“Riley tried to feed it to her,” Tess explained.
They sat together on stools to watch the children, soaking in the peaceful quiet before relatives and friends descended on them. He slid his arm around her waist and pinched the ticklish spot on her side. Tess laughed lightly, resting her head on Christian’s shoulder.
“Are you ready for this?” he asked her, placing a kiss on her forehead.
“As I’ll ever be,” she sighed.
“Enough already, you two. There’s children present,” Kendra smiled at them. “It’s cute. But really, there’s a time and a place.”
Tess swatted a hand at her. “You asked for this, remember?”
“Fair enough,” she sat down in an empty chair nearby, stretching out her legs in front of her. “It’s better than the alternative, I suppose.”
Grant backed through the kitchen door, balancing a tray of four filled champagne glasses. “It’s party time, folks. Why wait for the guests?”
“Please,” Kendra reached out for one right away. “Mommy needs the rest of the bottle.”
“Finish what’s in your glass first,” her husband teased, handing one bubbling glass over. He passed out the rest and left the tray on the bar counter. Grant raised his glass, gesturing for the others to stand up for a toast. “To Emma’s first birthday, Riley’s first year as a big brother, and Kendra’s first year as the gorgeous and amazing mother of two.”
“Aww, I’m blushing,” Kendra smiled, kissing his cheek. She raised her own glass. “To my best friends, who finally sorted out their crazies and now, happily, leave me out of the middle!”
Christian, realizing he was next in line, cleared his throat. “To the best wife I’ve ever had and the most entrepreneurial marketing consultant in town.”
It was Tess’s turn to smile, and to toast. Christian nudged her gently and as she looked around their foursome, she realized all eyes were on her, all glasses raised and waiting. Just one more toast and they could all sip their glasses.
Tess raised her own glass, paused, and then handed it to Christian. “To not drinking alcohol for the next nine months or so.”
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About the Author
Stephanie Haddad is a full-time mom by day and a writer by naptime. She lives in the Boston area with her loving husband, precocious toddler, and cuddly dog. While her short fiction has appeared in several online publications and won a handful of contests, Stephanie only began publishing her novels in 2011. Visit her website www.stephaniehaddad.com for more information on forthcoming titles.
Discover other titles by Stephanie Haddad at Smashwords.com.
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Read on for an excerpt from Stephanie’s next novel, Love Unlisted…
Available now at Smashwords, Barnes & Noble, iTunes, & Amazon.
An excerpt from
LOVE UNLISTED by Stephanie Haddad
Mark Preston doesn’t have enough line items in the Pro column to keep dating him. It’s not that he has too many Cons—although that column is sizable—just not enough Pros. I scroll through the list in my head one more time as I wring my hands, waiting for him at Ciao Bella on Boston’s Newbury Street. There’s no need to consult my Book of Lists; I easily memorized The Pros & Cons of Mark Preston as I agonized over this decision.
The simple fact that I’ve been waiting here for almost a half-hour, watching the condensation drip from our matching glasses of ice water onto the red tablecloth, is reason enough to be mad at Mark. Mad enough to dump him? Not on its own, but when considered along with that lengthy unbalanced list, it’s enough.
Although I’m confident in my decision, I’m still nervous. I mean, really nervous. I’ve never let a man stick around this long before. Six months is a substantial amount of time for me. Mark’s not that bad. He’s a good guy, but there’s just not enough substance between us. I’m going to do this. I’m going to freaking do this.
Mark enters the restaurant, handsome as usual, and he grins when he catches my eye. In all our time together, he’s never missed an opportunity to smile at me, one of his top Pros. It’s flattering, and kind of sweet, but I can’t let it deter me from my objective.
He’s also well-dressed, another Pro, in a vibrant burgundy tie and a sharp black suit, my favorite of his extensive wardrobe. It’s been nice to date a guy with keen fashion sense for once, but sometimes Mark is almost too dapper. That’s a big Con. No man should be better dressed than his girlfriend; I’m supposed to be the arm candy here.
