Loathe at First Sight

by Suzanne Park

  A small win, but a win nonetheless.

  Chapter Eight

  Candace called me on the way to the Bay 55 Steakhouse, the hottest restaurant in town according to Seattle Metropolitan magazine. With a several-week wait list, Jane must’ve had some serious connections to get a reservation for a large party within a few days of becoming engaged.

  “Mel! I’m going to be like ten minutes late. I had to get gas. Are you there yet?”

  I would be a little late, too. I had completely lost track of time working on Ian’s budget and forecast assignments and I didn’t feel like paying nine bucks for valet as extra torture that evening.

  After circling around for ten or more minutes and searching well outside a comfortable parking radius from the venue, I found a spot a quarter mile from the restaurant. But damn it, I saved nine dollars. Yeah, I was aware this made absolutely no sense since this logic caused me to be late all the time. I blamed my frugal upbringing for this unsound parking rationale.

  My car was at the bottom of Queen Anne Hill, with the restaurant at an 89 degree angle at the very top, so not only was it far, it was also high. I trekked two-thirds the way up before my excessive panting began. I let Candace talk while capturing my breath.

  She asked, “Hey, were we supposed to bring anything? Like a gift, or flowers or something?” I personally hated getting flowers as gifts, but other people seemed to like them. To me, buying them for someone was, like, Hey, here’s something that will die in a week. Enjoy. It was depressing to see a lovely botanical specimen shrivel and wilt by day seven. And no matter if you plucked, pruned, or watered, the florae faced an inevitable death. I let her know I’d be arriving empty-handed.

  She shouted into the phone. “Hey! My Bluetooth isn’t working. I have you on speakerphone now. I’ve never been to a prerehearsal dinner before. For the wedding party there’s usually only the rehearsal dinner beforehand. This is really unusual. But it’s totally Jane, right? Doing her own thing?”

  “Yeah, having a rehearsal rehearsal dinner seems like a very Jane thing to do.” I huffed back up the hill. “I’m almost there. I’ll let her know you’ll be a little late.” My phone buzzed with an incoming call from my mom. “Hey, I have to go, my mom’s trying to do video chat.”

  We said our quick goodbyes and I switched over. “Hi, Mom, what time is it in Italy?”

  All I could see was a peach-hued blur. As usual, her thumb was blocking her phone camera. “Early morning,” she croaked. “We having jet lag pretty bad.” Dad’s snores rumbled in the background.

  “Are you enjoying your visit?”

  “It be okay. I eat too many cannoli. Too much dairy but I eat anyway. You know, I have lactose problem since you were born.”

  I sighed. “I know. It’s one of your favorite topics to bring up.”

  “Rome is nice. Florence is nice. You should come to Italy. One day, when you have honeymoon. But you need husband first.”

  As if on cue, the sky darkened to black, and torrential rain bullets fell from the sky. I had no umbrella, no raincoat, and for some stupid reason I’d chosen today to wear suede shoes.

  “Mom, I really have to go. Have fun there and enjoy your cannoli.”

  “Okay. We can’t buy you any cannoli because it will get rotten. But we buy you hat.” Her thumb moved off the camera so she could show me a bright yellow cap with ROMA in red letters on the bill. She turned it side to side to show me the Italian flags stitched in various places along the trim.

  “Wow, that’s . . . something. Thanks for getting me a gift. Call me when you’re back home! Have a good—”

  She hung up before I finished my sentence.

  I picked up my pace at the crest of the hill. According to the map on my phone, I had arrived at my destination, drenched, winded, and perplexed. I scanned the newly constructed building. Hmmm. No door handle. Or to be more specific, there was no fucking door. The only thing on the building’s white wall was the name of the restaurant in tiny gold lettering.

  A giant golden button on a white marble pedestal caught my eye. I looked around to see if anyone could help me. Was this some kind of IQ test formulated by Jane? What the hell was going on?

  I pushed the button and waited.

  A rumbling sound emanated from the inside of the building, and the slab of wall in front of me swung open at a slug’s pace, revealing the bustling restaurant hidden behind the white heavy panel.

  The exquisitely dressed hostess, with a perfect bun and flawless skin, walked toward me and said hello. Her gold bangles jangled as she waved me forward.

