“I’m off for the summer, but yes, middle school history. How about you? Lisette said you’re a writer.”
“That’s a nice way to put it. I write for a financial magazine. I used to be a journalist.”
“And then you went for the big money?”
“Then I went for getting fired. But my current job does let me work from anywhere.”
“And you picked here. Of all the places in the entire world.”
“I threw a dart at a world map and then went with the place I could afford.”
“See,” Lisette said to Paul. “Didn’t I tell you she was funny? We should ask her to come to improv practice sometime.”
“Oh…” I began.
Paul smiled patiently at Lisette. “She doesn’t want to join our improv group.”
Lisette shook her head. “She’d be really good, though. I mean it, Abby. I’m totally serious.”
“But she doesn’t want to,” Paul said.
Lisette pouted. “But the people who do want to are never, ever funny.”
Paul gave me the wry smile I was starting to get to know well. He was waiting for me to make an excuse. He knew I’d say no, and he was waiting for me to let down Lisette. It reminded me of the way Laura had been certain I would never leave the country.
I met his eyes. “I mean, I could come to a practice.”
Take that, Paul.
He nodded and looked away, his expression unreadable. Was he upset? Why did I keep thinking I could read his thoughts?
“Unless you don’t want me to,” I said. “I was mostly kidding.”
He looked at me, serious. “Of course we want you. Don’t we, Mark?”
“What?”
“Can the tourist from Brooklyn come to improv practice sometime?”
“Of course!” Mark gave me a sharp glance.
“I talked her into it!” Lisette said.
“We need more women. I’ve got a very specific sketch in mind,” Mark said.
“Oh, gross, Mark.”
“That was your dirty mind,” Mark said to her. “I just wanted to pass the Bechdel test for once. Or is that not important to you?”
Later that evening, I would wonder what I had been thinking. It wasn’t just that I was starting to get a crush on Paul. It wasn’t even that his doubts had annoyed me enough to say yes, or that I liked Lisette and had trouble letting her down. It was also that the very thought of doing improv comedy terrified me. It was silly, and I was starting to feel too old to be silly. It was also probably the only time in my life that anyone was ever going to invite me to do something like that again. Nobody in New York asked you to join anything after you turned thirty, aside from a book club where you brought expensive snacks and talked about a bestseller. Everything felt different up here. Nobody knew who I really was. Maybe I didn’t have to know either.
When I said goodbye that evening a little after midnight, Lisette got up to give me a hug, and when I waved goodbye to the rest of the table, I could see Paul watching me with that same slightly rueful expression, like he already regretted something. I just wasn’t sure what it was.
That Sunday,I saw the same expression when I opened the door for him at ten in the morning. He was in jeans and a grey t-shirt with a light windbreaker, looking slightly too put-together for a puffin sightseeing mission.
“So,” he said, already apologetic. “Lisette just texted me. She has a church thing today.”
“Oh no, all day?”
