by Wendy Wax
He smiles sheepishly. “No, I want you to take Bree’s manuscript with you so you can read it.”
“Why?” I ask even as I think of all the crap I threw at her this morning. How unfair it was of me to take everything out on her.
“Because you were once her best friend and you’re a New York Times bestselling author, so your opinion and your contacts could be important.”
I start to shake my head but he just keeps talking. “Look, Lauren. I’m not always the best husband in the world. But she’s been working on this for fifteen years. I’d think you could take a couple of hours to read it and give her some feedback. For old times’ sake.”
I sigh. “I can pretty much promise you she doesn’t really want to hear the truth. No aspiring writer does.”
“Of course, she does,” Clay says. “And maybe you shouldn’t be so quick to assume it won’t be good.”
He smiles and I have a flash of the boy he used to be. The people we all were. “You know no one prints out a manuscript anymore.”
“I’ll UPS it to you if you like. Or fly up and hand-deliver it if you promise to read it,” he says. “I am a shit sometimes. But Bree’s not. And she’ll never come out and ask you.”
I think of all that Bree and I were to each other. Now that my relationship with my mother is broken, Bree may be my last link with home.
Before I can find my voice, Spencer takes the box out of Clay’s hands. “I know Lauren’s suitcase is full, but I’ve got room.”
And so we drive away. Me, my fiancé, and my ex–best friend’s manuscript.
Twenty-seven
Lauren
New York City
Just being back in New York is a relief of sorts. Spencer is busy trying to catch up after the time away and although I’m careful to appear disappointed, I’m relieved by that, too. With so many raw nerve ends vibrating and conflicting emotions still coursing through me, I can barely think, let alone write. For a few days I just lie in bed and lick my wounds. When I can’t lie in bed any longer, I put on baggy clothes and dark sunglasses and walk in the park.
When I get home I listen to messages. There’s one from my mother that I delete mid-apology. The next is a reminder about a dental cleaning. The last is from Danielle, my publicist at Trove. I haven’t responded to her since I got back, so I force myself to listen. Her message comes out in a rush: “Oh my God! Those social media posts were pure genius. Funny yet dramatic! They show an entirely different side of you.” There’s a brief pause for breath. “And I absolutely love the shot from Title Waves. The store is adorable. And the book club looks so . . . real.
“I can’t wait to hear how they reacted to the news about the fifteenth-anniversary edition of Sandcastle Sunrise. We’ve been talking about doing a live kickoff event from there—maybe a day or two before your wedding—you are getting married down there, aren’t you? We still need to confirm that date so we can tie it to release.” There’s a pause—and I’m about to hit delete when she continues, “I saved the best for last. I got a call from a producer at Say Yes to the Dress. She’s a huge fan of your books. They want you on the show. They’ve even offered to give you the gown you say yes to—though you’ll have to keep that to yourself.”
She pauses again, presumably to let my good fortune sink in. “They can weave you into an episode right before the wedding. Of course, you’ll have to have some friends or family participate. Maybe we can fly your mother up and . . .”
Unable to listen to another word, I hit delete mid-sentence. I’m no longer lying in bed, but the nightmare continues.
* * *
That night Spencer arrives with dinner from our favorite Thai restaurant and I actually greet him wearing clothes and makeup. While we open the takeout containers and settle at the kitchen counter, I tell him about the offer from Say Yes to the Dress. Only he’s not at all horrified.
“Danielle’s right. It would be great exposure for the anniversary edition. And you are going to need a wedding gown.” He raises an eyebrow in question. “Unless you’re planning to call your mother and ask her to ship up THE DRESS?”
I freeze, my chopsticks halfway to my mouth.
“I mean, doing the show would kill two birds with one stone. And if you’re not planning to talk to Kendra or include her in the wedding, then I guess we should go ahead and make plans to have it here in New York. Right?”
I maneuver the panang chicken into my mouth. Somehow I manage to chew though I’m not entirely confident in my ability to swallow. I’m not fooled by his innocent expression or casual tone, but I don’t call him on either.
“It’s mid-April now,” he continues reasonably. “If we choose a date next June close to the book’s release, we’re basically fourteen months out. According to my sister people book the most sought-after venues years ahead. So we’re probably already behind the eight ball. We’d need to start looking right away.”
I’m still chewing when he retrieves his laptop from his messenger bag and brings it back to the counter. He opens a file. A calendar page for June of next year appears on the screen.
“All we have to do is pick one of these Saturdays or Sundays.” He smiles and pulls up another file. “Here’s a list of wedding venues Molly and Mac looked at and the ratings they gave each one.” Another smile. “And here’s a list of wedding planners Molly interviewed and liked before her wedding. This is a list of florists from my mother.”
I stare at the screen, then at him. Now would be the moment to protest. To say I just need a little more time before I can talk to and forgive my mother, at which point we’ll plan an Outer Banks wedding. Instead, I ask, “Do you want me to make the appointments or shall we split up the list?”
It takes him a minute to accept that his ploy hasn’t worked. “Oh. I guess we should split them up.”
