Chapter Two

FIREWORKS EXPLODED ON the television as a brassy march drilled into Olivia’s brain. Stabbing the mute button, she turned from the raucous display, her mood more suited to the weak reflections blooming in the picture frames that crowded the fireplace mantel. She had sprawled on the couch after rolling Ben into bed, too exhausted by tonight’s Fourth of July disaster to do anything but dangle her feet over the arm and wait for Arti, who had texted her arrival with vague hints about some drama.

A key rattled in the front door, and Arti shouldered her way through. She closed it softly before dropping her purse onto the coffee table. Glints of fireworks picked up the sleek blonde streaks in her dark hair. “This is still on?”

“It’s a replay.”

“How’s Ben? I haven’t seen him so upset in a while.”

“He passed out the minute we got home. Tell your mom I’m sorry we left the picnic early.”

“She doesn’t care. She’s just happy to see you two, for however long.” Arti leaned her elbows on the back of a chair. A gold pendant spilled from the fleshy confines of her cleavage. “Poor guy. I know he wanted this to be the year he saw the fireworks in person.”

“I’ve never understood why he’s so fixated on the Fourth when he hates everything about it—large crowds, flashing lights, loud noises. Makes me miss the days when all he wanted was to watch it on TV. On mute. Over and over.”

“You’re a good mom to let him try.”

“Or a glutton for punishment.”

“Aren’t they the same?”

A soft laugh bubbled up, but it turned into a ragged sigh. “I really thought he’d make it. We talked it through, brought his favorite headphones and blanket, and then the first huge firework filled the sky and—”

“He lost his shit.”

“I could see it on his face—the brightness registering, the size, how close it felt, and before he even burst into tears I thought, I have made a terrible mistake.”

“He begged to go. Pleaded. You have to let him take risks.”

The finale erupted, and Olivia tilted her head to watch the explosions throw themselves against the screen in a thickening blizzard, their blinding frenzy in furious opposition to the muted sound. Was this Ben’s world, rising churns of emotion without the words to express them? She groaned and rubbed her eyes. “I’m never sure what will be just challenging enough for him without being too much.”

“Well, file this in the definitely-too-much category.”

“You think?”

“Listen, you can’t read the future. So stop beating yourself up.” Arti shoved one of Olivia’s overhanging feet to the side and perched on the couch arm. “Remember when we finally went to the fireworks by ourselves?”

“Summer before seventh grade.”

“My folks only let me go because ‘steady, responsible Olivia’ would keep me in line. Plus, your amazing growth spurt made you so easy to find in crowds. It was the first time I truly felt American.”

“Seriously?”

“Eating lukewarm hot dogs and drinking flat Coke with a blonde preteen? That’s American, baby, all the way.”

“Forty years of friendship, and you found something I didn’t know.”

Arti polished her long star-spangled nails on her dress. “I have untold depths.”

“Depths? Sure. Untold? Never.” She poked Arti’s hip with her big toe. “What’s up? I thought George had grand plans—the whole post-fireworks dinner and hotel.”

“Oh, there was a post-fireworks dinner, followed by post-dinner fireworks. But this story requires booze.” Arti grabbed Olivia’s hand, hauled her to her feet, and led them to the kitchen. “What do you have?”

Olivia dug past the milk cartons and yogurt containers to find a lonely bottle tucked in the corner. “Champagne?”

“Really? Not that I’m complaining.”

“Mom left it here last week. A friend gave it to her when her results came back benign, but she isn’t a big fan of carbonation.”

“Well, cheers to Alice!” Arti grabbed flutes from the cupboard, blew out the dust with two sharp bursts, and set them on the island. “I still can’t believe a woman who never talks got a damn vocal cord polyp.”

“My mom talks.”

“Please. She was put on vocal rest for three weeks, and no one noticed.” Arti plopped on a stool.

