“Hey, hey, sorry I’m late,” a voice said.
Stevie looked up to see a young white woman with shoulder-length pink hair and blunt bangs skirting around the café’s greenery then plopping down on the tufted brown leather couch where Stevie sat.
“The Q was down again,” Olivia said, huffing out a breath that ruffled her fringe. She wore gray leggings and a heavily patterned sweater that looked like it might have belonged to her dad in the seventies, but that she somehow made work.
Stevie waved a hand. “No worries.”
Olivia smiled at her, and Stevie smiled back. Olivia was young—twenty-five, though that was only three years younger than Stevie herself, but Olivia had such a hopeful, innocent air about her, she felt younger. She was an actual graduate of Juilliard, so she was a ridiculously talented actress and was playing Celia, Rosalind’s cousin and dear friend in As You Like It. She and Stevie had met during the auditions Thayer had invited Stevie to attend her first week in New York. Olivia was there too—she knew Thayer from some off-Broadway play they had both worked on last year—and her naturally open and bubbly personality made it easy for Stevie to relax around her.
She was also pansexual, and Stevie always felt safer, more herself, around other queer people anyway.
“What scene are you on?” Olivia asked, scooting close to Stevie and peering down at her script.
“Did you forget your copy again?” Stevie asked.
Olivia laughed, her clearly-false-but-still-gorgeous lashes fluttering against her cheek. “You know me. Last week, I lost my keys. Guess where I found them?”
“Let me guess. Your cat’s litter box?”
“Nope, that was last month. In the oven.” Olivia made a face. “Like, I don’t even use my oven. I keep my emergency stash of dark chocolate–covered almonds in there and—oh, oh, I see what I did now.”
Stevie smiled and shook her head. “You need a key hook. Right by your door.”
“I have one.”
Stevie laughed, then moved her already heavily marked-up script so it rested between them. “Act 1, scene 3.”
Olivia scooted close, her slim leg pressing against Stevie’s, and soon they were lost in the scene, whispering the lines to each other so they didn’t bother the other patrons, pausing so Stevie could mark something in her script or Olivia could tap out a note on her phone. It was exciting work, Stevie’s heart beating faster at the idea of performing this at the Delacorte under a July sky, the crowd happy and summer-soaked and beautiful.
“You’re really good,” Olivia said when they’d finished the scene, nudging Stevie’s shoulder.
Stevie smiled. She was learning not to brush off compliments—especially coming from someone like Olivia, someone who’d already been a part of New York’s theater scene for a few years. Stevie knew her words weren’t empty.
“Thanks,” Stevie said. “You too.”
Olivia smiled, fluttered her fingers down her face. “I know.”
Stevie laughed, then flipped through the script for another scene between Rosalind and Celia. Olivia waited patiently, her arm still warm against Stevie’s.
“You know,” Olivia said, “we should go out sometime.”
Stevie’s fingers froze on a page. She glanced at Olivia, who was looking at her with softly narrowed eyes, head tilted as though the idea had just occurred to her.
“Like . . .” Stevie said but trailed off.
Olivia just grinned. “Yeah, like . . .”
Stevie forced herself to keep eye contact. God, Olivia was pretty. Sweet. She understood theater life, had already helped Stevie navigate so much in New York, from where to get the most delicious bagels to the best little-known indie bookstores in Brooklyn.
She checked in with herself, gauged her breathing, her thought process, felt her legs pressing into the couch’s worn leather, all things her therapist encouraged her to do when faced with a new situation.
She wasn’t nervous—or at least, not in a way that crippled her, made her feel helpless and paralyzed. Her stomach fluttered a bit, but that was normal for Stevie, as was the warmth rushing into her cheeks right now.
“Oh, that is adorable,” Olivia said, laughing.
“God, sorry,” Stevie said, pressing her palms to her heated face, but she laughed too, the embarrassment easy and light, like a joke between friends.
And Stevie realized she wanted to say yes to Olivia. She had zero reasons not to, other than potential awkwardness during the play, but they were both professionals. Adults. And theater would hardly be theater if actors didn’t connect in these ways during productions. Olivia was safe, made Stevie laugh. She was lovely. She was perfect, really.
So . . . why couldn’t Stevie get that yes off her tongue?
She even opened her mouth, ready to take the chance, ready to try, ready to date, but all she could see in her mind—all she could feel, right there under her skin—was Iris.
Stevie exhaled, and Olivia saw it happen, that subtle droop of Stevie’s shoulders.
“It’s okay,” Olivia said.
“I want to say yes,” Stevie said. “I do. But I . . . I just got out of something, right before I moved here.”
Olivia nodded, waved a hand. “Totally fine. I get it.”
Stevie watched her, and she really did look fine, her smile just as real, just as eye-reaching. “I think I could really use a friend though. If you’re in the market.”
Olivia grabbed Stevie’s hand and pressed a kiss to her palm, a loud, friendly smack. “Already done.”
Stevie smiled, squeezed her hand, and then they got back to the script. Just like that. No awkwardness, no hurt feelings. It was amazing, really, the fucking maturity of it all. It took a while for Stevie’s heart to slow, for her fingertips to feel like they weren’t fizzing with adrenaline, but soon, she was back to normal, sitting in a Brooklyn café with her co-actor and friend.
Still, as the sun moved west across the sky and Olivia stood up, declaring she had to meet her two roommates for a house meeting about how one of them kept clogging the toilet and very pointedly not unclogging it, Stevie wished she could change her mind.
She wished Iris wasn’t still with her, hovering like a phantom, making her unready for someone as great as Olivia. As she walked back to her apartment, the dying light spreading gold over the city, she forced her mind to think of other things—the cup of tea she planned to make when she got home; her virtual therapy appointment in two days; Thayer’s most recent email updating her on the cast, which included the man who would play Orlando, an up-and-coming and publicly out gay actor who’d just finished a press tour for his first feature film.
All of these thoughts, from the mundane to the nearly fantastical, should’ve done the trick. They should’ve shoved a wild redhead right out of her mind, forcing Stevie into her life now, her reality now, her heart and feelings and needs now, but they didn’t.
They rarely did.
She knew from experience she probably needed a bit more than thoughts—she needed some intense distraction, like a movie or more work on her script. She could always work on her role, weaving together a Rosalind who was fresh and intoxicating and vulnerable.