“I feel like we’re undercover,” Julia says in the car. “Can we have code names? I want something badass. Like… Lilith Copperstone.”
“Why do I feel like you’ve been waiting to use that name? You came up with that way too quickly.” I check my mascara in my rearview mirror. I’m wearing one of my harpist dresses, ideal for blending in, my hair loose and wavy. “And no, we are absolutely not using names that might make us stand out in any way. You’re still Julia.”
The idea came to me last night, when I was in the middle of an intense mope session after texting Tarek. I can’t even begin to explain how sorry I am, I wrote. Do you think we could talk?
He didn’t reply. There had to be a way to show him I wasn’t the person I was last year, because, of course, he wasn’t either. I had to show him I’d finally figured it out. Tell him he’s never been nothing to me.
And then it hit me. The biggest—dare I say grandest—way to show I’ve changed.
“What do we say if someone asks who we know?” Julia says.
“Hopefully they won’t. But ‘family friend’ is probably the easiest, or that our parents are friends with the POGs or POBs,” I say. “We’re more crashing the wedding vendor as opposed to the actual wedding.”
“Not nearly as exciting.”
“Have I said thank you enough yet? Because seriously, thank you.”
“A few more times wouldn’t hurt.”
Our first attempt is a winery out in Woodinville, but when there’s no Mansour’s van out back, we move on. The next one is a hip event space in Capitol Hill. We get there right as guests are arriving, and Julia squeezes my hand as I square my shoulders and charge forward, using any amount of confidence and elegance I’ve gained over the past eighteen years to pretend like we fit in.
We fall in line behind a family with two young kids, one of them complaining about how long the ceremony was. “You’ll get to have cake soon, I promise,” the father is saying.
When we get inside, most people are checking their sweaters and bags, making their way toward the hand-lettered seating chart to see where their table is. Instead, I drag Julia down a skinny hallway, where I’m guessing there’s some kind of prep area for the caterers.
“Do you want me to stay out here? Keep watch or something?” Julia says.
“Sure,” I say. I’ve needed the moral support, but I need to do this next part on my own. “Thank you.”
On the other side of a glassed wall, waiters swarm around trays and plates and pots of hot food. My stomach turns over when I spot Harun, and then Tarek’s mom, and then Tarek, busying himself with a platter of what look like mini quiches.
It’s been only a week and a half, but he somehow manages to look both different and painfully familiar, his hair slightly longer, his jawline scruffier. If his posture indicates anything less than his usual confidence, I must be seeing things, wishing them into being.
I’m about to open the door when he heads toward it with the tray of quiches. And suddenly this whole thing seems like a terrible idea. He’s working. There’s barely enough time for me to flatten myself against the wall as Julia flashes me a panicked “What are you doing?” look. I motion to the door just as it swings open, and then I close my eyes and hope he doesn’t see me.
“Quinn?”
Slowly, I open one eye and give him a pathetic little wave. “Hi,” I say as an anxiety-laugh slips out.
He doesn’t seem to find it funny. “What’s going on?” From the expression on his face, dark brows pinched, it’s clear I’m the last person he wants to see. “What are you doing here?”
“I needed to talk to you, and you weren’t answering my texts, and—”
“Huh. Generally, if someone doesn’t respond, it means they don’t want to talk to you.”
“That’s what I thought for a year. But we both know that wasn’t true.” I take a step closer, and he seems to soften for a moment before shaking himself out of it.
“I’m working,” he says, bouncing the quiches. I spy a patch of red on his wrist. A flare-up. “I have to take these out.”
“Wait. Wait. Just hear me out. I promise, I’ll be fast.” I didn’t plan this far ahead. I assumed he’d be so swept away by the gesture that he’d wrap me in his arms, tell me he saved a slice of cake for us. But, ugh, I guess grand gestures tend to be accompanied by grand speeches. And I have no idea what to say. “I screwed up.” I have to show him I can do the kind of romance he wants. That I can be in a relationship—that I want a relationship. With him. “I’m so, so sorry. I shouldn’t have said those things about you—to you. I don’t feel that way at all.”
“How do you feel, then?”
“I… want a relationship.” There it is.
He snorts. Not the reaction I was expecting. “Really,” he says, deadpan. “Why? Why now?”
“Because I miss you. I care about you.” I fling an arm up, motioning to the venue around us. “Why else do you think I’m doing this, this grand gesture?”
At that, he just blinks at me. “So that’s what this is.” He switches the tray to his other hand. “A grand gesture is supposed to be this earnest, selfless declaration of love. This just feels like a performance.”
“And everything you did for me wasn’t?” I say. I didn’t want to fight with him, but I’m not the only one who messed up.
