by Elia Winters
“You are?” Scarlett raised an eyebrow, surprise or irritation in her expression. “You didn’t mention that this morning.”
“Yeah, well, it didn’t come up then.” Megan’s face was so hot, she must look like a tomato. “It’s all still up in the air right now. Very new.”
Scarlett was still looking at her like she was trying to understand what was happening when Juliet piped in. “I’m so glad you two are still hanging out! I was worried that you might not be friends anymore and I’d be making everything super awkward by messaging.” She smiled brightly, and Megan didn’t have the heart to disavow her of her belief. “What about you, Scarlett?” Juliet asked. “What are you up to lately?”
“I’m freelancing, actually.” Scarlett sat up a little straighter. “Telecommuting, mostly data analysis for private firms. It’s a great setup, because I get to make my own hours, work from home, pretty much living the dream.” She grinned with those perfectly white teeth that she hadn’t even had to suffer through years of braces to get.
“I’m so glad.” Juliet sighed. “The one downside of not being on social media is that I don’t get to see what you’re all up to. It is so good to see your faces.”
“Thanks.” Scarlett waved her hand in a “get on with it” gesture, and Megan was quite grateful for it. “Now we’ve got to know. Tell us why you’re calling. What’s your news?”
“I’m getting married!” Juliet fairly bounced out of her seat. “His name is Gabriel, and we’ve been keeping things kind of quiet because his family is very conservative and wouldn’t approve of us living together, but we’ve decided to make it official. We’re getting married on February 19 here in Quebec.”
“Congratulations!” Megan and Scarlett said together, their words overlapping. Megan meant all her congratulations, too; Juliet was always so sweet. She deserved somebody really good. But... February 19? Megan looked at the calendar and did some math. “But that’s so soon. There’s almost no time to plan a wedding.”
“Tell me about it.” Juliet gave a half-smile. “But his grandmother is not in good health, and we want everyone we love to be able to attend, so we decided to make it really fast. His father has wonderful business connections, and he pulled some strings, so we’re at the Château Frontenac for the whole thing.” She clasped her hands together. “I know we haven’t seen each other in a long time, but we were best friends growing up. It feels so important to me that the two of you attend. Is there any way you can make it?”
“Oh.” Megan’s heart fluttered. “I...don’t know.” Quebec? In February? “I’ve never been on a plane,” she said, trying to stall her mind that was already spending the ten thousand dollar check she still had in her pants pocket.
Scarlett looked similarly uneasy. “I...don’t know. It’s a lot of money for tickets, and I want to say yes, but... I have to think about it, Jules.”
Juliet’s face fell. “Of course. I understand. I haven’t mailed your invitations yet—I don’t even have your addresses—but I wanted to talk to you first so you could know how much I wanted you to come. And Quebec will be so gorgeous then. It’s Winter Carnival that week, and it’s so different from Florida...” Juliet had those big, pleading eyes, like out of a cartoon.
“Maybe it’s possible!” Megan found herself saying, with another cursed exclamation point sneaking into her voice. “I mean, I don’t know, but I don’t want to say no right off the bat...”
“Well. Think about it, all right?” Juliet bit her lip. “If you made it, we could totally cover your hotel. But maybe you two could talk more? I’ll hang up. Let me know! Please. I’d love to see you. And message me your addresses!”
“Of course. Of course we’ll talk.” Scarlett was saying it like she wasn’t going to hang up on Megan the minute she didn’t have the social obligation to talk to her, the way she’d avoided all of Megan’s attempts to reach out. She’d later made some attempts of her own that Megan had of course avoided, too, but who was keeping track of that?
“Okay! And let’s not be strangers. I miss you both.” Juliet gave them beaming smiles and then disconnected, leaving Scarlett as the only face on Megan’s screen.
For a minute, Scarlett and Megan just stared at each other.
Scarlett rested her chin on her folded hands. “Career change?”
“Diner’s closing, thanks. Telecommuting data analysis?”
