by Liz Talley
He looped his arms around her and set his chin atop her head. “I know. I know.”
And then she slipped away from him, literally and figuratively.
Two months later Eden found herself wiping down a table before seating a family in the Bayou Brewery and Bistro situated in the heart of Times Square. “I hope y’all enjoy your lunch. Ainsley will be your server. Let me know if you need anything.”
The mother, who wore capri pants and a fuzzy yellow cardigan said, “Well, darlin,’ I can tell you’re not from New York City. Where you from?”
Eden smiled because she got this four to five times a day. “Mississippi. Small town near Jackson.”
“I knew it,” the woman said, settling her girth into the chair. “I’m from Louisiana. Small town outside Lake Charles called DeRidder.”
“Oh, I lived in New Orleans for a while,” Eden said, hoping her voice wouldn’t break. She sort of got weepy every time she thought about Louisiana and the man she’d left behind.
“The best food in the world’s down there. Of course, where I live it’s not bad either. The whole dang state knows what matters in life—livin,’ lovin,’ and eatin.’” She laughed and picked up her menu. “Something my thighs can attest to, and something this here man can attest to too.”
The older gentleman smiled. “You can cook a mean pot of red beans and rice. I hope y’all can too. I been missing good cooking. We been up here for a week and it feels like a month.”
The two teenagers with them tapped on their phones. One rolled her eyes at her father’s comment.
Eden smiled. “The food’s pretty good. We’ll see what you authentic Cajuns think about it when you’re done. Y’all enjoy.”
Eden headed back to the hostess stand where another party of four waited. Valerie, the other hostess, said, “I got ’em. Take your break.”
Finally. She’d been working for almost five hours without a minute to breathe. She headed to the back to clock out for her twenty-minute “lunch” and pulled her phone from the regulation black hostess pants she wore, stepping outside where frantic traffic zipped through the crowded streets. To her right she could see Spider-Man and SpongeBob prowling down the center of 7th Avenue looking for tourists to take pictures with. To her left was the bustle of 6th with rollicking taxicabs and really, really busy people talking on their phones as they hurried to meetings or wherever. It was exhausting and exhilarating at the same time.
And Eden hated it.
She checked her phone, praying for a message from Fredric. Or Nick. Just something better than the spam that popped up or the Facebook notifications that dinged, showing her the world she’d left behind.
The world she’d left behind.
Sighing, she shouldered her way over to the Starbucks in the Marriott Marquis hotel and found a table. It was still busy but not as noisy as out on the street. The barista recognized her with a nod of her head and made Eden her usual hot herbal tea. It was the best Eden could do to soothe her frazzled nerves.
Pulling out her phone, she checked her messages again.
Nothing.
She’d had only two callbacks since she’d arrived a little under two months ago, and they’d netted her a big fat zero. So far she’d spent most her time wiping off sticky menus and juggling the demanding theatre crowd that showed up in force every night. Disappointment gnawed at her. She’d left so much behind only to have little success.
New York City was not what she expected. The image she’d held in her head was much different than the reality of living there. It was big. It was bright. It was busy. And it was somehow very lonely.
Oh, sure. She had two roommates who were perfectly nice if still too busy to try on the bonds of friendship. Katie hailed from Illinois and was a Rockette. When she wasn’t practicing, she was performing, sometimes three shows a day. Clair had come to NYC from California and was busy working the New York Resort show which had something to do with fashion. Eden wasn’t quite up to date with Fashion Week or anything haute couture, so she had no clue. She hadn’t seen either of her two roommates in two days, though there was evidence they’d come home to shower and change clothes. Clair had a boyfriend, some basketball player, and Katie was too tired to date much. Neither one of them ate very much of anything, but they seemed to like Skinnygirl vodka a lot.