  I staggered in and cleared my throat. “Hi. I’m with Jane Townsend’s party.”

  She smiled at me with her impeccably straight, white teeth. “Of course, I just seated them in the back. I’ll show you to their room.”

  We walked past the dozens of clients having work gatherings and fanciful dinner dates. Colorful Chihuly glass sculptures hung from the ceiling. The lighting was dim, but not so dim that you couldn’t read the menu or tell if your wine was white, rosé, or red. Each table showcased miniature candelabras with teeny lit candles. Customers seated along our path smiled as they ate towers of oysters and mounds of shrimp cocktail. I loved seafood but I liked the kind of place where they tied a bib around your neck and handed you a giant Thor mallet to smash open whole crabs. This place was way out of my league.

  I asked the hostess, “So can I ask you something about that really giant, slowly moving wall door? Isn’t that a fire hazard or something? Do you feel like you’re in the Haunted Mansion room with the hidden panel at Disneyland?”

  “We have several fire exits on the premises, all have a green Exit sign overhead.” She pointed to them as we walked to the back of the restaurant, ignoring my pressing Haunted Mansion question.

  Toward the back of the restaurant, there was a bar filled with elegant couples and postwork happy hour meetups. On the last stool in the row sat none other than Nolan, looking at his phone with one hand while sipping a beer with his other. He looked comfortable there, with his thick brown curly hair slightly damp from the rain falling forward into his eyes. I debated whether to say hello. It was always strange to see work people out in the real world in their natural habitat. But when Nolan laughed at something he read on his phone, something inside me urged me to walk over to him.

  As I took a hesitant step toward the bar, a swish of fresh blown-out golden hair swung right past me.

  Nolan looked up from his phone, offering her a warm and inviting smile that I’d never seen before. With both hands, she swooshed her golden locks back over her shoulders and went in for a hug right away. He hesitated at first, but then reciprocated. Who wouldn’t? I didn’t need to see her face to know she was smoking hot.

  After the embrace, she patted his shoulders. A ripple of jealousy pulsed through me as her hands traveled down to his chest, then down, down, down . . .

  “Did you want to stop for a drink?” the hostess asked, breaking my trance-stare at the bar. “I can wait here if you’d like.”

  “Oh, no, thank you. I . . . I was going to say hi to someone but he’s busy.” I placed my cold hands on my cheeks to cool them down as we continued walking.

  “Here you are, ma’am.” She gestured toward a tiny private dining room lined with walls of wines. I breathed in deeply, then put on a cheery smile and entered.

  Sean, Jane’s fiancé, gave me a little nod to acknowledge my arrival. He gestured for me to join his conversation with a dark-haired guy with a serious look on his face.

  “Hi. I’m Zachary. Sean’s friend from the hospital.” His stoic demeanor didn’t change, even though I smiled widely. We shook hands.

  I took a glass of white wine from the server walking by with a tray of them. “So are you a doctor, too?”

  Still, the grave face. “Yes, I’m in OB-GYN. Sean and I go blow off steam after long shifts at work at the pool hall.” It was hard to imagine anything riling this animatron up enough for him to need “blowing of
f steam.”

  Candace flurried through the double doors, peeling off her damp coat and shaking out her umbrella on the carpet. “Sorry I’m late,” she said.

  Sean brought her over. As soon as Candace saw Sean’s doctor friend, her hand flew up to cover her open mouth. She gasped instead of saying a customary hello.

  “Do you two know each other?” Sean asked. I looked at Candace, then back to Animatron. Maybe he did her pap smears?

  Jane stood by the doors and clinked her wineglass with a spoon before Candace could answer. “Please take a seat, everyone.”

  The bride-to-be saved a spot for me by her side, a reserved seat for the maid of honor. Quite literally, I was Jane’s right-hand woman.

  We all sat. I sipped water to replenish all the fluid ounces of sweat I’d lost from walking up that hill. Candace whispered to me behind her menu. “I have to tell you something.” She used the prix fixe insert to fan away the heat rushing to her ruddy face. It was impossible not to notice Dr. Zachary watching her from across the table, in tune to her every move, slightly more animated with his anxious glimpses over at her. When their eyes met, her gaze quickly shifted to her menu.

  Was Candace cheating on her longtime boyfriend?

