Don't Cry for Me

by Rachel Lacey

  After spending an obscene amount of time getting ready, she went into the living room to check on the kittens. She’d leave some extra wet food out for them, and they should be fine until she and Eve got back, whatever time that was.

  Her phone rang, and she grabbed it, hoping it was Eve calling to say she was on her way, but Adam’s name was on the screen. He must be downstairs getting ready to open. “Hey,” she said. “Need my help before I leave?”

  “Uh, you better get down here.” His voice sounded strange, tense, completely unlike himself. “I think we’ve been robbed.”

  26

  Eve entered Josie’s building through the back door, intending to go straight up to her apartment, but something stopped her. A noise. Static, like a radio between stations. It scratched at her nerves, clawing under her skin. She closed her eyes. Flashing red and blue lights. The crackle of static as a police officer rolls out yellow tape. Smothering pain as she’s lifted onto a stretcher.

  Police radios.

  She forced the image from her mind. Why was she hearing them now? Breathing hard, she strode down the hall toward the bar. A grim-faced policeman stood there, speaking to someone outside her line of vision. Eve’s stomach went into freefall.

  Josie.

  Oh God. Something cold sliced through Eve’s stomach, filling her body with an awful, paralyzing fear that she already knew too well. Her knees shook, and her chest seized. Not Josie. This wasn’t happening. Not again. Eve’s feet kept moving, propelling her toward the inevitable.

  The police officer turned toward her.

  “We’re so sorry to inform you…”

  A silent scream rose in her throat. The world around her was blurry and sluggish, silent except for the frantic whooshing of her heart inside her ears. She glanced toward the bar.

  And there was Josie, seated on a barstool. Relief almost knocked Eve’s knees out from under her. She pressed a hand to her heart, attempting to steady herself. It was all she could do not to fall into Josie’s arms, hold her, kiss her, sob into the fluorescent depths of her hair until she’d found her balance again. Josie was safe and whole. Alive.

  She’d changed her hair. That was the first thing Eve noticed. Pink stripes mixed with the lavender, and it was so fucking beautiful. But then the rest of the scene came into focus, Josie’s red eyes, the devastated look on her face, the policemen on either side of her. Adam stood nearby, arms crossed over his chest, his expression pinched. Josie looked up and met Eve’s eyes, chin quivering.

  Eve’s stomach bottomed out all over again. Two police officers had stood beside her hospital bed that night, just like they stood with Josie now. This time, it was happening to Josie, and Eve needed to be here for her. She forced herself to keep walking, the sound of her heels against the tile floor echoing way too loudly in the otherwise quiet room.

  “What’s happened?” she asked Josie gently.

  “I was robbed,” Josie said, blinking up at her.

  Eve exhaled, squeezing her eyes shut. She’d jumped straight to thinking someone had died. Robbed. That was…way less horrible. “Oh.”

  “Who are you?” one of the police officers asked.

  “Eve Marlow. I’m with—”

  “She’s my girlfriend,” Josie interrupted, extending a hand toward Eve.

  Girlfriend.

  She’d been about to say she was with the team from Do Over, and now her head was spinning for an entirely different reason. She stepped closer, skin prickling uncomfortably as she took the hand Josie had offered.

  “I let Lauren close for me last night, and it looks like she cleaned me out before she left.” Josie stared at her with dazed eyes, as if she still couldn’t believe it had happened. That made two of them. “She emptied the cash register and took a bunch of liquor and expensive wine from the cellar.”

  “How do you know it was Lauren?” Eve asked. Her whole body shook as the roller coaster of the last few minutes ricocheted through her system.

  “There are no signs of forced entry,” the officer said. “Everything points to an inside job.”

  “And Lauren’s not answering her cell phone,” Josie added. “Plus, she’s cleared out of her apartment.”

  “Holy shit,” Eve said, leaning against the bar.

