Page 89 of Meant to Be

“Stop that! It only happened once. And I was young! In high school!” Joe said. “And anyway, you cheated, too, Cate!”

“Never!”

“Yes, you did!” he said, then asked Curtis and Elna for their take on the Arlo situation and our first dinner in Paris.

“That wasn’t a date!” I said in protest.

“Yes, it was,” Curtis said. “Drink.”

“Oh, whatever,” I said, taking a long drink.

The game went on for a while, turning more outlandish and risqué.

Never have I ever had a friend with benefits.

Never have I ever joined the mile-high club.

Never have I ever gone down on someone in a taxi…or a movie theater.

Before I knew it, we were all pretty lit. I reminded Joe that our last meal had been hours and hours ago, on the boat, and suggested that we order some food.

“Nah, let’s go out,” he said. “Anyone in the mood for a nice steak?”

“Yesss!”Curtis said.

Joe started rattling off the names of high-end steak houses as Elna shook her head. “We’ll never get a reservation this late.”

Curtis and I made eye contact, and I could tell he was thinking what I was thinking—that any restaurant would bump Joe’s party to the top of its walk-in list. I had the feeling Joe was thinking it, too—and that it embarrassed him.

“You’re right, Elna,” he said. “How about a burger and beer at a dive bar?”

“Even better,” Curtis said, putting his boots back on.

The paparazzi crossed my mind, but I was tipsy enough not to care. Let them take pictures of us. Let them talk shit about me. I was with my people, and nothing else mattered.

Less than twenty minutes later, the four of us were walking into a random Irish pub on Second Avenue. I’d passed it many times but had never been inside. It was one of the things I loved about the city—there was always something new to discover. As my eyes adjusted to the dim lighting, I could see that the clientele was older, mostly male, and a little rough around the edges. The best part was that they were vastly more interested in the boxing match on the small screen above the bar than the fact that Joe Kingsley was in their presence. We crammed into a small booth, ordered a pitcher of beer and more fried food than we could possibly eat.

At some point, we got up and played songs on the jukebox in the back of the bar, singing and dancing to upbeat classics like “Sweet Home Alabama” and “Brown Eyed Girl” while mingling with some of the rowdier regulars. The last thing I really remember was Joe cutting in between me and an old Irish guy. He pretended to be jealous, then kissed me right in front of everyone. It was a very far cry from dinner with Dottie Kingsley in the Hamptons—not at all the way we thought the weekend would turn out. But in some ways—reallymostways—it was even better.

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