Chapter 8
For the first time in his entire life, Freddie was ready for the party to be over.
The music—a new album from an electronic duo that he used to love—was awful.
His newly painted apartment was lit up with carefully placed lights along the walls, full of strangers whose names he wouldn’t remember in an hour all mingling and laughing as waiters passed around platters of hors d’oeuvres.
Back in college he used to be the life of the party, but now he was counting down the minutes until he could sit down and enjoy some silence.
When had that happened? When he was younger, he made anything and everything into an excuse for a party, mostly because it had felt like there was so much worth celebrating.
The future held nothing but limitless opportunity, and all they had to do was grab it.
The excitement had been so pure and so naive he almost wanted to laugh.
“So what do you think?” George asked.
The sound of his friend’s voice pulled Freddie from his thoughts. The room was bursting with people and lights and music, but the two men had created their own little bubble in the center of it. It was the only thing keeping Freddie from retreating back to his room and shutting the door.
“About what?” Freddie replied.
His friend’s brow furrowed. “The meeting with Mark from AirSoil. He emailed you about sitting down over lunch sometime soon, right?”
“Right.” Freddie nodded as if he had been following.
He vaguely remembered the email, but it was like so many he had seen before—full of platitudes and false sincerity, all under the guise of making him feel important—that he hadn’t even really bothered to absorb the details. “Yeah, I think it’s set.”
“You think?”
Freddie turned to his friend and flashed him a crooked grin. “Don’t worry, George. I’ll make you look good.”
His friend didn’t look convinced, but before he could press Freddie further, the front door opened again and more people poured into the apartment, followed by squeals and laughter and greetings.
And Anne Elliot.
Freddie’s heart stumbled. Shit. What was she doing here?
He hadn’t invited her. He could have—for a split second he even considered it, but he had wanted to avoid this feeling more—the tension in his muscles, the ache in his chest as his gaze found her striking profile held high as she glanced around the room, her blond hair pulled back in that neat ponytail he remembered so well, her bow lips puckered just slightly…
Then his gaze slid to his sister at Anne’s side.
Double shit.
He turned so his back was to them and took a deep sip of his drink.
George frowned. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
George turned to see what Freddie had been looking at.
“Your sister’s here,” he said.
“I know.”
George considered. “The pink isn’t that bad.”
Freddie was about to tell him to shut up when Sophie burst through the crowd with Anne in tow.
“Freddie! Why didn’t you tell me you invited Anne?!” she exclaimed.
Freddie opened his mouth to speak, not even sure what the hell he was going to say, but just like that day when he picked up his keys, Anne had an answer ready first.
“He didn’t,” she said, a painfully forced smile on her face. “I just live downstairs.”
Sophie’s eyes grew wide. “In the building?”
Anne nodded, then stole a quick look at Freddie. “Hi, Freddie.”
“Hi,” he said. His tone was even and clipped.
“I can’t believe I didn’t know this,” Sophie said, turning her shocked expression to her brother. “Did you know this?”
“We ran into each other a couple of weeks ago downstairs,” he replied, then took another sip of his drink.
“Shut. Up.” Sophie’s mouth hung open. “That is nuts!”
“What’s nuts?” George asked, his brow furrowed.
“These two dated in college and hadn’t seen each other in eight years and now they live in the same building!” Sophie replied so loudly that a few people standing nearby turned.
George paused, then his eyebrows did a slight bob, like he had just connected two salacious dots.
Freddie shot him a look that he hoped communicated a demand for his friend to keep his mouth shut.
“It’s purely a coincidence,” Anne added, waving a hand between them as if batting away whatever cobwebs were left there.
For a brief moment, her eyes darted around the room again at the walls now a clean eggshell white, over the black-and-white photographs that had replaced the modern art.
Was she critiquing what he had done to her old home?
Silently judging how thoroughly she had been erased?
If she was, she didn’t say anything, and Freddie was almost ashamed by the relief that shot through his system. The last thing he needed was his sister learning that his apartment had been Anne’s.
