I told him about the bucket list we found.
“That’s wild,” he said. “You have to complete it, right? For Lottie.”
I agreed. “That’s what we thought, too. It’s almost like she wanted us to find it.”
“Absolutely,” he said. “Lottie was always sort of witchy that way. I can imagine her still pulling strings from the other side.”
I laughed, feeling a surge of love. Here was the Henry I fell in love with, the one who would sit in the garden with Lottie and help water her flowers while the mist rolled in every morning like an act of God and then scattered into sunshine by noon. When I looked atHenry, I missed Lottie’s laugh, and the soap operas she watched, and the cherry tree she planted in my great-uncle’s name and how its little white flowers batted its eyes against the windowpane in the kitchen bathroom.
I missed the levity of a wide-open future, all of our big dreams in a world still big enough to fit them. Anything was possible. We had youthful ignorance on our side—impossible to bet against it.
I miss everything I can never get back.
Toward the end of the night, he asked about my job again. “You know if you ever need help finding a new gig, my father has a lot of friends at Sotheby’s. He’d be happy to make some introductions.”
“Henry,” I said. “Thank you, but you know I can’t.” He had offered the same to me before, years ago, but I didn’t want to take a favor or cheat the system. I didn’t want to owe his family like that, either, or always wonder if my success was only because of my boyfriend.
Now I wondered if I was being a fool.
When we walked out of the party, Theo was drinking a beer with the tennis crowd. I waved him goodbye, but he didn’t return the gesture, so I let my hand drop back to my side, limp and uncertain.
I hope he’s not mad at me.
I try to sleep now, but I can’t stop smelling the bonfire smoke that still clings to my hair and skin. I consider taking a shower, but I’m worried it will wake up Rose, so instead, I lie awake in the twin bed. There’s a dampness to the ocean air coming through the window.
I keep thinking, What would Mary say if she knew?
I feel guilty for talking to Henry. Even though we technically didn’t do anything wrong, it was still a moral trespass.
I imagine when he tells her the story of this night, I’ll be erased from the picture, and the thought makes me feel dirty.
I’m done, I decide. I’m not going to talk to him again. What’spassed is past, and there’s nothing to do about it now. I will not be complicit. I will not be the Mistress.
I was eighteen years old when I met Henry, and I didn’t know if I could recognize my own face if I happened across it in a crowd. That’s what I really wanted out of romance back then: for someone to hold my face between the palms of their hands and simply say, “I see you.” And then in the process of being seen, maybe I could finally catch a glimpse of myself, too.
When I miss him, this is what I miss most: being known, feeling seen.
But it’s over. It has to be. Tonight was a mistake, but I’m done. I’m done.
I’m done.
Over the course of the next week, I do everything I can to put Henry out of my mind. I am determined to turn over a new leaf, to become someone Lottie would be proud of. Whenever I recall the bonfire, Lottie’s face floats into my mind’s eye and I shudder at what she would think.
“If you play with fire, don’t be surprised if you get burned,” I imagine her saying.
When I return to work the day after, I receive a chilly welcome.
“Hi, Theo!” I call out to him, placing my bag on the front desk. “How was the rest of your night after the bonfire?”
Theo is walking out the door when I catch him, and he pauses, looking torn. He’s in his tennis whites again, and he twirls the racket between his hands, catching it before it can fall. I follow the worn yellow tape as it jumps in the air.
“Fine,” he says, avoiding my eyes. “I have a lesson, but I’ll catch you later.”
My next shift continues like this. He isn’t ever outright rude, buthe’s stopped taking his lunch breaks at my desk, and he no longer goes out of his way to tease me. I don’t understand what I did wrong to upset him except for talking with Henry, but the absence of his friendship hurts. I was starting to rely on him.
I decide to channel my extra alone time into work. I still haven’t heard from Marie Chen, the gallery owner, since I sent her over another copy of my résumé. I still haven’t received any responses to my flyers.
Almost out of boredom, I start going through some of my old work on my iPad and come across a picture I took of Lottie a few summers back, before she received her diagnosis. In the photo, Lottie is bent over in the garden, hands in the soil, dirt up to her wrists. The way the light is hitting her face makes it look like there is a spotlight on her, illuminating her in some sort of heavenly, impossible glow, like a halo.
