Chapter 19
Chapter Nineteen
Talia
“I miss Leo.” Mara nibbles the ridged edge of a Reese’s peanut butter cup, carefully eating it off first. “He hasn’t even been gone for twenty-four hours and I miss him.”
“That’s sweet,” Lainey says.
“A girl gets used to being fucked well before work every morning after a full week of it.”
Suki clears her throat. “Children in close proximity.”
Mara sighs, using her teeth to scrape the chocolate top off her peanut butter cup. “I’ll just fill the void with wine and chocolate, I guess.”
“I hope you’re using the word void figuratively and not literally,” Suki quips. “Because some voids shouldn’t be filled with wine and chocolate. That’ll throw your pH right off. Give you a nasty yeast infection.”
We’re just killing time, sitting in the living room. Waiting for their other friends, Harry and Dex, to get here so we can all leave for Charlotte’s school play. She’s playing Pepper in Annie.
I’ve met Harry, but I haven’t met Dex yet. He’s an attorney, like Mara.
“Talia, have you found any jobs you want to apply for?” Lainey asks.
Our group text is very active, and they all know I was planning to look for job openings this morning after Lucien left for the road trip.
“I found two that sound promising. One in Indianapolis and one in Salt Lake City.”
“Those are both far away.” Suki frowns. “But I get it. You work in a field with limited openings.”
“Yeah. I love it here, but there’s not a single job opening in my field. There’s an athletic trainer job at a community college that I’m qualified for, but it’s not what I want.”
Darling comes racing into the room. Well, racing for him. It’s pretty much just a steady trot. He has a little tiara on his head and what looks like red lipstick on his snout.
“I wasn’t done yet!” Hallie, the youngest of the three girls, comes into the room on his heels, a tube of Chanel lipstick in hand. “Darling Maxwell, get back here.”
Darling sits down next to Suki and looks up at her.
“Is that my lipstick?” Suki asks Hallie.
Hallie looks from the lipstick to Suki, and then back at the lipstick again. “I don’t know.”
Suki arches her brows. “You don’t know? Where did you get it?”
“Um ... I think it was in your bathroom.”
“It was definitely in my bathroom, because it’s mine. That’s expensive lipstick, Hals, and it’s not meant for Darling.”
“Sorry.” Hallie turns the tube, lowering the lipstick back into the container.
“Check it for hairs,” Suki says. “I don’t enjoy picking wiry pig hairs out of my lipstick.”
Mara snort-laughs, then covers her mouth.
“We have to go!” Charlotte comes into the room, looking panicked. “I have to be there by six fifteen.”
“You will be,” Suki promises. “Harry and Dex are less than five minutes away.”
It’s less than a minute later when the door from the garage into the kitchen opens and Harry walks in, a handsome dark-haired man with him.
“Where’s my actress niece?” the man I assume is Dex asks. “I need to get pictures so I can say I saw her first performance when I’m watching her give her Oscars acceptance speech!”
Charlotte smiles. “I’m right here, but take a quick picture because we have to go.”
Harry, who is taller than Dex and has lighter hair, is carrying a small box with gold wrapping paper on it. As soon as Dex is finished taking a picture of Charlotte, Harry hands her the box.
“This is from your favorite uncles. We’re so proud of you.”
Suki gives her two friends a warm look. Carter can’t be here tonight, but Suki’s friends are making sure Charlotte feels special and loved. I don’t know Harry and Dex, but I know I like them.
“Oh!” Charlotte pulls a gold necklace from the box she unwrapped. “It has a theater mask on it. I love it. Thank you.”
She hugs them both and Suki gets a picture of them with her between them. Charlotte wants to wear the necklace, so Mara fastens it behind her neck while Suki yells upstairs for the oldest of the girls, Olivia, to come down.
“How long is this going to take?” Olivia asks when she gets downstairs.
Suki gives her a sharp glare and says, “I’m going to pretend you didn’t ask that. Get your coats on, girls. It’s cold outside.”
We all pile into Suki’s large SUV, Mara riding with Harry and Dex. I’m in the back with Charlotte, who asks if she can practice her lines with me.
I say yes, of course. I’ve never been around a big, happy family like theirs. My mom is nothing like Suki. She was critical of everything. I always looked forward to summers with my dad and Angie, because Angie was nicer than my mom.
