“Then let’s do this,” he said. They took the stage half an hour later and they moved fluidly through the set list, to deafening applause from not only the table of Brian’s fiancée and friends, but the bar patrons themselves. It was a decent-sized crowd, a little older and more respectful than some of the audiences Layla had played for in the past. They sipped their wine and their whiskey and they watched attentively as Brian and Layla sang “Brown-Eyed Girl,” “Mustang Sally,” and “Fire and Rain.” The older songs were always crowd favorites, but the set list also contained more recent songs from the Lumineers, Mumford & Sons, Sufjan Stevens, and Adele. They dusted off a few duets—“The Time of My Life” and “Leather and Lace”—that everyone seemed to enjoy. They played three forty-minute sets, and for Layla it felt like they’d flown by in seconds. Brian had asked if there were any songs she wanted to add to the set list, and she’d suggested a few, making sure he knew them, and he did.
At the end of the evening, she and Brian hugged, high-fived, and smiled like a couple of kids who’d been called up to the big leagues after patiently waiting their turn on the sidelines. Jeannie came up to them and threw her arms around Brian. He picked her up off the floor and they kissed. Layla stood awkwardly to the side as the others who had been sitting with Jeannie came up to offer handshakes and hugs. They were all so coupled up, and though Layla was bursting with excitement and happiness, she had no one there to share it with. This was the kind of thing you shared with a spouse or significant other. It was the kind of thing she’d have rushed home to share with Liam, if for some reason he hadn’t been there to see it for himself.
“I’m not sure if we’ll ever be asked back but only because my friend really likes this steady gig,” Brian said.
“That’s okay,” she said. “I don’t know if I’m ready for that, anyway.” What Layla did know was that tonight’s performance had been exactly what her creative soul needed. It had felt so good and it had been a long time since she felt those feelings. The sheer and utter bliss of doing what she loved in front of a crowd. Watching their faces. Seeing them smile and stop talking to each other and set down their drinks and listen.
She said her good-byes and then she drove home and got ready for bed. She patted the space beside her, and Norton jumped up and cuddled close, falling asleep instantly.
Layla was exhausted but couldn’t fall asleep.
This was what the rest of her life could look like. Maybe a few more opportunities for creative expression and doing whatever else she wanted to do with her time. She saw nothing but freedom ahead of her, and she realized that Liam had given her the greatest gift by showing her that she wasn’t shiny enough for him after all.
And lying there in the dark, still high on adrenaline, Layla decided not to regret the fact that what she hadn’t realized all those years ago was that Liam was never going to be enough for her, either.
chapter 26
Layla
On Saturday afternoon, Layla did, in fact, have plans to go to a movie with Tonya. Layla had already told her all about New Year’s Eve and Tonya had seemed genuinely crushed that Layla hadn’t invited her and her husband to come.
“But you had that party to go to. And you were meeting friends.”
“We would have come,” Tonya said. “We would have brought everyone with us.”
“Next time for sure,” Layla promised.
Before she left the house, Layla crouched down to give Norton a treat. He scarfed it down and then he panted and pushed his head into her chest. She put her arms around him and gave him a hug, and she didn’t feel the least bit foolish about it, either.
Layla and Tonya found their seats and sat down with their popcorn, waiting for the lights to dim. “How’s the dog sitting going?”
“Good. It’s hard to leave him at home. He looks so sad.”
“Where did you say Josh was again?”
“He started out in Colorado, but he and Sasha flew home and then he went to Vegas. Bachelor party. Probably drowning in women and whiskey by now. He’ll be home tomorrow.” Layla told Tonya how she’d been sending photos of the dog every day.
“So, you’re texting with him regularly?”
“Just so Sasha could see pictures of her dog.” Unlike the last time she’d watched the dog, Josh’s responses to her texts hadn’t involved much more than a short comment or a simple thank-you. “I’m not sending them anymore now that Sasha isn’t with him. Also, I mentioned I might be seeing a movie and he asked if I was going with a boyfriend. I told him I didn’t have a boyfriend and was going out with you, as usual.”
“And? What did he do with that magical slam-dunk opening?”
“Nothing. He did nothing with it. Total crickets. Maybe he’s got a girlfriend or something.”
“Would you have said yes if he’d asked you out?”
“I don’t know. I feel like I’m ready for something casual. Or ready-ish. But it’s a moot point because he didn’t ask.”
“Or maybe he doesn’t have a girlfriend but thinks there’s a policy about asking his daughter’s teacher out on a date or something.” There was no such policy, but dating the parent of a student did require some degree of discretion, at least while Layla was at school.
“Maybe he’s not interested.”
“Or…,” Tonya said, drawing the word out. “Maybe he is interested but is worried about the awkwardness of seeing you every morning if you turn him down.”
Layla reached for Tonya’s box of M&M’s and dumped half of them in their shared tub of popcorn. “We can hypothesize all day, my friend. But only Josh knows the answer to this one.”
“He seems like a great guy,” Tonya said.
Layla dumped the rest of the M&M’s into the popcorn and said, “They all do at first.”
* * *
Norton was waiting at the door when she came back. Maybe Josh did have a girlfriend. Maybe he had zero interest in Layla and that’s why he hadn’t taken the opening. Maybe Layla wasn’t even sure she wanted him to. But what she hadn’t admitted to Tonya—what she could barely admit to herself—was that something inside her was waking up and that something was the part of her that wasn’t necessarily ready for a romantic relationship but still craved human companionship. Josh seemed like a perfectly viable choice, because he wasn’t a stranger she met on a dating app and he could relate to her situation, and she to his. He was nice and, if pressed, she would admit that he was not hard to look at, not at all. But as she’d already said, she knew nothing about his current situation, so there was no need to hypothesize about his availability or interest in her. Then Layla remembered something Tonya had once said, and she grabbed Norton’s leash. “Hey, buddy. Wanna go to PetSmart?”
* * *
The parking lot was awfully crowded for a Saturday night, and Norton turned into a total maniac the minute they set foot inside the store. “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Layla yelled, struggling to contain the big goofy dog as they made their way through aisles crowded with customers. “Shit,” she muttered. Maybe this place was for women who had small, well-behaved dogs. It wasn’t that Norton was especially naughty; Layla just got the impression he hadn’t spent a lot of time around other dogs and didn’t play well with others. He calmed down after about ten minutes of wandering the aisles and sniffing every single dog he encountered, none of whom were there with a nice man in his mid-to-late thirties.
“Norton!” she yelled when the dog noticed a cat someone had brought in on a leash. Norton put his nose so far up the cat’s butt that Layla apologized profusely to its owner.