I force a smile onto my face as Mark leans down to give me one of those awkward half-bent-over hugs and a peck on the lips. I accidentally stiffen at his touch. Oops. Mark is very perceptive, something that’s both a Pro and a Con. It’s nice to know he cares, but the only thing more annoying than being annoyed with Mark is hearing him say—
“What’s wrong, Grace?”
Every five minutes.
“Nothing,” I mutter through gritted teeth. Let him ask me a dozen times, but I’m not giving in. I’ll drop the news when I’m good and ready. Mark sits. He stares. He gives up—thank goodness.
“I got stuck at work. Sorry to keep you waiting,” Mark sighs, glancing at the menu. He plans children’s birthday parties at our shared work place, Creative Celebrations. I’m glad business is booming for him, but there’s only so much time Mark can spend booking balloons, pony rides, and clowns—a huge Con, for the record. Since he’s a bit of a work-a-holic, another Con, it’s tough to pull his focus from his work desk some days.
By now, I know his innocuous comment is an invitation for meaningless, work-related dialogue. I consider taking the bait while I scrape absentmindedly at a scratch in my seat’s leather padding, and decide to let the comment linger unanswered. Talking about work is overrated. And boring. Also, clowns terrify me.
“Have you been here before?” He asks the air, still buried in the menu. I shake my head silently, but it doesn’t seem to matter that he can’t hear or see me. He excels at conducting a one-sided conversation, which is useful because I often have trouble thinking of something to say to him. “How did you find it?”
“Phantom Gourmet said it has a comfortable ambiance,” I answer, staring at the back of Mark’s menu. Ciao Bella’s “contemporary, artistic décor” is just as advertised, but sitting near the window makes me feel a bit exposed to the pedestrians trudging through the snow on Newbury Street. Granted, the street is mostly devoid of foot traffic in January, so it’s not so bad.
Ciao Bella, on the other hand, is warm, friendly, and busy. The perfect place to conduct an abrupt—and possibly awkward—breakup conversation. The server takes our order uneventfully, as though we are any regular couple out to dinner. Mark asks for the Veal Parmigiano and a glass of wine. I request the Chicken Marsala and a Diet Coke, then pass on the salad, as usual.
“Are you ever going to try something new?” Mark asks. Picking on my eating habits is another of his Cons, but I try to shrug it off this time. Stick to the plan, Grace, and you’ll make it out alive.
“Why? I like Chicken Marsala.”
“Right, I know.” Mark takes my hand across the table. “But you always order it.”
And what’s the problem with that? I want to say. “So?” I say instead, the epitome of eloquence. Bernsie and I have this argument all the time. Keeping with tradition, I use my standard defense against Mark. “At least I know I’ll enjoy my meal.”
“All right.” I hate when he uses that patronizing tone, a prominent feature of the Con list—emboldened and underlined, obviously. It’s enough to push me over the edge tonight.
“Mark, we have to talk,” I blurt out with completely inappropriate timing. I planned to wait for dessert, because bad news pairs best with tiramisu, but he’s getting on my nerves. It’s time to end this before it gets messy.
“I know,” he grins devilishly. He—what now? “I have a surprise for you.” Con.
Son of a bitch. My own sudden outbursts are surprising enough for one evening. Maybe for
one week. This is not the plan. This is not the freaking plan!
Mark’s surprises are never a success. Last week, he showed up unexpectedly on my doorstep with flowers. Of course, since I couldn’t see him behind the gigantic bouquet, I panicked. Swinging my arms about in my best Jackie Chan-inspired moves, I karate chopped him, obliterating the bouquet into a million tiny, colorful petals. A month or so before that tragic episode, Mark brought me to see a movie without letting me read the review first. It turned out to be pretty gory, which grossed me out, and I vomited into our popcorn. Sure, I appreciate all of Mark’s romantic gestures and sweet surprises; I just don’t handle them well.
Before I can tell Mark to save it for his next girlfriend, my whole life flashes before my eyes in a series of Dewey-decimalized library shelves, color-coded file cabinets and alphanumerical binders. He settles on one knee, offering me a square velvet box. He’s talking, but I can’t hear him because my brain is swimming in a hot tub, complete with bubbling jets and whirlpool. As he opens the box, my vision blurs. Mark grins, waiting for me to say something, and gives me the sappy I-love-you face he saves for important moments.