“It’s fate! It’s kismet!” Sophie exclaimed with a flourish of her hand.
“No, it’s the New York real estate market,” Freddie murmured.
His sister shot him a sharp glare, then turned back to Anne.
“What have you been up to? Where are you working? You went to business school, right?” Sophie asked, the words coming out in such quick succession that Anne looked almost panicked. “No wonder you can afford this building, it’s gorgeous! Are you working downtown at some investment bank or—”
“Pace yourself, Sophie,” Freddie interrupted. “You just walked in the door.”
His sister rolled her eyes. “Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t realize I wasn’t allowed to be excited to see someone after eight years.”
Freddie frowned and glanced over at George. His friend was watching the scene with mild amusement.
Sophie turned to Anne again. “Ignore him. Ever since he sold his company, he thinks he’s God’s gift to business. He traded in his cargo shorts and hoodie for a closet full of designer suits.”
“I don’t think anyone misses the cargo shorts,” Freddie said, throwing her a sardonic glare.
Sophie kept her attention on Anne as she nodded over to him. “Do you want to guess how much that suit cost? And I bet he still paid a fortune to have it altered within an inch of its life.”
“So altered I barely recognized him,” Anne said, that small, familiar smile on her lips.
The words snagged on something uncomfortable inside him. Freddie knew that smile, how it held back a wave of opinions, allowing only the smallest, least offensive through. He had always been the one she would dissect and probe those opinions with later. But now he was square in its sights.
That was it, the thing poking at his chest. It felt like she was judging him. After years of telling him how important it was to have a plan, to grow up and be an adult, she was judging him for doing just that.
Sophie cackled, her head falling back as she clapped. “Right? Exactly.”
“And what about you?” Freddie asked, masking his annoyance with a placid smile as he nodded to Anne. “You were in the Columbia Business School to C-suite pipeline. How’d all those big plans work out for you?”
The words sounded sharp even though the question was genuine.
He was desperate for any information about where she had been these past eight years, what she had done.
But he had also seen her apartment downstairs.
Met her roommate. Things clearly hadn’t worked out for Anne the way she’d planned, and he was almost embarrassed at his need to point that out.
She stared at him, eyes slightly narrowed.
“Great,” she replied. “Everything’s great.”
Their eyes stayed locked for another moment. Then Freddie looked away.
George cleared his throat, breaking the tension. “Can I get you ladies a drink?”
“Oh my God, yes. I need vodka,” Sophie said, as if she had completely forgotten her one goal of the night. “Anne, do you want a drink?”
She doesn’t drink hard liquor, Freddie almost said. The words were on his tongue so fast that it surprised him, a small detail he had worked so hard to bury for the last eight years yet reappeared like it had just been waiting for the right opportunity to emerge.
“No, that’s okay.” Anne shook her head. “I should actually be going.”
“No way! Here, give me your phone,” Sophie said, not even waiting for Anne to comply before taking it from her hands and typing away. “I’m going to text myself so I have your number, and we can meet up for a coffee and catch up without the running commentary and bad music.”
POP.
A champagne cork flew across the room and someone screamed, only for the room to erupt in laughter and cheers. Freddie looked to see the source of the commotion, and when he turned back, Anne was already making her way across the room, disappearing back through the front door.
The last of the guests left before midnight. A few years ago, it would have almost been embarrassing for a party to end so early, but now Freddie only felt relief as he collapsed into one of his plush new armchairs and took a long sip of his beer.
That had been a fucking disaster. Sure, he hadn’t thrown one of his parties in years, but it never entered his mind that he wouldn’t enjoy it. Yet, even before Anne walked in the door he was ready to disappear back into his bedroom. And then after she did…
Freddie pushed the memory aside, taking another sip of his beer. His starched shirt felt itchy and restraining, but he didn’t have the energy to get up and change, so he just unbuttoned the top few buttons and rolled up the sleeves, then let out a long-withheld sigh.
“I think that was the last of it,” Sophie called out from the kitchen. “I put all the wineglasses here on the counter and the plates in the sink.”