Olivia didn’t bother protesting. Arti used exaggeration the way she used jewelry, for conspicuous and extravagant effect. Mom was quiet, but it was an expansive quiet, one that gave both of them room to breathe. Olivia settled on her own stool, then popped the cork. She filled Arti’s glass to the brim. “What’s the story? Late night stress texts are my thing, not yours.”

“George proposed.”

“What?” Champagne sloshed over the edge of her glass. She sucked the fizzy liquid from her thumb.

“I should’ve guessed. He’d been fidgety all night, and then dinner took forever. I mean, it was already late after the picnic, we hadn’t had sex in a few weeks, and I wanted to get to the room and use the damn bed, but he begged to stay for dessert because the fucking cake had twenty layers or some nonsense. Turns out he’d had a ring put on top of a slice.”

She couldn’t imagine what George had been thinking. Nothing was less likely to appeal to Arti. Or more likely to drive her away.

“My first thought when I saw it was, ‘Fuck me!’ And right behind it was, ‘Getting chocolate out of a dense setting of diamonds? What a pain in the ass!’”

“How was the ring?”

Arti waggled her hand. “Sparkly, but not my taste. Expensive, though.”

“It can’t be easy choosing an engagement ring for a jewelry designer.”

“You know what’s not easy? Giving a ring to a woman who doesn’t want it.” Arti’s breezy tone couldn’t mask the disappointment shadowing her round face, more familiar to Olivia than her own reflection. Arti dunked her fingers in her glass and flicked champagne. “Stop looking at me like that.”

“Like what?” Olivia wiped the damp splatter from her neck.

“Like you can pull my soul out through my damn chest! God, it kills me every time. All I ask for is monogamy and a little personal space. Why is marriage so important?”

“Maybe your company is more charming than you realize.”

“Oh, I’m perfectly aware of how charming I am.” Arti emptied her glass. “I told him no, of course.”

“Where did this change come from?”

“He said he’d had an epiphany. He did want marriage. And kids.”

“But you’ve never wanted kids. Or marriage. He knows this.”

“Yet there he sat, with a ring half buried in chocolate, blathering on about ‘even at our age’ and fertility drugs and IVF and God knows what else.”

“IVF? Really?”

“I’m fucking perimenopausal, for Christ’s sake! I told George I didn’t drag my financially solvent ass all the way to middle age just to bankrupt myself coaxing the last eggs from my shriveled ovaries for kids I don’t even want!” Arti snatched the champagne and streamed it into her glass.

As the churning foam neared the rim, Olivia pried the bottle from her. “So this is when the post-dinner fireworks started.”

“I reminded him I’d made my expectations for our relationship perfectly clear. He sputtered nonsense about assuming it was something women said so they didn’t seem needy.”

“Oh shit.”

“I shoved the cake at him and said the next time a woman tells him something, he’d better assume she fucking means it!” Arti drained her flute, then sighed. “I shouldn’t have dated a Greek guy.”

“How did it end?”

“I dumped him. Actually, I let him dump me. If I dumped a guy from my parents’ church, I wouldn’t hear the end of it.”

“I’m sorry. He was decent. And funny. I know you’re going to miss him.”

“Yeah, well, I guess we’re both hard up for sex now.”

Olivia scowled into her half-finished glass, her easy humor vanishing as the flip comment dug like a thumb on a bruise.

“C’mon. It can’t be too soon for that joke. It’s been three months!”

Irritation crawled under her skin. It shouldn’t be too soon, but regret and loneliness continued to dog her. “I still hate how it ended. Walking out on Jen—”

“—was the right thing to do.”

“Maybe this is all I should expect now, casual sex and casual affection.”

“You’re only saying this because Jen’s the first person since—”

Olivia pushed away from the counter, away from Arti, from her words, from the truth. She turned and leaned on the sink, the cool porcelain soaking into her palms as she stared out the window into the backyard. Inky shadows lurked beneath the yellow haze of alley light. A neighbor launched bottle rockets, and their sound popped dully against the glass.

