Page 6

One Year Later

“A nd what was wrong with this one?” Kelsey asked.

“Nothing,” she said as she sat back down at the table.

“Nothing, but you came back over here when she was clearly into you?”

“She’s nice…”

“And gorgeous,” Megan added. “She has those big blue eyes you can fall into.”

“Megs, if you’re interested, I can make an introduction,” Bryce replied before taking a drink of her beer.

“What? No. I’m okay. I meant for you,” Megan said.

“You should, Megs,” Sean suggested, giving Megan a playful elbow nudge.

“Hey, leave her alone,” Kelsey admonished. “If Megs doesn’t want to, don’t force her. The point is that Bryce here isn’t interested.”

“That is correct,” she confirmed with a nod.

“But you never date anymore. When was the last time you–”

“Nope. Don’t say it, Megan. Don’t ask the question,” Sean interrupted.

“We’d have to listen to her again, and I cannot take it anymore,” Kelsey added.

“Not since Sophie,” Megan continued, not listening to anyone else. “Bryce, you can’t keep going on like this.”

“Like what? I’m not doing anything. I’m just enjoying a beer at this backyard barbeque my friends invited me to.”

“And not talking to the woman who is gay, available, and was definitely checking you out while you two were talking. I clocked her staring at your boobs at least twice, and when you bent over to get her a beer, she checked out your ass. Her head tilted to the side like a cartoon character; it was so obvious.”

“I didn’t come here for a date,” she replied.

“You don’t go anywhere for a date anymore,” Kelsey pointed out.

“Come on, Kels. Let’s leave her alone,” Sean suggested.

“Thank you,” she said to that.

“Are you sure you’re okay, Bryce?” Megan checked. “I know the whole Sophie thing kind of rocked you, but it’s been a year.”

“Almost exactly,” Bryce replied. “Two days from now, actually.”

“This is not the kind of anniversary you celebrate,” Sean noted.

“Trust me, I don’t plan on celebrating,” she replied. “I know you think I’m crazy. I get it. I know I haven’t stopped talking about that night or Sophie since it happened, but I can still feel her sometimes.”

“ Feel her? She’s miles away, Bry.”

“No, she’s not. Not to me, at least. She’s here.” Bryce placed her hand over her heart. “And I can’t get her out of here. I’ve tried.” She shook her head. “I’ve been on a few dates since we got back, and I can’t focus on the woman on the other side of the table. I keep picturing Sophie when I first saw her. I see her looking back at me after we kissed, like it hit her, too. It’s all I can think about, and it’s been a year. That has to mean something, right?”

“What can it mean?” Sean asked. “You don’t even know her last name. It’s not like Sophie isn’t a common name.”

“I know. There were four hundred of them just in New Orleans with public profiles online. I checked all of them, and I couldn’t find her. Some had private profiles without pictures I could see. There were more than twenty of those. When I added Sophias to the mix, the numbers went up even higher. I tried to find her, but I couldn’t.”

“You’re acting like you stopped looking; like it’s in the past. But I saw you on our way here on your phone,” Kelsey said. “You were looking again.”

“I try at least once a week,” she confessed.

“Bry, come on. It’s been a year. Let it go already,” Sean told her, sounding impatient. “Just move on.”

“You can get under or on top of someone else,” Kelsey suggested.

“Kels!” Megan glared a little. “Leave her alone. It’s not about sex.”

“I know. I’m sorry.”

“And it’s not like any of us are going out with a different person every night,” Megan said. “I haven’t been on a single date in over six months, and the last one was a total disaster. Sean, I think the last woman you went out with was right after we got back from New Orleans. And, Kels, I don’t even know the last time you had a date with some guy.”

“It’s been a while,” Kelsey replied.

“So, let’s just leave Bryce alone. If she wants to take her time to find someone else, fine. If she wants to keep searching for a woman whom she can’t forget, fine. None of us has any right to judge who she likes, loves, misses, crushes on, or lets go of, okay?”

Kelsey smiled softly at Megan, who was the sweetest, kindest woman Bryce had ever met. She wished so much that Kelsey could see what a beautiful person Megan was and that she loved her back in the way Megan needed her to because Megan deserved that, and Kelsey possibly wouldn’t ever be loved the way Megan loved her.

“Deal,” Kelsey said.

“Sure,” Sean half-heartedly agreed.

The barbecue had been fun. Still, as much as she enjoyed good food, drinks, and company, Bryce was ready to go home and wallow some more. She knew her friends had been meaning well, attempting to introduce her to women periodically throughout the year, but she was getting really tired of yet another attempt to set her up, so she said goodbye to them and drove the long way home.

The past year had been the most challenging yet for her. After she returned from New Orleans, she’d postponed that interview with the local food magazine because she hadn’t been ready to work. She’d taken a week off from blogging, which, it had turned out, hadn’t been enough time, and, as a result, her normal light, casual approach to writing had turned more serious and direct. She went here. She ate this. It was good. It was bad. It was somewhere in between. That was it. She lost subscribers, and no one else came calling for interviews.