“I heard Lucien got stung by jellyfish in Hawaii,” Lainey says from the seat in front of mine, turning to face me when Charlotte is finished with her lines. “What was that like?”
“Pretty awful. I had to rinse the stings with vinegar and they hurt for several hours.”
“Lucien got stung by jellyfish?” Charlotte gapes at me. “What was he doing?”
“Well, he was swimming in an area with a sign that said not to swim there because of jellyfish.”
“Is he dumb?” Hallie asks.
“Hallie!” Suki gives her a shocked look in the rearview mirror.
“It definitely wasn’t a smart move,” I say, amused. “He knew the risks.”
“F-A-F-O,” Charlotte says.
“Oh my god.” Suki sighs heavily from the driver’s seat. “I swear we’re good parents, you guys.”
She’s visibly pregnant. And I’m sure she falls into bed every night after keeping up with three active girls, a huge house, and a pig the size of a small horse. Add a baby to the mix, and she’s going to need help sometimes.
Charlotte’s school is a sprawling modern brick building. Suki parks and we all go inside, saying goodbye to Charlotte and heading to the school’s theater. Since Suki already has tickets, we breeze through the line and find seats near the front.
“I’m so happy for you and Lucien,” Lainey says from her seat beside mine. “Bash says he’s never seen Lucien so happy. He looks at pictures of you on his phone all the time.”
Well, that feels amazing. And it’s also a reminder that I should never send him any naughty pics his teammates might see.
“He’s really great,” I say. “It’s weird not being with him all the time anymore.”
“What you said about him, you know ... in the video? I teared up when I saw it. Lucien is a good guy, and he deserves someone who gets that and appreciates it.”
I hum a note of laughter. “He still wants me after that video was posted, and that says a lot. I really embarrassed myself.”
She shrugs. “I don’t know. Your sister saying she knew he was the one the first time she saw him? That’s an asshole thing to say. You called it out.”
“I know, but ... it was unclassy.”
“I embarrassed myself once with Bash. I was in high school and he was twenty-one at the time, playing pro hockey. I drove to his house and confessed my longtime love for him. I asked him to my prom.”
I cringe. “Oh no.”
“I wanted to die, girl. For real. And then my car wouldn’t start, so he had to drive me back to Columbus and he told me I was a great girl who would find someone my own age.”
“And then later things changed? Obviously.”
She nods, grinning. “Yeah. And teenage Lainey was mortified, but now I’m glad I did it. I went big, you know? Not everyone has the courage for that. And then, a few years later, things were different between us.”
“I love that. Thank you for sharing it with me.”
She covers my hand with hers and squeezes it. “Don’t wilt, Talia. I like you just the way you are.”
Her words are like a warm blanket being wrapped around me. I hadn’t considered that perspective before. My drunken toast was messy and unplanned, but it was authentic. Alcohol gave me the courage to say things I never would have said otherwise.
The lights go down and the play starts. The students’ hard work shows, and I’m impressed by every aspect of their performance. Charlotte shines in her role, and her cheering section is the first to its feet for a standing ovation at the end.
Dex gives her a bunch of long-stemmed roses when she finds us at the end of the play. Her sisters tell her how great she was, and her expression reminds me of how my students used to look when I’d tell them how well they did something. It’s like water and sun on a dried-out plant.
Harry is hosting a party for the play’s entire cast in a private room at his restaurant, and we all get to go, too. His restaurant is spectacular, and Charlotte beams like the star of the show through the entire party. There are even sparkling nonalcoholic drinks in champagne flutes.
I’m checking the score of the game when I can, and I do a little dance when I see that Lucien scored a goal on a power play. As a defenseman, being able to score makes him extra valuable to his team. I feel a pang of wishing I’d been there to see it.
It’s still a great night, though. I thought I’d have to force myself to rejoin the world again, but Lucien’s team friends are fun to be around, and now they’re my friends, too.
I want to keep this. It’s so hard to start over in a new place, and I hate the thought of not seeing Lucien and my new friends as much as I do now.
I’m torn between the job I love and the man I’ve fallen hard for. It’s an awful feeling.
“You okay?” Suki asks me, handing me a plate with a piece of chocolate cheesecake garnished with a strawberry slice.
I shake off my worries and smile at her. “I’m good. I’m having a great time.”
“I’m so glad you came tonight.”
In a perfect world, I could have it all—the job that fulfills me, right here in the place that feels like home now. But that feels impossible.