Page 19 of The Best Worst Thing
Napkin Studies
December, Four Years Ago
They take away your Banana Republic credit card?”
Nicole—who’d been checking her phone, trying to get an update from a work-swamped, still-halfway-across-the-city Gabe—craned her neck, already rolling her eyes. Logan was standing there in a suit and tie and what could only be described as first-date hair, smirking at her.
“Very funny,” she said.
They were at the agency’s holiday party.
Mari, who was around here somewhere, had mentioned the event was Quentin’s favorite way to burn a few hundred bucks off everyone’s December bonuses.
This year, he’d chosen the Culver Hotel, an art deco, Old Hollywood hot spot that had played host to the likes of Greta Garbo and Clark Gable during the Roaring Twenties.
A century later, the hotel still dripped in history.
Scandal seeped through the lounge’s dimly lit walls, swirling through the room and reflecting off every surface—black and white, mirrored and gilded.
Logan gripped a few fingers into the beveled edge of the bar. “I’m kidding. You look great. Very festive—like a Christmas tree! Reminds me of home.”
“Gee, thanks.” Nicole smoothed out the invisible creases of the skintight, emerald minidress Mari had made her buy last weekend. For this party. With her husband. Who was not here. “Exactly what I was going for. Tree.”
Logan rubbed his jaw. “Doing my best here, Speyer.”
“That’s your best? You just walk up to random women at bars and tell them they remind you of your weird hometown?”
“Well,” he said, getting the bartender’s attention.
Nicole hesitated, then ordered a glass of white wine.
Logan, an old-fashioned. “First, I tell them I have unlimited systemwide upgrades on American Airlines. And then, if that doesn’t work, yes.
I start describing the Pacific Northwest, leaf by leaf. ”
Nicole tsked. Logan was from Seattle—Issaquah, actually. She knew this because he talked about it almost constantly, rambling on and on about hiking and Puget Sound and how the 405 had nothing on Issaquah-Hobart Road come rush hour.
“You’re going to be alone forever,” she said. “You do realize that, right?”
“I have prospects! It’s just, they’re all …”
“Too normal for you?”
He laughed. “That’s one way to put it.”
The bartender, who Nicole could’ve sworn raised an eyebrow at them, slid their drinks across the onyx.
“To you,” Logan said, raising his glass. Nicole did the same. “For never missing an opportunity to remind me I’m worse than a box of raisins on Halloween.”
“To me. For seven months without murdering you.”
Their glasses clinked.
Their gazes met.
He looked right at her.
But by the time she’d caught her breath, tried to read his eyes, tried to figure out exactly what they were trying to say, it was over. He’d taken a long sip of his drink and begun to examine the embossed edges of his cocktail napkin.
Nobody had ever looked at her like that, not even Gabe. But just a few moments later, Nicole couldn’t say for sure whether she’d manufactured the whole thing. Whether he’d glanced at her at all.
She scratched her collarbone, he twisted his lips, and then they just stood there, sipping their drinks in this strange, synchronized silence. She was about to open her mouth and make some stupid joke about some stupid thing when a voice called out behind her.
“Hey, babe.”
Nicole spun around.
Gabe. Here, finally, and folding a valet ticket into his suit pocket, ninety minutes too late.
Nicole steadied her voice as best she could.
“Oh, hey,” she said. “You, uh, you made it.”
“Yeah, sorry, I …” Gabe looked over Nicole’s shoulder. Logan was leaning against the bar, still studying the grooves of that napkin. When their eyes met, Logan slipped it into his pocket, then lifted his glass and offered Gabe a quick, cordial nod.
“Sorry, man,” Gabe said, extending his hand. Logan, with a smile, did the same. “Didn’t notice you there for a second. It’s Leland, right?”
The tendons in Logan’s wrist tightened. Firm, stiff shake.
“Good to see you, Gabe. And it’s Logan, actually.”