“More like data entry.”
The silence stretched on some more, and maybe the mercy would be to just hang up and pretend they hadn’t talked at all.
“What are we gonna do, Meg?” Scarlett asked.
“About what?”
“About Juliet.” Scarlett made a face. “She really wants us to go.”
Megan wrinkled her nose. “She also apparently thinks you and I are still best friends.”
Scarlett laughed. “Who’s gonna tell her?”
“We can’t tell her,” Megan insisted. “She wants us to go to Canada! I’ve never even been out of the state.”
“Shit, I can’t afford to fly to Canada.” Scarlett shook her head. “We’ve gotta say no, right?”
“Right.” Megan sighed. “But I don’t want to look at that sad face.”
“Neither do I. I don’t know about you, but I’m gonna take the coward’s way out and just RSVP no when the invitation comes.” Scarlett leaned back in her chair. “And change my name and go into hiding.”
Megan looked at the screen. “I could...” She stopped, the possibility that had come half-formed to her mind suddenly dissolving. “No, it’s dumb.”
“What?” Scarlett asked.
“I was just thinking aloud. Never mind.” Megan shook her head. “Have a good night. Good luck with whatever you’re doing now.”
“Yeah, thanks.” Scarlett’s sarcasm filled her words. She didn’t even say goodbye before hanging up.
Megan stared at the screen, at her own face looking at her, and sighed again before closing the window. She had the whole evening to be sad and feel sorry for herself without worrying about what other people thought of her.
Especially Scarlett.
Chapter Three
This was probably dumb. Most of the things Scarlett did were dumb. She wasn’t even sure Megan still lived in the same house, but she’d gotten a Christmas card from this address a few years ago when Megan was maybe still trying to keep up appearances, and Megan wasn’t the type of person to move. So she sat in the driver’s seat of her car in front of a plain-looking beige house, which had a single string of Christmas lights trimming the garage like the saddest scene in a depressing holiday movie, and stared at the light on in the bedroom. It was late. It was late, and she and Megan weren’t even friends anymore. Sitting in front of her house like a creeper wasn’t a good look.
But.
If Megan had an ounce of adventure in her body, Scarlett could wrangle a trip to Canada out of it, and they’d both make Juliet happy. Which was probably the best thing to do in this situation. She’d been thinking about it for days, ever since the video chat. It was late, but she had finally convinced herself to go talk to Megan, and she didn’t want to lose her nerve.
So she got out of her shitty car and ran up the front steps to ring the doorbell.
Megan opened the door, her brown hair pulled back in a headband, wearing a matching pajama set because of course she wore matching pajamas, staring up at Scarlett with this expression of bewilderment that hit Scarlett like a punch in the gut.
She used to have a really, really big crush on Megan.
But now, they weren’t there anymore, and Scarlett gave her a thumbs-up, like that wasn’t the most ridiculous way to greet someone. “Hey!” Scarlett said brightly. “Can we talk?”
“What. The hell.” Megan looked past her. “Is this a prank?”
“It’s not a prank. But it’s cold! Let me in.” Scarlett
shifted from foot to foot.
Megan stepped aside, and Scarlett stepped into the house. It was the first time she’d ever been in here, and damn, Megan loved beige.
“Your house is nice,” Scarlett said, because that is what you said when you were going into somebody’s house for the first time. “Nice neutrals.”
“I’m not allowed to paint it anything unless I paint over it when I move out.” Megan made a face at her. Megan was always pulling these faces, scrunched up and irritated. “What are you doing here? It’s late.”
“I know it’s late. I needed to talk to you.”
“The internet is a perfectly reasonable option these days.” Megan was wearing bunny slippers, like the kind that had actual bunnies on them, and something about that tweaked a weird little vulnerability in Scarlett’s innards that she didn’t want to question too deeply.
