Page 122 of The Life-Changing Magic of Falling in Love

‘You know what, Zach? Forget it.’ I can’t make more casual plans right now. I need to workshop a solution to a change in plans already made.

I stare down at the entrance to the subway. How did I get here? This gives new meaning to walking off a bad mood as I’ve no memory of getting here from the hospital. Through a haze of yet more confusion, I wonder if Carlos would let me borrow Oz – wait, scratch that, Oz would not do well in any kind of small-talk, wedding-guest situation, so it’ll have to be that Oz is willing to let me borrow Carlos for the night.

‘Okay, we’ll do something else,’ Zach says, interrupting my train of thought.

‘No,’ I say. ‘I meant forget it as in whatever it was we were doing? I don’t want to do it with you anymore.’

‘Come on, don’t make it into such a big deal.’

‘It was a big deal to me,’ I whisper. I mean, I get that it’s all relative but I’m beginning to wonder if anything in Zach’s life is ever a big deal.

Or is his casual and convenient ability to forget a date that happened to include an overnight stay with me about something else?

Maybe I’m not attractive enough to him? Maybe I’m carrying around too much baggage no matter how much I tried to protect him from it? Have I somehow made this all too difficult for easy-going Zach?

‘Ashleigh, we can still have some fun together?—’

‘I don’t think so, Zach.’

‘So that’s it?’

‘I kind of think it has to be.’

‘Okay, well, then … no hard feelings?’

‘No feelings at all, Zach,’ I mutter, ending the call as I walk down into the subway. Although that isn’t strictly true as anger fizzes through me because … what? I didn’t even warrant the pretence of his being disappointed I called it quits?

Maybe I am too much, these days?

Maybe I – wait, no. This is his loss.

Everyone has baggage.

Wasn’t it George who’d said about evil humans and good humans and how he’d rather be a good one? Good humans help each other carry their baggage – help lighten the load.

Not that I think Zach’s evil but I guess what it boils down to is that we barely scratched the surface with each other – certainly didn’t get around to scratching an itch for each other.

That isn’t all on him because I didn’t even try to go deeper with him. I kept meaning to, but I didn’t.

As the movement of the subway train lulls me into a sort of quiet shock, I remember how I’d wanted uncomplicated and simple.

And how I totally had that with Zach, yet have thrown it away so easily.

* * *

Please, please, please be at home… I pound on the apartment door and when it opens, for some reason, instead of saying, ‘Thank you, I could really use your help,’ what actually comes out of my mouth is, ‘Don’t you know when someone’s pounding on your door, it’s usually an emergency? Were you asleep? It’s like, lunchtime already.’ I’m of course blaming the stress of not being able to stop time and the knowledge that the wedding is looming ever closer for my rudeness.

Unaware of the need for speed, George simply stands in front of me staring.

Yeah … instead of the subway leading me to Carlos and Oz’s door, it led me here, to George’s.

Slowly he looks me up and down and asks, ‘Why are you dressed like Bridget Jones?’

Ignoring the Bridget Jones quip I march right on into his apartment. ‘It’s really not healthy to stay in your apartment all the time.’ I turn around in time to see his gaze drag upwards from my fluffy cottontail. A flash of red appears high on his cheekbones which under normal circumstances would produce all sorts of tingles, but I don’t have time for tingles right now. ‘It’s lucky I decided to check on you,’ I say and then, going into his bedroom like I have every right, I add, ‘I’m taking you out. You’ll need to bring a change of clothes.’

‘Change of clothes? But I think my bunny suit is at the dry cleaners.’

‘Cute but can we – waaah.’ I whirl around to put a stop to the distracting bunny talk not realising he was right behind me and for the second time today clumsily bump full-on into someone only this time it’s George and his lightning quick reflexes. I manage to whack him in the face with my bunny ears as I look over my shoulder to check that what I’m feeling is real – George’s hands clamped confidently on my ass-et. ‘F-forget about the b-bunny costume,’ I stammer out.

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