They locked in a date and it made Sewanee so happy, that date, so anticipatory, that she wasn’t sure how she would get through all the other dates before it. “How’s Dublin? How’s Tom?” she asked.
“Good. Better. And his pub’s doing fantastic. The lads and I jammed last night.”
“That’s great.”
“So, listen. I found something here.”
“Okay?” Her tone took a sharp left into tentative.
He chuckled. “Why do you always expect the worst?”
She huffed. “Have you met me?”
He chuckled again. “So, this is . . . well, you’ll decide what it is. It’s yours.”
“Again, okay?”
“Tom had a box of June’s old books. Early ones, out of print now. No idea if any of them hold up, but I was thinking . . . you said the other day you might want to do more Romance and, well, none of these books have audio versions.”
“Oh my God.”
“So, the box is yours.”
“Oh, Nick, no–”
“Tom’s got a lawyer here, so I’ll get something drawn up that gives you the copyrights.” The silence was too long. “You still there?”
“Nick. That’s . . . you can’t.”
“I can. I am.”
“But it’s–it’s too much. A whole box of June French IP, that’s a gold mine for you. I can’t–”
“You can and you will. I want you to. Please. She’d want you to.”
Sewanee flopped back on the bed. What she could do with this. The projects she could make, the people she could employ, the possibilities– “They might be good for nothing but kindling. According to the flap copy, one of them is about a video store clerk and a pager salesman. But you’ll read them and decide. Do with them as you will.”
She swallowed. “Nick?”
“Yeah?”
“I’m happy. Right now. In this moment. In this very real life of ours.”
He sighed. She heard his smile. “Me too.”
She was so happy that even after they hung up she couldn’t stop smiling. She had been exhausted thirty minutes ago and now she was wired. She wanted to do something. Put on some music and dance? Watch an old movie? And then it came to her.
She knew exactly what she wanted to do. She had been thinking about doing it ever since Nick had mentioned it.
She went online and found her demo reel.
Just seeing the thumbnail of her old face . . . could she really do this?
She took a breath and pressed play. Once she was looking, she couldn’t stop. It was weird. It was sad. It hurt. It was great.
Glued to the screen, she could not recall a time when so many emotions colored her, as if she had all 120 Crayola crayons at her disposal. She had thought watching this would make her feel so much less of herself, but the opposite was true.
She had been good. She belonged there. She was captivating. She had thought it would be like watching someone else. Except it wasn’t. It was, undeniably, her. A part of her that had come home. Was welcomed home. A part of her that would live with her now. A part of her to be proud of.
The reel ended and the feeling that lingered when all the other colors faded was contentment. Similar to how she’d felt sweeping up the Tea-For-One: regretful but accepting.
It was a past she no longer wanted back. It was simply a part of her present and she was free to pursue her future. Heart full, Sewanee pressed play and watched it again.
She loved it.
THREE DAYS LATER, she picked Adaku up from the hospital in a garage under the back alley most people didn’t know existed. The “High Roller Exit,” Adaku snarked. They’d waited until 1 A.M., but it hadn’t made any difference. Adaku sat in the passenger seat looking at her phone. “My neighbor says there’s five or six of them camped out in front of my house.”
“Well,” Sewanee sighed. “You feeling strong enough to tackle sixty-four steps?”
“I thought you’d never ask.”
So they went back to Sewanee’s. And they spent the next few days reading, watching movies, and sitting outside talking and talking and talking. Adaku eventually called Manse back–he’d never called Sewanee again–and told him she wasn’t returning to Georgia. And then she told him that she was done jumping through hoops for the Angela Davis project but that he should feel free to do his job and get her an offer for it and, oh, she wanted a producer credit on the film, too. When she hung up, they high-fived.
The night before Adaku had decided to go home, Sewanee went to the store and bought sour cream and taco seasoning. It was comically delicious.