“In Pioneer Square?” Lara says, aghast. “Old bricktown Pioneer Square?”
“Mmmhmm,” Jackie sounds through a sip.
“In historic, bricktown Pioneer Square?” Lara’s really beside herself. “A building in that district?”
“That’s right!”
“That sticker price has got to be pretty high.”
“Tell me about it.” Jackie makes a sickened face. “But it was kind of one of those deals Andrew and I made when making up. I was still pretty shook up about us having separated all summer, you know?” She purses her lips and pans about our circle. “And I figured doing this solid for Hodge’s and the antique shop would be a great way to help someone else. The selfless thingamajig, you know?” She smiles proudly.
“Wow,” Robin exclaims. “If you have a pocketbook deep enough to foot that kind of goodwill, then you go, girl.”
“Marrying rich comes in handy so often,” Jackie says with a laugh. She quickly adds, “But marriage without love never lasts, so thank god Andrew and I love each other, right?” She laughs some more.
Claire and I exchange smiles—a mutual opinion that our friend Jackie, whose heart is in the right place, is a loose cannon, and one who always provides entertainment.
“Well isn’t that awesome?” Lara says. “Congratulations, Jack. That’s going to be quite an investment.”
“That’s what Andrew says.” Jackie picks up the bottle of champagne and gestures for refills.
“So how’s Conner doing, Claire?” Robin asks after we’ve moved from the kitchen into her front room and achieved comfortable seats. “He doing well at work?”
“Oh, girls,” Claire gushes. “He loves it! He’s a manager, finally, and is so happy we made the move to Spokane. Of course, he misses Chad and living in Seattle and being around everything that’s been so familiar for so long, you know?”
“I bet,” Robin says.
“But the move was really good for him. Good for me, too. For us.” Claire flashes a brief yet bright smile. “I like the hospital I’m working at, and everyone’s really nice. Haven’t made a ton of friends yet, but there are two nice girls in the college internship program I get along well with.”
“I told her it’d be a matter of time,” I say, patting Claire on her blue-jean-clad leg.
“I know.” Claire pulls up her shoulders in glee and smiles again, looking like that cheerful teen she’s always managed to impress upon us, the vintage Coca-Cola t-shirt and the hole torn in the left kneecap of her jeans deepening the impression.
“You know,” she says, toying absent-mindedly with the gold heart-shaped locket of her necklace. “Conner’s mentioned coming into town for an extended weekend, too.”
“Another trip here?” I ask excitedly. “Soon?”
“Maybe around the holidays.” Claire wiggles her eyebrows. “How cool would that be, right? He can hang with Chad and catch up, and we get lots more girl time!”
“This whole move to Spokane thing isn’t so bad after all,” Robin says. “It’s a great excuse to put everything on hold, have Bobby take care of the kids, and devote an entire night to this!” She takes a small sip of champagne.
“As if we haven’t managed to do this oh-so-often in the past,” Lara teases.
“Well with you and Worth always so caught up in each other’s lives,” Jackie razzes. She makes cheesy kissing noises.
“We are not,” Lara quickly retorts.
“Erm…”
“Things are still going well with us, yes,” Lara says matter-of-factly. A curious smile unfolds for a moment. “Worth’s really supportive of my career and schedule, too. It does help that he’s also big into his career.” She takes a fast glance at her BlackBerry—her usual habit of checking her email, always connected to work.
“A match made in heaven,” I say.
“I’ll say,” Claire adds.
“I’ve even been doing some advertising for my mom’s event planning company on the side,” Lara mentions. “Her business is expanding, and she’s been asking me for some ad pointers and tips. I told her she needs to get on board with an actual advertising firm if she wants to take this thing to the top, but for now it’s steady growth and I’m helping out.” She tucks her BlackBerry back into her blazer pocket. “Needless to say it’s kept me pretty busy, and Worth’s totally onboard. He’s supportive of my helping my mom, of my career. But, of course, I do strive for that work-life balance, girls.”
“Uh-huh,” Jackie sings sarcastically.