A month after that, she found her blog groove again, but the damage had been done. She was only making enough to pay rent and bills with nothing left over, so she’d started delivering food for an app to make extra cash, which gave her a chance to try some new restaurants. A few months later, she’d turned that into a topic for her blog, trying food her delivery customers tried. That became something her subscribers were very interested in, and she continued on that path until it was time to take a break because she could only eat so many cheeseburgers and fries from the place down the street in one week. In that time, the blog grew back in subscribers, and she got a couple new advertisers, so she was able to quit the delivery app but still maintain her login just in case she wanted to do a once-a-month spot in the blog where she ate whatever her customers ate again.

In her personal life, though, nothing much had happened. She’d gone out with a few women because her friends had insisted, but she hadn’t wanted to. She wanted Sophie. She wanted to at least see the woman again, to talk to her, to find out if she was still thinking of one night from almost a year ago when she’d met some tourist in a dimly lit bar and offered to take her home. Bryce doubted it. She was certain Sophie had moved on long ago, and that hurt her heart to the point where she could physically feel her body react at the mere thought of Sophie being with someone else now. She wanted her to be happy, of course, but Bryce was thirty-one years old now, and she’d never had that kind of reaction to another person in her life. When she’d had no clue she was gay and dating guys, she’d been in the dark about her own sexuality, and nothing had ever felt right, but she was okay. She never felt in love, but she’d been young and knew she had time.

Then, she’d figured it out, met Sean, and Sean had been the one to help her come out to her friends. Bryce had thought that she’d loved her at some point, but they weren’t compatible as girlfriends, and now, sometimes, she wondered if they were even compatible as friends. Every time they talked about Bryce meeting someone, Sean pushed back, so bringing up Sophie with her wasn’t something Bryce liked to do at all because Sean just rolled her eyes or told her she was crazy to still be talking about it. Sean also hadn’t really been dating herself, and while Bryce knew why, it still didn’t give Sean the excuse for acting how she was when Bryce just needed a friend.

To Bryce, that whole night had felt like a movie she could play back over and over again in her mind while she fixed up her aunt’s house or helped her with some of her doctor’s visits or other needs. She could see it as if she wasn’t one of the main characters but off to the side of the action, nearly bumping into Sophie going for the same table and instantly connecting with her eyes and just knowing something she’d never known before. Wasn’t that supposed to be how it felt when you met the person you were meant to be with, or at least, be with for more than one night?

It was true that Bryce didn’t know much about Sophie, but what she had learned that night, she liked. Sophie had her family obligations, though she hadn’t gone into any detail while they’d been flirting at the bar; she had a job she didn’t like; she kind of seemed a little nerdy, which Bryce was a fan of; and she had a thing for Hershey’s chocolate bars, preferring the one with almonds to the one without, but she loved using them in s’mores even more. Bryce had pictured them sitting in front of a campfire, roasting marshmallows, for a second before she’d come back to the present, and she could still see it just like a movie playing behind her eyes.

Bryce had searched for Sophie. That last full day in New Orleans, her friends had helped her drown her sorrows in powdered sugar-covered beignets, and then they’d climbed into an Uber and headed to this place Megan had been excited to check out before they left, but after that, Bryce had asked for some time alone. She’d walked Bourbon Street from bar number one all the way to the other end. The place had been jam-packed with tourists, so she’d given up around dinnertime, met her friends, and when they decided to go out for their last night, Bryce had gone to the river and stared out at it, walking around Jackson Square at night before she’d gone back to the hotel early and tried to find any Sophie from New Orleans on social media that might just be her Sophie.

And that was how it still felt, too: that Sophie was her Sophie. Yes, logically, she knew that wasn’t right. Sophie probably belonged to someone else now, who got to say, ‘This is my girlfriend, Sophie,’ or even, ‘This is my fiancée, Sophie,’ when they introduced her to people at work events. It had been a year, after all, so Sophie meeting someone, falling in love, and getting engaged wasn’t out of the realm of possibilities.

Having pulled into the driveway of her one-bedroom rented house, Bryce sighed loudly, and her head went back against the seat. She really hated thinking about that: Sophie being on someone else’s arm. She could still vividly remember the feel of Sophie’s fingers linked with her own, and picturing them touching someone else hurt. It made her stomach rumble and gave her the feeling that she might vomit. It took her a minute to pull herself together, but when she did, she finally got out of the car and headed inside.

She hadn’t eaten much at the barbecue, so she checked her fridge and found leftovers from an Italian place she had eaten at for the first time the previous night. She’d enjoyed the food and the atmosphere, and she needed to write her blog about it, so she decided to heat it up and have it for dinner to remind herself of the flavors. When she sat at her computer, though, she wasn’t thinking about the flavors or the atmosphere. Bryce sighed again. Sophie. All she could think about was Sophie. She took another bite of her lukewarm pasta and started typing, only she wasn’t typing about food.