  “I trusted her,” Josie said miserably. “I shouldn’t have let her close. I just…I never thought…I never imagined…”

  “Of course you didn’t,” Eve assured her, although the business part of her brain was already thinking how absurdly foolish it had been of Josie to let Lauren close for her last night. Adam was one thing. She’d known him for years. But Lauren had been a virtual stranger and, as it turned out, not a very honest one.

  Eve stood quietly off to the side while Josie finished up with the police. Finally, she, Josie, and Adam were alone in the bar. She could see people outside the front door, peering in. It was past five. Dragonfly should be open. “Are you opening at all tonight?” she asked, pushing past the emotions still churning inside her to focus on the business at hand.

  “I…I don’t know.” Josie looked around. “I don’t have any cash, and…” she drifted off, swallowing hard.

  “I’m going to print a sign for the door,” Eve said, walking to Josie’s office, where she printed out a piece of paper that said the bar was temporarily closed due to unforeseen circumstances. She took it outside and taped it to the door, locking it on her way back in.

  “You can’t afford to stay closed on a Friday night,” she told Josie. “What do you need to open?”

  “Cash for the register,” Josie said. “And I’m short a bunch of liquor.”

  “You can make do without the liquor for the night,” Eve said. “Adam, can you take her card and go to the bank? Josie, how much do you need?”

  “A hundred in small bills to make change.”

  Eve looked at Adam, who nodded.

  “I’m on it.” He headed out the back.

  And then she and Josie were alone. She pulled Josie in for a hug, holding on to her for a long moment as her throat constricted painfully. She couldn’t seem to get past the initial shock of finding the police here at Dragonfly, that awful moment when she thought something had happened to Josie. Her body still shook uncontrollably. Could Josie feel it?

  Eve pulled back, looking into her eyes. “Are you okay?”

  “No,” Josie whispered. “I mean, our date, and you look so pretty…” Her eyes welled with tears. “And now I’ll have to work.”

  “Forget about our date,” Eve told her. “We’ll go out another night. I can hang out here with you tonight if you like.”

  “It’s not the same.” Josie slumped in her seat.

  Eve stroked her fingers through one of Josie’s newly pink curls. “Love your hair.”

  “Thanks,” Josie said glumly. “I was in the mood to celebrate earlier.”

  “You’ll still get the chance to celebrate. This is just a setback. Every business has them.”

  “I’m down a bartender,” Josie said. “And a few thousand dollars in cash and inventory.”

  “Your insurance will likely cover at least some of that,” Eve said.

  “Right.” She blew out a breath. “I’ll give them a call in the morning.”

  “After tonight, Lauren wasn’t scheduled to work again until Tuesday, right? We can probably find you someone new by then. We’ve still got that whole stack of applications from last month.”

  “Can I even afford it now?” Josie asked.

  “It’ll be tight,” Eve admitted. “But you don’t have a choice.”

  “Well, I could just work by myself like I used to.” Josie propped her elbows on the bar, a faraway look in her eyes.

  “You have more customers now. Could you even handle it alone?”

  She shrugged, then sighed. “Maybe I should tough it out next week to recoup some of what Lauren took from me.”

  “That’s an option, if you think you can manage it.”

  Josie stared dejectedly a
t the wall.

  “You need to snap out of this,” Eve told her. “Pick yourself up and get back to work. Tomorrow will be better.”

  “That’s easy for you to say,” Josie said before turning to Eve with a stricken look on her face. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what…you of all people…”

  And it was Eve’s turn to sigh. “Come on. Get up.”

  Josie slid off the barstool, running her hands appreciatively over Eve’s dress. “You got so dressed up for me.”

  “Yes.” And it was a damn shame they wouldn’t get to go out and have the night they’d planned, but such was life. Money was replaceable, as were employees and liquor. “Tell me what’s going on here.”

  Josie’s eyes flooded with tears, and she bit her lip before pressing her face into Eve’s shoulder. “I never wanted this.”

  “Never wanted what?”

  “This bar,” she whispered.

  “Oh.” That wasn’t what she’d expected her to say.

