Page 17 of Back to Square One

“Coming?” Jazzy had gone into the kitchen and now had two bottles of water in hand as she headed for the back door.

Rowan followed her.

On a lounge chair out back, Becca was reading a book, and Jazzy stopped to give her a quick kiss and a “hi, babe.” Becca smiled at them both and asked a few questions about wine tasting.

Rowan listened to them go back and forth with an ease that surprised her, given how well she knew Becca. Also, the way Becca looked at Jasmine was new. Not that she’d ever mistreated any of the women Rowan recalled her dating in the past. She’d just never seemed to care a whole lot to know what they thought about any given subject. But with Jazzy, it was clearly different. Becca not only listened to her talk but watched her face the whole time. Asked follow-up questions. Reached out to hook a finger into Jazzy’s.

It was sweet.

“We’re gonna go down by the water,” Jasmine said. “Wanna come?”

“Do you mind if I stay here?” Becca asked—another thing she never would have done in the past—and held up her book.

“Not at all.” Jazzy bent and gave her a more lingering kiss this time.

“Stevie and Lizzie out on the water again?” Rowan asked once Jazzy stood back up. “I see the boat’s gone.”

“Fishing.” Becca shook her head. “Not sure how they can do that for hours on end, but they seem to love it.”

“Stevie likes to stay busy when she’s not with Sara.” Rowan didn’t mean her voice to sound as wistful as it did.

Jazzy hooked her arm in Rowan’s. “Come on, hon.”

They headed down to the level of yard near the water where there stood the Adirondack chairs in various rainbow colors, freshly painted by the smooth look of them. Jasmine set the water bottles down on two of them, then asked Rowan to walk with her to the end of the dock.

The sky was still overcast, so the traffic on the water was slightly less than it would’ve been on a sunny day, but it was still fairly busy. Water skiers, fishermen, people just drifting or anchored and hanging out for their Sunday. It took all kinds on the lake. Rowan knew this from her childhood.

“I love standing at the end of the dock like this,” Jazzy said quietly. “I used to do it as a kid. I’d keep my head up a bit”—she raised her chin to demonstrate—“so I couldn’t see the edge of the dock, and it would feel like I was about to walk on the water.”

Rowan smiled. “My grandparents had a boat, so when I was a kid, we spent a lot of time on the water. We’d pull out a local map on a Saturday morning, and my grandpa and I would decide which lake we’d take the boat to that day.” She smiled at the memory, picturing her grandpa with his deep chin dimple and bright blue eyes.

“Aww, I love that.”

They stood there quietly, each of them soaking in the warmth, the smell of the water, old memories. Then Jazzy asked softly, “What’s the deal with you and Evie?” She quickly turned to look at Rowan and reached out to put a hand on her arm. “Not that it’s any of my business,” she added. “I just…sensed some tension or something.”

Rowan thought about shrugging, about lying, about not answering at all, but she knew all Jazzy had to do was ask Becca later, and she’d rather get her own version out there. She inhaled and blew it out. “We were together for about two years.” She said it quietly, like she didn’t want the fish to hear or something. “We all came on a long weekend here.” She glanced over her shoulder. “Not this particular house, but this lake. We come here a lot, the bunch of us.” She cleared her throat, reluctantly reaching for the memory that had only come back to her in the past couple of days. “Anyway, we were here and she broke up with me. Out of the blue.” Another clear of her throat, which apparently didn’t want her talking. “I guess it was two years ago, and it falls into the window of my lost memories, so I didn’t know when I woke up in the hospital. I couldn’t understand why she wasn’t there.”

“Right, right,” Jasmine said, grimacing. “I’m so sorry. That’s awful.”

“Yeah. And I had some bits of it come back as I’ve been here.”

“Why did she break up with you?” Jazzy shook her head quickly. “Jesus. Ignore me. That’s none of my damn business. I’m sorry.”

“No.” It was Rowan’s turn to reach out. She liked Jasmine a lot, and she didn’t believe for a second that she was being nosy. “No, it’s probably good for me to talk about it. To say it out loud. You know?” Again, she inhaled and let it out, bracing herself. “She said she didn’t love me anymore.” Fuck, that hurt. Saying the words, releasing them into the air just fucking hurt.

“That’s it?”

Rowan nodded. “I don’t think there’s more. I mean, there could be, but the memory seems pretty full. It’s not choppy like some others I’ve recalled.”

“Jesus.” Jazzy gazed out onto the water. “Well, first of all, that fucking sucks, and I’m sorry you had to go through that.”

“Thanks.”

“Second, I asked because she seemed awfully…interested in you at the wineries today.”

Rowan turned to her and met her gaze, frowned.

“Standing close, asking your opinion on every wine, laughing at everything you said…” Jazzy let her voice trail off, then wiped her hand through the air between them. “You know what? Ignore me again. I’m probably making shit up. I tend to see stuff that’s not there. Plus, I was drinking wine all day.”