Gabe pulled back his hand. “Oh, right. My bad.”
Logan took a long sip of his drink. “Happens all the time. My parents were hippies. Gave us all these outrageous names. Even I can barely spell it.”
Gabe snickered. He gave Logan another glance—this one, a little longer—then finally dropped an arm around Nicole, who was very busy counting the silver sequins on her shoes. Wondering whether it’d be weird if she bolted for the restroom and never, ever came back.
“Well,” Gabe said. “Thanks for keeping Colie company. Holiday traffic, you know?”
“Sure do.”
Gabe signaled for the bartender and ordered a whiskey neat.
For the next few minutes, he and Logan made small talk about holding companies while Nicole fingered the rim of her wineglass and focused, pretty much, on only that.
Were they ever going to stop talking? When was this party going to end? And where the fuck was Mari? The moon?
“You know,” Gabe said, “this is exactly how I met”—a squeeze of her waist—“Colie here. She was standing at this NYU bar, just scowling at me. Wearing some tiny, little dress. Called me a finance bro to my face. Told me to go back to Goldman. But by the end of the night, I’m behind the bar, digging through receipts, trying to find her last na—”
“This story’s only interesting to us, Gabe,” Nicole said. But she’d had to stop him, right? This wasn’t their wedding. They weren’t at dinner with Gabe’s friends, or even with Mari and her husband. Logan was legitimately Nicole’s colleague. It was simply not a relevant anecdote.
Gabe smirked.
Logan scratched his neck.
And then it was over. Logan told Gabe and Nicole to enjoy the rest of their evening and disappeared into the crowd.
“Strange guy,” Gabe said, his attention now on nobody but Nicole. He was rubbing the seams of her dress, his fingers tracing her ribs. His voice, low. “God, do you look good.”
Nicole smiled as she peeled Gabe off her, reminding him her boss was here, her whole office was here. She turned him so they were facing away from the party and then lowered her voice.
“Hey, so, it kind of sucked that you weren’t on time tonight,” she said.
“When we go to your work stuff, it’s a huge deal.
I come home early, I do my hair, I plan my whole day around it, and …
I just wish you’d been here. I wish I didn’t have to beg, or even be in the position I’m in now, where I’m hurt, and then I feel stupid about being hurt because I know my job isn’t as big as yours, and … I don’t know. It just sucked, okay?”
Gabe chewed on his bottom lip. He dropped his hands to the small of Nicole’s back and drew her toward him so his forehead was nearly touching hers.
“I didn’t mean to, babe. I got caught up with Kyle, and then the freeway was completely insane.
Let me make it up to you. We’ll go to that diner on the way home.
Get pancakes, milkshakes, whatever you want, okay? ”
Nicole blinked the past couple of hours away. This was a work event, not their bedroom. What was she going to do? Cry about it? Make a scene? Slam a door?
“Okay,” she said. “But I want hash browns too. More than necessary. Like, a truly ridiculous amount.”
Gabe laughed, nodding, pulling her a little closer.
At the edge of the room, Logan was leaning against a velvet armchair; his phone, pressed against his ear with the help of a raised shoulder.
It sure didn’t look like business, whatever call he was taking.
He was nursing his drink, his face soft and interested. He was laughing, glancing at his watch.
He looked up.
For a second, their eyes met.
And then he straightened his tie, hung up the phone, and walked out the door.
“Hey,” Gabe said. Nicole startled. “We gonna try again tonight?”
“Oh, um … Yeah. Sorry—yes.” Nicole put a few fingers on his chest, then took a sip of her drink. God, he was gorgeous, wasn’t he? Gabe, of course. Her husband. “Wine’s okay for now, right? Like, half a glass?”
Gabe nodded, his eyes still fixed on hers.
And the way he smiled at her, the way she could see their future unfolding in front of them, it was just enough to forget all about that strange little moment with Logan …
and the fact that he’d almost certainly left this party an hour early to charm some other girl.