Page 61 of Love You, Mean It

“So now we’re best friends and as such you’re going to become my personal stylist and couturier. Awesome. I love that about us.” She grinned and I quickly mirrored it. I hadn’t expected to find someone I enjoyed talking to at this thing, let alone someone whose sense of humor seemed to mesh so well with my own. Had Jenna always been this wryly funny?

“You’re running your family’s deli now, right?”

“That’s right.”

“I always loved that place. We ate there at least twice a week senior year. Your dad would give us freebies since we came in with Bella.” She smiled fondly at the memory. A little swell of pride filled me. Things like this were why I couldn’t let the deli go under—people’s happy memories of my dad, the way it had woven itself into our town over decades. I wasn’t the only one who would be devastated to see it go. Or, well…sad, at least.

But would Dad be proud of me today? Of what I was doing to keep the deli alive? Or would he be disappointed that I’d given up on my costuming dream to do it?

“What are you doing these days, anyway?” I said, needing a change of subjectstat. “I didn’t even know you were back in Milborough.”

“It’s pretty recent. Just since last year.”

“What brought you back?”

“A job. At Winnfield?” She cocked her head as she named the nearby arts college, tiny, but well-respected in New England. “I’m teaching fiction writing.”

“Oh yeah? How’d you wind up there?”

“Mostly lucky timing. I’d just sold my first book when they posted the position, and I knew their last poet-in-residence from my MFA program, she put in a good word.” Jenna shrugged. “I neverplannedto teach, but it’s a decent way to pay the bills. Literary fiction definitely doesn’t. Especially when you’re managing a novel about every five years.” She smiled ruefully.

Something like jealousy momentarily needled into me. JennaDiSousa was publishing novels? It wasn’t something I wanted for myself, but there was something undeniably impressive about the fact that she had a creative career, even if it wasn’t a bill-paying one.

“Wow, congratulations,” I finally managed. “About the novel, I mean. Is it out yet?”

“Next spring. My agent claims that’s actually fast for publishing.” She rolled her eyes. “Until then I’m stuck in the land of thinly veiled coming-of-age autofiction by writers who have yet to actually come of age.”

“It can’t be worse than slinging salami.”

“If that’s not the name of a porno, it should be.” I guffawed and she rewarded me with a knowing smile. “And honestly…I love my baby writers. I should go, my mother has thatlookin her eye.” She threw side-eye in her mother’s general direction. “It was really good to see you. Let’s grab a drink sometime, I need to make an effort to have actual friends here. And congratulations.”

With that, she disappeared into the crowd, leaving me feeling simultaneously glowy and a little embarrassed. A drink with Jenna actually sounded fun…which made me realize just how little effort I’d put into findingmyactual friends since I’d moved back. Why had I assumed that no one in Milborough would click with me?

I glanced at Theo, still standing with Everett and a crowd of other vaguely familiar, generically handsome men, and was surprised to find his gaze already on me. He raised his bourbon and eyebrow simultaneously, mouthingNeed one?before glancing meaningfully at Ted, surrounded by a few of his more pompous cronies. Laughing, I shook my head. He smiled easily. I was about to make my way over—in the wake of Jenna, it didn’t seem so impossible to imagine actually enjoying his friends—when Mimi sidled up next tome.

“Don’t waste space on the burrata, no flavor at all,” she said.

“Good looking out, Mimi. So? How are we doing so far?”

“I’d say you’re selling it. The prick wouldn’t have been so snippy otherwise.” She waggled her eyebrows and I laughed. “I’m just gladyou letusknow the truth. Otherwise…” She shook her head slowly. My heart stuttered.

“What do you mean?”

“Just…all this,” she gestured at the grand space, the vests-and-bowties staff hunching obsequiously as they offered delicacies that the artificially youthful attendees waved away without making eye contact. “Theo seems like a smart cookie, which I’ll admit was a pleasant surprise, but this isn’tus. If I thought you were really hitching your wagon to it?” She chortled. “I’d be rolling in my grave, Eleanor.”

“You’re not dead yet,” I said, trying to keep my face neutral. It was hard with my lips going suddenly numb.

“Exactly.” She patted my shoulder affectionately. “But I’ll let you get back to it. Need to make sure you really sell it tonight, right? Then you can wrap this whole charade up and we can get back to our lives.Withoutthe Taylors, thank Pete.”

“Right,” I murmured. With one more gentle squeeze, she snatched an olive and moved off to find Ma, leaving me stranded there, heart beating wildly.

She was right, of course. Mimi knew me better than almost anyone on earth, barring Bella. This world, these people…I couldneverbe a part of it. I’d suffocate inside of a week. And since that was true…

What was I holding out for with Theo? The chance to make it a two-night stand? Another fancy meal? The longer I strung this out, let the two of us fall under the easy, hypnotic sway of novelty and hormones, the more painful it would be when we both had to admit to ourselves that fundamentally there was nothing there. Hell, the fact that he was so profoundly different from anyone I’d ever gone for made me even more vulnerable. Already I’d let him insinuate himself much too far, simply because I didn’t realize I needed to worry about him in the first place.

The only reason I was resisting Sam’s plan was attraction—the stupid “Look at thoselips” kind—and taking this place in through Mimi’s eyes…I realized how flimsy that excuse was. Feeling stifledby its grandeur, I beat a quick retreat from the ballroom. I needed to get my head on straight before I started up the act again.

The stream in and out of the bathroom was too constant to risk, so I ducked into the darkened après-golf casual restaurant next to the function room, moving to the nearest table and collapsing into a chair.

---