Behind Every Lie(2)

“I’m sorry!”

“Why don’t I go with you?” His face was expectant, hopeful.

I froze. “It’ll be boring,” I said carefully. “Besides, my family is weird.”

He laughed. “Aren’t all families weird?”

Liam knew better than most how weird families could be. He’d grown up so poor his dad kicked him out at sixteen, telling him he needed to fend for himself. I was sure that sort of rejection would have laid me flat on my face, but it didn’t seem to bother Liam. He said it had just made him strive harder to succeed.

“I’ll introduce you soon. I promise.” I looked at the time on my phone. “I’ll see you at home later, okay?”

I loved saying that. Home. After dating for a year and a half, I’d finally moved into Liam’s house. My princess-cut diamond ring winked in the morning light. Slowly but surely my life was coming back together. A large part of that was thanks to Liam.

I leaned across the console and kissed him good-bye. “Love you!”

“Love you most!”

I headed up Langley’s main street, a charming combination of antique shops, independent bookstores, eclectic boutiques, and art galleries. Town was quiet, the tourists gone now that fall was here. I hunched in my favorite green corduroy coat, a dreamy vintage style with a belted waist and buttoned front. I shoved my hands into its wide flap pockets, my boots clicking sharply against the pavement.

My neck suddenly prickled, the feeling of someone’s eyes on me heavy and hot. Something moved in my peripheral vision. I swung around to look, but there was nobody there. The American flag above the door of the tavern at the end of the road flapped in the wind. Across the road, an elderly couple walked hand in hand along the sidewalk.

I scanned the road, the familiar feeling crawling over my body. I closed my eyes and breathed in. Nobody was there. Nobody was ever there.

I scuttled down the quiet lane to the Crafted Artisan, the art gallery where I rented space to paint and sell the clay pottery I made. Mostly dishware, pots, and vases. My favorites were the special requests from customers who stopped by the gallery with a piece in mind.

The bell over the door chimed as I entered. The gallery was small but brightly lit, with glossy white paint, black tiled floors, and varnished redwood accents. A wall of floor-to-ceiling metal shelves holding colorful ceramics lined one wall; another featured a collection of glass mosaic works.

The owner, Melissa, was standing in the middle of the gallery. She held a dark-green vase with a crackle glaze that looked like it had been broken. An intricate web of gold beads filled the cracks. Her blue-black curls were wild around her round face, dark eyes winged with black eyeliner and coated in mascara, a slash of red lipstick on her mouth.

“What’s that?” I asked, slipping my coat off and stuffing it under the cash register desk.

“I met a woman on the beach in San Diego this summer and we got to talking. Turns out she’s an artist. She makes the most beautiful pieces, so I offered to display her work.”

I smiled. Melissa was one of those über-friendly types, like a hairdresser or one of those women in the makeup department at Macy’s, someone people told their secrets to without meaning to. She liked people, and they liked her. She’d become a good friend since I’d moved to the island, even if I still couldn’t bring myself to tell her the whole truth about my past.

“Look at the detail! She wrapped each broken piece in fabric, then used these beads to patchwork the pieces together. It’s based on kintsugi.”

“What’s that?”

“It’s a Japanese art. The artist fixes broken pottery by filling the cracks with gold. Usually they use epoxy to glue the pieces together. It’s supposed to highlight the damage instead of hiding it.”

I lifted the vase from her hands and examined it. “It’s beautiful.”

“Oh, by the way.” She reached behind the cash register and handed me a flyer for an art exhibit in Seattle in the spring. “You got mail.”

“Thanks.” I glanced at the flyer and dropped it in the garbage.

Melissa shook her head, one hand on her hip. “Why do you do that? You could totally get your work shown there!”

“Melissa, these are trained artists. They’ve been doing it their whole lives. I only bought my kiln and wheel a few years ago. My little homemade pottery can’t compete.”

“What is it going to take for you to just trust in yourself a little?”

She plucked the flyer from the trash and thrust it at me so I had no choice but to take it.

But I knew the truth: I couldn’t trust myself at all.





two

eva




THE FIRST RUMBLE OF THUNDER came as I turned in to the parking garage in downtown Seattle. Despite morning sunshine, clouds had rushed to fill the afternoon with rain, and it looked like we were in for a storm.

I took my ticket from the machine and slowly nosed the car into a tiny space, wincing when my bumper scraped against a metal pole. I sucked at driving. I’d already stalled the engine an embarrassing number of times driving off the ferry. This was why I always let Liam drive.

I shook my umbrella open, hard drops of rain thumping against it like handfuls of gravel. I walked up the street’s steep incline, my thighs and shoulders still burning from my lunchtime yoga class with Melissa.