Eden hadn’t been able to bring any of her furniture with her. She’d put it in storage in New Orleans and had to buy a mattress, chest of drawers, and a microwave when she arrived in Manhattan. She’d nearly swallowed her tongue at the price of the cheapest furniture and had to take one of Aunt Ruby Jean’s nerve pills the day the delivery guys showed up and attempted to get it up the narrow stairway. She’d tried to make her postage-stamp bedroom cozy with a pretty floral bedspread and one of Rosemary’s coveted quilted pillows, but the apartment still didn’t feel like it was hers. She supposed this was what it felt like living in a dorm room at college. Her old roachy New Orleans apartment felt plush compared to the tiny place she shared in Washington Heights.
That she missed her apartment outside Tremé said all that needed to be said about her frame of mind.
“Excuse me. Would you mind if I borrowed this chair?” a man in a gray business suit asked.
The same words Nick had used those many months ago. Another fracture in her heart. “No. You go ahead,” she said, gesturing toward the empty chair.
He dragged it away, no concern for the sadness that leaked out of her.
This was her life now. Just another struggling actress with no one to care whether she had a bad day or not.
Lord, this was the same kind of pity party she’d indulged in when she first got to New Orleans. She’d become the queen of the New York pity party circuit, leaving soggy tissues and long shadows wherever she went. She longed to pack her bags and head south, but her damned pride and Fredric’s faith in her wouldn’t let her. Eden wasn’t a quitter. Wasn’t in her DNA, right? She couldn’t slink back to Morning Glory or New Orleans with her tail between her legs just because fortune and fame didn’t happen right away. This was New York City, not a Vieux Carré dinner theatre. This was her Everest, and she couldn’t back down, shivering because her dream perched among the clouds.
Her phone rang, drawing her thoughts back to where she sat.
Rosemary.
“Hey,” Eden said, finally feeling some warmth.
“Hey, you,” Rosemary said. “I’ve got good news.”
“You’re pregnant,” Eden said.
“No. Why does everyone ask that?” Rosemary sounded exasperated. Her mother Patsy had started the whole nudging-her-daughter-to-have-a-baby thing. And when Patsy Reynolds nudged, it was more like a bashing over the head. “I’m in Manhattan.”
“What?” Eden’s heart skipped a beat. Rosemary was here?
“We had to come up because Sal’s grandmother Sophia had a cardiac episode. It’s not as bad as the family thought. She’s actually doing okay, thankfully. But we’re here until tomorrow evening.”
“I forgot Sal’s grandmother is named Sophia.” A small pang at the thought of her sweet girl Sophie. Eden missed the silliness they made together. She was homesick for snoballs, blowing bubbles in the courtyard, and painting Sophie’s fingernails turquoise.
“Yeah. Old Italian name. I think. So you want to get together?”
“Does a bear crap in the woods? Of course I do. I’ve been dying I’m so lonely. Come see me right now. I’ll get you a discount on the jambalaya.” Eden squirmed in her chair with sudden happiness. She felt like she’d been given a present with a giant bow. Rosemary was here. Thank God. Someone familiar. Someone who ate chocolate and pasta. Someone who knew her and loved her.
“I can’t right now. We’re at Sal’s mother’s house, and if I leave in the middle of them making Italian pastry, I’ll move even farther down on her list,” Rosemary said with laughter in her voice. Sal’s mother, Natalie Genovese, had shoved a good Italian girl (who turned out to be not so good) down his thr
oat. She’d been disappointed when Sal ran off to God only knew where with a girl as country as a turnip but had since come to accept Rosemary, especially when she saw how happy she made her youngest son.
“Okay, when?”
“Tonight? Sal’s going to hang with his brothers. I’ll take you to SoHo and we’ll eat there. When do you get off?”
Eden sighed. “Not soon enough. My shift is over at five o’clock. Give me a couple of hours to go home, shower, and change. Meet at seven o’clock?”
“Sure. At the corner of Broome and Broadway?”
“Perfect.” Eden hung up and hugged herself. She didn’t care that several people stared and one gentleman moved away from her table. She felt like a new person, and it had been almost two months since she’d felt a smidgeon of joy.
Losing Nick and Sophie had been hard. Much harder than she’d thought.
