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Shoshana knew down to her toes that she didn’t deserve the kindness reflected in Patti’s eyes. That feeling in the pit of her stomach she used to get when people started talking about her dad was coming back. She knew this was a bad idea. She wondered if she could duck out to the bathroom and then just not go back to the table. She had some cash; the hostess would probably help her. Her palms were getting clammy. She hated her own cowardice.
Patti was watching her, and after a moment, she said, “For what it’s worth,Ithought we were friends. And I’d like to still be friends. You know, if you want.”
“I think I would really like that,” Shoshana said, meaning it. She felt something like warmth blossoming in her chest and was surprised at the unexpected prick of tears. She shook her head, forcing a laugh before she could speak again. “I’m sorry, I don’t know why I’m having emotions.”
“Hey, it’s allowed,” Patti said, reaching across the table to grasp Shoshana’s hand, “Besides, if you need a reason, you’d be giving me mom-cred with Becca. You know you’re famous. You and the shop, I mean.”
“Oh God, no I’m not,” Shoshana said, feeling a flush creeping up her neck. She took another sip of her water for something to do.
“Yeah, girl, you really are. My daughter and I watch your videos every week. That one you did for the eighteenth-century settee. Remember you did like a Frankenstein fabric and stained the wood with beets? We totally used that as a guide and redid this old rocking chair in her bedroom.”
“You’re kidding,” Shoshana said, jaw dropping. She remembered that video. That settee had been a bitch. The cane backing didn’t need repair, which was a good thing, but staining the cane hadn’t gone as well as she’d hoped, and the video had taken roughly two weeks of shooting to complete a thirty minute segment.
“No, I’m not. Becs loved how it turned out--we used a different fabric though. Her daddy is still getting used to her liking the creepy stuff, so we had to go with a kind of flocked velvet damask. Hang on I’ll show you.” She reached behind her for her purse on the back of her chair and rooted around for a moment before coming back with her phone. She flicked through some things on the screen and handed the phone to Shoshana proudly. “That’s the before. If you go right, the next six or so pictures are how it turned out. That rocker was so seventies--it was my mom’s--but Becca loved it.”
“It turned out so great!” Shoshana said, impressed. She scrolled back to look at the before again. “You hid the staples for the fabric really professionally.”
“Becca had the idea to use the braid and a glue gun. She said you did that in another post somewhere,” Patti said, preening a little. The waiter arrived with their food and she sat back so he could put her plate in front of her. “We had so much fun with that. I think her dad was a little jealous we didn’t need his help--not that he would have known what to do anyway. He hung back in the corner talkin’ aboutwhat are you doing with perfectly good beetsand then acting like those are a vegetable he would eat on a good day. The man was just mad we didn’t need his belt sander.”
Shoshana laughed appreciatively and handed the phone back to her. The black hole in the pit of her stomach was replaced by something entirely different. She was relatively familiar with these kinds of conversations by direct message or in comments on her store’s various social media accounts, but she couldn’t remember the last time she’d had a conversation like this with someone who wasn’t a client paying her to do the work herself. She waved to the waiter before he could walk away and he stopped, waiting politely for her to tell him what she needed. Shoshana gestured to Patti’s place setting.
“Could I get a glass of that tea too?”
* * *
“So he just quit? With no warning? Who does that? No wonder I didn’t hear from you all day.” David sounded shocked, and Shoshana appreciated the show of outrage on her behalf. His brow furrowed in consternation. She bit her lip, digging in her bedside drawer for the bendable tripod she kept in there for her phone.
“Were you worried?” she asked, glancing at the phone. Her tone was playful, but she was genuinely curious. He had messaged her a few times during the day. He even called at some point while she was eating lunch with Patti. If it had been a normal day she would have giggled and responded immediately and obsessed with Baxter and Leah and Abi over what it all meant.
But it wasn’t a normal day.
Her best friend was leaving her.
And she’d learned some truths about herself.
“Yes, I was worried,” he said simply, and Shoshana straightened, giving the phone her full attention. He was in bed. It was after nine. She sighed, sitting down hard on the edge of her own bed and rubbing a hand over her face.
“I should have texted you sooner,” she said, because she had finally responded to one of his messages around seven. When Abi told her to.
Immediately after work, she’d gone to Abi’s house for dinner so that she could freak the fuck out. There had been a lot of yelling and cussing and she’d had an unholy temper tantrum on Abi’s rug.
“Is that an apology?” David said, his and there was a bit of humor in his tone. Shoshana rolled her eyes and gave him a pointed look as she reached back into the drawer, still intent on finding the annoying tripod thing so she could go hands free.
“Yeah, I mean--”
“I was kidding, Shoshana. I didn’t realize things had gotten so serious, I was worried maybe--about last night, I mean,” he said, then laughed shortly, shifting on the bed and taking his phone with him. He was wearing thick-framed, black glasses. Stubble darkened his jaw. His hair was rumpled, as though he’d been actually laying in bed before she’d FaceTimed him.
Shoshana met his gaze on the phone screen. Hoping her face held no trace of anything but absolute lust, because the last thing she wanted was for this man to doubt himself. After a moment she said, “Would it make you feel better if I told you thinking about last night was the only thing that got me through today?”
“Is it true?” he asked, then laughed, shaking his head. “Actually, don’t answer that, I would rather believe it.”
“It’s totally true,” Shoshana said, completely serious. “If I hadn’t been so thoroughly fucked already when he dropped that bombshell, I might have just burnt the whole place down.”
“Now you’re just stroking my ego,” David said, the smirk on his face a shade self-deprecating. He sobered, looking at her seriously. “Do you want to talk about it?”
“About stroking you?” she let the words trail off meaningfully as she positioned the phone on the tripod and sat back, triumphant. He laughed again and she thought about how much she loved the sound. She dipped her chin, looking more closely at the camera and said, “I like you like this, by the way.”
“Like how?” he said, hand reaching up to scratch his jaw again. Shoshana resisted the urge to tell him to show her the rest of the bedroom, because his headboard was one of those tufted, upholstered jobs and she was wondering if he was the type to just order individual furniture items or whole suites because it was easier. A person’s space was an extension of their personality, and he’d already seen hers, she reasoned. Also, she was probably trying to distract herself. She’d already cried on Leah and Abi’s shoulders.
