Page 100 of Fate Fiction

Maybe: Evan

Hey.

It’s Evan.

I fly in the 10th and leave the 15th early in the a.m. I have meetings in the mornings but would love to get dinner. Are you free then?

More importantly, do you want to see me?

He’d love to get dinner.

Love.

My hands hovered over my phone keyboard. I wanted to see him, there was no question about that. Despite the possibility that he could be using this as a chance to tell me off more thoroughly or sue for emotional damages, I needed the closure.

I’m free that Friday.

The truth was I was free basically every night, but he didn’t have to know that. A handful of variants of a message that indicated that I did, in fact, want to see him sat in the text box. None of them felt right. None of them could convey these bizarre conflicting emotions I was feeling.

I had two weeks to figure out what I’d say to him when I saw him again. He clearly wanted to talk to me, I still wasn’t sure about what. I decided not to save his contact to avoid any permanence to this situation.

nineteen

. . .

Two weeks later, Early September

This calendar date loomed over me like a doomsday clock.

For two weeks, dread sat in the pit of my stomach as I tried to be cool about it and force myself to pretend it wasn’t happening at all. Superficially, I was. I’d smile and laugh with my best friends through patio drinks, walks to the train station, and nights on the floor of their living room.

When everything went quiet at night in bed, or in the mornings while I watched the sunlight pour onto my hardwood floor, the overwhelming weight of it all sunk onto my chest. It would become impossible to breathe.

I had painted him to be a caricature of himself. Someone who could never have loved me in the first place, someone who lived underneath a handsome and charming facade for those blissful five days. It was easier to envision him under a fictional filter.

Those two weeks passed without any further communication. Sometimes I’d click on his Instagram profile and scroll through his few posts. This was the home for his photography hobby, and he’d even uploaded a handful of pictures from our trip. His trip.

Nothing was actually “ours.”

The day before our supposed meet up I still hadn’t heard from him, to the point where I assumed that he’d forgotten it and I felt the relief of being an afterthought to him. The morning of I pretended like it was any other Friday, one where I didn’t have dinner plans with Evan McLeod at the end of it.

My relief was short lived when he sent a text confirming our…date? Was it a date? Was it a business meeting?

I texted the address of the hidden gem Mexican place in my neighborhood. It was the kind of low key spot no one would expect to see a TV star, and it was well within the comfortable confines of familiarity for me. I’d been to this place dozens of times, I’d have the upper hand.

Now, here I was with my hair curled in loose waves and a little casual dress flowing over my curves. I couldn’t overthink what I was wearing or what I’d look like. I tugged at the dress in the mirror and considered changing my mind again. Settling on an outfit that made sense felt impossible. I hovered between two realms, not trying so hard that it was obvious, not looking so casual it seemed like I’d given up.

In the midst of looking for a missing lipstick, I jumped at the noise of my phone buzzing on top of my vanity.

Maybe: Evan

I’m leaving the hotel now

Ok. I’ll meet you there.

Maybe: Evan:

I can also pick you up.