“Okay. Good.”
“About the wedding dress . . .”
“Yes?” I take another bite of my panang chicken and chew slowly.
“While Brett was choreographing The Music in Me, he dated a dancer who’s also a part-time bridal consultant at Kleinfeld’s.”
I’m chewing and bracing. The vision of me in THE DRESS at the Sandcastle before Jake arrived flashes through my mind.
“If you wanted to go in on the quiet to look at gowns and see how you feel about the idea of doing the show, I could get her number.”
Our eyes meet.
“I’m sure Molly and my mother and grandmother would be glad to go with you.”
There’s a long beat of silence in which he does not say that I could avoid all this if I’d just call my mother, and I don’t make up reasons why I couldn’t possibly do any of the things he’s suggested.
I put my chopsticks down. Miraculously, I manage to swallow without choking. I even smile. “Sure. Let’s sync up our calendars and start setting appointments. It only makes sense to look around and see what our options are.”
* * *
Bree
It’s a week since Lauren went back to New York, but the fallout continues. We all pretend to go about our lives as usual, but Lauren’s isn’t the only reality that’s been altered.
I’m at the store every day until three. I shop for groceries, cook meals, stop by to see Kendra, do my best to prod/supervise/“be there” for Lily. I’m even careful not to ask or look too carefully at where Clay is on a daily basis, but everything feels off. Everything is off. My husband is the only one of us whose life still appears to turn on its normal axis.
It’s not just Lauren’s past that has been rewritten without warning. Kendra is no longer the person I thought she was and Lauren’s early “adventures” in New York aren’t what I thought they were.
Not only have the blinders been ripped off, I no longer have my novel to disappear into. Nor do I really know what I’m supposed to do with Heart of Gold now that it’s completed. I mean
, you can’t work on something for fifteen years—let everyone know that you’re doing it—then shove it back under your bed when it’s done. Even if that’s where it probably belongs.
Mrs. McKinnon brings that point home each afternoon that she comes in.
“So, have you sent off Heart of Gold?” she asks again today with an eager smile.
“No, not yet,” I say, offering my standard response. “I’m still planning to do a final pass to clean everything up. But I’m going to take a couple weeks to get some distance first.” I offer a reassuring smile. “All the how-to-get-published books suggest this.”
“You really should ask Lauren to read it for you. She could tell you if it needed anything.”
She’s said this too many times to count. Each time I just smile and change the subject. Lauren and I did not end on the best of notes. And even if we had, I’m no more ready for criticism from her than I ever was.
Lily has cheerleading practice this afternoon, so I swing by Kendra’s. I find her in the kitchen pulling trays of muffins out of the oven. The kitchen smells warm and sugary. Although she has dark circles under her eyes and a worry-crease in her forehead, I’m relieved to see her dressed and working.
I am not so relieved at how differently I view her. I’ve been forced to take her off the pedestal on which I placed her and accept that she’s human. I’ve also been forced to confront the fact that my not going to New York had serious consequences for Lauren. Consequences that I’ve been too caught up in my own needs and wants to ever imagine or, if I’m honest, even ask about. It was so much easier to just hold on to my jealousy and dismiss her grudge as unreasonable.
“Lemonade?”
“Sure. Thanks.”
Kendra pours us both a glass and sets out a plate of cookies. As if I’m still that lonely girl Lauren brought home after school. “Have you had any word?”
“From Lauren?”
She nods then droops when I say, ‘No.”
“I’m sure she’ll get over it,” I add, though I’m not at all sure.
“Do you really think so?”
“Yes.” I hesitate. “But I can understand her reaction. It was such a big shock and, well, from her point of view you did choose Jake and his family’s needs over hers.”
I keep Lauren’s description of what happened when she first got to New York to myself, because I’m ashamed of my part in it and because it will only make Kendra feel worse. It’s not my story to tell.
“And is that how you see it, too?” Her eyes are pinned to my face for the eternity it takes to weigh my answer.
“Well,” I say when it becomes clear she’s not going to let me off the hook. “I believe you did what you thought was right at the time.” I swallow, searching for the words that will allow me to tell the truth without inflicting more hurt than necessary. But there is no pain-free option here. “But I also think Lauren and Jake deserved to know about each other, especially once Lauren and his other children were adults.”
Her nod is slow. Neither of us touches our lemonade or reaches for a cookie. “I know I need to do something, only I can’t think what. I’d go to New York right now. Except I’m afraid that if I show up at her door she won’t let me in.”
It’s my turn to nod. This is entirely possible.
Her eyes shimmer with tears. As they begin to fall I realize that while she’s dried my tears lots of times, I’ve never seen her cry. She’s always been upbeat and positive. I learned to put one foot in front of the other no matter what I feel like on the inside from watching her and my grandmother.
“I’m even more afraid that she’ll never forgive me.”
“Oh no. I’m sure she’ll . . .” I stop. Because this is not the time to offer idle promises. “I don’t think that will happen. But I do think she probably needs more time to process and absorb everything.”
I can hardly meet her eyes. I desperately want to help, but I also want to run as far away as possible from all this hurt and pain. I am not the brave one, I never have been.