My name is Bryce. In my blog, I don’t really talk much about myself; I just write about the food because that’s my thing. Today is different, though, so I hope you won’t mind me taking a slight detour from the delicious Italian food I had at Marco’s Italian Kitchen last night. I’ll get to that in my next blog, I promise. If you’ll allow me this one time to tell you a non- food-related story, though, I’ll be forever grateful. I think my poor friends are out of patience, having to listen to it over and over again, and I still have some talking to do.

One year ago, or rather, nearly, I was in New Orleans. If you’ve been following the blog, you’ll remember my week in the Big Easy because I blogged extensively about all the fantastic food I ate there, but something bigger than food happened back then; way bigger. I was there because three of my friends and I decided that we wanted to take a road trip somewhere, and we chose New Orleans. We drove all the way there, singing songs from our Spotify playlists and arguing over whose playlist we’d listen to. It felt like I was back in college again, going on spring break with my friends, but I’d just turned thirty and had been out of college for eight years.

When we got to the city, we explored, walked, ate, went to museums, and sat by the Mississippi River. We went to voodoo shops, and I learned about the religion. We listened to jazz and explored cemeteries. We walked the Garden District and saw the beautiful houses. And yes, we went to bars. A lot of them. I’m not really a big drinker, but I enjoyed spending time with my friends on a carefree vacation.

Then, I met her. I was grabbing a table with my friends when another woman approached with a friend of her own, and I was mesmerized. Her name was Sophie, and she was beautiful. She had these deep brown eyes that I described as soulful and this wavy brown hair that I could run my fingers through forever.

About six years ago, I came out as a lesbian and right into a relationship. We ended when we realized we were better off as friends. I tried to date again, and I met women I was interested in, who were beautiful and kind, but things never worked out because there was just nothing there.

When I saw Sophie that night, though, it felt like my life was changing, like it was a moment I’d never forget, and I spent the next several hours getting to know her. We talked on this little sofa in the only relatively quiet bar that I don’t know the name of in this town, and we held hands and danced. She ran her hand through my hair, and I know hers smelled like grapefruit. While we danced, I breathed in the scent of her skin, and I took a chance and kissed it once.

Hours later, we had the kind of first kiss romance movies can’t even compare to, and I felt it in my bones that I never wanted to kiss anyone else ever again. I know you might be wondering how I would know that after only a few hours with her, and that’s fair. I get it. It sounds crazy. All my friends tell me as much. But it’s not crazy to me. Sophie asked me to go home with her that night, and I said yes immediately because, yes, I would’ve loved to have made love with her, but I also never wanted our night to end. I wanted to stay up all night talking to her, hold her as we fell asleep, and not think at all about the fact that I would be leaving New Orleans soon.

This story, unfortunately, doesn’t have a happy ending. A fight broke out in the bar, and Sophie and I got separated in the crowd when things got crazy. I tried to find her. I promise, I did. I searched the bars; I walked the city; I looked on social media. But my Sophie was nowhere to be found.

For the past year, I’ve tried to push her out of my mind. I’ve tried not to think about her and move on, but I can’t. Somehow, this woman, whom I met nearly a year ago, is in my soul, and I don’t see her vacating it any time soon. I want to find her, to talk to her, to ask her if she tried to find me, too, if she still thinks about me, if she thinks I’m nuts to believe that I’d be writing this blog right now, and if she would have given us a chance.

I’ve never believed in love at first sight, but Sophie made my heart race, my toes tingle, my brain unable to form thoughts, and my mouth unable to say words at times. Is that love at first sight? It feels wonderful, confusing, terrifying, and exciting, and I miss it. I miss her. I miss my Sophie, who will never know that for one night, I was the happiest human on the planet. I still picture taking her to dinner, holding her hand as we walk the city at night, and I still look for her online almost daily.

Sophie, if you’re out there, all of that is true: I still think about you. I will probably always think about you. Knowing you for just a few hours also gave me the courage to tell my parents that I’m a lesbian after years of knowing the truth about myself. Realizing that I could meet the love of my life in an instant and that my family wouldn’t even know because I’d been too scared to tell them made me let them in and share with them something that’s so important to who I am. So, thank you. Thank you for that, and thank you for the tingles and the heart racing. Thank you for trying to steal our table and dancing with me when you were worried your hips wouldn’t move. They moved. Trust me. Just… Thank you. If I never find you, I hope you find someone one day who makes you so happy. I’ll try to wish for that for myself, too.

Bryce read and reread what she’d just written. When she first started typing, she’d had no intention of actually posting it, but as she read through it a second time, she decided that she needed this to get out there. She needed to get these words out somehow, and her friends, as patient as they had been, were struggling now, listening to Bryce continue to rattle on about going weak in the knees for a woman she’d never see again. So, she gave the blog a title and hit the publish button, not even checking it for typos, which wasn’t something she usually did. Then, she finished her pasta, showered, and fell into her bed, feeling at ease for the first time in a year.