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She found Everett sitting on the curb of the parking lot with a cigarette resting between two fingers. The sunset painted a starburst halo over his head.
She waited for her heart to flip over like a pancake.
It didn’t.
Almost as if she’d left the vital organ back in West Hollywood.
“Hey,” she said, trying not to cough. Not her finest opening line.
Everett swiveled and his mouth dropped. “Cee? Oh my God, kid.” Stubbing out the cigarette on the pavement, he got up and wrapped her in a bear hug. “What are you doing here?”
Brushing her hair out of her face from where he’d accidentally pushed the heavy locks into her lipstick, she aimed for nonchalant. “Thought I’d catch the show.”
“Wow.” He nodded his chin at her suitcases. “You planning on moving in?”
“Not exactly. I, ah.” It’s only embarrassing if you let it be embarrassing. “I’m on my way back to New York. This is a layover.”
“What?” His face fell. “Trip’s over already? How much trouble could you have possibly gotten into over the course of one summer?”
“You’d be surprised.” Her laugh turned into a wince.
“I can’t believe this. I can’t believe you’re here.” Everett’s eyes traced her from head to toe. “You look different.”
Clara tried not to fidget. She’d waited a long time for him to look at her with unbridled interest. So why did it make her long to wipe off her makeup and pull on sweats? Everett only ever saw her at her best. Her most polished. Josh had seen her covered in flour and raw egg, in lounge clothes that made her resemble a human potato, and in a terrible hospital nightgown—bruised and battered. Not to mention buck naked. He looked at her the same way when she was stripped to her foundation as he did when she was decked to the nines.
Everett gestured at her general form. “Did you do something different?”
She knew he meant had she dyed her hair or lost weight or bought a new shade of lipstick. But the more honest answer went beyond the way she looked.
This summer, she’d done a lot of things differently.
While on paper, she was ending the summer the same way she’d started it—unemployed, single, and in search of housing—she’d recently learned that sometimes the facts only told half of the story.
If her name had never appeared in those articles, today would have gone a lot differently. She’d seen the bottle of champagne Josh had bought weeks ago and tried to hide behind a grapefruit at the back of the fridge. In another life, they were toasting their success right now, the bubbles stinging her nose each time he made her laugh.
“You know,” she said, folding her legs to sit next to Everett on the sidewalk, “I think I might be a coward.”
He ran a hand across his head, ruffling the dark hair. “Come on.”
“I’m serious.” She could still feel the tequila hot in her throat, loosening her tongue. “I spent all those years in art school. Countless hours observing creators, their patterns and motivations, their fears, and their pain. And I never once had the guts to make something with my own name on it.” Shameless could have changed everything if she’d had the strength to claim it.
“There are worse things than being afraid,” Everett said gently. “I was always really proud of you going for your PhD. Keeping art history alive. I’d picture you in a museum somewhere, showing everyone how much smarter you are than them. The path you chose suits you.”
The future he described had always been the plan. The Guggenheim. Perfectly tailored pantsuits. A lifetime preserved in a temperature-controlled room.
“I’m more than my job.” The words came out bare. Truth without accusation. The first lesson, though not the last, that she’d learned from Josh.
Inside, she heard the band begin to tune up. The drumbeat was almost visible in the stifling Nevada heat. Why had she come here?
Up close, it was stupidly obvious that Everett was never going to want her. He was never going to look back on their friendship and wish for more. Never going to lie awake in bed wondering where he’d gone wrong. Never going to see her name in the Sunday wedding section and taste regret. Hollywood had promised her that if she loved hard enough, pined long enough, threw herself in his path, again and again, eventually, her childhood best friend would fall for her.
But real life didn’t account for free will.
It didn’t matter how many reasons she could list why Everett should love
her. He didn’t. Not in the way she’d always wanted. And until she stopped waiting for a love she felt she was due, she’d never be able to imagine the future with anyone else.
Everett ran his hands down his jeans-covered calves. “I guess you’re not the girl with Popsicle-stained lips trying to dunk me in the pool anymore.”