“Um, well…Uh…” I only realize I haven’t said any real words when I see Mark hasn’t moved. Nothing is going as planned, which disturbs me on a level normal people do not understand. “Mark.” I say his name with reproach, sending a slight twitch through his left eyebrow.
“What do you say, Grace?” He holds the open box up a little higher, as though my eyes will like its contents from a closer angle. The overhead lights reflect off the gold. I turn away.
“No,” I whisper in stunned disbelief. To my horror, he doesn’t get up or even look upset. Instead, Mark still grins broadly, flashing those beautifully-aligned, pearly Pro-column white teeth at me. He really is a good-looking guy, with that square jaw and the playful glint in his eye. His dark hair, his golden eyes, and that damned sexy smile. I once thought I could love him. It never happened.
Good looks aren’t enough for me. I need personality and passion; someone who’ll take risks without being too risky; someone who’s confident without being cocky; someone who won’t try to “fix” me. Not only is Mark lacking several of these imperatives, but he also has a number of inexcusable Cons, not the least of which is his poor performance in the bedroom. Suffice it to say I only like my surprises in one arena.
I swallow hard and look him in the eye. “I can’t marry you.”
“What?” Mark asks through his smiling teeth, frozen under the glares of several restaurant patrons. “What did you say? That’s not what I—”
“I said I can’t marry you,” I string the words together with great difficulty, motivated only by the desire to cease the unwarranted stares. “I don’t love you, Mark.”
Now, now he gets what I’m saying, rising to his feet and snapping the velvet box closed in one fluid movement. “You also don’t listen very well.”
“I’m sorry, Mark. I wanted to tell you.” I pull off a stray thread stuck to my cloth napkin, keeping my eyes averted. The table shakes as Mark sits in his chair, slamming the ring box down and drumming his fingers loudly against the table. “It’s not going to work out between us.”
When I look up at him, Mark’s face is distorted in an unsettling grimace. I feel bad, I do, but I can’t think of anything to say. Speechless, par for the course when the situation doesn’t go my way, I gawk at him.
“So what finally did it?” he says abruptly, locking his eyes with mine. Oh, he’s angry. “What does your list say? What’s my inexcusable con, Grace?”
I squeeze my feet tighter around my handbag on the floor. My trusty Book of Lists hides within it, the Mark Preston list safely concealed in its pages. No one reads my lists. No one. The thought is enough to lower my defenses for a moment. “How did you know about that?”
“Bernsie told me,” Mark says, narrowing his gaze. I’ll make a list of Reasons to Kill My Best Friend when I leave the restaurant. If I leave the restaurant. “What does it say?”
“Nothing. It doesn’t—”
“Grace, after six months, you have to give me a reason. You can’t just dump me because the mood strikes you. Now spill.” Mark swigs the remnants of his wine glass. Then he stares right through me.
Swallowing, I squeeze my eyes closed and try to find the courage to answer him. He’s got a point. All dumpees want a reason. As a frequent dumper, I should’ve thought of that. I’ll add that pointer to Things to Say During a Breakup later. For now, I’ve got to come up with something.
My eyes pop open as the perfect answer settles on my tongue. Mark’s expression changes at the sudden movement. I have his full attention.
“Well, Mark,” I square my shoulders. He raises one dark eyebrow in expectation. “You snore.”
****
An hour later, Bernsie is eating Mark’s dinner. Loudly. With her mouth open.
“This is amazing,” she says blissfully. To Bernsie, everything is amazing. I’ve tried to explain that overusing a word dilutes its meaning, but she insists. Usually by telling me that my bad attitude is amazing. For the rest of the night, I’m choosing my battles wisely.
“Shut it, Bernsie,” I say coldly, throwing one of Coco’s squeaky toys at her. The dog goes ballistic, leaping across the room in a white, hairy blur to fetch the purple squirrel, or whatever it is. Coco is an eight-pound something-or-other Bernsie brought home from the Animal Rescue League about a year ago. She looks more like a monkey than a dog—Con—but she’s sometimes useful for torturing Bernsie—Pro. For example, right now, as Coco returns and tries to drop the slobbery toy rodent into Bernsie’s food container.
