Page 86 of Locke

“I know.”I pick up my wine.

“You need to do something about it,” Molly says.“Formally.Not ignore and hope.”

“Locke’s been pushing me to get a restraining order.”

“I’m a nurse, Livia.I see what happens when women ignore and hope.”

That hits me right in the fear center of my brain.“Do you really think Grant would try to hurt me?”

“I don’t know,” Molly says.“But why would you not treat it seriously?”

“I’ll deal with Grant,” I capitulate.“That’s a separate problem from the one currently eating me alive.”

“The one currently eating you alive is named Locke,” Birdie says.“What’s your plan?”

I blink in surprise.“I don’t have a plan.Why would I have a plan?He called it off.Said our fun times were over.”

Birdie looks at me.“You know what I’ve noticed about men like that?The ones with the walls up and refusal to look at things with good old-fashioned common sense?”

“What’s that?”I ask.

“The fortress has to become more uncomfortable than the risk.”

“That’s either very wise or very bleak,” Molly says.

“Both,” Birdie says.“Mostly both.”

Juno reaches over and taps my leg.“What do you actually want?Not what’s fixable or what’s professional or what makes sense.What do you want?”

I look at the rain on the window.

“I want him to choose me,” I say, letting out my greatest hope.“Not because I pushed him into it or maneuvered him there or made the alternative uncomfortable enough that I was the easier option.I want him to look at what happened and what we are and decide on his own that it’s worth it.”I glance around the room.“I want to be chosen.”

Nobody says anything.

Then Molly, who has known me my entire life says, “That might be the most honest thing you’ve ever said out loud.”

“Don’t make it weird,” I say.

She smiles.“Too late.”

Birdie raises her glass.“For what it’s worth—and I say this as someone who has no idea what she’s talking about and a demonstrably chaotic personal life—he’d be an idiot to walk away from you.”

“He might be an idiot,” I say.

“He might,” she agrees.“But you’re not going to know until you give him the room to prove otherwise.”

“That’s terrifying,” I say.

“Yep,” she says.

“I hate it.”

“Yep.”

We sit with the rain and the wine and the four of us in this warm apartment and I let myself bask in the comfort of women who care about me.

Chapter 27