Page 23 of Hers for the Weekend

She was going to figure it out, but she had to be subtle or Holly’s walls would go up.

So instead, Tara asked, “I need to know about the fact that your name is Holly and you married a girl named Ivy. Holly and Ivy?!”

Holly laughed. “Well, Ivy never called me Holly, she called me my middle name, Siobhan, which I always wanted to go by but no one could ever pronounce.”

“See?” Tara said. “You wanted to go by your middle name, too! It’s not weird.”

“It’s not.” Holly shook her head. “Although in the end, I kind of liked that only Ivy called me that. There’s something about having someone call you by a name no one else in the world does that feels precious. But yeah, we did think our names were fate when we were kids. Like it was a sign that we were destined to be together. Our little dollar-store wedding with our Goodwill dresses and fake ivy leaves and my grandma’s old Christmas lights. We thought it looked so sophisticated. Silly babies.”

Smiling, Tara said genuinely, “It sounds beautiful.”

All Tara had gotten for her high school graduation was Cole dragging her back from boarding school, since no one from her family had bothered to show up to take her home. A dollar-store wedding lit by little twinkling lights sounded, honestly, really lovely, even if they had been silly babies.

“So, there you go. I didn’t go to college because I’d just gotten married and we couldn’t afford it, and by the time we split up, I didn’t want to. I wanted to live, as much as I could, as free as I could, for as long as I could.”

“It sounds like you’re living the dream,” Tara said, although she couldn’t imagine much of a dream life without a community, without friendships. Tara’s real friends might all live in the Arctic tundra, but she needed them.

“Yes and no. I mean, it came with some sacrifices, but doesn’t every life?”

Holly stopped, like she was trying to figure out how to explain. “I always said, once I was an adult, I would go by Siobhan and I wouldn’t care if people didn’t know how to spell it, but then…”

“You did care?” Tara guessed. “Or it was too tied up in your ex-wife?”

“Both? It was easier to have a common name waitressing, because anything that invites people to stare intently at the name tag over your boobs and comment on some personal part of you is not ideal.”

“Although they do that anyway, I’m guessing,” Tara said.

Holly nodded. “Oh, of course. No force in the galaxy could stop cis straight men from deciding that waitresses exist for their personal entertainment. But Siobhan? Somehow I was too tired for the fight.”

Tara didn’t mean to snort in disbelief, but she did.

“Yes, okay, yes, I’ve always been the sort of person who leads with my chin and spoils for a fight,” Holly rushed on. “I rush in and ask questions later, I do things because so what and fuck people who don’t like it. I had blue hair and self-done tattoos and snakebite piercings in Davenport, Iowa. But I… I don’t know, I put myself out there all the way in my marriage, and when we broke up, I kind of created another version of myself so no one could see the real me. I hid Siobhan away to keep her safe.”

“I wasn’t going to judge you,” Tara said. “Not for spoiling for a fight, or for leading with your chin. I haven’t rushed in or asked questions later or done a single damn thing because so what, for a couple of decades.”

It intrigued Tara, Holly’s ability to, well, to do anything. To not be constantly frozen in fear and indecision. It made Tara want to know her so much more.

“So, this whole sunshine rockabilly girl thing is just a character?” Tara guessed. “You didn’t learn how to do a victory roll and suddenly stop listening to My Chemical Romance or become an optimist?”

Holly’s laugh ricocheted through the car.

“I did not. But now, that’s who Holly is, and I don’t even know who Siobhan is anymore. She used to be an angry wild child ready to take on capitalism so no one would ever be trapped in poverty, unable to make their own choices about the life they wanted to lead. But then I guess I got disillusioned by constantly fighting what felt like an unbeatable force? Selfishly decided to opt out of the hustle myself and stopped trying to make big structural changes, instead focusing on local actions like community fridges and volunteering as a clinic escort?”

Tara shook her head. “There’s nothing wrong with micro, intra-community action. Honestly, it might be the best possible choice right now. And the clinics that are left always need escorts.”

“That’s a very generous read on my life choices,” Holly observed. “Anyway, now I’m kind of stuck being this version of me. Which is fine. It’s a pretty good life.”

“I’ll start calling you Siobhan, if you start calling me Sloane,” Tara told her. As soon as she said it, it felt way too cheesy, but Holly flashed her a huge grin.

Maybe it had been just the right amount of cheesy.

“Siobhan and Sloane sounds like a seventies detective show,” Holly joked. “If we get lost in this storm, we can start a new life for ourselves somewhere in Delaware, solving crimes and baking cinnamon rolls. But okay, let’s make a deal. On this trip, no matter who we have to pretend to be for anyone else, we’ll only be our real selves with each other.”

She took one hand off the wheel, which made Tara’s heart stop for an instant, only to hold it out for a fist bump, which Tara returned.

“We might have both chosen lives where we wear masks all the time,” Tara agreed, “but we can have a little bit of our real selves when we’re together.”

They fell into a quiet that was less comfortable than the silences they’d shared earlier. Tara never talked about the arson, ever, even with Cole. It felt too vulnerable. She started to retreat back into herself.

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