Work Text:
July 2021
She pushes her near-empty plate to the center of the table and curls her hands over the edge of it. “Okay,” she exhales heavily, “I have to go pee.”
Chris huffs an exhale out his nose, shaking his head and smirking. “Of course you do.”
“I’m sorry,” she says, tilting her head to one side and narrowing her eyes, “did you not see how much coffee I just drank?”
He puts his hands up in a defensive position. “Hey, I was just making an observation. I’m not judging you for having one of the world’s smallest bladders, even though you did brag about your ‘teacher bladder’ when we first got together.”
“Alright, first of all,” she rests her elbow on the table and holds up one finger, and she ignores the deepening smirk her fiance doesn’t even try to hide, “pointing out that I’m capable of holding my pee for very long periods of time because I often have to is not bragging.” Chris snickers. “Second of all, I’m on summer break, and I’m damn well going to pee any time I want to.” Chris outright laughs then, nodding as she pushes her chair back and stands, looking back at him over her shoulder and sticking out her tongue as she makes her way toward the door leading into the restaurant where she and Chris - and Dodger - have been having lunch on the patio.
She pulls her face mask out of the pocket of her dress as she makes her way inside and hooks it over her ears. She’s glad they have the option now to do things like have lunch on the patios of some of their favorite restaurants, but she’s also glad for safety measures like masks and vaccines. Of course, Chris teases that she actually likes the mask, because it hides the facial expressions that she can’t control and gives her the ability to mutter things under her breath without anyone else realizing. He’s not entirely wrong.
She’s just gotten into one of the bathroom’s three stalls and locked the door behind her when she hears the bathroom door open and close again. Almost immediately, she hears a squeal, followed by an, “Oh my god.” The voice sounds young, probably around the same age as the students she teaches, maybe a bit older, and excited. Instantly, she’s on alert.
“Is that really him?” Another voice asks, and She can’t help the way her whole body just sort of sags.
“Definitely. Didn’t you see Dodger under the table?”
“Still, it just doesn’t seem possible that we just had lunch like, two tables over from Chris Evans.” It’s quiet for a moment and She looks under the stall door as best she can without doubling herself over. She sees two sets of feet move to stand in front of the sinks. Several seconds pass without the two young women moving or speaking, and she assumes they’re using the mirrors and that the conversation is over. She’s just about to move forward with her business when the same voice that last spoke picks up again. “But who’s the girl?” She freezes then, and sucks in a sharp breath. She finds herself inching carefully toward the stall door, turning her ear toward the sound. “Sister?”
“No. I’ve seen pictures of his sisters, she’s not one of them.”
“A cousin or something maybe? She’s got similar eyes, very blue, and her hair’s about the same color as his.”
It’s quiet for a beat, then, “I don’t know who she is, but I know who she’s not.” Another moment of quiet, like the girl speaking is waiting for a reaction from her companion. Finally, in a tone noticeably more smug than it had previously been, “His girlfriend.”
“Why do you say that?”
Good question, She thinks, and she’s very interested in hearing the answer. It’s not like she wants to be spotted as his girlfriend (fiance, actually, but she’s not in the mood to split hairs), not after they’ve done so well for so long at keeping their circle small and keeping her out of the tabloids and off the internet, but at the same time, who wouldn’t be interested in hearing the answer to that question? Why does this other woman seem so sure that she can’t be with Chris?
“Because,” the woman smacks her lips audibly, “did you see her?”
Well shit. She tells herself she’s prepared for this, prepared to go public (if they make it to the wedding without being ‘outed,’ the plan is to make some sort of announcement after the honeymoon) and deal with the intrusive - and judgmental - comments and questions that come along with that. But no matter how much she may be intellectually prepared, there’s really no way to be emotionally prepared to hear something like that about yourself, even though she’s pretty much always known it was coming sooner or later. She’s silently and repeatedly coaching herself not to spiral over this when the other woman speaks again.
“I thought she was cute,” she says, and She allows herself a small smile at the compliment.
“I mean, yeah, she’s cute, but he’s Chris Evans. Do you really expect him to be with someone cute?” Wow, talk about a backhanded compliment, if it’s even kind enough to be called that.