  “I hate saying it. I hate even thinking it. I know it sounds awful. You know I’ll do anything to save Swanson’s—Dragonfly—but this isn’t the life I wanted. I just want to rescue kittens and grow my YouTube presence, you know? Think of how many lives I could have saved these last two years if I hadn’t been shackled to this bar.”

  “Shackled?” Eve repeated, arms tightening around Josie.

  “That’s how it feels sometimes. I’m always here. I never get to leave.” Her voice was dull and monotone. “Every time I start to make progress toward getting my old life back, it gets taken away from me. I just want to have enough staff that I can start rescuing kittens again or take you out for a date on a Friday night. Is that so much to ask?”

  “You will,” Eve told her.

  “I just…sometimes I hate this place,” Josie whispered. “I hate it, and I wish I had let it go under.”

  Eve stared at her for a moment in shocked silence. “Hate is a strong word.”

  Josie stepped backward out of Eve’s arms. She took a long look around the bar as her lips twisted into a frown. “Right now, I hate absolutely everything about it. I wish I could walk out that door and never look back.”

  “Well, that’s unfortunate considering I just spent the last month helping you save it.” Eve’s rampaging emotions had built to the point where she felt slightly hysterical. For a moment, she’d thought Josie had died, while Josie was ready to throw in the towel over some lost cash?

  Josie gulped, nodding. “I know.”

  “You begged me for this.” Eve’s skin flushed hot, and that heavy feeling was back in her stomach. God, why couldn’t she stop shaking? “I told you I didn’t work in bars. You knew how hard it was for me to be here, and you begged and pleaded until I agreed to help, and now you’re telling me it was a mistake?”

  Josie opened and closed her mouth, blinking rapidly. “It wasn’t a mistake.”

  “No?” Eve heard the ice in her voice. She was being unfair. She knew she was. But something deep inside her felt wounded and raw, and it was a feeling she’d never wanted to experience again. Her fingers clenched defensively.

  “She’s my girlfriend.”

  Josie’s words echoed in her head, mixed with the static of police radios and the tangy scent of blood.

  Lisa hooked her arm through Eve’s. “Mom, Dad, I want you to meet my girlfriend.”

  Josie stepped forward, desperation morphing into defiance. “You’re twisting my words. I just had the rug pulled out from under me, and I deserve a few minutes to feel sorry for myself.”

  Eve turned away, not trusting herself to speak.

  “We’re so sorry to inform you that your wife didn’t make it. She and the baby died en route to the hospital.”

  “It wasn’t a mistake,” Josie repeated. “I’ll keep working because I promised my dad at his funeral that I wouldn’t let us lose this place. I’ll save this bar, even if it’s not what I want.”

  “That doesn’t make any sense.” Eve was hot and cold at the same time, lost between the past and the present.

  “Family doesn’t always make sense,” Josie told her. “Sometimes you just have to do things because they’re the right thing to do. This building is my home, and someday I’ll be able to make it all work the way I want it to.”

  They faced each other, tempers sparking, and Eve’s shoulders slumped as she realized with sudden, sinking clarity that the only person she was angry at was herself. She had an overwhelming, irrational urge to cry because she couldn’t believe she’d let this happen, that she’d let them get to the point where Josie introduced her as her girlfriend, where just the thought of something happening to her could send Eve into an emotional tailspin.

  “I never took it lightly that it was difficult for you to be here,” Josie said quietly. “I still don’t.”

  “I know.” Eve swallowed roughly. “I’m sorry.”

  Adam walked in with a sleeve of cash, staring between them as he tried to read the tension in the room. Eve stayed out of the way as Josie stocked the cash register and Adam chopped lemons. By the time they were ready to open, it was past seven, and dusk had fallen across Manhattan.

  “I should probably just go home,” Eve said, feeling suddenly exhausted. She’d briefly entertained the idea of hanging out here at Dragonfly and keeping Josie company during her shift, but the thought of sitting on one of those barstools for another nine hours was too much. Tears pressed behind her eyes, and that sick feeling in her stomach just wouldn’t go away.

