As you progress through the guided, improv-based scenarios in this book, you’ll rediscover fun, games, and each other. Your experiences, memories, and imagination will make the scenarios uniquely yours. And you’ll uncover inner characters who can help you see your partner(s), and yourself, in a new light.
All you need is a rule book to get you started on your second chance.
Oh my god.
My party. My job. The pitch competition. I could never find the right person to be. But this book says I have inner characters who can help me be someone else. This book has a recipe for me to follow, like Craig’s checklist for promotion.
I pull the next page out from under Tobin’s fingers without ripping it.
The first rule for second chances is the simplest one. And the most difficult.As the improv greats say, finding ways to disagree is all too easy. Couples, threesomes, and moresomes can break the cycle of disagreement by saying YES, AND. When improvisers react honestly while seeking harmony, the relationships in their scenes come alive. When partners do the same, their relationship can come back to life, too.
“Liz?” Tobin’s voice cracks, opening a matching fissure in my heart. He’s stroking the hardware in his left wrist with his right index finger, a nervous habit he’s picked up since his surgery.
This is too much pressure. I only want to say yes if I’m sure this will work. I can’t bear to fail again; I can’t put us through the blood and sweat and tears of trying unless we succeed.
And I don’t know if we will. Neither of us does. Maybe I’m not brave enough to find out.
“I think I spoke too soon about this book,” I say, stalling.
“It’s not actually a sex book,” he says, the tiniest hint of a smile playing at the corner of his lips. His eyes flick to where I’m rubbing the tips of my fingers together, something I do to soothe myself when I’m feeling uncertain. He knows I’m wavering.
“Some of it might be all right,” I concede. “Parts of it look like improv, or at least role-playing.”
Improv. I’d be practicing improv.
With Tobin, who’s fantastic at saying the right thing, to the right person, at the right time. Tobin, whose supernatural charisma and uncomplicated devotion to sea-shanty TikTok can get an entire boat of soaking, freezing, wretched guests belting out a vaguely dirty chorus with hours left to go in a dark-skied day. Whose greatest talent is making people think it was their idea to do everything his way, without him even having to ask.
Tobin, the original magic man. I could watch him, learn from him, copy all his mannerisms and best lines. Use them to make myself into the kind of person who doesn’t have to endure the sting of knowing she didn’t get her retired ex-boss’s job even though nobody else wanted it.
He thrusts the book into my hand. “Read it, okay? Take all the time you need.” There’s a light in those eyes as blue as anAugust sky north of sixty. It’s obvious hope has infected him, like a virus.
I need to get back to Amber’s, if only to make sure Eleanor hasn’t snapped Yeti into a Lego jail with a phalanx of Barbie prison guards, all of their hair shorn to match her own.
“I’ll think about it,” I say, shoving the book into the front pocket of my suitcase. It’s a very convenient piece of baggage. Tobin laughed when I bought it at a Black Friday sale, saying he hoped we’d never take a trip that needed a suitcase.
I look up at him, hand on the door latch. “No promises.”
“No promises,” he echoes. He forgets I’ve known him for eight years, and I can hear the promise in his voice.
My phone pings with Amber’s text tone.
Guess you’re not coming home, lol. Enjoy the makeup sex. Hate to say I told you so, but… I’m glad you decided to be happy with what you have.
Sisters are so complicated. I want us to be close. Yet there’s this groundswell of fury inside me, as if I’ve failed to get promoted to adulthood with her the same way I’ve failed to get promoted at work. “What you want from marriage isn’t important; be happy with what you can get.” “You’re not suited for leadership, Liz; you’re happier with numbers, not people.”
But what if I’mnothappy? What if I don’t agree that I shouldn’t try for what I want?
Halfway out the door, I wheel around, riding an angry wave of impulse that washes away logic and reason.
I cansoreach for something better. A job, a life, a partnership where I get to be more than background scenery. My only chance to save this marriage is to stop taking what I can get and start going after what I want. I don’t think it’s a big chance, but Tobin and I are going into this with our eyes open.
And even if the marriage thing doesn’t work, I’ll still be saving my job. After all, who better to learn improv from than the best?
“If we do this, I have conditions.”
“Yes! Absolutely, name them.” He blows out a long breath the way he does when the painkillers finally kick in.
“No sex.”
