Free Widdershins by Charles de de Lint

happen when we broke up?”
    “You guys wouldn’t break up.”
    “Every relationship I’ve ever had has fallen apart. Every relationship he’s ever been in has broken up.”
    “Except Sam.”
    “Who just vanished on him.”
    “But—”
    “Mona, let me ask you this,” I said. “How often do you get together with your exes?”
    She pulled a face. “Like, never.”
    “Exactly. I don’t want that to happen with me and Geordie, and I know he feels the same.”
    “But what if it didn’t?”
    “Do you ever see the girls he goes out with?” Before she could answer, I did for her. “They’re all gorgeous. Mother Crone’s a knockout. Tanya’s a movie star. And remember Sam?”
    “You’re gorgeous, too.”
    I shook my head. “No, I’m old and broken.” I lifted a hand to stop her before she could argue what was such an obvious and plain fact. “I’m not saying oh poor me. It’s just how it is. And I can live without a guy in my life. Trust me. It can be a real relief sometimes.”
    “I guess. It just seems sad.”
    “It doesn’t have to be. I’ve got a bunch of great friends. And I’ve gotten to the point where I’m pretty much comfortable in my own skin, even if some parts are a bit worn out and don’t work as well as they should anymore.”
    Mona gave me a slow nod. “And you can’t force love anyway.”
    “Nor can you plan for it. It happens or it doesn’t.”
    Mona picked up the half-full wine bottle, but I laid my hand over the top of my glass.
    “No more for me,” I said. “I don’t even know if I can get out of my wheelchair with all I’ve had tonight.”
    “I can help.”
    “You should stay over,” I said.
    “I’m not drunk.”
    “How many fingers am I holding up?”
    “Which one of you?” she asked, grinning. Mona fell asleep almost immediately, but I lay awake for a long time on my side of the bed, staring up at the ceiling. I didn’t think about it often, but Mona had put it in my head and the wine wouldn’t let it go away.
    Geordie.
    How different would our lives have been if we had gotten together all those years ago?
    And if we were to get together now, could we make it work?
    I wasn’t ever going to find out because it wasn’t something I’d ever ask him. But I couldn’t help thinking about it now as I lay here, trying to sleep.

Lizzie
    For all that she’d gotten in after dawn, Lizzie still woke up in the middle of the morning and couldn’t get back to sleep. She looked over at her cousin’s bed to see that Siobhan was already up. But of course her bed was made—it didn’t matter that hotels had housekeepers, Siobhan couldn’t leave her bed unmade. Her few belongings were neatly set out on her night table and one half of the dresser, her clothes folded and put away, her knapsack in the closet.
    Lizzie smiled. Unlike her own clothes and knapsack, which she’d tossed onto the chair in the corner last night and were still lying there all in a heap. She closed her eyes and tried to sleep some more, but even with the blinds drawn, too much light crept in through them. Finally she gave up, had a shower and dressed, then went downstairs to see if any of the other band members were up and about.
    She found Siobhan in Cindy’s, the little restaurant/cafe off the lobby. The room didn’t promise much from its looks: painted cement floor, Formica table tops and mismatched kitchen chairs, old faded photos on the walls that weren’t hung for their artistic or historic value so much as that they’d simply always been there. But the band had eaten here last night and the food was spectacular. It was, Andy had said, as though the chef decided to go slumming after getting top marks at wherever it was that she’d studied the culinary arts, opting for this out-of-the-way backwoods cafe when she could have been the toast of the town at some five-star restaurant in the city.
    Siobhan was sitting at a table by the window, reading a paperback. The remains of her breakfast