The week after she told Nick she was going to New York had been busy. At first, she’d thought he was over the funk he’d sunk into when she told him she’d be moving to Manhattan. Traveling from Morning Glory to New Orleans had been fine. Nick had made jokes, avoiding any mention of her leaving, and it had felt normal. Except he’d dropped her off at her apartment and not said anything about her coming over that evening. And when Monday rolled around, he told her he couldn’t see her that night because he had to meet with some investors about the seafood restaurant the company wanted to open on the Northshore.
She knew he was hurt. Heck, she was hurting too. She didn’t want to actually leave New Orleans, but she couldn’t brush away the opportunity of a lifetime. It was the classic story of right man, wrong time. But that didn’t mean they had to call it quits. Or at least she didn’t think so. She decided to give him another day or two and then she’d show up on his doorstep.
But he’d shown up on hers.
She answered the door, thinking it was Mrs. Gonzales, her next-door neighbor, bringing her another icon to protect her on her journey. The woman had already given her three statues and a rosary . . . along with a bottle of tequila. Eden wasn’t sure which she would need most during her last week in New Orleans.
“Nick,” Eden breathed, stepping back.
“You shouldn’t answer the door without checking who it is first, especially in a neighborhood like this.” He wore a pair of worn jeans, a short-sleeved polo, and running shoes. He looked really good aside from the slight circles beneath his eyes and the serious expression on his face.
She gestured for him to enter, wishing he could have seen her place when it was clean and not covered in packing material and empty boxes. It was amazing what a person collected in such a short time. She had twice as much stuff as she’d come to New Orleans with. “That’s true. I thought it was my neighbor. She’s the only person who’s ever knocked on my door. Come on in.”
He stepped in and looked around. “This isn’t as bad as I thought.”
“It took a little work. Cleaning the carpet and scrubbing the tile helped.”
Silence descended. Not the comfortable silence they’d enjoyed many times before but the kind that stretched infinitely. The kind of silence when words were needed but they played hide-and-seek.
“Sorry I couldn’t see you last night,” he said finally, turning toward her, his face steeled into something she’d never seen before. Of course, she’d seen the expression many times reflected in the mirror. Nick was protecting himself.
“I understand.” Though she didn’t. Precious hours and minutes had expired.
“Do you?” he asked, plunging his hand into his hair. Like the day she first met him, the pieces stuck up. “Because I don’t think you do.”
A fist squeezed her heart. She’d been dreading this moment, sensed it would come for her. Nick wasn’t a man who bent easily. “Nick, I don’t know what to—”
“I know you don’t. Part of me understands what you’re doing. This is something you’ve wanted for a long time, and I can’t ask you to give it up. That’s your decision. It’s just . . .” Nick paused and then shook his head. “The thing is, Eden, I love you.”
Boom.
“Nick.”
“I know. But it’s the truth. And I know this isn’t fair, but I’m asking you to stay. Stay with me, Eden.” His words piled up, each syllable weighing her down. She didn’t want him to love her. Because if he loved her, how could she leave? How could she do what had to be done?
Eden slid her hands against her thighs, pressing her fingernails into her flesh. “Don’t, Nick. You can’t play that. It’s not a game.”
His gaze lasered hers. “I’m not saying it to manipulate you. I’ve wrestled with my emotions—with what was right and wrong to say—for the past two days. In the end, the truth is the best policy, right?”
“Don’t do this,” Eden said, putting her hand up. “You’re not in love with me. That’s not something you decide in two days so I don’t leave.”
“You’re telling me how to feel?” His words were dropped coins plinking against cold stone, round with anger, frustration, and something she couldn’t quite put her finger on.
“I’m not. You’re feeling panicky. It’s change once again for you and Sophie, but it’s not impossible. Don’t mistake love for control.” Eden clutched the chipped Formica separating the miniscule kitchen from the teacup living room. She needed something to keep her standing as Nick’s words sank down into those deep places she ignored, those places that wept to be loved and needed, those places that nurtured happily-ever-afters coming on a white steed.
“I’m not using my feelings to control you.” He sank onto her futon couch and clasped his head. “This isn’t about Sophie. I talked to the agency I used in the past and, miracle of miracles, they have one of their most experienced aides coming next week. You don’t have to stay Sophie’s nanny if you stay. You can go to school. Have your life at Gatsby’s. Be with me.”
