Page 12 of The Wrong One

A waiter came to the table, carrying a bottle of wine with the label turned out for us to see. He had a white towel over his forearm. Patrick gestured to our glasses, approving the wine. The first sip of the crisp white wine hit hard. I immediately tasted sweetness. “It’s delicious,” I said.

“Do you remember when we went on that wine tour?” he asked.

“I do.” I smiled. “It was a lot of fun.”

“This is the wine we tasted, and you loved,” he said. “That is the day we went home and made love for hours. Do you remember?”

I blushed a little. “How could I forget?”

“That night meant everything to me,” he said while gazing into my eyes. “I knew that night you were the woman I wanted to be with.”

He was really going to make me cry. He slid out of his chair and dropped to one knee beside the table. He took my hand in his. My heart was beating so loud in my chest I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to hear the words he was about to say. I knew what was coming. The whole restaurant knew what was coming.

“Izzy?”

I blinked, snapping myself back to the present. “What?”

“We lost you there for a minute.” Emmy laughed. “Do you want some wine?”

“Uh, yes, please.” I nodded and held up my glass.

“Is everything okay?” Emmy asked.

“Yes,” I murmured. “I was just lost in thought.”

We all took our first bites and everyone nodded and made sounds of pleasure. “These are really good,” I gushed. “Really, really good.”

“Thank you.” Lena smiled. “You guys enjoy those, and I’ll be back with the next dish.”

Julia, Caroline, and Emmy were chatting about the lobster rolls and the wine. I took another sip and was plunged back into that reverie. I looked down at my empty finger where the giant rock used to sit. The first few days without the ring had felt so weird. I kept looking for it.

Everyone who saw the ring thought I was the luckiest woman on the planet. Patrick was a good-looking guy. He knew how to work a room. He had a thousand-watt smile that made everyone melt, including myself. We were the power couple in our social circle. We were invited to all of the parties and coordinated our outfits. We looked good together. We had fun together. My Instagram account was filled with pictures of us out and about. I wasn’t embarrassed to admit I used a little bit of editing software to make sure I didn’t look like a total loser standing next to the hottest guy around. I posted countless photos of us happy and doing things together.

When we broke up, I spent way too much time going through my social media account and looking at every picture. I read through all the comments. People loved us together. It was addicting. Every time we got a bunch of likes, it fueled us into wanting to take more pictures. We were addicted to the accolades. When I started really looking at the pictures, I could remember the moments. It was almost all fake. Something changed. We were pretending to be happy. We weren’t. Not even a little.

I couldn’t even explain why we were trying to fake everyone out. Or were we trying to fake ourselves out? I deleted the pictures. I couldn’t stand to look at them. They made me want to puke. I was done with that life. I had to start living for me and not for social media clout.

“Are you okay?” Emmy nudged me.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “It’s the wine.”

“You’ve barely drank anything,” Caroline said.

“No, I’m not drunk, it’s just that… the wine brings up old memories,” I clarified. “I’ve been to the winery that produces that wine.”

“Oh shit,” Emmy said. “With Patrick?”

“Yep,” I answered.

“But it’s good, right?” Caroline said.

“Is it.” I smiled. “Really good. It’s a good wine.”

“Tell me more about the job,” Emmy said. I knew she was trying to distract me.

“What job?” Caroline asked.

“Her brother offered her a job,” Emmy answered.

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