Page 80 of What If It's You?

I pushed open the door and made a show of spotting him.

“There she is.” Ollie popped up, then lifted my chin with a forefinger, gentle yet insistent, to place a soft kiss on my lips. I could feel a familiar tingle swirl through me, and I wrapped my arms around his neck, drawing out the moment. Well…as much as I could in public. The glimmer in his eye as I pulled away told me we’d be holding the same thought until we got home that night. I couldn’t imagine a better celebration.

Ollie helped me out of my coat and we followed the hostess to our usual table, his hand at the small of my back. While we made a show of studying the menu—we both knew what we would order—he glanced up at me from across the table.

“You look extra beautiful tonight. Did you do something to your hair?”

“No. But I was thinking about a change, actually.” I fingered the ends of a long curl, the same style I’d been wearing for longer than I could remember. “Maybe go darker for winter.” I imagined the reflection of that other Laurel, the sharp bob framing her face in deep, shiny black. “I might even try a bob. One of the ones that cuts right across your jawbone, you know?” I mimed the severe borders of the hairstyle.

“Sorry, but…none of that meant anything to me.”

I rolled my eyes indulgently and pulled up a picture on my phone.

“Like this.”

Ollie glanced between the image and my face, then raised an eyebrow.

“Not that I don’t think it would look good on you—it would be impossible for somethingnotto look good on you—but doesn’t it feel kinda…wrong?”

“Wrong how?”

“I don’t know.” He shrugged and handed the phone back to me. “It just doesn’t feel like you. But if you like it, go for it.”

“Naw, you’re right. It’s not really me. Just something I was playing around with.”

“Maybe she’s a character in your book.” Ollie pointed at the sharply bobbed woman with the tines of his fork. “She’s got a…superspy vibe.”

“Actually…she could be. Though that’s not really the story I had in mind.”

“Oh?” His eyebrow quirked. “What ideadidyou have?”

“I’m still sorting out the details, but at its heart it’s a romance.”

“Perfect. Dead in your wheelhouse.”

“But the actual story is this woman, like…slipping between two different lives. In two totally different universes. And to get back to the life she’s meant to be in, she needs to find out what she has to change, but she doesn’t realize that the answer is thatsheneeds to change…” I shrugged. “I don’t know, I’m still sorting out the details. But it’s a love story. You know…in the multiverse.”

Ollie tilted his head to one side, a slow smile dawning.

“That sounds…incredible. How is she going to get between the lives? Like…have you worked out the mechanism yet? I’ve always loved a classic ‘cursed object’ story but maybe that’s a little trite? You tell me, you’re the writer.”

I tucked my phone away and started haltingly sketching out the idea that—surprise, surprise—I couldn’t seem to get out of my head, Ollie’s rapt attention almost more enticing than what I knew was coming next, probably with “surprise” champagne just after the dessert course. I was still scared—terrified, really. The future was so vast, the possibilities endless. What we felt right now might not always burn so bright, it might slip out of sight or occasionally vanish altogether.

I couldn’t guarantee that nothing bad would ever happen to us, or that we’d always feel the way we did in this very moment. There’sno such thing as guaranteeing happiness, or risk-proofing life. But I knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that I was exactly where I was supposed to be. And whatever unknowable future I would be entering into after tonight, when the ring I knew was nestled inside Ollie’s pocket at that very moment perched instead on my left hand, one thing was abundantly clear: We were meant to walk into it together.

The November air had turned wintry, the damp off the Charles sharpening its bite, and the woman turned her collar up around her ears, a feeble protection against the cold. She should have worn a warmer coat—she had an entire closet full of slim-fitting puffer jackets in different lengths and fills, not to mention half a dozen formal options in camel hair and dark wool, perfectly tailored but unobtrusive, in what she’d used to believe was the personification oftaste.

Lately most of her life felt like something she used to believe.

Tonight, for example, she wasn’t heading out to yet another technically brilliant dinner at some buzzy restaurant, most of the oh-so-highly-sought-after seats filled by variations on herself—sparkling (if recently gappy) résumé, significant disposable income, a certain kind of status gained with every new reservation, as if all of them were hoping they’d eventually win at bougie bingo.

Instead, she turned down Mass Ave, making for the music venue she hadn’t been to in years, where she would be meeting Aurora—at best a sorta-friend from the marketing job she’d just started—for anight out she might have planned herself five years ago but hadn’t really considered an option since.

The narrow bar attached to the venue was packed with groups of twentysomethings gripping cheap beers and half-shouting at one another, the excitement of the weekend palpable. She could almost feel the energy coming off them, theyouth. Though…they weren’t any younger than she was. They just looked less…finalized than she felt—at least until recently—like they might still become someone different.

But fuck it. She was here, and she was wearing a totally-wrong-for-the-weather leather moto jacket, and she was probably going to have a couple drinks too many to smooth over the fact that she and Aurora didn’t actually know each other all that well. She wasn’t set in stone yet. Hell, she wasn’t eventhirtyyet.

But by the time she managed to elbow her way to the bar, Aurora had texted that she’d be at least an hour late, “it’s a whole thing I’ll tell you when I get there UGHHH.” She didn’t want to just sit there drinking alone—if she was going to be alone regardless, she might as well pop down the street to the chichi speakeasy she knew was tucked away beside a parking garage and get her liquid courage without constant elbows in the boob and drinks splashing onto the boots she was workingreallyhard to be casual about. After all, it wasn’t any of these people’s fault that she’d stupidly worn $500 boots to a rock show. Breath coming a little short—suddenly it felt like everyone could see what an imposter she was, like it must be written in neon, flashing over her head at precisely the angle where only she couldn’t see it—she squeezed her way back through the thicket of limbs and hair and secondhand clothing that would never look that effortlessly cool onherand emerged onto the street, not stopping until she was halfway down the block, protected by the darkened entryway of a shoe repair shop.

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