I leave Kendra’s in an emotional fog that sticks with me through the grocery store and I come home laden with all kinds of things I rarely buy. This includes assorted containers of Häagen-Dazs Trio Crispy Layers; a decadent new addition to the ice cream world that I’ve mostly managed to resist. Until now.
When I lug the bags into the kitchen Lily is standing motionless in front of the open refrigerator. She looks up as I enter. Her expression is tragic. Kendra isn’t the only person that I love who’s been crying.
“What’s happened?” The fact that whatever it is has sent her to the refrigerator makes me more anxious. How many years have I been coaxing her to eat more than bird-size amounts? I rush to put the groceries down even though I feel ill equipped to handle a meltdown right now. Or any other emotional challenge. Not when I seem to be having one of my own.
“It’s Shane. Shane Adams. He . . . flirted with me and told me that he really liked me. I thought he was going to ask me out, but now he barely even notices me.” Her chin juts and quivers. “I saw him hanging out with Kelsey Gardner yesterday. I feel like I’ll die if he asks her out instead of me.”
I study her more closely. “You’re not going to die over Shane or any other boy.”
“I feel like I might.”
I sigh. “I wouldn’t spend thirty seconds mooning over anyone who doesn’t appreciate you.”
“I am not mooning. What does that even mean anyway?”
“It means to behave or move in a listless and aimless manner,” I say because there are a whole lot of normally useless definitions floating around in my head. “You don’t want to waste your time, affection, and emotional energy on someone who doesn’t deserve it.”
I pull a Häagen-Dazs Trio out of one of the grocery bags (yes, I knew which bag they were in) and retrieve a spoon from the silverware drawer. “Here. Try this.” I put both on the counter then put my hands on her shoulders, even though I have to reach up to do so, then direct her to a stool. I put the second container in the freezer and take the third for myself.
“Ice cream is not the answer.” She says this with such prim certainty I have to fight back a smile.
I grab a spoon for myself and settle on the stool beside her. “That depends on the question. Lauren and I figured out a lot of things at the Dairy Queen.”
Even as she rolls her eyes I am hit with a slew of memories of Lauren and me hashing out our hopes and dreams, our story plots, even our plans for New York City, over Blizzards, and sundaes, and banana splits. Treats that made me ever rounder and curvier and that never added an ounce to her frame.
“Oh, Mom. I don’t want to lose him without ever really having him. Do you have any idea how that feels?”
In this moment I wish I didn’t. But I do. I peel the top off both our ice creams and place her spoon in her hand. “You feel like you can’t bear it if he looks at someone else the way you want him to look at you. That if he doesn’t fall in love with you life won’t be worth living. That you’d rather not have anyone if you can’t have him.”
Her head comes up and she looks at me in a way that she hasn’t since she got out of elementary school. “How do you know that?”
“Because that’s how I felt about your father not long after we started dating.” This is, alas, true. I pick up my spoon and dip it into the ice cream then pull up a spoonful of soft yet crispy salted caramel and chocolate.
“But that was forever ago,” she says.
I open my mouth and slip the first spoonful of ice cream inside. The flavor explodes in my mouth and I can’t contain a sigh of pleasure.
Lily frowns but tentatively dips her spoon into her own container. I watch as she spoons the ice cream into her mouth.
I’m too raw today to push aside the truth like I usually do. I married a man who didn’t love me anywhere near as much as I lov
ed him then convinced myself that I loved enough for the both of us. “Sometimes when we actually get the thing we wanted most we’re afraid to look at it too closely. We hang on even when we should let go.”
“Is that why you let Dad go out with other women?” There’s nothing tentative about the question. Her tone and the look that accompanies it are starkly frank and shockingly adult. “Because you’re afraid of losing him?”
I can’t seem to catch my breath or gather my wits. All this time I’ve believed she didn’t know. I convinced myself that the occasional personal and public humiliation was the price I paid to protect my children and keep our family together.
“I keep waiting for you to stand up to him and make him stop. To be the mother I always thought you were. But you just keep taking it.” Her voice drops. It and her eyes are filled with disappointment. In me.
She puts the spoon back into the container and pushes it away as she stands. “There’s no amount of ice cream that’s ever going to make that anything less than pathetic.”
Twenty-eight
Kendra
In all the years that Lauren has been in New York she’s only been a phone call, e-mail, or plane ride away. Now she might as well be in Siberia. More truthfully I am in Siberia—found guilty and cut off from the person I love most in the world. A fitting punishment that my unanswered phone calls and unreturned messages confirm I have no way to appeal.
It’s early Saturday morning when I arrive at the Dogwood to deliver muffins. Bree and Deanna have made sure I know that Jake, though traveling, is still in residence. I haven’t heard from him since the Blue Point debacle, so I’m not sure whether I want to see him to get news of Lauren or hope to avoid him because that news is likely to be bad. This uncertainty has me tiptoeing across the deck and into the kitchen, where I am nonetheless woefully unprepared for his presence in front of the coffeepot.
