top of the one nearest me is a photo of the smiling couple, their arms wrapped around each other in an intimate embrace as they stand in front of the Statue of Liberty. She’s holding out her hand. So, everyone who sees this picture can’t help but notice the shiny rock on her ring finger.
They’re engaged. He’s been exploring his options all right. So much for being friends.
“Can I offer you something to drink?” she calls from the kitchen as the sounds of her rooting through cupboards float to my cotton-filled ears.
“No,” I barely manage to cough out through my shock. “No, thank you. I really can’t stay long. I’m meeting a friend soon on the other side of the river. It’s the whole reason I was even in the city today in the first place.”
Using the word friend to describe Mike tastes so unfamiliar on my tongue, unlike the photographic image of the man who was my first…everything.
His fiancée stands beside me, smiling as she gazes at the picture I can’t stop stupidly staring at. “That was months ago, but you’re the first friend I’ve met of Ben’s who isn’t mutual between us.”
I have no idea what to say to that. In spite of—or maybe because of—the leading tone of her unasked questions.
Who are you to Ben?
How far do you go back?
Why do you seem so upset?
I’m upset, but not for the reasons she obviously thinks. Honestly, I’m surprised at how little this hurts. Shouldn’t it feel like a knife stabbing me in the chest?
Still, uncertainty rolls off her in waves, and I feel genuinely bad about that. I didn’t come here to wreck another woman’s happiness. “I’ve known him since high school. We went to college together and broke up shortly after finishing our degrees at U of M, but we remained friends.”
I wince when she gasps. That might have been a little too much honesty. I’m great at that lately.
Her gaze burns the side of my face, but there isn’t any venom in her tone. Neither pity. “Not that good of friends if he didn’t even share the exciting news of his engagement with you.”
“No. I guess not.”
She faces me fully. “Be straight with me—woman to woman. Should this raise red flags for me? You were obviously together for a long time. I’ve never heard of you, and you’ve never heard of me.”
I study her expression. She’s not gunning for my imminent death as she would be completely justified to. There’s an underlying tension in the current between us, but also an openness that can’t be denied. “Do you have doubts? About how much he loves you?”
“I don’t know,” she confesses, splaying her hands wide. “It all happened in the blink of an eye. We joked in the hallway about fantasies, but it was exactly that. A whirlwind romance that happened so fast, I didn’t have time to second-guess myself until just now. I’m suddenly terrified I know nothing about him. Not really. Should I have doubts?”
She poses a genuine question, so I pause to give a thoughtful answer. Nothing sticks out in my mind to warn her about. Ben was good to me. I can’t deny that. He never promised marriage, white picket fences, or a happily-ever-after. When he wasn’t feeling it anymore, he broke it off rather than string me along. “No. He wouldn’t have asked you to marry him if he didn’t mean it. Ben is nothing if not a man of his word. Of honor.”
“Are you okay?” She places a hesitant hand on my shoulder.
I want to hate her so much, but I can’t.
Because I am okay. She said it in not so many words. For some reason, they just clicked. He offered her everything, and she felt confident enough in that moment to grab his promise with both hands.
We should all be so lucky.
I don’t get a chance to answer because my phone dings with an incoming text.
Mike Mitchell: Where are you?
“I need to go,” I tell Bethany. “Please tell Ben I said hello. And…don’t doubt the love between you because of me. But, if at any time, you feel like you’re not getting his one hundred and ten percent then be a modern woman. Don’t settle for less than everything. We can have it all now, right?”
“Right.” She nods, but it’s more sad than resolute. Woman to woman. I like her more than ever. She leads me to the door she welcomed me through in spite of her misgivings. We both