“Well,” I say, “whatever you’re doing it seems to be working. You seem really happy and content, Lara.”
“Finally, right?” she says with a roll of the eyes.
After the first bottle of champagne has been drunk and we’re already well on our way to working on the second, we’re in deep discussion about Robin’s Brandon debacle.
The cat having been let out of the bag among all of us not that long ago, each of us giving the general same piece of advice to Robin: “push for that phone call,” “demand adoption,” and “wait on pins and needles for an outcome.” But now Robin shares the latest news.
“It’s absurd, really,” she says, thunderstruck. She leans forward on her crossed legs, elbows boring into her yoga-pant-covered thighs. “Brandon’s gone from this on-again, off-again father, wanting to meet Rose one day, then bailing on the idea. Never pulling through.”
I nod, tongue in cheek in disgust with my ex-boyfriend’s immature behavior. He’s tortured Robin for years with this looming idea that he someday wants to meet their daughter, perhaps even eventually pull the plug on the child support. It’s no matter, though, because Robin is adamant that she no longer wants a dime from him. His laughable fatherly duties are done. She just needs to get him to commit to the adoption.
“Now he says he actually wants to consider adoption!” Robin says, wagging her head rapidly. “Unbelievable, is it not?”
“Totally,” Jackie commiserates.
Evidently Brandon had called Robin recently, and the two had a tight-lipped discussion that resulted in him agreeing to consider adoption. It took him several days to get his act together and get in touch with Robin, which is no surprise whatsoever. When he finally gathered the nerve to do what he said he’d do, he told Robin, to her complete surprise, that adoption is actually something he himself had in mind. Can you believe that? Things could actually be easier for Robin than she imagined.
“Well, we’ll wait and see,” Robin says through a hearty mock-laugh. “I’ll only believe anything with that man when I see it.”
“Wait and see,” Lara says reassuringly. “Give him this time to consider—you’ve taken time to consider it, he needs it now.”
“Who cares ‘what he needs,’” Jackie spits out in girlfriend defensiveness, always ready to rally to her friends’ sides.
“I’m crossing my fingers and hoping for the best,” Robin says with a weak smile. “Bobby really wants to adopt Rose and make us an official Holman family.”
“Patience,” Lara says. “Everything will work out eventually. Just be patient, Robin.”
“Yeah,” I say. “Give it some time.”
“Speaking of family,” Claire says with a suspicious expression, “anymore little ones you plan on adding to the fam, Robin?”
Robin laughs in exasperation. “Oh, heavens! I can hardly keep up with the two I’ve got. I think it’s someone else’s turn.” She removes her glasses and cleans them with the hem of her shirt. “I’ve played the game twice, girls; I’m passing the buck to one of you.”
“Claire’s still aching for a baby here, I presume,” Lara says, nudging Claire in the arm.
“Aching, longing, desiring, hoping, wishing…” Claire looks upward dreamily. “But I need to still take the time to get used to my new job. Conner, too.”
“Good for you,” I say, pleased that Claire’s come to her senses. For the longest time she was on Baby Planet, obsessed with the idea of becoming preggers the moment she a
nd Conner became Mr. and Mrs. a year ago.
We finish off the second and last bottle of champagne and move on to sparkling water and late-night tea. As is often the case with girls’ nights, we’ve been chatting the night away, yesterday behind us and the early-morning oil already burning.
“And Sophie,” Claire says, wrapping an arm around me. “How is my Sophie? The café manageable? Still in dire need of help?”
“All of the above,” I say, resting my head on her shoulder.
“You ready to hire on more help yet?”
“Not quite yet,” I say. “Ask me next year. It should be a different story. I think I’ll have enough stocked up for a rainy day, just in case, and then I can hire on some help.”
“That place will only grow, Sophie,” Jackie says. “I mean, you work way harder than I do, and my company’s growing! You’ve got nothing to worry about.”