Arti’s resolute reflection, distant and small from the other side of the island, came into focus on one pane. “I know you hate unresolved endings, but it’s time to move on.”

“You don’t think she’ll change her mind?” The question sounded pathetic the moment it left her lips.

“I think anyone who lets you go without a fight doesn’t deserve you.” Arti made a three-fingered throwing gesture, disgust plain on her face.

“I still can’t believe we’re even talking about this.”

A broken tile, its crack like a frown, scowled at her from the backsplash. They’d delayed renovating the kitchen, waiting for more money, more time. Now she was both grateful and guilty they hadn’t. Guilty because Sophia had spent hours planning a design she would never realize. Grateful because her wife’s touch still permeated the room—the sticky drawer they had to rattle free, the crooked cabinet door that thwarted every cursing hinge adjustment, the chip in the island Sophia worried at with her thumb during conversations about Ben. Imagining a glossy magazine kitchen devoid of her wife’s presence made Olivia’s stomach turn.

Arti’s reflection wavered, disappeared, reformed as she shifted off the stool to come stand beside Olivia, dark head hovering at her shoulder. “I’m sorry to push—”

“No, you’re not.”

“You’re right, I’m not.” She slipped Olivia’s phone from her back pocket and opened the text messages. “Well, this is a long list. Me, Ben, Alice…Jen.”

Arti didn’t mention the final name, the one Olivia skimmed past because deleting it would carve away a piece of her heart. Sophia. Even now, Jen’s name next to hers churned a horrible guilt. Sophia had meant everything to her, and to see her name the same size, in the same font as Jen’s, impersonal, indistinguishable…

Arti tapped on Jen’s name. Her gray text box sat on the left. Did you get to your mom’s okay? Excited for tonight. Feels like months, not weeks, since we’ve seen each other. Can’t wait.

Olivia’s last reply sat in blue below. Traffic was bad. Here now. Glad your boys are with their dad so we can have a longer night. Be there soon.

“The surprise reservation was a mistake. It was too much.”

“Because dinner out is the new edgy lesbian alternative to sex? Please. If she’s fine trading secret hotel liaisons for months, a restaurant should be no big deal. It’s not like she needed to buy a Pride shirt or swear a blood oath to lesbianism. Or bisexualism. Or any ism! Women have dinner together for all sorts of reasons.”

“But her sons—”

“Are going to college soon. They’re old enough to deal. Look, it’s done with Jen. And you need to let it be done. Which is not your skill set, I know.” Arti swiped Jen’s name in the text list. The red delete box popped up.

“What are you doing?”

“You gave her the ultimatum—contact you when she’s ready to date openly. You don’t need to see her name every time you check your messages.” She tapped the delete square, and Jen vanished.

It brought relief, not having the name there as a nagging reminder of her failure, but it stripped away a bit of hope as well. Olivia grabbed the phone and tossed it facedown on the counter.

“Why is this still eating at you?”

“Doesn’t matter.”

“Olivia, whatever words are stuck in there, spit them out.”

She clenched her fingers around the edge of the counter. Hiding the truth from herself was one thing. Hiding it from Arti was almost impossible. “Until Jen said no, I didn’t realize how much I needed her to say yes.”

“You and your big tender heart.” Arti nudged her with a gentle shoulder. “I knew this wasn’t as casual as you said.”

Guilt lodged in her chest like a stone. “What does it say about me that the first person I slept with after my wife died was the wrong person?”

“It says you’re human, nothing more. At least you tried.”

“Trying was my big mistake.”

“Don’t use Jen to shut down again.” Arti grabbed her forearm and forced Olivia to face her. “It’s okay that you wanted to feel something with a woman other than Sophia.”

“You’re very sure of yourself.”

“It’s easy when I’m always right.” Arti patted her cheek and smiled. “I know this hurts now, but when it hurts less, you can try again.”

“What if I don’t want to?”

“You will. Trust me.”