Page 23 of Play On

Now I feel the flush of shame creep down my neck. “I’m doing it because I’m afraid to fail,” I say quietly.

The waitress returns with our cocktails, setting them down in front of us, and as soon as she retreats, I pick mine up and take a sip. After all, I need liquid courage if I’m going to share any more truths about myself.

“Violet. Everyone fails. Everyone.”

I play with the aubergine napkin my cocktail glass is sitting on top of. No, not everyone fails. Nicholas is successful. He’s bright and ambitious, and because I’m his twin, everyone thinks I’ll be just like him.

And when they discover I’m not?I will disappoint them.

“I think you are putting way too much on yourself,” Aimee continues after I remain silent. “Failing is normal. Screwing up is normal.”

I snort. “Then I have a master’s in that.”

“What?”

I shake my head. Nobody will ever know how badly I screwed up with Noah.

“Violet. You can’t expect to do everything perfectly. I can’t imagine the pressure you’ve been living with, keeping that in mind. You’re asking for something impossible. I mess up all the time at work.”

I quirk my brow at her. “Doubtful.”

Aimee quirks a brow back at me. “Oh, is it? How about this: I thought I was communicating with an author about her sweet Christmas meet-cute rom-com, and I sent her a blurb and promo copy to approve, except it was for a completely different, super-sexy, erotic Christmas romance.”

“That is an error that would be easy enough to make,” I counter.

Aimee takes a sip of her drink. “Just like an error you might make. You need to let go of this fear. It’s holding you in place, Violet. And I suspect it’s a place you don’t really want to be, or you wouldn’t be talking about it with me.”

She’s right. Aimee is absolutely right. I don’t want to be working in the family gift shop in Dorset. Dad won’t allow me to do much of anything with the art in the estate—he keeps all of that under his control. Nicholas will let me take that over in the future, but he has no say in what goes on at Wintersmith Hall right now.

Even then, I’d still feel the same pressure. What if I messed something up? What if I let my twin down?

Then I’d really be compared to him, wouldn’t I?

But I don’t want to fold tea towels for the next thirty years. I asked for the beehive project, but Nicholas told me I’d flake out on it, like everything else I’ve ever tried to do.

If I get a serious job, will I want to flake out on them, too? Disappoint a whole new round of people?

Or do I get brave enough to take a chance not only on a serious career, but myself as well?

“Maybe it’s time to be brave,” I muse, taking a sip of my margarita.

“It’s not like you wouldn’t know anybody if you came to London,” Aimee says, her eyes lighting up at the prospect. “I live here, you know. Oh, did you know I share a flat with Jules now?”

Jules was another one of our friends from St. Andrews. She was a sweet girl, but I could tell my talking overwhelmed her and she would kind of shut down around me.

“Really?”

Aimee nods as she takes a sip of her drink. “Yes. She’s an extremely reliable and quiet roommate.”

I laugh at that. “I know I drove her crazy with all my talking.”

Aimee grins. “You did, but I love that you are rarely quiet. I’ve missed that about you. It’s a completely different experience living with Jules. You thought she was quiet because you talked so much? I think she’s just quiet in general unless she’s around people she’s super comfortable with. Even then she’s a listener first, talker later.”

Like Noah,I think.Noah is like that.

“Why are you frowning?”

“I’m not.”

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