She tells herself not to let this upset her. She’s engaged to one of the sexiest, most desirable men on earth, that’s bound to inspire some jealousy. Even if he wasn’t a celebrity, the fact that he looks and acts the way he does would guarantee that there would be plenty of women who would want to be in her shoes, which means that they probably wouldn’t be thrilled about her existence - or, at least, her existence in his life. But no matter how much her brain knows that’s all this is - jealousy from someone who doesn’t even know her, or Chris, for that matter - it still hurts her heart to hear it so plainly stated that she’s just not at his level. She’s worked for three years to fight her own suspicions that that very thing is true, and more often than not nowadays she wins that battle. But hearing it from someone else, theoretically an objective third party, stings more than she wants to admit.
She’s holding her breath, biting the inside of her cheek to keep from tearing up, when the voice that she has decided belongs to the kinder of the two girls speaks again. “Well, we don’t know what he’s attracted to. Maybe he thinks she’s more than cute.” God bless this sweet girl, She thinks. “And maybe he sees a lot of other things in her besides just the way she looks.” She exhales so heavily that she has a moment of internal panic, worried that they might have heard her. It’s short-lived, though, because the other girl speaks again.
“Eh, I’m still going with no.” She rolls her eyes inside the stall.
“Who do you think she is, then?”
“Well, she’s not a celebrity, or we’d recognize her. And I don’t think she’s any kind of like, industry professional.”
“How would you be able to tell that ?”
The smug girl scoffs. “She’s dressed like a kindergarten teacher.”
And somehow, that’s what almost has her coming out of the stall to confront the young women. High school! She wants to yell, And he likes my clothes. He picked out this sundress online! She doesn’t, of course, but god she wants to. In a way, though, she’s grateful for this turn in the conversation, because the flash of anger at that comment (and really, what’s wrong with dressing like a kindergarten teacher? Most of the ones she’s known have adorable wardrobes) has replaced her earlier self-consciousness and insecurity and allowed her to remind herself that she doesn’t need these girls (or the one, really) to approve of her. The only person whose opinion matters when it comes to her relationship with Chris is Chris himself, and she stopped being worried about where she stands with him a long time ago. He leaves no room for doubt on that front, and in the two years since they met, she’s managed to internalize a good bit of that confidence. Because of him, and the way he loves her, she’s a stronger, more secure person than she was before they met. And because of that, rather than hiding here in the stall any longer, or, heaven forbid, letting their words send her into a pit of self-doubt, she decides to put a stop to this whole thing.
She opens the stall door without a word and steps to the free sink on the opposite wall. Without turning, she makes eye contact with each girl in turn through the mirror. One of them flushes instantly and drops her eyes to her hands where her fingers twist together in front of her. She assumes that’s the kinder of the two. The other only takes a deep breath and squares her shoulders before looking at her friend as she drops a tube of lip gloss into her purse, her mask looped over her wrist. “Alright, I’m finished,” she says, and the first girl nods without looking up. The two leave without another word. For a second she forgets that she still has to pee , but as she’s turning on the faucet to wash her hands, the sound of the water sends a jolt through her. She turns the water off and rushes back into the stall she just exited.
When she gets back out to the patio, Chris looks like he’s on alert, his eyes trained on the door and his posture stiff. She’s told him many times that he doesn’t have to be in protection mode every time they leave the house together, but it hasn’t made a difference. The second he sees her, though, his shoulders drop and his chest falls. His lips turn up into a smile as he reaches down beside his leg to rub between Dodger’s ears and says, “There she is, Bubba. There’s our girl.”
“Hey.” She smiles at him from behind her mask (he can tell, she knows) as she drops into her chair then leans and reaches to the opposite side of the table to scratch under Dodger’s chin.
“Is everything okay?” Chris asks, apprehension still evident in his voice.
“Yep. All good.”
He lifts one eyebrow slightly. “You sure? You were gone for a while, we were starting to worry you’d fallen in.”
She rolls her eyes at the cheesy joke. “I’m sure. Just … crowded ladies room.”
Chris seems to relax fully then, his face opening up as he reaches for his phone where it’s lying face-down on the table. “Okay, cool. Well, in that case,” his thumb flicks over the phone screen a few times until he finds what he’s looking for. “Do you think your mom would like these?” He turns the phone to show her a pair of earrings, pearly white flowers with a blue stone in the center. “I want to get a gift to give her at the rehearsal dinner, and these look nice and I figured they’ll probably match whatever she plans to wear to the wedding, since they’re blue and white. If she wants to wear them then, of course. But they’re also not too formal, and she can wear them other times too, you know?”
