Page 23 of The First Love Myth

“Liz.” I offer the boy a smile. “And you are?”

“Ryan.” He points to the book I hold. “My mommy has that book.”

“All right, bud,” Spencer says, and I swear a look of chagrin passes over his face. “Let’s go pay and get through these chapters. I don’t want to spend our whole weekend together reading about an orphan who lives in a magical peach.”

Ryan sighs dramatically. “No spoilers, Dad. That’s like the first rule of life.”

Spencer rolls his eyes and gives me one last smile, his eyes locking on mine. “Enjoy your book, Liz.”

Chapter 19

Cecilia

“Stop fidgeting.” Evie cups my cheek, and her deep-brown eyes meet mine. “I’ve never known you to be nervous.”

That’s because I’ve never introduced you to my family.“I’m not nervous. Liz is late.”

Evie rolls her eyes, clearly seeing through my pathetic excuse for a lie. “By five minutes.”

The door to the restaurant opens, and then Liz is there, an excited smile on her face. She’s come straight from work. “Sorry, sorry,” she says. “Route 1 traffic was a bitch. It took me like fifteen minutes to drive two miles.”

“It’s fine,” I say and slip my hand into Evie’s. My heart is in my throat. I don’t do this, and yet now that it’s happening, it feels inevitable and right. Keeping separate lives is a burden that I didn’t understand until this moment. “Liz, this is my girlfriend, Evie. Evie, this is my sister.”

“It’s about time,” Evie says, nudging me with her shoulder. At the same time, Liz laughs and exclaims, “Finally.”

Right.They’re going to get along great.

Two hours later, our dinner has long since been cleared, the wine’s run out, and we still chat easily. Evie leans forward, taking in everything my sister says, her hand never leaving mine. Liz sits back in her chair, more relaxed than I’ve seen her since I’ve been here. For my part, I have no idea what they’re talkingabout. But I love this moment. It’s unexpected and everything I thought I never wanted, and yet it’s been more than perfect. I’m not sure why I’ve been avoiding this.

“Wait, wait, wait!” Evie’s voice pulls me back to the conversation. “Cecilia used to do what?”

Uh-oh. There are any number of stories that my sister could be sharing about our childhood. The glee behind Liz’s smile is disconcerting and gives it away. I want to throttle my sister. This inside look into my life is something I haven’t given anyone since my college boyfriend. But letting Evie all the way in has opened a long-sealed door. Every day its rusty hinges loosen further. Maybe this time, with this woman, things can be different. MaybeIcan be different.

“Play wedding,” Liz says through a giggle. “She did it often enough that our parents got her a fancy white dress. She would decorate the living room, put on classical music, and make our next-door neighbor marry her. I, of course, was maid of honor, which really meant I had to do whatever she said. She is quite the bridezilla.”

I glance at Liz, taking her measure. She’s not drunk. We only shared a bottle of wine between the three of us, and that was with more food than was healthy. She’s happy.

Evie’s eyes are bugging out of her head when I turn to her. And true, this doesn’t fit with the woman she’s known for the last year. “And this went on for how long?”

“Oh, maybe a year?”

“And what happened to your husband?”

I blink. It’s been ages since I thought about Dan. Dan, who had been my first kiss, my first love, my first everything. “We eventually dated for real. His family moved to Chicago about halfway through junior year, and that was that.”

It most certainly wasn’t that simple, but time and distance and maturity have given me a different spin on the situation.

“You never saw him again?”

I shrug. “We kept in touch at first. You know, the whole ‘It’s only a year and a half, and then we can go to college together.’ He visited once for junior formal, but even then, we knew whatever it had been had passed.”

That’s true but also a lie. We broke up when he moved, and I hated him for it. But we’d been friends for so long, we tried to stay that way, but when he came for the dance, he’d already been dating and I’d already figured out that maybe I liked girls as well as boys. I wasn’t willing to compete with girls halfway around the country, and he wasn’t willing to compete with girls at all.

“The divorce was quite amicable,” I say. We’re even friends on Facebook. Not that I’ll ever let that slip in front of Evie or Liz.

Evie laughs but then clears her throat. “Sorry to break up the party,” she says, “but my car is here.”

I glance at my watch. The night went too fast. I’m not ready for Evie to head to Philly and get on a plane to Chicago. Not without me with her.

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