tried to hide. He stood erect, hands tight around his bottle, and if he wasn’t glancing over at me, his eyes drifted to the floor, to his beer, to the ceiling.
It drove home how badly I’d tricked him, how I’d made him drop his guard without realizing I was just a Trojan horse. If anyone here messed with him like that, knowing how vulnerable he was right now, I’d probably shank them.
When Dex found a reason to move on, Evan grabbed my elbow and whispered. “I’m about five minutes from bailing.”
Thank God. After only twenty minutes, the mingling was wearing me out, too. I wanted to skip the rest of our date night and lock ourselves in his house. But I wasn’t going to rush him. “We have time if you want to catch up, put new faces to old names.”
“It’s strange. I look around and sort of recognize people, but it’s like when you’re watching a movie and you can’t figure out where you’ve seen an actor before.”
“Ah, you need the Internet Yearbook Database.”
“IYDB?” He laughed. “That would be perfect.”
I mimed scrolling an invisible phone. “Dex Whatshisname. Starred in French class. Oh, here’s a gallery of photos. And oh, he pissed himself in Algebra class? Bam. That’s how I know him.”
He snorted. “Honestly, it makes me feel a little less stupid for falling for your deception.”
The familiar sting of guilt soured my stomach. I hadn’t even thought of the possibility of meeting the real Lizzy Grant until right then. “She isn’t here, is she?”
“I don’t think so.” He stepped a little more into the living room, scanning the faces, and then he froze, skin turning white. “What’s she doing here?”
He directed the question at Kyan who was nearby, chatting with Dex. I followed his line of sight, expecting to find my doppelganger, but the woman he was staring at was the dark-haired Patagonia chick. Was she an ex-girlfriend? I swallowed down a sudden jolt of jealousy.
Kyan reached for Evan’s elbow, backing him into the kitchen, “Hey, be cool.”
I stayed close, hoping the mystery would resolve itself before I made an ass of myself, digging for information. “Is everything okay?”
“No,” Evan said through clenched teeth. I hadn’t seen him this angry since the day he first saw me at the newsroom. He glared at Kyan. “You should have warned me Vicky would be here. I wouldn’t have come.”
Kyan held up a hand. “Dude, it’s been a decade. Until right now, I’d honestly forgotten about all that. You should let it go, man.”
Evan raked a hand through his hair, totally destroying his structured look. “I don’t care. You know what she did to me?”
He was asking Kyan, but I was the one left in the dark here. I shook my head. “No. What?”
He turned to face me, his eyes clearing like he was surprised to find me there. He chewed on his upper lip, one eye narrowed, and then he said, “Remember when I told you I’d had a rough time in high school?”
I nodded. He’d hinted at a series of events that had bulldozed his trust. “What did Vicky do?”
“She and one of her friends pulled a nasty prank on me in tenth grade that embarrassed the fuck out of me.” He breathed heavily through his nose, like a bull reading his charge.
“They each asked me out on a date, same night, forcing me to choose between them. I foolishly thought it meant I’d become some kind of super stud.
” He laughed bitterly. “You have no idea what a loser I’d always been, and I just wanted to feel the slightest bit accepted, you know? Cool. Likable.”
This was all news to me. In what universe was Evan a loser? “So what happened?”
“I chose Vicky. Meghan told me she’d only been joking anyway, and I thought she was just saving face. But when I went to pick Vicky up, she said the same thing. It was all a joke. Who would want to go out with a dork like me?”
Oh. The horror of high school mean girls hit me with a visceral nausea, like I was still in tenth grade getting picked on myself.
I felt like the last person in the world who could offer him comfort here after the way we met, but it gave me a deeper insight into why he’d been so angry with me.
Right now Evan just needed an ally, however imperfect. “So we hate her?”
That shocked a laugh out of him. “Yes.”
“Do you want me to fight her?” I pulled my hair back, making like I was getting ready to rumble.
Kyan stepped in. “No fighting.”
I rolled my eyes. “You’re no fun.”
“Look,” Kyan said, his arms forming a human barrier as if I was seriously going to throw a punch. “We all had beef with someone in high school, man. Maybe you could confront her now, give her a chance to apologize?”
Evan closed his eyes, shaking his head. “I don’t want to give her the satisfaction.”
I had to agree with Kyan. Evan was going to be in a grumpy mood the rest of the night anyway, and I’d already experienced his world-class grudge holding. If he could patch an old would, maybe he could get closure and move on. But it was Evan’s decision. I was ready to hit the road on his say.
He didn’t even get that choice because Vicky Patagonia stepped into the kitchen.