  My pulse quickened at the thought as a familiar voice boomed into the room. “Sorry I’m late. Work was a fucking pain in the ass.” I briefly suspended my Zachary-Candace surveillance detail to look up.

  Asher stood in the doorway.

  His eyes darkened the instant he saw me.

  My eyes widened as his narrowed to slits.

  Oh god, no.

  Sean stood up. “You made it! Everyone, this is Asher, my best man. So good to see you!” He stood up and gave his frat brother a bro hug that ended with a two-man hair tousle. Asher found his seat next to Zachary and continued to shoot over little blasts of hateful stares. I couldn’t believe that directly across the table was Satan himself.

  I grimaced but tried to be friendly. “Hi, Ash-hole.”

  Oops.

  He chugged his glass of water and continued to glare. Did he do this at work, too, while I took calls and typed? That would be pretty fucked up.

  “You guys know each other?” Sean asked. Candace cleared her throat and tried to send me nonverbal questions through weird, obvious facial expressions and hand gestures, like, Who the heck is he? and Why the hell are you acting so weird right now? Like she had any room to judge me, with her strange lookie-loo stares at Dr. Zachary.

  I let Asher be the one to answer Sean’s question while I chugged my wine. “Yeah, we work together. She even sits in my office.” He added, “I was late to dinner because she assigned a production deliverable today that required lots of overtime hours for our team. But I see she made it here on time.”

  Jane squealed, “Wait, is Melody your BOSS?” She clasped her hands together in delight, like I’d given her this intense awkwardness as an engagement present.

  Candace, who had no context about this work relationship but could tell the Melody-Asher dynamics were off, gasped and cringed behind her napkin. Even she knew not to say something like that. Why, Jane? Why?

  “He and I share an office, and we’re on the same team,” I grumbled.

  Sean responded with a single laugh. “You go by ‘Ash-hole’ now? You should go by ‘Hash,’ like we called you at school, bro.” Asher’s icy glare morphed into an exasperated eye roll. So he was a pothead back in college. No surprise there.

  “Hey, Melody, did you see your boy toy intern outside?” Asher shot over a sardonic smile. “I’m sad to report that he’s moved on to another girl. A really hot one, too.”

  Jane asked, “You have a boy toy intern?”

  Asher added, “Yep. The CEO’s nephew, too—does she know how to pick ’em or what? But he’s heading out with a hottie tonight. Lucky guy.”

  I coughed out my wine. “There’s no boy toy. Everyone, please ignore him.”

  “Who’s hungry?” Zachary snapped open the menu. But between Asher being here, Nolan being on a date, and this weird Candace-Zachary tension hanging in the air, my appetite was nonexistent. On top of that, my heart beat so fast it was on the verge of exploding with any more stimulation.

  Candace leaned over and said to me, “Mel, I need to tell you something later. After dinner.”

  “Yeah, you have some explaining to do,” I said in a clipped tone. Focusing on the menu was difficult, with Ash-hole’s critical eyes watching my every move while he chewed dinner rolls with his mouth open. This was way too much Asher for one day.

  The table chattered about appetizer options and the waiter came by with champagne. He poured generously and we all held up our glasses of bubbly to toast the soon-to-be married couple.

  Jane smiled at us and then at her fiancé. “To marriage!”

  Ah. Short and sweet.

  We all clinked glasses (even Asher and I did) and I downed it all without taking a breath. Refill, please.

  Jane asked, “Candace? Don’t you like champagne?”

  Candace’s eyes widened like she’d just been caught reading a nudie magazine by her grandma. Candace loved champagne. “I . . . I . . . can’t have any.” She watched Jane with the fearful eyes of hunted prey.

  Then it clicked. But Jane’s brain processed things more quickly than mine.

  “You’re PREGNANT?” she screeched.

  Candace squeaked, “Yes?” She glanced at me and then looked at Jane again.

  A waiter walked by with a steaming, heaping bowl of seafood spaghetti alfredo. “Our house specialty!”

  Candace yelped, “Oh god, I think I’m going to be sick!”

  She bolted to the bathroom and I excused myself from the table to go look after her. Jane remained in the same motionless position, her color drained from her face, with her full champagne flute in her hand. She looked like someone had frozen her into a toasting pose. This night had been carefully planned and then . . . surprise! Candace dropped a bomb. A baby bomb. This had left Jane literally speechless, which I’d never seen before.

