Page 12 of The Wedding Fake

I made a wry face, refraining from mentioning that was half the problem.

“He’s smart and sweet and hella good looking,” Nora added, and while he was reasonably good looking and definitely smart, I’d never seen any evidence he was sweet. This had to end.

“I appreciate the thought, Nora, but I’m seeing someone,” I said. It was a lie I probably should’ve let die, but with Nora and Mom’s setup nipping at my heels, I needed to pull out the heavy artillery. I’d deal with the fallout as it came.

Nora made a disdainful little snort. “Emily mentioned, but I know you, Claire. If it were serious, you’d bring him with you to the wedding. You aren’t, so this is either something very new, or you know it’s never going to work, because I think if you ever found the right guy you’d lock him down quick.” She tittered as if she’d made a funny joke. “That’s why I think you’d be so good with Grant.”

My nose curled irritably. I hated that this was how my family saw me. It wasn’t like I was being purposefully picky. It was depressing to be single. I happened to know that only thirty percent of women my age were still single, and if I dragged my sad, lonely, single self all the way to age thirty, that number would drop to less than twenty percent. It was depressing to know that I didn’t just feel like the only single woman left in the whole city, I quickly was becoming just that.

And yet, all the wallowing and self-pity in the world wouldn’t make Grant the right man.

“I think he may be able to come to the wedding,” I said. They were stupid words. Stupid, crazy words said by a stupid, crazy woman.

“Who?” Nora asked.

“Hudson. If he can get off work. We’ll see.”

8

HUDSON

My finger hovered over the button labeled “four,” just as it had nearly every time I’d used the elevator since being stuck with Claire. I’d gone to the fourth floor the very first night, only hours after we were rescued, and found the fourth floor looked very similar to the fifth. Units were labeled with numbers and letters ranging from 4A to 4T. By my count, that was twenty different apartments. Claire could probably calculate the probability of finding the correct door—probably in her head—but I didn’t need to know the precise probability to know it was crazy to go knocking on nineteen strangers’ doors at ten at night. Even if I found her apartment relatively quickly, I was bound to piss off a lot of people.

At the time, I’d stood, looking helplessly around the sterile fourth floor, and it had seemed like a sign. The stopped elevator had been traumatic for her, and maybe she needed time to recover. Maybe she wouldn’t want me at her door. Maybe she hadn’t felt all the same fireworks I’d felt during the hours we were stuck together.

I figured I was bound to run into her in the elevator. I always ran into her in the elevator.

But four days later, when I still hadn’t run into her and I still couldn’t get her out of my head, an opportunity I couldn’t pass up arrived at my door. Actually, it showed up in the vestibule.

The box was roughly the size of a shoe box, but it didn’t have shoes inside. Apparently, it had some special towels my mom swore would clean fingerprints off the stainless steel fridge. I didn’t think my fridge was full of fingerprints, but my mother evidently did. The first night after the box had arrived, I picked it up as I walked in the vestibule, but then I stopped. I didn’t have to knock on all twenty doors on the fourth floor or pray we’d end up in the same elevator. There was another way to get Claire’s attention. I set the box back down on the counter in front of the mailboxes and walked into the lobby.

That had been a day ago, and today the box was gone. I sincerely hoped Claire had picked it up, but I had no way of knowing. Perhaps Claire had been right and thieves had taken it. I consoled myself with the knowledge that a thief would be disappointed to find a box full of magic rags.

I was restless waiting. I tried to make dinner, but settled for some tortilla chips and salsa. I tried to watch TV, but I kept getting up, wandering into the kitchen and realizing I’d gotten up for no reason. I fiddled on my phone for a while, trying to edit a video I attempted to make last week, but it couldn’t hold my attention. Nothing held my attention until nearly nine, when there was a knock at the door.

I stood slowly. There was no reason for anyone to knock on my door. In the four years I’d lived there, I didn’t think I’d ever had an uninvited guest, and yet I was afraid to look through the peephole. Finding anyone other than Claire outside that door would be a terrible disappointment, a realization that disarmed me. Inhaling deeply, I leaned toward the hole and squinted a single eye.

She was every bit as beautiful as I remembered, standing with her brown waves cascading over her shoulders, a mask covering all but her startling green eyes. In her hand was a box, and I recognized it as the one from my mother. I clicked the lock, still watching her through the peephole, and she straightened at the sound.

In the instant it took to swing the door open, I visualized my options. I could scoop her up in my arms. I was sure she’d respond. Maybe only mostly sure. But I could imagine us stumbling back into the apartment, frantically kissing and undressing.

And then what? What would she think after it was all over? I’d never once cared if a woman wanted to walk out the door after sex—it was less complicated that way, honestly—but I didn’t want Claire to walk out of my bed tonight and out of my life forever. “You’ve got mail,” she said as the door opened all the way, and I stepped back to offer her entrance. I hoped she’d be willing to come in.

“Come on in. It’s nice to see you.” The mask blocked what I thought was a smile, but her eyes brightened visibly. “You can take your mask off, if you want.”

She slipped the mask off and set it on the kitchen counter as she walked in. “Nice place,” she said.

She stood in the middle of a kitchen I’d thought was standard in the one bedroom units. “Is it different from your apartment?” I asked.

She shrugged, turning a little pink. “No, it’s the same,” she admitted. “Your decor is different, obviously.”

I looked around, trying to see the apartment from her eyes. It wasn’t decorated all that well. “Probably yours is nicer,” I said.

“Yours is nice,” she said with a shrug.

“I’m glad you’re here,” I said, gesturing toward the couch. Claire sat down where I’d suggested, but looked uncomfortable. I sat in a chair across from her, trying to decide exactly what her perching at the edge of the couch meant.

“You mentioned you work a weird shift,” Claire said, and my head tilted to one side, thrown by the non sequitur. It had been one of the things we’d talked about in passing, but didn’t tend to be the part of my job people remembered.