“Can I sit?” Scarlett went over and sat on the couch anyway without waiting for a response. She looked around the room again. Something seemed off. The art looked like the standard kind of art you’d find at Target, but hell, that wasn’t weird. Scarlett got most of her wall hangings at big box stores. It was the stuff on the bookshelves. Megan had always loved romances, so those lined a whole shelf, but she wasn’t really a fan of video game tie-in novels, and there were three full shelves of...
“Metal Gear Solid?” Scarlett asked aloud, squinting to read the titles.
Megan flushed. “They’re Matt’s.”
“Matt?” It took Scarlett a moment to remember. “Your brother?”
“He lives here with me.” Megan folded her arms.
“Meg, you’re not doing the South any favors here by living with your brother.”
“Very funny. He lost his job a few years back and needed a place to stay, so I told him he could rent here with me.”
“A few years back.” Scarlett wasn’t friends with Megan anymore, and she should probably keep her nose in her own business, but the curiosity was driving her into the questions she probably had no business asking. “And what’s he doing now?”
“He picks up some hours here and there at a few different places.” Megan’s tone was evasive.
“Where’s he tonight? Work?” The answer was probably no.
“He went out with friends. And now he’s probably gaming.” Megan grimaced.
Of course it wouldn’t surprise Scarlett at all if Megan’s kid brother was a deadbeat who didn’t pay the bills. He’d been a slacker in high school, but hell, lots of people were slackers in high school. Matt was the kind of slacker who liked to mooch off his parents until they stopped him, though. Maybe they’d finally stopped for good and he’d had to move in with Megan.
“What are you doing here, Scarlett?” Megan crossed her arms over her chest. Even standing while Scarlett was sitting, she looked slight. Megan had always been slim, unlike Scarlett’s bold curves and wild hair, and her pale skin looked especially pale in the dim light. She didn’t seem to ever get much color, even during the hot Florida summers when she and Scarlett used to spend all their time after school swimming and sunbathing outside. Now, the paleness made her look unwell.
“Are you okay?” Scarlett was asking before she thought about it.
Megan waved her hand. “I’m fine. I’m less fine if you don’t answer me.”
“Okay.” Scarlett interlaced her hands, pressing her palms between her knees, and leaned forward on the couch. “Do you actually want to go to Juliet’s wedding?”
A softness stole into Megan’s eyes. “I can’t.” Her tone wasn’t “I can’t,” though; her tone was “I wish I could.”
“But is it that you don’t want to, or don’t think you can? Why don’t you think you can?”
Megan sighed and spun in a circle. “Do we have to go through this now? It’s almost midnight.”
“Do you have to get up in the morning?” Scarlett asked.
“Yes,” Megan shot back, and then paused. “Well, no.” She bit her lower lip. “Winston called and asked me not to come in tomorrow. They’re cutting back on hours in the last few weeks the diner’s open.”
“Great. So you have time to talk.”
Megan flopped into the recliner across from Scarlett. “You’re impossible. You’ve always been impossible.”
This was the closest they’d come to broaching their past. Scarlett wasn’t sure if she wanted to. There were always questions involved, questions she wasn’t ready to answer.
“Yes,” Megan said when Scarlett didn’t respond. “Yeah, sure, I’d love to go. But it’s ridiculous. It’s a whole different country. I’ve never been on a plane.”
That was the part that had settled in Scarlett’s mind, the part she hadn’t been able to let go of. “Are you scared to fly?”
“I don’t know.” Megan sighed. “What do you want me to say?”
“I didn’t think it was a particularly difficult question. Lots of people are scared to fly.” That didn’t seem right to Scarlett, though. For all of Megan’s quiet, unobtrusive demeanor, she had never really been fearful. She just...didn’t expend a lot of effort on things for herself.
“You said it was a lot of money.” Megan’s tone was accusatory. “Why are you asking me if I’m going to go if you can’t afford to go?”
Time for the pitch. “I was thinking maybe we could drive,” Scarlett said, and forced the last word out. “Together.”
Megan stared at her.