  I swung open the bathroom door and found Candace standing over the sink, with both hands clenching the rim. A slightly green hue colored her face.

  “Sorry, wave of nausea. I just found out about the baby and wanted to tell you. There’s already a heartbeat! I didn’t plan to announce it here publicly.” She entered a stall and, leaving the door open, dry heaved and slumped down next to the toilet. Thank god the floor looked clean.

  I bent down and rubbed her back. It all clicked now. “Candie, this is great news. Is Zachary your doctor?”

  She nodded. “We’re due in six months.”

  A laugh bubbled out of me. “Sorry, I was just thinking how funny it was that I thought you and Zachary were having an affair.”

  “Me, cheat on Wil with Dr. Robot Zach?” Wrinkles formed between her brows as she frowned at me.

  “I know, it was a stupid thought. But wow, six months! My game will be released in six months, too, just before the holidays. We’ll be giving birth at the same time.” Stroking her hair, I added, “Jane will be fine. She’s probably just worried about her foiled bridesmaid dress plans because you’re preggers now. But I have to ask . . . I thought Wil was superreligious and didn’t believe in sex before marriage.”

  She lifted her eyes from the floor to my face. “Yeah, we abstained while we did the long-distance thing, but one night we got really drunk and, well, all those years of pent-up angst blew the fuck up, and we crammed a lot of sex into a short period of time. He was so horny that we broke the—”

  I cut her off before she got too pornographic and made ME vomit. “Oh geez, I don’t need to hear all that. I just assumed you guys were all Puritan-like and, well, you aren’t.”

  “Yeah, we are definitely not. Not anymore.” She pulled herself upright, using my arm as leverage. “Do I look okay? Let’s go back to the dinner. I’ll be fine.” As she washed her hands she said, “Oh, wait, I had one more thing to say.”

  Betwee
n Asher’s dinner cameo appearance and Candace announcing her pregnancy at Jane’s prerehearsal dinner, I couldn’t imagine anything else surprising me.

  “Wil went out and bought me a ring.” She pulled a tiny drawstring satchel from her purse’s inner pocket. A classic square-cut solitaire ring its only contents. Exactly Candace’s style. Good job, Wil.

  She continued. “I didn’t put it on because I didn’t want to upset Jane at her special dinner, you know how she is.” It was a good plan, except for the fact that the accidental baby announcement turned out to be an even bigger deal than Jane’s engagement. Our Candace bringing a human into this world? What a huge fucking deal!

  “I really am so excited for you! Wil is an amazing guy. I know you’ll be happy together! And that little guy or girl will be gorgeous, I bet.” Wil was Chinese, Candace was Caucasian. They’d have a cute little happy hapa baby.

  She smiled and hugged me. “Thanks. I . . . I know it’s crazy to ask, but . . . um . . . would you be the godmother for the baby?”

  What did godmothers do? Babysit? Attend all birthday parties? My only godmother context was Cinderella. And that involved ball gowns, fairies, and step-bitches.

  “I guess? Could you let me know what that means? And are you getting married first?”

  She nodded and sighed. “We’re going to do a courthouse wedding soon, because I don’t want to look huge in all the pictures. I know, it’s totally shallow. But I hope you’ll come to that. I can’t imagine getting married without you by my side.”

  My eyes brimmed with tears. We’d been through so much since our freshman year of college together, and I loved her so much. Plus, she was pregnant and no one should be mean to pregnant people. “Yes, of course I’ll come. And I’ll be the godmama. I would be honored.”

  She squealed and hugged me again so hard my arms may have bruised. “I was thinking about asking Jane to be at the courthouse ceremony, too, but I might give her time to sit with my baby news first. I think my engagement news on top of that baby announcement might be a lot for her to handle. Since the pregnancy and engagement were unplanned I’m hoping she doesn’t see this as me upstaging her somehow.” Candace put her ring back in the satchel. Really? We couldn’t celebrate this amazing news out of fear of hurting someone else’s feelings? She and Jane grew up together, and they became roommates after college. I met Jane through Candace. We’d all gone through a lot together and I had hoped by now that none of us would be trying to one-up each other.