“Riles, who are you kidding?” Julian said. “That’s what you hated about him.”
“I know,” she said. “But why does his wandering nature seem so appealing to me now?”
Julian took her hand. “You deserve better,” he said. “You will have better.”
“Is there anything better than him?” Riley’s elegant, fine-featured face had sadness etched on it as if she didn’t think so.
“Yes—me for one.” Julian smiled.
“You’re taken. And not for nothing, but why does Mirabelle get to have you? Who the hell is she? The rest of us have put our time into you. Years. She bats her eyes at you in a coffee shop and suddenly she’s Mrs. Know-it-All? How is that fair?”
“I’m saying,” Julian said, “plenty of other fish in the sea. For instance, did you notice how Mia’s mother’s companion, Devi Something, was smitten with you in Vegas? You stand a real chance with him.”
“I’ve had enough of your jokes,” Riley said, but she was smiling. “But, you know who does keep texting me from the wedding? Liam.”
“Liam Shaw? From Freddie’s?” Liam was a good guy, a tall welterweight.
“Yeah, he was pretty drunk at the Wynn. Kept asking me to dance. Got a little handsy. Now won’t stop texting me.”
“Riley, you can’t hook up with him,” Julian said. “Both your last names are Shaw!”
“I know! He told me he’s a thoroughly modern man and if I marry him, I can keep my name.”
“So he’s funny, too?”
“All you men think you’re damn comedians.” Riley glanced at her watch. It was time for her to get back to work. She walked Julian through the sliding exit doors and before he left, said, tearing up, “Are we still going to be friends, Jules? If you were a girl, you’d be one of my best friends. I think that’s another reason I’m mad.”
“Come here, Riles,” Julian said. “Come in for a therapeutic lean.” He embraced her. “You and I are not breaking up. We’ll always be friends. Who else is going to regale me with the benefits of a colonic cleanse?”
“Not to mention the benefits of coconut oil,” Riley said, giving him a kiss. “Or have you already discovered those?” She grinned into his grin and strolled back inside Whole Foods in her high heels and pencil skirt, her silky blonde hair swinging.
* * *
Julian’s dreams had lessened in their viciousness, but not in their murky vividness. There was less of her melting in fires or being shelled with empty bottles, less of his helplessness, but more of the heaviness. She kept appearing to him on a stage. She stood high in red lights or low on some door. Sometimes this door would open like a trap and she’d vanish. She wore headscarves and bonnets. Sometimes she was a boy. All her hair was cut off. Once she was in La Traviata, dying of a wasting disease. And sometimes she looked like a Russian babushka, in black clothes, with a kerchief tied under her chin, standing on a stage that froze under ice floes, reciting words he couldn’t hear.
In recent days, the dreams had become less about Mia and more about something else troubling and indefinable. He kept hearing a dull distant toll of ringing bells. He walked, trying to get closer to the sound. The tolling was constant, ringing every few seconds. He felt a man’s mangled hand on him. It was Devi, the Asian man Mia’s mother had brought to their wedding. In real life, shaking the man’s half-hand on the receiving line after the ceremony had flooded Julian with the oddest sensation, like stinging salt water filling up his body from his feet to his head. And the way Devi had stared at him . . . Julian didn’t know what that was about. In the dream, the man gave Julian something to drink. It was sweet. After Julian drank it, the tolling got louder.
He looked up. It was Big Ben. London again. It kept ringing and ringing.
49
Everything Forever
JULIAN KNEW WHY HE NEVER WANTED TO BECOME AN ACTOR. All the waiting around on sets made him want to drive off a bridge. It was no way to live.
The one-minute scene of Mia wordlessly walking down the street before getting hit by the bus was taking days to set up. They were still building the sets. They kept telling Julian to come back, that they weren’t ready for him. Maybe the next day. Or the day after. Finally, they promised him that tomorrow would definitely be the day.