I stand in the mirror on Monday morning, studying my image, thinking of the two sides of me represented in the dating-site photos. The one who is free and confident. The one who is anything but those things. Right now I’m her, the girl who has pridefully lived up to the geeky librarian persona with my dark hair neatly pinned at my nape, my thick-rimmed glasses solidly on my face. But is that pride about who I want to be or the limits I’ve placed on myself?
Adam’s words replay in my head for about the hundredth time:
“You looked beautiful and natural in the first photo. In the new photo you just put up, you look guarded and awkward. As if you’re afraid to be the woman in the first photo.”
I let out a choked laugh. “How can I be afraid to be me?”
And yet I changed that picture with whiplash speed in denial of something, didn’t I? Fear, I decide, is a bit like those relatives at holiday gatherings you dread seeing—in my case my aunt Betsie, who tries to recruit me to hot yoga to cleanse my karma. There’s only one way to avoid Aunt Betsie, and that’s to stay home, in which case I miss everyone else.
And so I don’t stay home, not on the holidays, but it seems I do the rest of my life.
I’m tired of staying home.
I open a drawer filled with a variety of colored lipsticks, all of which Jess has gifted me with the promise, “They look gorgeous, darling.” I choose the least intimidating, a pale-pink shade, and slide it over my lips. It’s subtle, but it does seem to brighten my features. I also think I have a sweater that, contrary to my Christmas-tree wardrobe, is this shade.
With a quick pace, I walk to my closet, dig way in the back, and there it is. A long, silky pale pink, almost nude, sweater, also compliments of Jess. I quickly change into it and return to the mirror. The color changes to my lips and sweater are nothing dramatic, and I doubt anyone will notice anyway.
My phone buzzes with a text message from Jess that reads: Coffee? Lunch?
It’s not that I don’t want to meet her, but this new me, trying to be some other me, needs to do so on my terms. I text back: Can’t do coffee Will text you midmorning and see about lunch.
She sends back two emojis: a sad face and a happy face.
I head down the stairs, and, truly, I don’t recognize the girl who spent all weekend talking to Adam and who turns down coffee with Jess. I’m not sure that’s a bad thing, though. To Jack’s point, on many occasions, I do compare myself to Jess. I don’t plan to snub Jess, by any means, but I’m not sure I can find me if I don’t give myself a little time with, well, me.
I’m set enough on this strategy that I stop at a coffee shop a few blocks from my normal walking path, the Caffeine Castle. A silly name with sillier drink names, but they taste good.
I’m just about to head inside when a familiar face exits the coffee shop. Mike Adams, of all names, considering the current Adam in my life, is an old college acquaintance who is both good looking and successful. Mike is an FBI agent who personifies the television imagery of an FBI agent, dressed in a fitted suit with his dark hair cut short to the scalp. My knowledge of his career choice is not a product of a friendship but rather of him visiting floor three to show us photos of a suspect he was hunting. I knew the man but hadn’t seen him in months.
“Mia,” he greets, his tone friendly in a genuine way. “How are you?”
“I’m good,” I say, and I’m struck by how comfortable I am with Mike. Truly, we really don’t know each other well outside of our study group, but he has a calming presence, and he has always called me by my name. “Or I will be when I get my coffee,” I add. “Is the FBI office near here?”
“It is, but I also live nearby,” he says. “I just moved downtown to be closer to the office. You still at the library?”
“Still a book geek,” I assure him. “I hope you caught that guy you were looking for.”
“Not yet,” he says, “but we will.” His watch buzzes with a text message, and he lifts his wrist and reads a text that flits across the screen. “Damn. Gotta go, but I’m sure we’ll run into each other again now that I’m in the neighborhood.” He opens the door for me. “I highly recommend the White Elephant,” he says, indicating his cup.
“I’ll try it,” I say. “Stay safe.”
I head inside, the exchange leaving me with the sense of the casual but rather meaningless banter one shares with passing neighbors. Already my mind is leaving it behind, scurrying through the lost minutes and my growing urgency to grab my coffee and head to work.
I walk to the counter, order a White Elephant, which is a white mocha with Snickers flavoring, and then head to the bathroom. Or I plan to head to the bathroom but freeze just outside the archway leading to the sitting area, in shock at what I discover. Jack is sitting at a table across from a man, and for just a moment, from the rear, which is the only view available of the stranger, he looks like Adam.
Still, I find myself skipping the run to the bathroom.
I walk back to the counter, and I make sure the barista does not call out my name, not that this was ever an issue. When I pick up my cup, it reads only, “White Elephant with whip.” I don’t linger on the generic writing. My White Elephant and I rush for the door.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
The fragility of friendship is on my mind as I start the hurried walk toward the library, thankful that I’m the opening manager this week and due to be in the library before Jack today. This allows me the much-needed time to think, to process why I somehow feel as if him sitting with a stranger is a betrayal. Why I ran from him rather than greeted him. These reactions are illogical, but there is no denying their existence. There’s something in the core of our relationship rotting away, and I do not understand how or why.
This idea journeys my mind through history again, landing solidly on my first lesson in that fragility. Ana, the childhood friend who I’d accidentally tripped, is at the center of that lesson. While I cried and worried about her after her fall, she told everyone I’d hurt her on purpose.
I hadn’t been ignored when I was mocked and tormented by her friends, who were once mine. But shortly after I’d become nothing but a ghost to those I’d played with, celebrated birthdays with, called friends. So easily life shifts, night from day, sunny to stormy.
I’m back to why I ran away from Jack today.
My answer is one dirty word.
Secrets.
They’re in the air, burning through the sweet smell of friendship and leaving behind a bitterness I cannot quite name.
I only know that as an adult, we are faced with the reality that secrets exist. They come at us in shades of many colors, in both small and large, layered with history, if only that of how we were raised.
Who was Jack sitting with, and why does it feel like a secret?
Why is my skin prickling, nerves jumping around?
My pace quickens with my heart rate, my mind jumping here and there, landing far in the past this time, in my childhood, where my own secret originates. When I was five, my little mind conjured a group of imaginary friends, four pastel-colored cartoon character animals. Only, pastel colors and cartoonlike characters do not represent friends at all. They were mean, stalking me, scaring me. No, terrifying me. Yes, I really did manage to transform cartoon characters in shades of pink and neon blue into demons. I’m sure a psychologist would tell me this is representative of a fear of the world—or myself, maybe.
Or something else I choose not to linger on.
Whatever the case, the entire situation feels weird, and no one knows about this part of me but my parents.
And now Adam.