  Josie crooked a finger, indicating for Eve to follow her. She led the way into her office and closed the door, turning to face Eve. “Are we okay?”

  Eve took a step back, feeling trapped in the confined space. “For tonight.”

  “Tell me what that means,” Josie pressed.

  Eve rubbed a hand over her brow. “It means, you’ve had a tough night, and we should regroup tomorrow.”

  Josie nodded. “Okay.”

  Eve blew out a slow breath. “Okay.”

  Josie stepped forward, wrapping her arms around Eve. They held on to each other for a long minute, and then they were kissing, and every cell in Eve’s body was lit with the energy that seemed to charge them every time they touched. It was so intense that she felt herself splintering, because she knew this feeling. She’d felt it before, and she couldn’t let herself feel it again. Her heart couldn’t take it. She pulled back, breathing hard, tears stinging her eyes.

  “Tomorrow,” she whispered, already dreading the horrible inevitability of what she was going to have to do. She walked out of Josie’s office without looking back.

  27

  Josie blinked over gritty eyes, tightening her grip on the bag of carry-out in her lap. As usual, it had been almost five by the time she made it upstairs last night—this morning—and then she hadn’t been able to fall asleep. She’d been too wired, a swirling mass of emotions all warring for dominance inside her.

  She was furious with Lauren for screwing her over, hurt by the betrayal, discouraged by the setback to her business, and utterly confused by whatever had happened between her and Eve afterward. While she felt a little guilty for dumping her deepest, darkest fears on Eve like that, she also didn’t, because she’d had a profoundly shitty night, and she should have been able to vent about it for a few minutes before she moved on.

  So now she was on the subway, holding a bag of Chinese food and hoping to set things right between them. She exited at Eve’s stop and climbed the steps to the street, headed toward her building. Josie gave her name to Eve’s doorman, who ushered her inside. She rode the elevator to the eighth floor and knocked on Eve’s door.

  She opened it wearing jeans and a sleeveless blue top, her hair in a messy ponytail. How did she manage to look even more beautiful every time Josie saw her? Maybe that was part of Eve’s magic, this invisible force around her that drew Josie in deeper and deeper. At this point, there was no way back out, at least, not with her heart intact.

  “Hi,” she
said, giving Eve a gentle kiss before following her into the living room.

  “Any new developments in the case?” Eve asked.

  Josie shook her head. “Lauren is long gone. The police don’t seem super hopeful that they’ll be able to track her down.”

  “People are profoundly shitty sometimes, aren’t they?” Eve said with a frown.

  Josie laughed, sitting next to her on the couch as they began opening cartons of food. “Yeah, they are.” This felt right, like the balance between them had been restored. They’d both been upset yesterday, but now they’d had a chance to calm down and cool off.

  Eve went into the kitchen, returning with plates and napkins, and they began to eat, not talking much. Eve looked as tired as Josie felt, and she figured she wasn’t the only one who hadn’t slept well last night. Once they’d finished their lunch and put the leftovers in the fridge, they went back into the living room.

  “I’m sorry,” Josie said earnestly. “Those things I told you about feeling shackled to the bar…they’re all true. But it doesn’t change the fact that I want to save it.”

  “And that still doesn’t make any sense to me,” Eve said, staring at the table in front of her.

  “I guess a lot of things about me have never made sense,” Josie said with a self-deprecating laugh.

  Eve smiled, but it was a fake one, the kind she used on camera.

  The wall between them was back up, and this time, Josie had no idea how to scale it. “What’s happening to us?”

  Eve shook her head. “I don’t know.”

  “Yes, you do.”

  “I think, if we’re really honest with ourselves, we both know,” Eve said quietly.

  Josie was about to retort that she didn’t, but before she could get it out, she realized Eve was right. She did know. “We did what we said we weren’t going to. We let it get serious.”

  Eve didn’t move, didn’t speak. She just stared at the table, her expression blank. “I said I’d do this thing with you until it didn’t make sense anymore, and I think that time is now.”