Page 101 of What We Got Wrong

She just kept telling herself that the week, the few days that they’d had together, really, was a gift, and maybe it was time for her to move on. Maybe it was time to truly let go of Quinn. Maybe this truly was just…goodbye. It wasn’t what she wanted, but she hadn’t heard from Quinn in the days since they’d seen each other, and she was trying to respect her need for space.

One pleasant surprise, though, was that she had heard from Emma in the intervening days. She messaged and talked to her regularly, in fact—whether it was just a quick picture of Paisley at the library, or a note about a book that Emma enjoyed, or a call just to check in on Liv while Emma made her family dinner. It was lovely to be back in touch, to have that piece of her old life back.

And she was trying to make sure that she didn’t sink into old habits. She’d kept her life cut in two back in college: when she was in Michigan, with her college friends, she did whatever she could to not talk about her life in Chicago. When she was in Chicago, with her family, she didn’t talk about Michigan, except to update her parents on school. She had shared brief things with Quinn and Emma about her family, the situation with Conner, her life back home. But she’d worked diligently to keep the conversations brief, trying to control the narrative.

Now, she was trying to be purposeful in how she talked to Emma, to share what her life really looked like here. She texted photos from her apartment in the Chicago suburbs. One night, they had a video call, and she gave Emma a tour of her place. She told her about work, about how much she actually enjoyed her job, even if sometimes it still felt like she was carrying her family with her through each day.

They talked openly, at least, as openly as they could while keeping major topics off the table. They didn’t often discuss college. They stuck more to their current lives, deftly avoiding the subject of why they hadn’t spoken in ten years.

And, of course, they didn’t discuss Quinn. Liv wanted to ask how she was doing, wanted to ask Emma’s opinion on this whole thing, but she wasn’t going to bring it up. If Emma wanted to talk about something, to give her opinion or advice, she certainly wasn’t shy about it back in college, so Liv assumed that she wouldn’t hesitate to share her viewpoints now.

So, Liv was okay. She was rebuilding a friendship, she was getting back into the groove of things at work, and she was not—she wasn’t—preoccupied with Quinn.

Her parents had invited her over for dinner on the following Friday night, something they always tried to do, just the three of them, when any of them had been gone a while on a trip. Though she’d obviously seen her mom since her return from Australia, it had been in the midst of the chaos of the conference, of Rhea’s visit, and, of course, unbeknownst to her parents, her personal emotional turmoil of seeing Quinn, so she figured it made sense for them to have that time to reset.

Neither of Liv’s parents cooked much. They’d had a live-in nanny and a housekeeper when she was growing up who split meal preparation tasks, though now they mostly subsisted on a ready-to-eat meal plan service and takeout. On this night, they’d had dinner brought in from her favorite local restaurant, a simple rice and chicken dish that her mom had served on chinaware older than Liv.

Liv was powering through this meal, trying desperately to pay attention as her mom talked about drama that had happened during her trip, but Liv found that she just couldn’t quite focus.

“You’ve been quiet this evening,” Liv’s mom said, and yeah, it must be bad if her mom was calling her out.

“I’m just…exhausted,” Liv replied, but she knew they weren’t going to accept that as an answer. They’d been in therapy for years, working nonstop on their communication. There was no way they weren’t going to push, even if only lightly.

“Olivia,” her dad said gently. “Is everything okay?”

It was, right? She was returning to her routine, and she was okay, or at least she knew that she would be. She just needed to get past the aftershocks of seeing Quinn again, and she would be good.

“Livvie.” Her mom was trying to add to the gentle parenting attempt, her eyes soft, her tone kind. “Are you okay?”

And, regardless of how difficult their relationship had been, regardless of how she was still working to develop the connection with her mother beyond surface topics, the way her mom asked that question made her feel like a little kid, like her parents had the power to make everything better.

“Last week was kind of overwhelming for me,” Liv admitted. She was purposely not looking at them, focusing instead on the design of her plate, a pattern that she’d memorized long ago.

“Did we put too much on you for the conference?” her dad asked. “I thought you were managing it well, but we can certainly make adjustments for next year if it’s too much, or if your oversight of the event was eating too much into your regular duties?”

“No, nothing like that,” Liv assured him. “I enjoy planning the event. It’s, um. It’s not work related.”

They were blatantly bewildered by that, which…rude. But also fair. Liv didn’t have much going on outside of work, so she supposed she could understand their confusion.

Liv was quiet for a few seconds, all of them letting the moment breathe. “I know we haven’t talked much about it…but do you guys remember when I told you that there was someone at college? Someone who I was…kind of…in a relationship with?”

She caught it as her parents glanced at each other for an instant before nodding. It was her mom who spoke. “Your female friend?”

The moment was a little tense, sure, but she laughed, nodding. “My gal pal, yes.”

“Of course we remember this,” her dad said.

“You said you thought you could have been happy with her,” her mom added, and while Liv didn’t recall using those words, it certainly sounded like something she would have said.

Liv nodded again. “She was here last week.”

“In Chicago,” her mom said, sounding both surprised and extremely interested in the gossip. Liv had to admit that she loved hearing her mom amused by the conversation.

“At the conference,” Liv corrected, and her mom’s jaw dropped. “One of the speakers.”

“Your ex is one of the ‘do it badly’ girls,” her dad realized, awestruck, referencing their viral video in a way that almost sounded like he thought of them as celebrities.

“Yeah, Audrey said that you had talked to them about Livingston,” Liv said, not bothering to try to explain that Quinn wasn’t exactly her ‘ex.’ “Quinn, the one with shorter hair, she was… Well, we were good friends while I was there.”