Unlike Jackie, though, who has a husband and his wealth to fall back on, I’ve got all my eggs in one café basket. I know if I was in a bind my parents and grandparents would rush to my side, I’m sure some of the girls would offer to help out on occasion, too, but I can’t depend on that. This is my responsibility and my journey. Playing it safe with finances and waiting to add extra help until absolutely necessary is a prudent move.
“But I honestly can’t complain right now,” I say cheerfully, infusing some positivity into the topic. “The café is doing really well. Oh! And I found out my brother John just might be back from London for the holidays! How fab would that be, right?”
“John,” Claire says. “Unable-to-settle John.” She makes a tsking noise. “John, John…”
I can’t help but snort out a laugh at Claire’s ability to be an endearing adolescent sometimes. Claire’s wanted to get her hooks in John’s love life, thinking it’s time a thirty-three-year-old, successful, and handsome attorney settle down. She was once insistent that he was gay and would be the perfect partner for Oliver Maury, the Frenchie baker with whom I used to work at Katie’s Kitchen.
Claire loves playing matchmaker, to a fault. She was let down, though, when she got her Cupid arrows crossed and learned that John had more interest in someone with long, slim legs and a perky chest (of which Oliver has neither). Too bad for the matchmaker, and for Oliver, too, seeing how he was eyeballing my brother at the opening of my café. Dear god. Even my brother—though he’s evidently unwilling to settle down and provide my mom with grandchildren she so desperately wants—is able to attract a man. And he’s not even interested in them! Some people just have all the luck.
“I bet he’s loving it in London!” Claire says. “So exotic and romantic.”
“He does have a girlfriend, apparently. Jean,” I sing out the name in a flirty way. “Not a serious relationship—not one that’ll result in another branch of the Wharton family tree—but a relationship nonetheless.”
I sigh, thinking fondly of my two trips to London to see John—the whimsy, the feeling of freedom abroad, in a foreign country. There was even an air of romance to my travels, as if I felt fate could pull a one-eighty on me and drop a charming man and holiday romance in my lap at any moment. And, funnily enough, it did.
“Sounds like maybe you need to take a trip abroad, eh, Sophie?” Jackie says with wiggling eyebrows. “Find some love in London…France…let someone see Sophie’s underpants…”
Yeah, I think to myself, a small smile tugging at the corner of my lips. You have no idea how right you are, Jackie.
Best girlfriends don’t keep much from each other, but there are always exceptions to rules. And my love life in Paris was just one of those exceptions.
I never divulged much about my love life (or, rather, lust life?) in Paris, because it’s so futile. The past is the past, and I can’t go back, even if I wanted to…even if I tried. What’s the point, you know?
Besides, some experiences are just meant to be memories. You have them, they’re fun, maybe you learn something from them, then off they go into the Memory Bank. Nice to meet you; the end. Since you don’t really think much of them, and god knows nothing came from those kinds of “relationships,” it somehow becomes one of those exceptions to the rules when it comes to girlfriends and swapping stories. Sure, you may slip an anecdote in here, a casual mention there, but nothing to get hot and heavy and gossipy about over cocktails.
There are the other experiences, though, that you never share. Because they’re kept close to the heart. That’s right, they’re called secrets. Maybe you’re embarrassed, or nervous, or regretful, or who the hell knows what, but you just don’t talk about these kinds of experiences. Ever.
You don’t really personally revisit them much, either. They’re just distant memories—all part of the past, no chance of return—and you sure as hell don’t talk about them. You just have them, keep your mouth shut tight, and move on. Maybe you even try to pretend they never happened…
Unlike the memory, though, secrets can be painful, they can leave you with a million and one unanswered questions. And as for pretending they never happened? Yeah…that’s a tricky game.
Chapter Thirteen
Four Months Ago, Summer in Paris
I told myself I shouldn’t have done it, but who was I kidding? Henri Rochefort from Paris’s eleventh arrondissement, the twenty-nine-year-old journalist-by-day, novelist-by-night, had told me that if I were ever again in Paris I should let him know. Actually, he’d said I should look him up when I inexorably came back to Paris, because the city has a magnetic pull and intoxicating charm that always deserves and demands a return visit.
