“Well, that is a coincidence, because my friend Lynne just walked in too. Where is Linda?”
Shawn gestures to Lynne’s table and a sinking feeling starts in my gut. When we were kids, Lynne, who always thought her name was an old lady name, used to say that she would reinvent herself as Lindsay or Lisa or Linda when she went into business. The California connection. The pasta turns to lead in my stomach. It’s just not possible. I turn back around quickly before she sees me. “Maybe we should bail?”
“Of course not. We’re adults; I’m sure she won’t make a scene. Besides, what do they say is always the best revenge when running into an evil ex? To be madly in love with a gorgeous, smart, funny, spectacular woman on your arm?”
“Yeah, that’s what they say.” I down the rest of my wine quickly.
“Well, prepare yourself, she’s coming over.”
Maybe it isn’t her. Maybe he was pointing at the table behind them, and it will be a funny story Lynne and I can tell Teresa later.
“Shawn,” says Lynne’s voice over my head. Fuck.
“Linda,” he says, rising. “You look well.”
“Visiting from San Francisco?” she asks, still not noticing me.
“I left San Francisco a couple of years ago, moved back here. You in from L.A.?”
“Nope, moved back myself a few months ago.”
I can see the dark cloud move over Shawn’s face, and I can’t blame him. Since moving anywhere for his career was a big part of what broke them up, even just a few hours away from L.A., it must be a real slap to hear that she moved all the way back to Chicago. “How interesting,” he says.
“Yes, well. And I’m sorry, so rude of me, who is your lady friend . . .” She turns to introduce herself to me and I look up at her. “Eloise?”
“Hi. Small world.”
“How do you two know each other?” Shawn looks very confused.
“This is my friend Lynne. That I told you about,” I say.
“More importantly, how do you two know each other?” Lynne asks.
“Eloise is my girlfriend. My interior designer fixed us up a few months ago. ‘Lynne’? Back to your roots, are you?” There is venom in Shawn’s voice.
“Figured if I was going to lose the last name, might as well lose the first as well.” Never would have pegged Lynne for taking her husband’s name. Maybe she’s a little more traditional than I thought. Crap. Her husband. Shawn, my Shawn, was her Mr. So-Very-Wrong. “Eloise, this can’t be the guy you were describing to me,” Lynne says, narrowing her eyes at me. I think back to all my effusive praise of Shawn, especially his prowess in the bedroom, and I blush deeply. “Not the man I know so well—he isn’t capable of it. At least it’s early enough to save yourself. I’m certainly glad we ran into each other.”
Save myself from the best relationship I’ve ever had? “I don’t know what you mean, but I think we all need some air and some space.” All I want is to get out of here.
“I mean that of course you aren’t going to still date him, now that you know who and what he really is.” Lynne says this as a statement of fact, and it burns into my chest like a laser.
“Linda, please do not make me forget my mama’s careful upbringing,” Shawn says with a low growl.
“For all her efforts, you’d think you’d have turned out better.”
“Wow. I’d have thought after all this time, all this space, that I wouldn’t be so much as a blip on your radar.”
“And you’re not. But if you think I’m going to just sit here and let you hoodwink my poor dear friend here, you have another think coming.”
I can feel my face burning. “Lynne, can we all take a breath and talk about this?” This is the worst possible thing. I care about Lynne and her feelings, but I’m in love with Shawn, and while I’m a big believer in girl code, and never would have started dating him if I had known who he was, I don’t think I can stop now.
“What on earth is there to discuss?”
“Lynne, I’m sure that this is shocking to all of us, but I’m not prepared to stop dating Shawn just because you used to be married.”
“Well, that tells me where your loyalties are. For someone who hasn’t had so much as a date for years, I find it fascinating that you will choose some new piece of boy over your oldest, dearest friend.”
“That’s unfair . . .” I hate how quiet and defeated my voice sounds. I was never able to stand up to Lynne, not when we were kids; she was always so sure of her rightness. The tone in her voice sends me right back to that place.
“Linda, so help me . . .” Shawn is livid. “That is enough.”
Her whole face goes stony. “Fine. Enjoy each other. Eloise, don’t say I didn’t warn you. Really, good luck, both of you.” She turns on a heel, heads back to her table, and whispers something to Angelique, and the two of them look over at our table and head for the door.
“I’m so sorry,” Shawn says. “She’s a nightmare.”
“And one of my oldest friends,” I say.
“Yeah. That too. Talk about your shit sandwich. I hope I haven’t ruined your friendship.”
I look up at him. “I frankly don’t care a flying fig about my friendship, not when she was just so awful.”
“She and I always did push each other’s buttons, bring out the worst in each other. But that doesn’t mean you throw away twenty-five years of friendship. Not over me.”
I think about this. “Four years. Four years of friendship, twenty years ago. And a few months of reconnection. If you take high school out of the equation, I’ve only known her two months longer than I’ve known you, and you are a much better addition to my life.” I’ve never been so angry, so hurt. That she would immediately go for the jugular with me, knowing my past, knowing how hard it was for me to open up to a relationship; I don’t care that they had a bad marriage, that doesn’t excuse her behavior.
“Thank you for that. I love you, El, I really do. I don’t want anything to mess that up, especially not my ex.”
“I love you too. I’m going to pretend for her sake that she was having an out-of-body experience, and give her some time to cool off and get her head right. But know this: If she can’t get past it? I choose you.” The words are stronger in my mouth than they are in my heart. I feel awful at this turn of events, and, what is worse, I feel awful that I am feeling so certain in choosing Shawn over Lynne. I should need some time, I should need to talk to Lynne alone when heads are cooler. But deep down, I know my heart won’t change. And the idea that I don’t feel worse about it makes me feel terrible. Like the worst friend on the planet. Teresa is going to freak out. I hope she will back me up, and if I lose Lynne, I hope I don’t lose her too.
Shawn reaches across the table to take my hand just as a wave of five different desserts arrives at the table, courtesy of Lisa the pastry chef. “We’re going to need a couple of bourbons, one cube each,” he says to the waiter, reading my mind.
Armed with the strength of renewed commitment to each other, and a pair of forks, we reach out and choose the abundant sweetness that lies before us to erase the bitterness in the past. Whatever that choice may bring.
Seventeen