Relief he’d found someone flooded her. She’d been worried about the stress she’d placed on him and Sophie. “I’m glad you found someone. I’ve been so worried about Soph.”
“This isn’t about Sophie. It’s about what we have. A rightness has been there from the very beginning. You said it. A meant-to-be.” Nick lifted his face to her, anguish etched in every new crevice. “Look, I’ve done heartache before, and my biggest regret is that I wasn’t honest. I told Susan what she wanted to hear. I told her to go, that we’d be okay. We’d commute. We’d make it work . . . even as I knew it wouldn’t. I never asked her to stay with me.”
“I’m not her, Nick.”
“I know. I’m just saying I didn’t ask for what I wanted.” He said it like it should make a difference. Like what he wanted was more important than what Eden wanted.
“But you’re asking me?” Eden said, something edging out the sadness inside her. Of course he’d make this about him. And that he’d compared her to a woman who left her daughter and tossed aside her vows irked her. Eden had made no vows. “I’m not your wife. In fact, I’m not sure I’m officially your girlfriend. We’ve been together for a month.”
“You know what you are to me. We’re heading somewhere, somewhere permanent.”
“So you’re saying it’s your way or . . . you’re done with me? I either stay and give you what you want or it won’t work?”
“Don’t put words in my mouth.”
“Okaaaay, so if I go to New York, what?”
“If you go, things will be hard. I don’t see how we can make it.” He looked resigned.
“Do you even consider me a person?”
“Of course I do. I understand having aspirations, but you’re doing well here. Give it a few years and you’ll be Chris Owens.”
“I don’t know who Chris Owens is, but I don’t want to be him.”
“Her.”
Eden felt anger bubble up. What an ass. “Whatever. I’m not asking you to give up anything. I’m not making you choose between love or career. I didn’t suggest you leave your home, your job, your family, to ta
ke a chance. But you’re asking me to do that. You’re asking me to give up part of myself so you can be comfortable.”
“Wow,” he breathed, shaking his head, his expression betraying disbelief. “I’m not discounting your dreams. I’m trying to be honest about me. That’s it.”
“But you are. Why can’t you be happy for me instead of sad for yourself? My going to New York City doesn’t mean I’m abandoning what I feel for you. You’re thinking of how this affects you . . . and how inconvenient it would be to not have me in your bed or in your life.”
Nick stood up. The tic in his clenched jaw clued her in—no more Mr. Sad Nick. Instead, this was Pissed Nick. “First, I don’t value you as a lay, Eden. And I don’t have you around because it’s convenient. I care about you. I love you. How can a woman hear a man say those words, lay his soul bare, and then fling them back at him?”
Eden jabbed a finger at him. “You know I’m not throwing anything back at you. I’m merely questioning why now? And why do I have to make this choice? Why is this black or white?”
“Because I’ve done gray, Eden,” he said, frustration increasing in his voice. “No matter what anyone says, it doesn’t work. You can’t go to Manhattan and still have a life with me. I can’t come there every other weekend. I have a disabled child and a business. Eventually, it will get too hard and we’ll end ugly.”
“So in order for me to be with you, I have to forget my dream of being on Broadway? That’s the relationship you want to have?”
“No. I’m being honest. It won’t work. I’m not telling you what to do. I’m telling you what I know will happen. And, yeah, I’m telling you I want you in my life. But I want you to . . .” He squeezed his eyes shut.
“Pick you,” she finished.
He opened his eyes, and within the steely depths she could see the truth. That’s what he wanted. He wanted Eden to choose him over what she wanted.
And there was the crux she’d always faced—everyone wanted her to give up herself for what they wanted. Her mother. Her sister. And now Nick.
As much as she cherished the thought that Nick loved her, she wasn’t erasing who she was. Going to New York wasn’t capricious. It was a goal. And now the dream she’d held on to when times were so hard she couldn’t bear to think on them was in her hand. If she crumpled it, she’d never truly belong with Nick. Regret was a seed that grew into bitterness. Eden didn’t want that rooted inside her, poisoning the love she had with Nick.
