The Twin Switch

“It sure did.”

My eyes adjusted, and I could see the candles now, little dots of light on the tables illuminating the faces closest to them. They reflected off the windows. Beyond, across the bay, I could see the lights of ships and sailboats in the distance.

“Nothing but a power failure, folks.” It was the bartender’s hearty voice. “It happens sometimes. Please sit tight and enjoy the ambience. I’m sure the lights will come back on soon.”

“At least we’re not waiting on our drinks,” Sophie said, lifting her glass to take another sip.

“I wonder if Brooklyn will be able to find us.” I looked around, but I couldn’t see much of anything beyond the candlelight.

“Hey, guys.” Nat appeared and hopped up on the stool next to Sophie.

“What happened to your man?” Sophie asked.

“When the lights went out, he squealed like a little girl.”

“That’s disappointing,” I said.

Sometimes I wondered if there were any good men left in the world. I had a list of qualities. I mean, it wasn’t a long list, mostly to do with integrity and temperament. But squealing like a little girl was definitely not on it.

“So not the type to rescue you from a bear,” Sophie said to Nat. She sounded disappointed.

There was laughter in Nat’s voice. “Who needs rescuing from a bear?”

“I might go camping,” Sophie said.

“You?” Nat asked.

Five-star restaurant manager, downtown high-rise-dwelling Sophie was definitely not the outdoor type.

“Well, maybe you,” Sophie said.

Nat had been known to spend time outside—at least in her rooftop garden.

“Then that’s definitely not my guy.” Nat took a two-second gaze back over her shoulder.

I realized then, that after a mere five minutes I’d wondered if Nat’s guy would be the guy. It could have been a really romantic story—Nat meeting the love of her life while spending a girls’ weekend in San Francisco celebrating Brooklyn’s wedding.

We were all single. Well, Brooklyn wouldn’t be single for long. But Sophie, Nat and me hadn’t had a lot of luck meeting men.

Good guys were hard to find. I could list the flaws in each of my dates from the past six months: too loud, too nerdy, too intellectual, too moody.

I knew how it sounded. And I realized perfectly well what I was doing with that list. If I focused on the guys, I didn’t have to explore the possibility that it was me—which, of course, deep down, I knew it was.

I’d love to live in denial. And I would if I could figure out a way that I didn’t know denial was denial.

So far, I hadn’t been able to make that work.

“Where’s Brooklyn?” Nat asked.

“Ladies’ room,” I said.

Sophie craned her neck to gaze across the dim room. “She should be back by now. I hope she’s not stuck in an elevator.”

“I’m going to go look for her.” I slid off my bar stool.

“You’ll get lost, too,” Nat said. “Or you’ll trip and break your ankle.”

I remembered my black-and-gold sling-back stilettos. They were stylish, but not the most stable footwear in my closet. Nat made a good point.

Instead, I retrieved my phone from my purse and shot Brooklyn a text.

I climbed back up and took a sip of my drink.

We all stared at my phone for a few minutes, but Brooklyn didn’t text back.

“Stuck on an elevator,” Nat said in conclusion.

“Or in an ambulance,” Sophie said. “I bet she was rushing to get back to us in the dark, and it all went bad.”

“Don’t even joke about that,” I said. “There are five hundred people coming to her wedding.”

“And it’s a long way up the aisle at St. Fidelis’s,” Nat said. “What if she broke her leg?”

“She didn’t break her leg,” I said and then realized I was tempting fate. “I mean, I hope she didn’t break her leg.”

Brooklyn with a broken leg would be an unmitigated disaster.

It was thirty minutes before the lights came on. When they did, conversation around us spiked for a moment, and there was a smattering of applause.

The bartender went back to work, and the waitresses began circulating around the room. Brooklyn still hadn’t returned from the ladies’ room, and I looked at the lobby entrance, trying to spot her.

“There she is,” Sophie said.

“Where?” I asked, disappointed in my powers of observation.

“Left side of the lobby. Talking to a guy.”

I leaned in for a better angle, but I still couldn’t see her.

“It looks like she got more support from random men than I did,” Nat said.

“He’s hot,” Sophie said.

I got down from the bar stool so I could see more of the lobby.

“Whoa,” both Sophie and Nat said in unison.

“What?”