Page 114 of Under the Weatherman
I shook my head to stop these intrusive thoughts, reminding myself of the conversation I’d had with Evan on Sunday. We’d promised each other to talk before jumping to conclusions, so I took a deep breath, determined to trust until I had a reason not to.
The other woman gave me a quizzical look, like I was the interloper. What the hell? Now I wasn’t even good enough to be a third?
Before my thoughts could spiral again, Evan said, “Elizabeth Wright, may I present Liz Grant, formerly known as Lizzy.” He bit his lip, like he was struggling not to laugh, and I was so caught off guard, I had to plop back down on the stool. “Kyan called me after I left Chelsea’s to let me know she’d stopped in and wanted to talk.”
“Shit.” It was almost worse than Evan cheating on me. My chickens had come home to roost. Karma really was a fucker.
Lizzy turned to Evan and said, “Are you blind?”
I gave her a solid once-over, understanding her objection. We looked nothing alike. But man, this was awkward. “I’m sorry I accidentally co-opted your identity. Please don’t sue me.”
Liz scanned me from head to toe and said, “Darling, I don’t know how he confused you with me, but good lord, I’d die to know your skin care routine.”
Oh, thank God she wasn’t mad.
Evan nudged me. “I’m so glad I got a chance to connect with Liz again. I’m just amazed at how complicated the world is, how many weird twists of fate it took to be standing here now.”
He was right. If I hadn’t stepped into Lizzy Grant’s glass slippers for a night, I never would have met Evan. We wouldn’t be here. Well, I might literally be here, working at this bar night after night. Evan had even altered the path of my career.
“I’ll be sure to invite you to our wedding.” As soon as the words slipped out, I shot a panicked look at Evan, but he slid his hands into his pockets and sighed. It was the most relaxed I’d ever seen him.
I felt a wave of shame for how quickly I’d believed the worst of him. That wasn’t on Evan. That was on me. But it made me understand his loss of control last Saturday night. It gave me a window into Chelsea’s mindset on her most cynical days, when her inner demons got loose and convinced her she wasn’t enough.
Maybe I had an inner demon too. Maybe I needed to find an actual therapist instead of siphoning off Chelsea’s.
As soon as Liz said goodnight and headed toward the exit, I turned to Kyan and hissed, “Fuck you, Kyan,” explaining to Evan, “He told me you were reconnecting with an old flame.”
Evan pressed his lips together, a smile breaking through against his best efforts. “You were jealous?”
Fuck. Busted. “Maybe. A little. Mainly, I worried you were going to invite me to join your polycule.” Had I just spoken out loud? Kill me now.
Evan snorted. “My polycule?”
Kyan snickered. “I’d be down for that.”
“No,” Evan and I said in unison.
“This night has just been so weird,” I admitted.
Evan asked, “You want to get a drink and talk?”
“Yeah.” I exhaled the stress of the past turn of the clock. The shock of going from heartbroken loser to our regularly scheduled programming gave me whiplash. “I could go for an Irish coffee.”
“Make it two,” Evan said.
“Grab a seat,” Kyan said. “I’ll bring them over.”
As we settled into a booth, I realized how stressful that impromptu meeting must have been for Evan. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah. That was uncomfortable, but somehow…I dunno. Freeing?”
“How so?”
“I’ve gone my whole life feeling bad one way or another, and it’s like you said the night we met. I’ve been carrying around versions of people in my head who never really existed, stories about myself that weren’t true, and I’ve felt ashamed or angry, rejected and unloved. And it’s all been my own voice narrating. I’ve had the power all along to let it all go and write my own adventure.”
That was a beautiful realization. “You’re starting to sound like me, you know.”
“That’s not a bad thing.” He reached across the table, and I slid my hand over to meet him halfway, so grateful we’d returned to this fragile, but real burgeoning romance. “I can see my life laid out in a new way. I have choices. I don’t need to be controlled by fear or other people’s expectation.”
