Iris Kelly Doesn't Date (Bright Falls, #3)(6)
But this was fine, because Stevie had found her own place, just a block from Bitch’s where, yes, at twenty-eight, she still worked in between auditions and any roles she actually managed to land. Which, lately, wasn’t many. Her most recent acting job had been nearly a year ago, a modernized remake of The Importance of Being Earnest in Seattle, where she played Gwendolen and got decent reviews, resulting in absolutely zero interest from other directors.
Needless to say, she was in a bit of a rut. Ren, a publicist for an ethical clothing company, said she simply needed to remake her brand. Whatever the hell that meant. If Stevie had a brand, it was an underwhelming amalgam of anxiety and childish dreams she couldn’t seem to relinquish.
How very inspiring.
“They’re extremely unclassy,” Ren said, glancing at Adri and Vanessa with a white stylus pressed to their cheek, head tilted elegantly. Ren’s apartment wasn’t the only thing that was immaculate. They were dressed in a three-piece gray suit, purple-and-green paisley tie, and three-inch purple heels. Their hair—black, short on the sides and long on top—coiffed and swirled upward in a way that would make Johnny Weir jealous. Their makeup was also perfect, silvery-purple eyeshadow, winged liner, shimmery lavender lip. Ren was Japanese American, nonbinary, pansexual, and the single coolest person Stevie knew.
Stevie laughed, shaking her curly fringe out of her face. She knew Ren loved Adri and Vanessa just as much as she did, but, yeah, she wouldn’t mind if they took their little midday make-out sesh elsewhere. She had a feeling that the Shakespearean fortress was for her benefit—don’t show PDA in front of the ex—but it wasn’t exactly successful.
“They’re fine,” Stevie said, even as she thought the opposite. Ren eyed her, their quintessential I’m calling bullshit expression firmly in place. Stevie waved a hand and loaded the hopper with more glossy espresso beans. “It’s fine, Ren.”
“Okay, sure, whatever you say, Stefania.”
“Oh, bringing out the full name, I see,” Stevie said. “I must be in trouble.”
Ren shrugged. “I’ll bring out your middle name too if you don’t grow more of a goddamn backbone.”
Stevie’s stomach pinched and she looked away. She knew Ren didn’t mean to be harsh. They understood—better than anyone, lately—that Stevie’s struggles with Generalized Anxiety Disorder were very real, but Ren tended to have a tough love approach to things, which, sometimes, made Stevie even more anxious.
Not that she’d ever tell Ren that.
“They’re dating, Ren, what do you want me to do?” she asked.
“I want you to bring someone into the Empress and stick your tongue down their throat in front of Adri,” Ren said calmly, tapping at something on their phone. “That’s what I fucking want you to do.”
The idea was so preposterous, Stevie couldn’t help but laugh. The Empress was Adri’s theater and they all loved it dearly—small, all-queer right down to the gaffer. Stevie had acted in nearly every production when Adri was first getting it off the ground, but about a year ago, she’d sworn off community theater. Adri hadn’t been happy, but she’d understood—if Stevie was ever going to make a living off of acting, she had to go for bigger roles, bigger theaters, bigger exposure.
Lot of good that had done her lately.
“Who would I even make out with?” Stevie asked. She couldn’t decide what was more unbearable—thinking about her flailing career or her nonexistent love life.
“Ever heard of a dating app?” Ren asked, a smirk on their face.
Stevie shuddered.
“A bar?” Ren said.
Stevie pretended to nearly throw up.
Ren laughed. They both knew Stevie was horrible at talking to people she didn’t know, bordering on disastrous. Extreme anxiety made her literally nauseous, and nothing triggered that lovely symptom more than trying to charm a beautiful stranger.
“Okay, fine,” Ren said, picking up their cold brew, “but something’s got to give, or else you’ll end up watching former lovers metaphorically bang in your place of employment for the rest of your life.” They jutted their thumb toward Adri and Vanessa, who were now making out with such gusto, the screenplay had fallen and Adri’s hands were tangled in Vanessa’s lustrous hair.
Stevie’s stomach, jerk that it was, leaped into her throat and set up shop. It wasn’t that she wanted Adri back. She didn’t. They had fizzled out long before they officially broke up, and deep down—way the hell deep down—she was happy for her two best friends if they wanted to be together.
But goddamn.
Just once, she’d love to be the one doing, instead of the one watching.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake.”
Stevie startled as Bitch’s Brew’s owner, Effie, came up next to her. She was dressed all in black, as usual, and her thick Cockney accent always seemed to make her sound pissed off.
Granted, this time, she was pissed off.
“Oi!” she yelled in Adri and Vanessa’s direction. “This ain’t a fucking brothel, you two.”
Adri and Vanessa sprang apart. Vanessa fumbled with the screenplay, which she’d clearly only just realized had fallen from her fingers, and opened it back up to a random page. Adri just laughed and ran a hand over her chin-length hair, that dimple Stevie used to kiss at night before bed pressing into her pale skin. Her lipstick was bright red, as always, but now it was smeared all around her mouth.