CHAPTER 7: Second Thoughts
1186 Words
SLOANE
I woke up on the 29th convinced I had made the worst decision of my adult life.
The kids’ menu was on my nightstand like evidence in a crime scene. Crayon signatures, dinosaur border, three-second-kiss clause. In the gray morning light it looked exactly like what it was: proof of temporary insanity.
My pulse was already sprinting. I grabbed my phone and opened a blank text to Jackson.
Draft one:
This was a mistake. I’m out. Sorry.
I stared at it until the words blurred. Too cold.
Draft two:
Hey, I’ve been rethinking everything and I don’t think I can do this.
Too polite. Too easy for him to talk me back in.
Draft three:
I can’t lie to my entire family for a year. I’m sorry.
True, but dramatic.
I deleted all three and threw the phone across the bed like it was radioactive.
Then I did what any sane person does at six-thirty in the morning after agreeing to a year-long con: I made coffee and panic-listed.
THINGS THAT COULD GO WRONG
1. My mother cries when she finds out (because she will find out)
2. Peter smells blood in the water and never lets it go
3. Jackson is secretly married/a cult leader/allergic to commitment
4. I develop actual feelings and ruin everything
5. He develops actual feelings and ruins everything
6. We both develop feelings and it becomes the messiest breakup in family history
7. Someone googles him and discovers something awful
8. Someone googles me and discovers I once wrote erotica under a pen name for rent money (long story)
9. We get too good at this and forget what’s real
10. We get too good at this and never want to stop
I underlined number ten so hard the pen tore the page.
The coffee tasted like ash. I drank it anyway.
I tried to work. Opened three client briefs. Closed them all. The words swam.
Every five minutes I checked my phone, half expecting Jackson to have come to his senses and canceled first. He didn’t.
At eleven Maya called.
“Tell me you chickened out,” she said by way of greeting.
“I’m ninety percent chickened.”
“Ninety percent is still ten percent in, babe.”
“I have a list.”
“Of course you have a list. Read it to me.”
I read it. She listened without interrupting, which for Maya is practically a miracle.
When I finished she was quiet for five full seconds.
Then: “Add one more thing to the pro column you’re pretending you don’t have.”
“What?”
“Fun. When’s the last time you did something just because it might be fun?”
I opened my mouth. Closed it.
“Exactly,” she said. “You’ve spent years being careful and responsible and still ended up crying in your car on Christmas night. Maybe careful isn’t working.”
“That’s not how logic works.”
“It’s how life works. You’re allowed to be reckless at thirty-five, Sloane. You’re not dead.”
I rubbed my temple. “If this blows up—”
“Then we’ll burn that bridge when we get to it. But you’re not canceling. You’re just scared because this feels like the first thing in years that might actually change something.”
I hated how right she was.
After we hung up I sat on my couch in silence for a long time.
I thought about Christmas dinner. The way my mother’s eyes kept drifting to the empty chair beside me. The way Peter’s smile went sharp every time someone asked if I was seeing anyone. The way Susan’s drunk wisdom had lodged in my chest like shrapnel.
I thought about every New Year’s Eve I’d spent faking smiles while couples kissed at midnight and someone inevitably asked when I was going to “settle down.”
I thought about the way Jackson listened when I talked. The way he looked at me like my cynicism was interesting, not a flaw. The way his hand felt in mine during rehearsal—like it belonged there.
I picked up my phone.
The half-written cancellation text was still there.
I deleted it letter by letter.
Typed a new one.
ME: Still on for tomorrow?
I hit send before my brain could vote.
The reply took three minutes. Three minutes I spent staring at the ceiling, heart in my throat.
JACKSON: Was starting to worry you’d ghost me.
ME: Considered it.
JACKSON: And?
ME: I make terrible decisions.
JACKSON: Same. See you at 7. I’ll pick you up.
ME: You don’t have my address.
JACKSON: You gave it to me when we scheduled the rehearsal dinner. You were very thorough.
Of course I was.
ME: Fine. 7.
JACKSON: Wear something that photographs well. Your mom’s going to want evidence.
ME: Already planning the outfit that will give her heart palpitations.
JACKSON: That’s my girl.
I stared at those three words longer than I should have.
My girl.
Fake. All of this was fake.
But my stomach didn’t seem to care.
I spent the rest of the day alternating between work and panic. Revised a tagline sixteen times. Rewrote an email four. Every time my mind wandered, it wandered to tomorrow night.
To walking into my mother’s house with Jackson’s hand in mine.
To the moment Peter’s smirk falters.
To the moment my mother’s eyes fill with tears—happy ones, for once.
To the moment I have to remember this is all pretend.
At six PM I stood in front of my closet and pulled out the dress I bought on clearance last year and never had an occasion for. Deep green silk. Simple. Elegant. The kind of dress that says I have my life together even when I very much do not.
I laid it on the bed next to the kids’ menu contract.
The dinosaur looked judgmental.
I took a photo of them side by side and sent it to Maya.
ME: If I die tomorrow, avenge me.
MAYA: Dying is not an option. You have to live to tell me everything.
I tried the dress on. It still fit. Maybe better than last year.
I did my makeup heavier than usual—smoky eyes, red lip. Armor.
I left my hair down. Jackson had never seen it down.
At 6:58 my intercom buzzed.
He was early.
I grabbed my coat, took one last look at the dinosaur contract, and walked out to meet my fake boyfriend for the first real test.
Twelve holidays.
One year.
No feelings.
I could do this.
I had to do this.
Because the alternative—another year of pitying looks and enamel lectures and Susan’s prophecies—was suddenly unbearable.
I opened the door.
Jackson stood there in a dark coat, snowflakes melting in his hair, looking like every bad decision I suddenly wanted to make.
“Hi,” he said softly.
“Hi.”
He smiled, slow and certain.
“Ready, girlfriend?”
I took the arm he offered.
“As I’ll ever be.”
- Writer
