“No way. You’ve got a color in your face. Don’t tell me you’ve been hiking. Did somebody kidnap you and force you to do a trendy maple syrup diet?”
“There was some hiking. I made a couple of friends there,” I said.
“How dare you.”
“Male friends?” Jasmine asked.
“One, and I was madly in love with him,” I said.
Jasmine and Lucas stared at me for a moment. “And…?” Jasmine asked.
I took a deep breath. This was not the way things usually went between us. I was usually joking about my horrible love life, but never meaning much of it. Maybe after my honesty with Laura, I couldn’t stop it from gushing forth everywhere. “He’s sweet, and I miss him. And Kedar said I could work from home again, so technically I could go back to live in Newfoundland for a few more weeks, but Laura needs me right now, and I don’t know if I have the courage to go back because I don’t think I could handle leaving him twice.”
“Jasmine,” Lucas said, “our little cynic has fallen in love.”
I shook my head. “But it doesn’t matter, because it’s impossible.” My eyes were welling with tears, which wasdefinitely a sign that I no longer knew how to behave in New York.
“Maybe he could come here?” Jasmine was not usually this hopeful. I appreciated the effort she was making to avoid her usual snark, but I shrugged. Paul coming to New York felt impossible, too.
“So tell us about your soulmate,” Jasmine said.
“He’s cute and sarcastic, and he’s a schoolteacher who knows a lot about Canadian history.”
“So Gilbert Blythe?” Jasmine said. “You’re dating Gilbert Blythe fromAnne of Green Gables.”
I smiled sadly. “It doesn’t matter, because unless I get a visa, I can’t go back.”
Lucas sighed and put one hand on mine. “At least you’re finally over the last one. What was his name? The one who quotedThe New York Review of Booksto me in an argument about Marvel movies?” Lucas meant Farid, of course.
“So where is the photo?” Jasmine pointed to my cell phone.
I flipped through my camera roll and found one of me, Paul, and Lisette hiking. “There’s a moose in the lake behind us, but it’s so far away that it looks like a speck.”
Lucas examined the photo carefully. “Not bad. He’s giving me actor-waiter vibes, like he’s a Broadway understudy for a 1960s musical. And the manic pixie dream girl is…?”
“Lisette from Quebec. She’s a good friend, too.”
“Look at how he’s looking at you.” Jasmine smiled knowingly. “You’re going to have one of those destination weddings in a barn in Newfoundland. And I’m going to have to go.”
“He’s probably getting back together with his ex-wife as we speak.”
“If I go to any event involving farm animals, you’re buying me new shoes.”
My heart sunk a little at her teasing. They were still my closest New York friends, but Lucas was right, too. I was different.
Paul wrote me back on the way home from dinner:I miss you too, Abby.
My breath caught. I didn’t move from the sidewalk until someone muttered a swear at me and I managed to get out of their way. Hope isn’t dead in New York, I thought, but it better not take up any sidewalk space.
Some of themore famous improv theaters I’d heard about in New York were defunct when I tried to look them up, but I did some digging online and found a little black box space in the Lower East Side that had a biweekly improv show. They had a show the next day, so I decided to go.
It was in a brick building with a couple of small theaters inside and an exhibit in the lobby by a local artist. The lobby art consisted of mouths painted in bright colors, rows upon rows of teeth in blue and purple and yellow. I stood before them for a moment, trying to decide if they were interesting or embarrassing, like I did with a lot of modern art. They felt very improv-appropriate.
Inside, the theater held about one hundred seats and had an audience of about sixty, half of whom would eventually appear in the show. The atmosphere was fun and cheerful, and large groups of people seemed to know each other. A young woman with purple-black hair got up and pitched the theater group’s improv classes to the crowd, and then the show began.
“We are asking for help from the audience. Tell me the last time you felt afraid.”
I considered it. I could think of a dozen times I’d been afraid recently, but none that I wanted to see performed.
