Gabe sighed, releasing both the breath in his lungs and the weight of the truth, something that, up until now, he’d been reluctant to acknowledge. “So what happens to us?” he asked.
My eyes brimmed with hot tears, and I swallowed past the tight knot in my throat. “We go our separate ways, wish each other well, and cheer one another on from the sidelines, the way we should have been doing all along. Just think, we finally replaced that question mark with a period, and maybe now we can close this door and really move forward.”
He pulled me into his broad chest. “For what it’s worth, I’ll never be sorry you came knocking on mine.” His thick lashes hooded a heavy gaze, his expression wistful and full of reflection.
Without even thinking, I recited aloud the words that had become almost like a prayer to me. “‘No space of regret can make amends for one life’s opportunity misused.’”
“It wasn’t misused. And I have no regrets. Not a single one,” he said, and pressed his lips to the top of my head.
“No, me either.” I inched up on my toes, pushed my fingers through his wavy hair, and kissed Gabe goodbye for the very last time.
Chapter Forty-Three
I slid my time card into the clock and waited for the familiar punch before grabbing the set list off the wall and heading to the dressing room. I glanced down. Ugh, not again. I appreciated Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber as much as the next gal, but if I had to pour myself into a spandex unitard for the Cats megamix one more time, I was gonna give Charlie a “Memory” he wouldn’t soon forget.
As I started to open my makeup case on my dresser, a loud bang made me practically jump out of my skin. “Jesus Christ!” I shouted, and reeled around to find Charlie dressed in a long white robe and Birkenstock sandals and holding a shepherd’s staff.
Charlie yanked off his full beard and mustache combo, the sound of the sticky spirit gum pulling from his skin almost painful. “Superstar, in the flesh.” He gestured and took an exaggerated bow in place.
“I didn’t know Jesus was such a bull in a china shop.”
“Yeah, new staff.” He waved it around gingerly, careful to not whack the doorframe again. “Haven’t broken it in yet.”
I smirked and turned back to the mirror to get ready for my shift.
Charlie set down the large wooden rod, kicked off his leather sandals, and sat on the edge of my vanity stool while I set tubes of green paint out on the counter.
“An Elphaba day? Is rent due?” he joked.
I took a sponge and began to pat the verdant creamy base across my forehead. “Nope.”
“I thought you were doing an Evita set and some Mama Rose today?” He stood up. “So should I tell Mack to cue up ‘The Wizard and I’ instead?”
I swiveled around in my seat to face Charlie. “I was actually thinking I might give ‘Defying Gravity’ a shot.”
Charlie looked at me quizzically. “BrAvery Lawrence, did you find out about Marley Is Dead?!”
I shook my head. “Nope, not yet. Haven’t heard a thing.”
He cocked his head to the side, confused by my song request. “So then what’s with the change of heart and goofy smile?”
“Because it doesn’t matter. If I don’t get this part, then I’ll go after the next one and then the one after that. I know what I want and I’m not backing down. And I’m certainly not going to let a little high E above middle C stand in my way.”
He started to walk out of the dressing room. “‘Defying Gravity’ it is . . . after the Cats megamix,” he yelled back.
“Charlie!” I cried in defiance.
He peeked his head back into the doorframe. “What can I say, you look so damn good in that unitard, Lawrence.”
I smiled inwardly at his admission and couldn’t help but call after him, “I knew it!”
When my shift had ended and Charlie and I were finishing up our closing side work, he nabbed me by the elbow and asked me to stay for a few minutes longer, unless I had somewhere to be. I assured him I didn’t. So, he directed me to take a seat on the diner’s small stage and said he’d be back in a moment with a special surprise. I tucked my coat and bag in a booth and climbed onto the platform, sitting cross-legged in the center as instructed.
He approached holding a pie dish and cupping a protective hand around one lit candle, its flame threatening to extinguish with each brisk step he took in my direction. Under his arm, he tucked two small plates, a few utensils, and a handful of napkins. I rose to help him, grabbing for the items that threatened to slip from under his elbow, and with an impressive bit of athletic dexterity and balance, Charlie hopped up onstage, the pie never in danger of wobbling free from his grasp.
He handed me the plates and forks and then carefully took a seat across from me on the floor, placing the pie dish between us, the flame still glinting brightly in the dim light of the closed diner.
“I asked the chefs to whip up something special for you. I wanted to make it myself, but that is something maybe best left to the professionals, especially if we were hoping for something relatively edible,” he joked.
I scooched in closer and peered at him over the candlelight and smiled. The thoughtfulness of the gesture was all I really needed. If it was delicious too, that would just be . . . well, icing on the cake, for lack of a better phrase. “So, what is this exactly?”
“This is a pie I created in your honor. I’m calling it The Impossible （Chocolate） Dream Pie. For my impossible dreamer and the badass who has been brave enough to go after what she wants . . . no, deserves. So, make a wish!” He pushed the tin in my direction and waited for me to close my eyes and blow out the candle, but as I did, he suddenly sprang up off the ground and cried, “Wait! One more thing and it’ll be perfect!” He hopped down off the stage and over to the panel of switches on the wall to flip on the snow machine.
As silvery white flakes floated down over the stage, I bent forward, resting my hands on the floor. Leaning into the candle, I closed my eyes, and for a minute, I struggled to come up with what to wish for because finally, for the first time in a long time, maybe ever, I had everything I could ever want.
But just in case, I blew out the flame anyway.
Epilogue
December twenty-fifth, exactly a year to the day from when my life had imploded back on the Upper East Side, the white lights of the stage were blinding me from most of the theater’s house, but I could still make out just about every single person in the front rows. Everyone was on their feet screaming for me during the final bow on the opening night of Marley Is Dead, which was making its Broadway debut on Christmas Day. Marisol, Charlie, Gabe, my parents, Lyla, Sevyn, Oak, Kai, friends, everyone. Their hoots and hollers seemed to never end, and I bowed again and again, the entire audience on its feet singing their praises for Broadway’s newest “triumph” according to the Times . . . and pretty much every other publication in the city.
I soaked it all in—the heat of the spotlight warming my face, the roar of the crowd echoing in my ears, the beads of sweat trailing down my back under the heavy folds of my woolen costume, the clammy palms of my castmates during the curtain call, and the pinched tightness of my cheeks from smiling so damn hard. I felt lighter than air, certain I was going to float right off the stage and up into the catwalk overhead.