She can’t help the way her head tilts a little to one side and her eyes soften as she smiles, almost like she’s looking at a cute puppy or baby. She starts to reach for his hand, then decides against it, slipping her hand under the table instead of across the top of it. They are sometimes affectionate in public, especially now that everyone is wearing masks, but after what just happened in the bathroom she thinks better of it. So, she reaches for Dodger, and as he inches closer to her side of the table she slides her feet across the wooden planks of the patio to slot them between Chris’s.
“Chris,” she shakes her head a little, “you could give my mom …” she trails off and looks around, then spots a small rock under the next table over, “that pebble over there, and it would probably bring her to tears. For one thing, for all her flaws, my mom is an incredibly gracious, appreciative person. For another, she absolutely adores you. As far as she’s concerned, you can do absolutely no wrong.”
He shrugs. “Well, that’s nice, but I don’t want to give her something she’ll appreciate just because that’s who she is or because it’s coming from her future son-in-law -”
It doesn’t escape her that he focuses on his relationship to her more than who he is, as if that’s why her mom loves him and not just because he’s so amazing.
“- I want to give her something she’ll actually enjoy.”
She really, really wants to go across the table and kiss him all over his stupidly handsome face. But again, she’s aware of where they are and the fact that they are almost certainly being watched, so she taps his ankle three times with the side of her foot, prompting him to squeeze his knees together under the table so that they press in against hers. She loves that she doesn’t have to tell him that they need to be discreet, he just follows her lead. She holds out her hand. “Let me see the picture again.” He grins and pulls the photo back up then hands her the phone. After studying the image for a minute, she looks back up at him and says, “I think she would find them very pretty, but she really only wears studs and really tiny hoops that basically hug her ears. She’d probably wear them to the wedding, since they were a gift, then never wear them again because they’re too big for her preference.”
“See!” he exclaims. “That’s what I needed to know! Okay, well, there’s a necklace too, with the same flower. Would she like that?”
She nods enthusiastically. “Definitely.”
“Awesome.” He winks at her as he shifts to one side to slide his phone into his hip pocket. “I’ll order that later. Alright, well, I guess we need to get going. You’re meeting Carly this afternoon to go school shopping, right?”
She wrinkles her nose, her mask moving over her cheeks as she does. “Actually, she texted me this morning and said apparently one of the boys forgot to inform her that he needed to be driven to Worcester today for a baseball thing, so I guess I’m on my own.”
Chris shrugs. “Or I could go with you.”
He doesn’t seem to notice that she’s just kind of staring at him, because he wraps Dodger’s leash around his hand and gives it a quick tug before standing and pushing in his chair. He looks down at her expectantly. “You want to go school supply shopping with me?” she asks almost incredulously.
“Well, I mean, we need to take this guy home first, but yeah. Is that okay?”
“Yeah.” She does a pretty decent impression of a bobblehead. “It’s great. I’m just surprised, I guess.” Chris furrows his brow, watching her as she stands. She shrugs, “It’s not exactly the most exciting way to spend a summer afternoon.”
“Sweetheart, when I get to be here, at home, there’s nothing I love more than ‘not exciting,’ especially if it’s with you. You put up with some insane shit because of my job, the least I can do is spend a couple hours with you in Target and Office Max so you can get what you need for yours.”
She opens her mouth to say something, then just shakes her head and pushes in her chair.
“What?” he asks.
“Nothing,” she answers. Then, with a shrug, “Just … feeling lucky.”
“I mean, if you wanna get lucky -”
“Alright,” she says with a sigh and an eye roll, “let’s go.” He laughs and lets her lead the way back to the car.
Once the three of them are settled in the car in the small parking area behind the restaurant, Dodger sprawled across the backseat and She and Chris in the front, shielded by the car’s heavily tinted windows, and once they’ve removed their masks, she reaches across the console to cup his jaw in her palm. “I love you.”
“I love you, too,” he answers, looking a bit perplexed.
“I know,” she says softly, and his face breaks into a wide grin just before he leans across the console to kiss her.