Page 74 of One-Star Romance

“I shouldn’t still be your first priority! That’s not healthy!” Gabby shook her head, pacing the basement. “And besides, it’s not even true. You are your own first priority, as you’ve made very clear with this TV show.”

“Okay, so you want me to turn down the opportunity to write for television, finally be financially stable, just because your husband might be a little bit hurt?”

“Of course not. But you could have at least talked to me about it before you made the decision!”

Natalie’s voice was rising, and she didn’t know how to stop it. She felt out of control, skidding down a dangerous path, no choice but to plunge forward. “Are you kidding? I’ve tried to talk to you about so many things over the years, and you have shut me down over and over again. It feels like you’ve never cared about me the way I care about you. I can’t open up to you about my writing, you’ve never even read a full book of mine, and you make it very clear that all you really want me to do is get married and have children like you.”

“You’re one to talk! Every time I try to tell you some detail about the parenting shit I’m dealing with on a daily basis, your eyes glaze over. No wonder I’d rather talk to other people instead. They don’t make me feel like I’m boring because I care about raising my child or wanting a big family.”

Gabby and Natalie had snapped at each other before, had arguments over meaningless things like Natalie leaving the window open when they used to live together. But they’d always turned away when it came to confronting the deeper issues.

Perhaps they’d been saving up all their vitriol for this, every time they’d swallowed down resentment or failed to understand each other. They had reserves of anger from all the times they didn’t let it out before, and now it was coming to drown them.

“I don’t know when it got so difficult to connect with you—” Gabby was saying, and Natalie couldn’t just stand there and let Gabby dump her, couldn’t let the woman she’d loved most say something irrevocable, so she said it herself instead.

“Maybe we’ve outgrown each other.” At Nat’s words, Gabby stopped her pacing. Natalie straightened her spine, heart breaking as she went on, “We love the memory of each other instead of each other now.”

“Maybe you’re right,” Gabby whispered, eyes shining. “So, why are we wasting our time?”

Natalie realized that she’d been memorizing the new details of Gabby to store them up. Unless it wasn’t too late, unless she could take it all back, throw herself at Gabby’s feet, and promise to keep trying to grow together instead of apart.

But Gabby turned on her heel and headed to the stairs. Before the first step, she said, over her shoulder, “I’m going to talk to Angus. I think it’s time for you to leave.”

And then she was gone. The girl who had made Natalie feel at home the moment she met her. The woman who had held Nat’s hair back and made her laugh so hard she peed herself, and rubbed her back while she wept. Her plus-one, her confidant, her soulmate. A part of Natalie’s past. Now, inconceivably, not a part of her future.

She wanted to sink onto the carpet and wail. But if she let herself start crying, she’d never stop. She’d melt onto the basement floor, a pile of defenseless, quivering guts, and eventually Gabby would come downstairs and say, Didn’t I ask you to leave?

So Natalie forced herself to walk back upstairs into the pathetic remainders of the party. She spied Tyler sitting on a chair in the corner, looking at his phone. He’d ruined so much, but she couldn’t blame him. He hadn’t known.

Rob, who’d been pacing by the snack table, locked eyes with her and came her way. He, on the other hand, had known everything, had told her way back from the beginning how cruel and careless she was. And Rob had been talking to Tyler right before everything went to shit.

“I think Angus just needs some time,” he started, but Natalie cut him off.

“Did you say something to Tyler? What did you do?”

He sighed, running a hand through his rumpled hair. “I’m sorry. I misspoke.”

A dry, disbelieving laugh escaped her. “Misspeaking all over the place tonight, huh?” He’d misspoken, and now her best friend didn’t want to see her again. The hard line of Gabby’s mouth as she told her to go flooded Natalie’s mind. The pain she felt was so strong and sharp, unbearable. She spat at Rob, “Your life is so screwed up that you have to blow up mine too?”

Rob stepped back. “Natalie,” he said, the sound of his voice matching the hurt inside her.

She began to turn away from him.

“Stop,” he said, reaching out a hand for her. She couldn’t let him touch her, couldn’t bear to feel the hands that had made her shiver earlier that evening. She pulled back.

And suddenly she wasn’t in Gabby’s living room anymore. The other party guests disappeared, and she stood in the hallway outside the wedding reception, facing off with a man who confronted her with the parts of herself she didn’t want to see. She was supposed to be grounded and successful, but Rob had plummeted her back into all the shame and confusion she used to feel. And if he was going to drag her back there, she could act like her younger self, someone who got hurt, and hurt in turn.

“What happened with Gabby?” he asked, concern in his eyes, and her fury gathered strength in her chest.

“It’s over.”

“What?” He shook his head. “No, she’ll come around. It can’t be that bad—”

“It is, actually.” She threw her shoulders back, formal and cold. “You’ve ensured that I won’t get invited to any more of Gabby and Angus’s events. So, goodbye. I guess this is the end of us meeting like this.”

“No. What? Stop, it doesn’t have to be—”

“I think it does.” Tonight, he’d cost Natalie her best friend. So how could she ever fall back into his arms? “I hope you have a nice life and figure your shit out.”

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