I knew it was probably for the best that I not pick up the phone in my hotel room on one of the “Islands of the City” and ring up Henri. I knew, as had happened two years prior when I’d first come to Paris and met him, that having to say that eventual goodbye to a fabulous hot and steamy summer fling would be anything but easy. Fun is fun when it’s being had, but when it ends? Ugh! It was just better not to get anything started, knowing it’d inevitably have to end…right?
Ha, ha! Think again.
As Paris often does to its intrepid visitors, it cast its magical spell on me and before I could say, “Sophie, think this through!” I had the phone in my hand and I was dialing.
I was in Paris on holiday—a gift from my parents for the one-year anniversary of my café and a much-needed time abroad to feel re-inspired, since I was starting to feel stifled at work, not developing any new and exciting recipes. I was supposed to have fun!
If I just told myself that I was engaged in only another short-lived fling à la française—nothing serious at all…just fun and games, and perhaps a piece to the relaxation and inspiration puzzle—I could live with my choice to call up Henri. I could live with my decision to see him, to have a romantic time in the most romantic city in the world, and to not feel lonely when it came time to say au revoir.
“Henri?” I said in a slightly quivering voice when he picked up after the fourth tone sounded. “It’s Sophie.” I swallowed. “I’m in town…”
“Ma chérie!” Henri’s warm and cheerful voice rang over the line, giving me goosebumps all over my arms. Oh that accent, those words, that voice! I thought, eyes shut tight, grin growing. “Sophie! Sophie chérie!”
That was how it all began…for the second time, the second amazing summer vacation in Paris. At first it was one email a few weeks prior, mentioning I’d be coming to Henri’s slice of the world, then it was one phone call the very day I arrived in Paris by way of London after a visit with John, and finally it was one exhilarating walk from the Île St-Louis to Henri’s apartment in the Bastille.
Then, standing there on the sooty front steps of his apartment complex, leaning against the short, wrought-iron fence, was Henri Rochefort, my lustful, carnal, absolutely drool-worthy Parisian affair.
A single pink rose in his hand, Henri lit up when I came into view. With arms outstretched he cried in his subtly accented English, “Sophie, you’ve arrived!”
&nbs
p; In an instant I found myself in his embrace, exchanging four Euro kisses, the final kiss on my cheek lingering quite near my lips.
“Chérie, I’m so excited you made it.” Henri leaned back, hands clutching my arms, and appraised me. “It’s been so long. So long.”
“Two years,” I said with a smile, taking the moment to appraise him for myself.
He handed me the rose and stroked my cheek. “Feels like yesterday.”
Henri hadn’t changed in two years, that much was certain. He still had the same dazzling smile, twinkling green eyes, and floppy espresso-colored hair that always found a way to fall sexily to the side of his face. He was still clean-shaven, but had permanent speckles of dark facial hair, giving him a clean yet edgy vibe.
His pristine vibe was accented by his penchant for dressing well, always in a pair of leather loafers, a belt to match; a pair of tightly-fitted pants cupping his rear in unimaginably perfect ways; a button-down shirt dressed up with a thin black tie or dressed down with the top three buttons undone, exposing a hint of dark chest hair. Since Paris has fouler weather than most like to admit, Henri almost always had a jacket with him—usually a grey or camel-colored dress jacket with designer stitching and a faux pocket or two, a jacket that was cut in all the right places, showing off his broad shoulders and trim waist, while simultaneously announcing his fabulous sense of fashion.
Henri’s edgy vibe came not only from his inability to conceal his dark facial hair, but from his attitude, his swagger, his charm. When we’d first met at that café in the Latin Quarter two years ago he struck up a conversation and took a seat at my empty table with such ease he could have given Don Juan a run for his money. Henri had said he could spot an adventure-seeking American a kilometer away, said I looked like I could use a tour guide…and a date for dinner. Then some time after the Merlot and the dancing and the flirting, romance-less Sophie wasn’t quite so romance-less anymore.
When Girlfriends Find Love Page 10
