“Talk soon.” And then he was gone, and Stevie’s phone changed back to her lock screen—a picture Teri took of the two of us sophomore year, in our Doll’s House costumes, sitting backstage with Diet Cokes and sharing a bag of fries, deep in conversation.
“I’m so sorry,” I said after Stevie had just stared down at her lock screen for a moment, swallowing hard, like she was waiting for her dad to call back, say that it was a mistake, that he was going to be there for her birthday dinner after all. “That really sucks.”
“It’s okay,” Stevie said with a one-shouldered shrug. “I mean, he’s in the middle of a deal. He has to work. He can’t, like, leave because he has to have dinner with his kid.” She flopped back on the bed, and I did too. When you feel the need to flop back on a bed, it’s no fun to do it alone.
I looked over at Stevie. There was a lot more I wanted to say about her dad and how he wasn’t showing up for her when he needed to, but I knew I couldn’t. If your friend was complaining about their parent, you could agree and sympathize, but you could never criticize their parent without it being initiated. It was just one of the rules of friendship. “Do you think maybe,” I said, after a moment of silence, “you should have told him that you were upset?”
Stevie shook her head, still looking up at the ceiling. I looked up too—at all those glow-in-the-dark stars that I’d stuck there in constellations I’d invented. They were still hanging on, even though they now only emitted the faintest glow. “There’s no point. He couldn’t just stop working. And then he’d be feeling guilty.”
“But then at least he’d know how you felt?”
“It’s not like it would change anything.”
I wasn’t so sure about that, but I also knew when to stop pushing her. We lay there in silence for a few moments together. I knew she was working through it, doing a dive into her feelings, which she always, for whatever reason, seemed to keep buried five fathoms deep. Finally, she turned her head and gave me a quavery smile. “I was really looking forward to it. How stupid is that? Just me and him, and actually getting some time together. No Joy. No Mallory or Margaux or Mateo. Just us. And I wanted to tell him that I’d started my application to Northwestern…” Her voice trailed off.
“You know what else Northwestern has? A really great theater program!” Stevie gave me a look. I held up my hands. “Sorry. Not the time.”
“And it was nice of him to offer the reservation to me and my mom, but she has plans with my aunt tonight.” She sighed deeply. “So you said there’s a party at the Orchard?” she asked after a moment, sounding like someone who was trying very hard to look on the bright side, and not entirely succeeding.
“Don’t forget, we can always hang out with Teri and Ryan Camper.”
“How could I?”
“Hey,” I said, making a decision and sitting up, “let’s have a really fun night, okay? We have to shake this off. Maybe a movie? Your pick. And then we could see if maybe they’d let us back into Café Asiago.”
Stevie sat up as well. “They were pretty mad about the mint thing.”
“I thought they were free!”
“There was literally a sign that said twenty-five cents.”
“Which, clearly, I didn’t see!”
She laughed. “What’s even playing now?” She pushed herself off the bed, grabbing the blazer. “I’ll just put this away.”
“It’s really okay.”
“I don’t mind.”
I watched her go, feeling like it wasn’t really about the blazer and more about taking a moment to adjust to the new reality. I picked up my phone again, opening up my browser to look up movie times. As I did, I saw among my open windows the Echo Theater website. I clicked on it now, looking at the poster showing tonight’s premiere of Navel Gazing—a woman in a bikini, an orange held over her belly button.
I looked at the show information and was starting to scroll through the website when suddenly an idea—a possibility—occurred to me. I sat up straighter, my heart pounding, my thoughts racing.
It was a great idea.
We probably shouldn’t do it.
But it would be a lot of fun.
It would save Stevie’s night and make up for the fact that her dad wasn’t coming though for her. She’d have a birthday celebration to