Prologue
Well I hope it comes now
Well I hope it comes soon
Well I think it’s about time
I stopped waiting for you
–
2009
“I just don’t know what I did wrong.”
I sighed and took a half-hearted sip of my beer. My friend Marie sat across next to me at the tavern. She smiled sadly, and patted my hand in reassurance.
“I’m just so sorry, Audrey. I know you really liked him. Just know that you didn’t do anything wrong. He’s an idiot, and he’ll regret this, I can promise you that. Trust me when I say you will meet the right guy someday. I know it. You’re beautiful and smart. You’re better off without him. And it’s his loss.”
I smiled at Marie. She was such a good friend, and always had the sweetest things to say about me. The slight cynic in me told myself she was biased, but the eternal optimist in me – perhaps the stronger side – wanted to believe her. But right now, it was hard to, considering I’d recently been dumped by my boyfriend.
I had been dating this guy named Ryan for the past year. We knew each other from college, but lost touch after we graduated and he’d moved to Sydney for a job. We’d always wanted to be more than friends, but were always with other people, and the timing was never right. About a year ago, he’d relocated to Wollongong, where I lived. We’d reconnected and been inseparable ever since. I was always careful with dating, and had to admit things had moved fast with Ryan, but I had gone along with it because I’d liked him so much. I’d fallen for him quickly. Everything had been going really well…until about a month ago.
But about a month ago things had really started to take a downturn. He’d started blowing me off, not returning my calls and acting distant. I had no idea what was going on. When I asked him, he denied anything was going on. Then one morning he dropped the bombshell: he had met someone else, a woman from his work, and he wanted to pursue a relationship with her. I was crushed. The only good thing about the whole situation was that at least he’d had the decency to break up with me before pursuing her. That’s what I told myself, anyway.
So here I was, a week after the breakup, freshly single, drowning my sorrows in a mug of beer at a little pub called Cooney’s Tavern with one of my oldest friends. I went to Cooney’s a lot, sometimes after work. I especially enjoyed their monthly open mic night.
“Thanks, Marie.” I said sadly. “I know you’re right, but it doesn’t feel like that now. I really liked him… a lot.”
“Well, you know what they always say…you meet the right person when you’re not looking. Remember how I met Greg?” she asked.
I nodded, remembering that day. Marie and I had been planning a girls night in. We’d went to the supermarket on a whim in our pajamas, with our hair in rollers, to get ice cream and wine. While in line, Marie had dropped the bottle of wine. It had shattered on the floor, much to our embarrassment. An attractive man in front of us in line had offered to help us clean up the spilled wine. He’d asked for Marie’s number, and well, the rest was history. The next week, he’d taken her on their first date and they’d been together ever since. That was two years ago. In fact, they were engaged to be married in the fall. I was to be one of her bridesmaids.
I smiled despite myself, remembering that night.
“That is true. Remember how embarrassed you were?” I laughed, an image of Marie blushing bright red in my head, her pretty face framed by giant pink rollers that matched her pink satin pajamas.
She nodded, taking a sip of her beer. “Oooh, yeah. Not my finest hour: hair in curlers and wearing pajamas, and here is this gorgeous guy asking for my number.”
I chuckled again, in spite of myself.
We sat in comfortable silence for a bit, drinking our beers.
After a while, she turned to me and smiled, her green eyes locking into my brown ones.
“You’ll find your Greg someday. I promise. Who knows, maybe it’ll even be here.”
I wanted to believe her.