Well Played, стр. 78

“Hey.” He paused and looked around, as though that single word was all he had planned to say.

“Hey,” I said back tentatively. I wasn’t in the mood for MacLeans right now, and I had no desire to make this conversation any easier for him. After an awkward few seconds he cleared his throat.

“Listen, I just wanted to make sure that you’re cool.”

I raised my eyebrows. “That I’m what?”

“You know, that you’re okay. You seemed really upset the other night. At the hotel?”

My lips twitched at the question. As if I’d forgotten Thursday night. “That’s because I was.” That was a hell of an understatement. What on earth was he going to do about it?

“Yeah.” He rubbed the back of his neck. Dex clearly wasn’t an apology kind of guy, and he was totally at sea here.

But it wasn’t my job to help him. “Did you need anything else?” I gestured back to the lane; I really wanted to be on my way.

“Yeah. No. I . . .” He gave an exasperated sigh. “I just wanted to make sure you’re okay.”

“That I’m okay,” I echoed, my voice flat. I was the exact opposite of okay. Would I ever be okay again?

“That you’re okay,” he repeated. “Like I said the other night, I think you’re great, I really do. And if I said anything, or did anything, to upset you . . .” He shrugged. “Well, that wasn’t what I was trying to do.” His eyes met mine squarely, and I felt a jolt. His eyes were brown, like mine, not the startling green of Daniel’s. But there was something in the shape of them, and in his expression, that reminded me: oh, yeah. They were related.

And he really was trying. To be honest, this was probably the longest conversation Dex and I had ever had, even during those summers when we were . . . well, I don’t think I could use the word together to describe what we’d been doing. Not anymore. Not when I’d been with Daniel, and truly knew what together meant.

So instead of telling him where he could shove his inadequate almost-apology, I decided to take it at face value. “Thanks,” I said. “I’m not doing great right now, but I think I’ll be okay.” Sure, that last bit was a lie—but he didn’t need to know that.

Dex’s expression cleared, like a puppy with a short attention span. “Good.” He gave me a gentle punch on the shoulder, which was probably meant in the spirit of camaraderie, but really just showed me that he had no idea how to relate to a woman he wasn’t actively trying to bed. “I gotta get back.” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder. “Show in a few minutes. But good talk, yeah?”

I blinked a few times as he all but bounded away. “Yeah,” I said after him. “Good talk.” I strode down the lane, away from the Marlowe Stage as fast as my feet could carry me. I needed to get the last day of this topsy-turvy Faire season out of my system; I could start fresh next year. I twirled the dragonfly pendant between my fingers as I walked. Dragonflies meant change, Daniel had said to me last summer. I’d had a little too much change.

At the same time, I’d had no change at all. Back to work on Tuesday. Book club later that week. I’d stayed up late a couple nights finishing the book since I was supposed to lead the discussion, which left me overtired and irritated. The little sleep I’d managed was fragmented and interspersed with dreams that hinged on the plot of the book I’d just read—a woman finding herself and moving on after a breakup. Or were the dreams about me? I was too tired to try and figure it out.

By the time I got to book club that night I’d had three cups of coffee too many and a bad day at work. The last thing I wanted to do was talk about some fictional woman’s problems. But I forged ahead anyway, helping Chris’s daughter Nicole arrange the chairs in a circle, setting out the wine and snacks as Emily and I always did.

“So, what do we think?” The bright smile on my face belied my churning insides as I consulted the book club questions provided by the publisher. “When Molly chooses to leave her old life behind to renovate the farmhouse in the Midwest, what does that symbolize? Does anyone have any thoughts on that?”

On my right, April shrugged. “I’m not a symbolism kind of person. Can’t a farmhouse just be a farmhouse?”

Chris snorted and popped another cube of cheese in her mouth. “I don’t know, I could go either way with that. I think I can see where the author was going with the symbolism. Scraping off the old paint as a way of showing how Molly sheds the skin of her old life.”

“Right.” My mom leaned forward, clearly interested in this line of discussion. “She talks about the house being vulnerable before the new coat of paint goes up. Maybe that’s how Molly feels herself, being between relationships? Raw, like a layer of herself has been scraped away? And once she gets into that new relationship, with the guy who helps her put the new coat of paint on the house, she feels strong again.”

“But why?” April made a tsk sound. “Why does it have to be a guy, or a relationship, that makes you feel strong? I don’t like that message: that a woman can only be strong if she’s with someone. Why can’t Molly have painted the house on her own?”

“I agree,” I said. “What kind of message is that, that you’re nothing without a guy? That’s crap. There’s nothing wrong with being single. In fact, it can be liberating. You’re not dependent on anyone else to make you happy, you can just . . . live your life. Right?” I turned to