Chapter 11 | Cecilia

Chapter 11

Cecilia

I wave to the couple walking to their car. They look so young. It was the first thought I had when they walked up the drive of the mansion I had intended to sell today. They were my third visit, and all of them—from the yuppie hoping to move out of the city to the millennial couple who spent the whole time playacting what their kids would say about each room—were wrong for this house. Today, more than most days, felt like an episode of Property Brothers. This is the dream, but let me show you what you can really afford. Sometimes, HGTV makes my job a lot harder.

The couple is not the problem though. Not really. It’s, well, me and this house. I want to sell it, need to sell it, but also I relish each showing that isn’t the one . Because I love this house. A two-story luxury colonial in a good neighborhood with good schools. With neighbors who stop and chat through open car windows, kids biking, and couples walking hand in hand, it is a suburban dream. It’s only been on the market for a few weeks. Longer than I expected, to be honest, but inflation has buyers hesitant. People were buying above their means, but now they are clutching their purse strings. I could buy it. Sometimes I imagine what it would feel like to have the key handed to me, like I do every time I sell a house. The realization that this beauty is mine. But despite having lived in and outside of Chicago for nearly two decades, I’m reluctant to saddle myself with property. Not to mention, what would I do with all those rooms? The furniture from my River North loft would cover two and a half rooms. How would I fill the silence that settled in once the thrill of the purchase faded?

I asked my mother that once, as the number of people in our house dwindled from four to three to two and eventually only her. She wouldn’t sell even though she knew the value she held in her palm. I might be a good Realtor, but my mother is a mogul, having opened her own ultra-successful agency when I was still in diapers. She shrugged and told me that she simply went room by room and made them hers—a library here, a new office there. The shrug and her nonchalant attitude were the tells that she was not lying but sugarcoating her answer. I knew that she had remodeled her castle of familial bliss into a fortress.

Back inside, I do a quick walk-through of the rooms. I adjust the throw pillows in the formal living room and wipe a spot of dust off the mantel. This room, with its vaulted ceiling, begs for built-in bookcases. It was made to be a library, sliding ladder and all. That’s the first thing I would do. I flip off the light and head out into the humid night. I don’t look back. This house is not my path. Maybe it might have been once, but that girl hasn’t been me in a long time. Not since I watched my mother’s world shatter, and mine with it, when my father’s affair came out, and I had to watch the pain etched into her face every time he showed up to pick up my sister with another woman’s baby in his arms.

So no, I’m not buying this house, and I’m not settling down, as much as I might crave the normalcy of shared nights and spaces with my girlfriend. I can’t. I won’t.

The sound of my phone buzzing inside my purse brings me back to myself. I shuffle through the mess inside, secretly hoping it’s Evie trying again to persuade me to come over for Thai. Even though I woke up with Evie curled around me this morning, I miss her, which is why I turned down her invitation to join her for dinner this morning. All these hours later, I would cave. But when I pull out my phone, my sister’s number flashes. “You are alive,” I say by way of greeting.

“Cee...”

The teasing evaporates from my tone at the tears in Liz’s voice. “What happened?”

T he parking lot at Evie’s garden apartment complex is busy this time of evening. The traditional workday ended a short while ago, and the usual ebb and flow of people getting home for the day makes it hard to notice Evie’s car. Finally, I spot the muted-green sedan a few spots down from the building next to hers, and relief calms the tempest roaring in my mind. Julian and Liz separated. That by itself would’ve been a sad truth, one I hoped would never come for my sister, but the whole story is infinitely harder to swallow.

My sister left her husband. My brother-in-law had, at the very least, an emotional affair that ended in a kiss, all while purposely planning his work travel to avoid Liz getting pregnant. I feel sick to my stomach thinking about it.

I get out of the car, shouldering my bag, and stare up at Evie’s building. I haven’t been here in weeks, and even I can admit that makes me an awful girlfriend. But the news rattled something inside me, and the only person I want to see right now is my girlfriend, my rules and boundaries be damned.

I knock on the door of Evie’s apartment, equally hoping she’s out and praying that she opens the door and pulls me into her arms. I can’t carry this new reality myself yet. Liz’s revelation hurts in a way I didn’t expect and could not have anticipated. Something like heartbreak churns in my chest.

The door opens after my second knock. Evie stands there in yoga pants and a tank top, her auburn hair pulled back in a ponytail. She’s so fucking beautiful. Her eyes narrow, and she crosses her arms. She’s not happy to see me, and I can’t blame her. I was tactless this morning when I turned her down.

Her gaze lingers on my face for a moment, and then she steps aside to let me in. When she speaks, her tone is soft. “What’s wrong?”

I reach for her, and she lets me pull her closer. “I’m sorry about this morning.”

“It’s fine.” She looks up at me, her eyes wide. It wouldn’t have been fine, but Evie’s a psychologist, and she has always been able to read me like a book. “I ordered extra, so you can stay and tell me why you’re really at my door.”

I kiss her then. Because I love her, even if I won’t say it. Even if it doesn’t matter in the long run. It’ll never be more than this, especially not now.

She pulls away first and cups my cheek. “Cee, what is it?”

“It’s Liz,” I say. “She left Julian.”