Page 81 of The Seven Year Slip

“I’m not sure, really. It was very good sex.” I inclined my head a little, studying this man standing in the shadow of his friend’s food truck, hungover for—what I suspected—was the same reason I was: each other. Though I was very certain I had more fun last night than he did.

He rubbed his face with his hands. “If this was to get back at me for turning you down last night—”

“Oh, don’t worry, you didn’t.”

“You know what I mean,” he growled. Right—he thought I went back to the apartment last night, and had sex with his past self to make his present self jealous.

I rolled my eyes. “Well, you’re wrong. The apartment does what it wants towhenit wants to—it’s not my fault you want nothing to do with me now.”

He took a step closer, close enough I could kiss him, if I dared. “Nothing to do with you?” he whispered, incredulous. “I remember how you taste, Lemon, the sound of your breath as I held you.” I felt my skin getting hot even as I pressed a water bottle to the side of my neck and looked away. “I remember the way you counted the tattoos on my skin, the shape of your mouth, the way your body felt when you came for me,” he muttered, gliding his fingertips across my furiously red cheeks. “And I still fucking love the way you blush. It drives me crazy.”

My mouth fell open. Heart hammered against my chest. He didn’t look like James for a moment, but Iwan, my Iwan, lookingout from a face seven years stranger. And I thought he was going to bend down, to steal a kiss, but he stepped away and quickly climbed into the back of the truck as Drew turned the corner.

“Hey,” she said, our food in her hands, “is everything okay?”

“Fine!” I squeaked, quickly turning around. The sooner we left, the better. “I got the bottles of water! We should go.”

Drew gave me a confused look. “Okay...”

“Onward! Let’s go sit by the fountain,” I said, quickly herding her and Fiona away from the food truck. I glanced behind me when we’d crossed the street, and saw James climbing out of the back of the truck. Then he pulled his cap low and left the opposite way.

Off-limits, I reminded myself, turning back to my friends.He’s off-limits.

32

Second and Final Bid

I spent the restof the weekend deep-cleaning my aunt’s apartment and sketching Mother and Fucker in the NYC travel journal section titled “Wildlife.” The apartment didn’t send me back to Iwan—though I wished it would have. Painting was an easy way to distract myself, at least until I started to clean out my purse and found the letter from Vera again. The address was on the Upper West Side. So close—just across the park from the Monroe—but an entire world away.

The longer I lived in my aunt’s apartment, the more I could see why she’d kept it. Why, after her heartbreak with Vera, she hadn’t sold it, and instead traveled the world to stay away. There was a possibility in the sound of the lock clicking open, in the creak of the hinges as the door flung wide, a roulette that may or may not bring you back to the time when you felt happiest.

Analea had said that romance across time never worked, but then why was Vera still writing to her? I wanted to open the letter, to read the contents, but that felt too personal. It wasn’t mybusiness to read whatever was inside, and I doubted my aunt would want me to. The most I could do was return it, and ask Vera in person.

When I arrived to work on Monday, Rhonda was already in her office, looking more worn out than usual. She had shrugged out of her blazer already—something she usually only did after lunch—and had exchanged her heels for the sensible flats she kept stowed in her bottom desk drawer.

I knocked on the glass door, and she glanced up. “Ah, Clementine! Perfect timing.”

“Early start?” I asked.

“I couldn’t sleep, so I thought I might as well get some work done.”

Which meant that she had thought of something in the middle of the night that kept her awake, so she came into work early to get it done. Her entire life’s work was this imprint, she poured her entire life into it. Her hobby was reading, her downtime spent brainstorming new strategies for the next big book, her social circles peppered with the directors of other imprints. That should be me, too—Iwantedit to be me, but there was an itch under my skin that was growing by the day. A feeling like I was in a box too small, a collar too tight.

And I was afraid of it, because I’d spent so long trying to find somewhere permanent to stay.

“By the way,” Rhonda went on, tapping her ballpoint pen against a notepad on her desk, “have you decided what to do about your vacation?”

“I think I’ll just be around the city,” I replied, knowing she was asking to make sure I was actually going to take it. I was—against my will.

She nodded, though from the bend of her shoulders, I could tellthat she was relieved. “Good, good. With the transition, you might need to be on call.”

That made me pause. “The transition?”

“Yes.” She didn’t look at me as she spoke, neatly organizing her pens in her tray. “As I said, Strauss’s splitting my job into three—copublisher, director of marketing, and director of publicity. I’m nominating you for the director of publicity, but he wants to interview outside of the company as well. Something abouthealthy competition,” she added deadpan.

“Oh.” I nodded. “I mean, that makes sense. I’ve only been here seven years.”

Finally, my boss looked at me, and her face was pinched. I recognized the expression—she was angry. Not at me, though. “And you are one of the most talented people I’ve met in a long time. I will fight for you until the end, Clementine, if this is what you want.”

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