This isn’t real.
Chapter 23
VIOLET
FINN AND I SPEND A lot of time by the water, the long summer days melting together, and suddenly more than a week has slipped away.
We don’t take any more long road trips, but we get up each morning and swim together in the lake. More times than not, Rose and Alba join us, occasionally with some of the other guests staying at the bed and breakfast.
Since Alistair—who works as a police officer—has a schedule that’s a bit more sporadic, he and Finn spend the mornings he isn’t working riding bikes up along the trails in the hills nearby. They take their mother to Iona for lunch one afternoon.
And while Finn spends quality time with his family, I bounce between visiting with my two friends.
I spend a day with Florence at her bakery, and she shows me the designs for her wedding cake. I tried to tell her you probably shouldn’t make your own wedding cake, but she wasn’t having any of it. That afternoon, she bakes a chocolate cake with something called boiled icing, which tastes like melted marshmallows, and after dinner I take the rest of it back to my cabin like the dessert goblin I am.
Florence brings me, Alba, and Alistair’s mom for the final fitting of her wedding dress. It’s a thin-strapped A-line dress, with a low back and a deep V-neck in the front. There’s an overlay with tiny flowers, giving it an almost whimsical, beachy vibe. It’s made a hundred times more ethereal by my beautiful, beaming friend.
The four of us go out for lunch and they tour Eileen and I around Sydney, walking along the boardwalk near the harbour and stopping to take pictures with the giant fiddle. I buy a postcard for my Nan and we stop at the Christmas Island post office to get a special stamp before mailing it. Florence tells me that this is where her mom worked for most of her life, and in December, they get mail here from all around the world, just to get that stamp.
This morning, Rose, who does social media for a local florist shop, was up early to get to a big event a few hours out of town, so I didn’t see her before she left. Alba spent the first part of the day doing a few housekeeping things around the bed and breakfast while I lounged by the dock.
Now, the two of us are lying in the grass in front of her house, making daisy chains.
Are you all set for tomorrow?
Alistair and Florence are having a joint bachelor-bachelorette party. We’re loading up in a van to drive to Halifax, where we’ve planned a very jam-packed two days.
Yep, I’ve got everything I need locked and loaded, I tell Alba. I can’t wait. I’ve never been to Halifax. Well, outside of the airport anyway.
Alba doesn’t respond right away, getting slightly more agitated by the daisy chain not looking exactly how she wants it. I don’t dare tease her about it.
And you’re fine with the sleeping arrangements? She asks me this casually, but I know she’s getting at something.
Why wouldn’t I be? We’ve split off into two rooms, the boys in one, and me, Florence, Alba and Rose in another. Florence wanted to have a girls-only sleepover for the weekend, which I honestly thought was great.
Well, don’t you want to share a room with Finn? Alba asks, her tone suggestive.
I try to diffuse this, letting out a fake laugh. I get enough time with Finn.
I mean, the photos you two are posting are… Alba stalls, twirling a piece of grass in her hand as she reaches for the words. Pretty couple-y. I think about the photos we took up on Franey that Finn posted—and literally posted, not put up temporarily on his story. And tagged me. When I looked at the number of women who liked the post, I felt relieved that my profile was private.
Again, that curiosity tinged with green jealousy. Which of these women was he trying to prove something to? And had it worked?
Finn’s friend Billie, I noticed, had commented almost immediately: Who is this stunning creature and when do I get to meet her???
Finn had only liked the comment.
Alba sneaks a look over at me, but I’m pretending to be extremely busy with my own daisy chain. What’s going on here, Vi? Her tone is gentle, but firm. I get the sense she suspects something is off about this whole thing with Finn. This is the closest she’s come to asking me about it.
I want to tell Alba, I really do. But saying the words out loud: So, Finn and I have concocted a fake dating scheme to piss off what I assume is a line of women back in Scotland—oh, and to get my family off my back after they tried to make me a dating profile, would bring me never-ending shame. There’s no coming back from that.
So instead I shrug, and say as nonchalantly as I can, We’re just testing out the waters.
He seems like trouble, Alba says, raising a singular eyebrow at me. I don’t want you to get hurt. She pauses, fiddling with the stem of a small flower she’s plucked up from the field. Listen, if you want a summer fling, then fine. But this feels more serious from what I can tell and… you’ve never really dated anyone before, right?
I feel the shame burn on my cheeks. We’ve never talked about this. She would know, from our nights out in New York, that I’ve slept with plenty of people. But my friends have never pressed me on why, exactly, no one ever seemed to stick around. Why I’ve never had a real boyfriend to introduce them to—and I’m grateful that they haven’t pushed. But Alba, I know, notices everything, and picks up on every subtlety. I think about how to answer her without it being a full-blown lie.
No, I haven’t, I let out a sigh, repeating my earlier comment, Which is why we’re trying it out, to see if this could be something more. The words make me feel physically ill because I know there isn’t a world in which there’s something more to be had here. I try to play it off as a joke. I throw out a fake laugh, I’ve never met anyone I liked enough to keep around, so it would be a first.
