Chapter Eight

It takes another thirty minutes to figure out which girl goes in which room and where their keys are, and by the time I’m back in my bed the sun is starting to peak through the curtains, bathing the room in an eerie blue glow. It was bad enough in full daylight, but now the kitsch-factor is through the roof.

I find myself staring at the swan photograph, with their two necks in the shape of a love heart. It’s positively nauseating. Just imagine having that staring back at you when you’re trying to have sex, I think, and shudder inwardly.

I’m almost pleased to find that it’s not just the fact that Carter isn’t here with me that makes the room seem tacky and obnoxious. It would be tacky and obnoxious even if I was curled up next to him, rather than laid out in a thin line in the middle of a too-large bed. What the room’s decorators were selling wasn’t love. It wasn’t even close. It was a shorthand, a facsimile. No one had love like this. No one’s affection was ever adequately conveyed with swans and chocolates, with rose petals and heart-shaped sequins – and if it was, maybe it wasn’t really love at all. Maybe it was just as fake as the flowers on the dresser.

My relationship hadn’t had all that schmaltzy crap in it; I would never have allowed it. The whole idea of romance seems suspect to me. Even when Carter proposed, it didn’t come with any of the trappings. I mean, sure, there was the ring, but that’s just expected. And there was the dinner… but a dinner is a dinner. We went out for dinner all the time. We could afford it, so why not? That was different. We went out because it was easier than cooking, not so we could show each other how we felt. We didn’t need to. It was just… understood.

Take the proposal, for example. It wasn’t a big thing. We had a serious discussion about marriage, came to the conclusion that it would fit both our lives – or so I thought, anyway – and then he’d gone out and bought the ring the next time he could make time. When he found it didn’t quite fit, even though I’d told him my ring size myself, he’d joked about hoping I didn’t take it as an omen – but of course I didn’t. It wasn’t a signal from the universe, or a bad luck charm. It was the logical choice. It felt right.

It was all according to the plan. I had never felt so content.

Lauren’s proposal, though… Jesus, that was a hot mess. Drew had turned the tiny apartment above the comic shop into an out-and-out fire hazard. He’d filled the whole place with candles, some of them so strongly-scented that it they had made Lauren’s eyes water, not that she’d ever admit that; she’d managed to convince him she was just crying tears of joy. He’d left a narrow path to his bed, where he was knelt on one knee, ready and waiting. Of course, she’d run late at the hospital, so he’d been there for an hour longer than he was expecting, stuck in place because he didn’t want to blow his big opportunity by accident. It all sounded ridiculous to me, but she cried happy tears – genuine happy tears this time – every time she told the story. She could describe the exact look on Drew’s face when she managed to choke out her answer. She remembered every word he said to her when she stopped in front of him at the foot of his bed, even though there was barely room for her to move without risking setting her dress on fire. She knew exactly how happy she was in that instant, and how she had never felt anything like it before.

I mean, it’s alright, if that’s what you’re into, I guess – but it’s not for me. Lauren was always the one who wanted the big fairy tale wedding, who longed to find the man of her dreams, who thought her life would be so much better as soon as the right guy came along. Then she had ended up with Drew, somehow. She had had a plan, and then he had come along and messed it all up. I couldn’t imagine a world in which Drew was the guy she had been talking about when we were kids – Drew, with his kitsch tastes, with his zero ambition, with his gawky, awkward smile. Prince Charming, he was not.

But that’s the thing about plans: they only work for as long as you stick to them. You’ve got to sacrifice things in the short term to get to where you want to be in the long run. You’ve got to make them work – otherwise, what’s the point in having a plan at all?

And suddenly, out of nowhere, there’s Carter’s face for just a second, and that nasal whine of his voice: Like you planned, Ella, he says. Like you planned. Like you always planned. And look where it got you, eh?

I turn myself away from the godawful swan picture and bury my head in the pillow, blotting out as much of the light as I can until I finally fall asleep.