“You don’t have to do that, Soph,” Freddie said. “The cleaning people are coming in the morning to handle all of it.”
Sophie snorted out a laugh as she grabbed a bottle of water from the refrigerator. “Just when I think you’ve said the bougiest thing possible, you go and say something that completely tops it.”
“Thanks?” he replied with a wry smile.
She shuffled toward him and landed in the deep armchair across from him. They sat in silence for a long moment, looking out the window at the skyline glowing against the dark sky.
“So,” Sophie finally said. “Are we going to talk about it?”
Freddie’s body tensed even as he maintained his calm expression. He knew this was coming. “Talk about what?”
Sophie snorted again. “Okay.”
He frowned, leaning over and putting his beer on the coffee table. “Soph—”
“Did you know Anne Elliot lived in the building when you bought this place?”
He ran a hand through his hair. Sophie didn’t know the half of it, and he was in no mood to tell her.
“No, I didn’t. But it’s fine. She’s an old friend who I haven’t seen in a while. That’s it.”
Sophie rolled her eyes. “My darling brother, that’s like saying the ocean is a little damp.”
“Come on, it’s not like we were about to run off and get married or something,” Freddie said. “We were practically kids when we were together.”
“Right. I distinctly remember a conversation about rings, though.”
Freddie took another sip of his beer.
“What even happened between you two?” she asked. “One minute you were looking for a place to live in Buenos Aires with her, and then she just never came up again. Did she cheat on you or something?”
“Jesus, no,” he murmured. “Nothing like that.”
“Then what?”
“We broke up.”
“Okay, but why?”
His head fell back on the cushions. He didn’t want to turn over those last few weeks, especially with his sister.
How Anne had pulled back, forcing distance between them until she ended it.
How, even after her practiced speech, none of it got to the core issue, the reason that drove her to decide to do any of it.
Anne said she wanted to break up because they “wanted different things.” As if either of them knew what the hell they wanted back then.
He didn’t even know now. And by the looks of it, she was struggling, too.
The future had been such an amorphous, intangible thing between them that he hadn’t really thought about it before she ended their relationship.
Then after, he put all his energy into the future in a desperate attempt to erase the past.
“It was eight years ago,” he replied. “I’m over it. You should be, too.”
“Right.” She let out a bitter laugh.
He opened his mouth, ready to reiterate his point in the hopes that she would let it lie, but then he caught the hurt that flashed across his sister’s face.
Sophie had always been his fiercest ally.
Even when they were little, and their parents would catch him playing video games at three a.m., she would be the one to argue why he didn’t deserve a punishment.
She was also the one who convinced their father not to dismantle Bertha after he found out Freddie had raided his plumbing van to build it.
And once Anne started spending time at their home in Queens—enjoying his mom’s homemade dinners and indulging in his dad’s obsessive ranting about the Mets—Sophie was more than happy to adopt Anne as the little sister she’d always wanted.
Tonight had been a quick flash of that, enough for him to realize his sister had lost something eight years ago, too.
“Sorry, Soph,” he murmured.
“It’s fine.” She waved him off, the Wentworth signal to move on. “You’re coming out to Mom and Dad’s next weekend, right?”
Shit. He vaguely remembered a text from his mom earlier in the week, something about Christmas decorations in the basement, but it was one message among a flurry of others, and he had completely forgotten.
“Do I need to?”
He felt like an ass the minute he saw his sister’s glare.
“Are you serious?” she asked. “You know Dad’s back won’t let him lift those boxes up the basement stairs. And if you don’t do it, Mom will try and end up with a broken pelvis or something.”
Freddie winced. “Thanks for the guilt trip.”
She just shrugged. “Jimmy’s not around for the literal heavy lifting anymore, so you need to step up.”
“All right, all right. I’ll be there.”
They finished their drinks before he called her a car to take her back to Queens, then walked with her downstairs to make sure she got in safely.
After that Freddie went straight to bed before he spent any more time thinking about how far his life had veered from where he thought he would be eight years ago.