Page 53 of Roommate's Guide to Love

I snicker at my sister’s demure, yet cutting, answer. Ainsley has that way about her. She might be the good girl of the Banks bunch, but the woman can throw a quiet shot and have it cut just as deep as a profanity-laced dig.

“Okay, enough about un-caffeinated Ainsley being better than all of us,” Stella says. “No offense, Ains.”

“None taken,” she says. “You’re right. This isn’t about me. Tonight’s about Quinn.”

I nearly choke on a cheese fry. “What do you mean tonight’s about me? I thought we were just getting together for a sisterly dinner?”

At least, that’s what tonight was spun tomeas. Since the bar is only open a half day on Mondays, Porter told me I’d always have the whole day off. Which is great since I’m now working weekends. I thoroughly enjoy a reset day. I sit back, relax, think about meal prepping for ten minutes before I don’t, and in the meantime, I ponder my existence.

You know, adulty things.

So when my sisters asked me if I could have dinner tonight—Stella works in town, Ainsley had a day shift at the hospital, and Maeve was free of all of her commitments—it felt like a great night to catch up.

Little did I know this was some sort of weird intervention.

“It is,” Maeve says, reaching across the booth and taking my hand. “We just wanted to talk to you. See where your head’s at.”

“My head is fine,” I defend.

“We’re not saying it’s not,” Ainsley adds. “It’s just that last time we all really talked, you hadn’t made a decision on whether or not you were staying.”

“And you hadn’t started at The Joint yet, and we wanted to see how that’s going.”

I make sure to hide any sort of reaction after that statement from Stella. My sisters don’t need to know what kind of benefit package I’m getting by working at the town bar.

I also have to swallow a laugh at my use of the word “package” because apparently hanging out with adolescent boys for years has given me their humor.

“Everything is fine,” I say. “It hasn’t even been a month since I quit. I’m barely settled here. I started at the bar last week, which has taken up a lot of time. So yeah, I haven’t really gotten to ‘plan rest of the life’ yet on the to-do list. But I promise it’s coming.”

Is there snark in my voice? Of course there is. But even for me, it’s a little sharper. I mean, what do they expect? The wound is still fresh.

Though judging by Maeve’s look, she’s not amused by my tone.

“Words of wisdom from Mama Maeve?”

She shakes her head. “All I was going to ask is if you’ve truly processed what happened.”

Processed? Yes. Recovered? Not even close.

“I’m fine.”

“No, you’re not,” she says. “You came here in a whirlwind. I know we thought this was going to be good for you to sit back and think about what you wanted. But now I’m worried that you’ve thrown yourself into working at the bar, just delaying the process you’ll need to go through to come to terms of what quitting actually means, and what’s going to be next.”

Okay, she’s getting a little too close to the wound. Time to deflect.

“I know. I thank you. And so does future Quinn. Those are her problems.”

Maeve, nor do any of my sisters, think that joke was funny. “Quinn. Be serious about this.”

“I am,” I defend. “I just…it’s a lot, you know?”

Ainsley reaches over and places her hand on top of mine. “We know, Quinn. Please know and we acknowledge that.”

So much of me wants to spill and tell them everything that’s going on in my head right now. Because while I might be deflecting, or filling every waking hour with staying busy so I don’t have to acknowledge my life, I think about it every day and every night.

Each night when I lie in my bed, Turtle next to me, the silence of Rolling Hills is deafening. Somehow the silence of the small town is a loud reminder that I’m back in the town I swore I’d never call home again. I cry every day when I wake up in the morning and I remember I’m not going to school. We should be in the thick ofThe Westing Game.We should be getting ready for end-of-year field trips and game days. When those emotions take over, I want to book the first flight back to Arizona, talk to the school and tell them I made a rash decision, and see if I can get my job back for the next school year.

From time to time, I wonder if I could start fresh again. Throw a new dart at the map. I hear Oregon is beautiful this time of year.

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