“Hi,” she said flatly.
“Don’t sound so excited to see me.” Hayley walked over and joined Gemma on the couch. “Ticket to Tokyo?” She nodded toward the television, Caitlin’s face frozen on the screen.
“Yup. Torturing myself.”
“Is this why you’ve been MIA? I was about to file a missing person’s report, and you’ve just been over here binging old Caitlin Stone movies.”
“It’s literally been like forty-eight hours.”
“Exactly.”
Gemma sighed. “I need to tell you something, Hay.” She turned to Hayley as she shifted closer. “I slept with Caitlin. Again. The night of the wrap party.”
Hayley didn’t look shocked.
“How’d that go?” She asked, raising an eyebrow.
Gemma told Hayley everything—the letter left in her trailer, the charged conversation at the wrap party, the walk down memory lane in the bar from when they were eighteen, and every intimate detail of their last night together.
“I told myself not to overthink it and just do what felt right,” Gemma finished.
“And doingCaitlinfelt right in the moment.”
Gemma threw a pillow at her friend as they both laughed.
“It felt like a goodbye, the official end of us.” Gemma sensed the heaviness of her words as she lay flat on the couch, placing her long legs across Hayley’s lap.
“But?”
Gemma breathed a groan. “But… I don’t know. Part of me felt like it could have been a new beginning. I guess I wanted her to fight harder, to prove somehow that hell would freeze over before she’d leave me again. But she didn’t. She left—again.” Gemma threw her arm across her eyes. “Ugh. I’m a mess, Hay. I feel like I’m right back where I started ten years ago. Except, this time, I brought it upon myself. I pushed Caitlin away.MyCaitlin.”
Hayley placed her hands on Gemma’s legs. “You’re not back where you started,” she assured her. “You’re older, wiser, hotter, and now Caitlin knows exactly what she missed out on.”
Gemma let out a half laugh, remembering the last night they’d spent together and how Caitlin had melted under her touch.
Hayley went on, “Gem, you were just a kid back then. It doesn’t have to be like that again. You just need to figure out what you want.”
Gemma propped herself up on her elbows, listening closely.
“You’ve loved Caitlin half your life, and you know she still feels the same. I’ve never seen two people more magnetically drawn to one another,” Hayley said, shaking her head. “I mean, for fuck’s sake, what are the odds you both get cast in the same lesbian romance movie?”
They both laughed, the sound loosening the knot in Gemma’s chest. Itwasrather ridiculous.
“Only you can say if you could trust her again, but if Caitlin is the future you really want, then stop living in the past and just take the chance, dammit. People rarely findthe one, Gem. You found yours twice.”
Gemma exhaled a long breath, feeling some of the weight start to lift. “Thanks, Hay.”
Hayley leaned over and gave Gemma a hug before snatching Gemma’s glass of wine from the table with a coy grin. “Okay, enough about you—can we talk about me now?”
Gemma chuckled, gesturing for her to take the floor. “Please, by all means.”
Hayley took a sip of Gemma’s pinot noir, then dropped her voice like she was confessing a crime. “The other night, I had the worst experience of my life. I was in bed with this woman and mid-orgasm, I fucking called her Maddie.”
Gemma exploded in laughter, her shoulders shaking, her legs kicking in Hayley’s lap, and almost spilling the burgundy liquid.
“It’s not funny, Gem!” Hayley protested with a groan. “How the hell did that insufferable woman wedge herself into my brain after one evening?”
“Probably because she’s exactly your type, to a T—blonde hair, blue eyes, short enough to put in your pocket. She’s model-level beautiful.”