“Coco, stop,” she says sternly, maneuvering away from the yipping dog. “Go play with your hippo over there.”
“That thing is a hippo?”
“Whatever. Coco, no!” Bernsie struggles with her precious pet for a few moments before shoving a mangled rawhide into the dog’s mouth. Content, Coco settles into the couch and chews away. “Sorry.”
“It’s all right,” I say, wringing my hands in my lap.
Even with my Mark-dumping objective achieved, the chaotic circumstances still bother me. After I admitted the truth to him, he stormed from the restaurant, leaving me to awkwardly ask for our food to-go and pay the bill. I’m too bothered to eat anything, Chicken Marsala or otherwise. Instead, I’ve surrendered it all to Bernsie’s incredible bottomless pit. Honestly, I don’t understand how this girl can eat anything she pleases and stay so damn thin. The mere thought of dessert makes my butt expand to a new jean size, so living with Bernsie’s voracious appetite is sometimes an intimidating Con, but always a Pro when you’re cleaning the fridge.
But I’ve been forbidden to track the Pros & Cons of Bernadette Shaw since about ten years ago. It’s a long story.
“Stop doing that.” Bernsie sits up straight, waving her fork at me in an idle threat of violence. “No internal listing in my presence.”
I sigh heavily. “Speaking of which, could you please stop telling all of my boyfriends about the lists? That’s three in a row now. It’s getting old.”
“Well, I think they should know what they’re dealing with. You’re completely neurotic. And a borderline psychopath.”
“Ouch,” I say, blinking. “That’s a little harsh.”
She casually waves off my indignation. “So talk to me.” She sets aside the empty Styrofoam that once contained Mark’s dinner. Coco tries to sneak up and steal it, but Bernsie pushes her off the couch. “How did it go? What did Captain Ego say?”
“I think he took it well… Better than I thought.” I tell her the important points, assuring her Mark did not overturn the table and punch the host on his way out the door. He’s not violent, and he’d never do those things, but Bernsie’s got an overactive imagination. Reaching into my pocket, I pull out the velvet box, left behind in his irate rush toward the door.
“That’s good,” Bernsie says, unconvinced. “Ooh! What’s that?”
I toss it to her and she catches it before Coco can snap it out of the air. “He was in the process of proposing when I freaked out. I panicked, Bernsie. I didn’t expect that.” I exhale, dropping my head into my hands.
She pops the box open and immediately starts giggling.
“Come on,” I straighten up. She doubles over with laughter, as she closes the box and tosses it back to me. “It’s not funny. I was humiliated.”
“You’re about to be even more humiliated.” Bernsie wipes away a tear from the corner of her eye, her giggles finally subsiding. “Open the box, Grace, and really look at it.”
“Cubic zirconia?” I venture, staring at the blue velvet lid nervously. I don’t want to look inside and make my night seem any more real. I can’t face the diamond, or imitation bling, inside this box. But Bernsie insists, leaning over to smack my knee. “Fine, fine. Stop hitting me.”
Wincing, I lift the lid and peek through one half-opened eye.
“All the way,” she says. Another giggle escapes her lips.
When the box top pops up, it takes a moment for my eyes to register what’s inside. Expecting commitment jewelry, my brain can’t process anything else, especially not the shape of a shiny new key.
“What is this?” I breathe out the words, half to myself.
“It’s a key to his apartment, you idiot. He wasn’t asking you to marry him.” She suppresses another round of chuckles, pulling down the corners of her mouth with force.
“He wanted me to move in?” I stare at her for a moment, twirling the golden key between my fingers. “I am an idiot.”
“Don’t beat yourself up too bad, Grace. You still needed to break it off, just maybe not as frantically as you did.” She shrugs as I drop the key back into the box, stunned to total silence. “So what now?”
“Back to singlehood,” I sigh, lying back against the chenille pillows that Bernsie’s mom made. They’re soft and squishy, like little pink, puffy marshmallows. I love them. I’m staying right here. “Maybe I’ll take a break from my lists.”
A Previous Engagement Page 21
