Page 72 of Fly with Me

She arrived at Silver Diner twenty minutes early. Plenty of time to have an almost-freak-out when she realized she had no idea what to tell Stella.

Nothing had changed exactly.

Her family was still a mess.

The idea of fake dating still made her uneasy.

But the idea of losing Stella now felt unbearable because she hadn’t felt this way about anyone in a very long time.

She couldn’t say that, though.

A hand tapped her shoulder from behind. Olive whirled around, and before she could figure out what to say, the worst thing ever came out of her mouth. “Who was with you in the photo on Instagram?”

Oh fuck.

“Shit, I mean, not that it’s any of my business. And good morning.” Olive gave a half smile. She should have hugged her. Damn it. “Thanks for meeting me,” she ended shakily.

“My roommate from flight school. Angie. We had dinner last week. And I’m—uh—glad you called.”

So, definitely not one of the two exes then. Why didn’t Olive feel relieved?

The hostess called them over to the desk and then ushered them to a table.

Olive rubbed her eyes. “I’m sorry for texting you what I did last night. I was having a bad day. It happens to me sometimes, worse since my brother’s accident where I have these dark days where I have trouble functioning. I shouldn’t have taken it out on you.”

Stella shook her head. “It’s reasonable. I’m the one asking you to be my fake girlfriend.” The last two words were heavy. With regret? “In any case, I’m really sorry you were having a bad day yesterday. I’m sorry if I’m making you stressed. I know that having me around can be a lot.”

“No. You’re not a lot. Except maybe a lot of—like—good things. Cool things.” Smooth. To reinforce the point, Olive shook her head so quickly she might have pulled a muscle. Being in your thirties was awesome. “No. No. My sister called. And I haven’t told you much about this, but the big picture is that my family and I are not on good terms right now.”

Stella’s brow furrowed. “That must be really hard.”

“My niece saw us on TV and then my sister made a couple comments and that made me want to actually check out what’s going on with the viral video of me from the plane. And my mom… Well, she posted something that upset me. It shouldn’t. I should be used to it by now.”

Pity lined Stella’s eyes as she reached across the table to pat Olive’s hand once. “I’m sure that must be incredibly stressful.” Her head tilted. “Out of curiosity, was this related to why you were asking about Angie?”

Olive internally cursed her word vomiting.

“I guess it made me realize that I didn’t know if you were… seeing other people.”

“You thought I was… oh. No. Like I said, I don’t do relationships. I’m not seeing anyone.” Stella gave a humorless laugh. “That’s why I needed to convince a relative stranger to be my fake girlfriend.”

“Not having a relationship doesn’t mean… well… I’m sorry if this isn’t my business.” Olive’s cheeks burned. The word stranger still clanged in her ears, interrupting her train of thought.

“I’m not sleeping with Angie,” Stella said quietly. “She’s actually married. But I’m not sleeping with anyone right now, if that’s what you’re curious about. I haven’t had a lot of time for that lately.” Her lips pressed together as if she were actively stopping herself from saying more.

“Oh, okay.” Olive fiddled with the stack of jellies on the table as if she were playing Jenga. “I think… is it okay with you if while we’re doing this, we don’t see other people?”

“I suppose I assumed that would be true, but I can see how that might not have been clear in our initial conversations.”

“I didn’t see a tab in the binder for monogamy…”

“That was remiss of me.” Stella offered a tight smile, but the expression vanished too quickly. “I think this is more complicated than I expected. I meant what I said in my message. I don’t ever want to be the reason why someone else is more stressed.”

“I know you did. And thank you, but I’m fine. I swear.”

Stella nodded once and frowned.

Interrupting their conversation, a server came by and filled both their mugs with coffee. While the server took their orders, Olive dumped way too much sugar into hers since she was distracted. Stella concentrated on stirring her own even though Olive knew Stella drank her coffee black.