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But she wasn’t happy either.
I’d seen that coming over the last year, the tiny, barely perceptible signs of her growing restlessness: the hand stitched bone-laced corset, the brochures for gardening classes and guitar lessons littering her hallway, the self-improvement books on her workbench.
I hadn’t mentioned the signs. Part of me wondered if I just ignored them long enough, would they go away? But they hadn’t. And more and more I worried she had finally worked up the nerve to move on, away from Franklin Notch. Away from me.
“What’s your wish? Maybe that’ll inspire me to come up with one of my own.”
She swayed on her feet, the corners of her eyes crinkling as she thought. I waited patiently, emptying the rest of the wine bottle into my glass, intent on dumping it down the sink as soon as she turned away. She had already drank enough to regret all her life decisions in the morning, and I hoped to mitigate at least a little of that hangover.
“I have three.”
I let out a soft whistle. “Three? Big year, huh?”
She pushed off the counter and turned to face me, a tinge of sadness clouding her eyes that made all the pieces slip into place. I worried something was coming because something was coming, and I should have known all along.
“Your mom,” I grimaced, wanting to eat the words back down again.
“Mom,” she agreed with a sigh.
Thea’s mom had been twenty-seven when she died, both of us barely out of diapers. I remembered all the other important days: her mom’s birthday, the day of her death, her parents’ anniversary. How had I missed this one?
“I’m starting over this year,” she said, shifting the conversation so quickly that I blinked to make sense of her words.
“What does that mean?”
“I’m getting married and having a family.”
I choked on a sip of wine. “Excuse me?”
“You heard me,” she said defiantly.
“With Chase?” I asked.
I’d long ago trained my face not to react with anything besides a placid acceptance when it came to Thea’s long-time not-boyfriend.
Sure, I’d dated women that Thea didn’t love. Lauren was a prime example and Thea stayed pleasant with her regardless. I had a harder time with Chase. Maybe it was his salesman energy. He had an unnaturally white grin and a smile that never quite made it to his eyes.
Yet, he treated Thea well, and she seemed to enjoy his company. But after two years of… whatever arrangement they’d come to, I’d only been forced to interact with him a handful of times and he’d never spent longer than a night in Franklin Notch.
Hell, the guy hadn’t even come to our birthday party.
“I’m taking that under advisement,” she said, pursing her lips together smugly. The alcohol slurred the words together, and she sounded more like she said “advicemence” than “advisement,” undercutting the coy answer.
“Under advisement? What does that mean?”
“I’m going to forget this,” she mumbled, bumping me on the way to her junk drawer. She rifled through the pens and hair clips and batteries until she pulled out a pink notepad that read “Thea Dawson’s To Do List” at the top and a matching pink pen. She set the notepad on the counter and quickly scribbled out three barely legible words:
Marry
Chase?
Kids
She showed me the list triumphantly; her own little drunken manifesto.
“You gonna remember why you wrote that in the morning?” I asked, eyebrow raised.
“How could I forget something this important?” Except she slurred out the word “impotent,” giving the list a whole new meaning.
