Page 71 of Save the Date

Will stood up and wrapped his arms around her. “That was absolutely terrifying,” he whispered in her ear. “I’ve never been more impressed.”

“Thank you.”

She felt the same way about herself.

***

“Let me get you a drink,” Will said as they entered his apartment. “We need to keep celebrating.”

“First, I must pee.” Emma raced toward the bathroom.

After leaving the brewery they’d stopped at another bar to process what had just happened, and Emma’s bladder was dangerously full. They’d decided to go back to Will’s for financial reasons after two rounds of twenty-five-dollar cocktails. Emmawas still riding the high of having said exactly what she wanted to say in exactly the way she wanted to say it. She’d spent many sessions telling clients that closure was something you had to give yourself, butholy shitdid it feel good to tell Ryan the truth to his face. She’d long suspected that he had rewritten the story of their breakup in order to live with himself. Not that that was unusual. People hated feeling like they were bad, so they often went through elaborate mental gymnastics to justify their behavior to themselves and the people around them.

Good luck not feeling bad now, Ryan.

As Emma washed her hands, she tried not to wonder how Ryan had explained his abrupt relationship-ending behavior to his friends and family. She could only assume they all thought it was her fault since everyone loved Ryan. He wassuch a nice guy. But seeing him tonight made her question if her assumptions about him had been wrong from the beginning. Sure, Ryan presented as a grounded, incredibly kind, rational person. But Emma had technically only met him less than two years ago. For all she knew, Ryan could be the kind of person who regularly blew up his life. She’d had a roommate like that in college—before the roommate had dropped out of school to pursue something akin to environmental terrorism. Except Emma knew Ryan’s whole family and no one had mentioned this kind of pattern.

Who was the real Ryan? The man who once asked her to be his girlfriend in a mailed letter because she’d jokingly said he should put his request in writing, or the self-centered asshole who’d just tried to gaslight her into thinking their breakup had been a mutual decision?

Maybe accepting that she would never know the answer to that question was the last step in finally getting over him.

“Everything okay in there?” Will shouted. “Because I just found some novelty schnapps that I think we should drink immediately.”

Emma opened the bathroom door to find Will standing in the hall with a huge grin on his face. He proudly held up a bright blue bottle of alcohol and said, “It’s blue raspberry, which doesn’t even exist in nature.”

Emma laughed and headed toward his couch. “Why do you have that?”

“Inside joke with my college friends. We always try to gift each other the grossest alcohol available. I got this bad boy for my thirtieth birthday.”

“Oh good, the blue raspberries will be nicely aged.”

“Exactly. You get it.”

Will joined her on the couch and reached for the two shot glasses he’d already put on the coffee table. Emma suddenly noticed what was also in front of them.

“Oh my god,” she exclaimed. “Unicorn Laura!” Emma grabbed the hand-painted plate that Will had strategically placed on top of his pile ofNew Yorkermagazines as a surprise. “You’ve had her this whole time?”

“Yep. I picked her up after our date. I kept planning to give her to you but then it felt weird after we stopped hooking up.”

“She’s beautiful,” Emma murmured as she gently stroked Laura’s colorful mane.

“She’s yours, if you still want her. You’ve earned it.”

“Thank you,” Emma said with tears in her eyes. It was an emotional night, and the alcohol was clearly catching up with her. She should probably stop drinking before she did anything stupid, but being responsible all the time was an unrealistic expectation to put on herself. Plus, she was morbidly curious to see what the blue concoction tasted like.

“This one’s for you.” Will handed her a shot and Emma saw that the glass was from Amsterdam. The one in his hand was from Chile.

“Is there anywhere you haven’t been?”

“Of course. I refuse to go to Glendale on principle.”

Emma laughed. Glendale was about forty minutes away and completely lovely. “Why?”

“Just to be contrarian and have something ridiculous to say at parties. It makes people furious.” Will raised his glass and clinked it against Emma’s. “To Laura!”

Emma braced herself and opened her mouth. The chemical smell hit her before the extremely sweet taste. She forced herself to swallow without gagging, which was a real feat.

“Wow,” Will said as he smacked his lips. “That’s the worst one yet. And my old roommate once bought me Belly Button Beer.”

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