Scarlett stared back.
“Together,” Megan repeated. “In the same car.” She drew back. “Wait, what car? Not your car, certainly. I saw that thing in the driveway and it’s the same one you had in high school. I’m surprised it isn’t currently on fire.”
Scarlett couldn’t even defend herself. “My car’s a death trap. We’d take yours.”
“So you want me to drive across the entire country with you in my car so you can save money on plane tickets?” Megan’s eyebrows were so high up they were practically hitting her hairline. “You’ve got some nerve, Scarlett Andrews.”
“Your car’s a convertible,” Scarlett tried.
Megan gave her a withering look. “It’s winter.”
It really was a terrible plan, wasn’t it? But Scarlett had already thought it up, and she was committed. “It doesn’t have to be so bad. You and I used to be friends, once.” She swallowed, the words suddenly hanging heavier between them than she wanted them to. She forced herself to press on. “Juliet wants to see us both. She was the final member of our trio. We should try to go to her wedding.”
Megan wrinkled up her nose. “Gross.”
“What?” Scarlett snapped back.
Megan kept the wrinkled-prune expression for another moment. “It’s gross that you’re getting all emotional about this.”
“Unbelievable.” Scarlett flopped back on the couch and stretched her arms out over the back of it. “I didn’t even want to ask you, you know that? I knew you were going to be an asshole about this, the way you’ve been a total asshole since we stopped talking.”
“Right. Right. I’m the asshole. Obviously. And you’re perfect.” Megan was getting heated, color rising in her pale cheeks. “How am I supposed to do this road trip? I’ve never—” She cut herself off abruptly, mouth snapping shut.
“Never what?” Scarlett asked.
Megan shook her head. “Never mind.”
“Never what?” Scarlett insisted. “Never been to a wedding? Never actually had a valid driver’s license?”
“I’ve never been out of Florida.” Megan folded her arms. “There, are you happy?”
“You were serious about that?” Scarlett gaped. “But this state is so bad!”
“This state is not bad. I happen to like it here. People come from all over the world to the beaches, and the cost of living is so low, and I have a Disney yearly pass...” Megan ticked off th
e pluses on her fingers.
Scarlett interrupted her. “It’s hotter than Satan’s taint, and you can’t go thirty feet without hitting a nail salon or a Wal-Mart, and alligators just fucking show up in the drainage ditches, and don’t even get me started on sinkholes—”
“So move away, then!” Megan said, practically shouting. “Why do you even live here if you hate it so much?”
“Because it’s cheap! And because I don’t want to shovel snow! And because I grew up here and it’s like a damn wart, you can’t get rid of it. And...” Her voice fell. “And I like it.” Scarlett hated that she actually liked the sunny weather and the beaches and the quirky people.
Megan was nodding like she knew everything, and that was its own annoying bullshit. “I see.”
“Ah, yeah, ‘I see.’ Don’t act like you’re my therapist.” Scarlett waved her hand. “At least I’ve left the state.”
“Don’t hold it over me.” Megan looked off to one side, something sad coming over her face that made Scarlett feel like kind of an ass for picking on her.
Other obstacles were crashing into place in Scarlett’s mind already. “Well, we couldn’t drive, then. You probably don’t even have a passport, and it would cost a fortune to get one expedited.”
“I have a passport.” Megan interlaced her fingers in her lap.
“What? Why?” Scarlett couldn’t imagine why she’d have gone through the trouble and expense of getting one, if she wasn’t going anywhere.
Megan clammed up again, pulling her legs into her chest on the chair. “I don’t know why you care.”
“I’m curious. For old time’s sake.”
“I got one back when I first graduated college. I thought—it’s dumb.” Megan’s voice was muffled against her knees. Scarlett wanted to push her, but they didn’t have that rapport anymore. But then Megan continued talking. “I thought I was going to travel, and I didn’t.” She picked her head up and rested her chin on her knees. “Is that good enough?”
