CHAPTER 10
Mimosa Morning was a brunch that Alderton-Du Ponte held once a month for all the ladies of the club and the daughters they brought along with them.
I’d been attending with Mom ever since Destelle stopped going, and where my sister had grumbled about her forced attendance, I made sure to show up with a smile. And the ladies loved me more for it.
They were mostly fun, especially if a tipsy brawl broke out. That’d happened a few times, usually when Ms. Jennings had more than three flutes.
Today, she was already nursing her second.
“Is anyone else feeling that this May is just so boring?”
I sat squeezed between Mom and Lydia, because Mrs. Flannagan had pulled her chair up at our table even though it hadn’t fit. Every time Lydia lifted her flute of orange juice to her lips, her elbow would cut into my side. After the third time, I knew it was on purpose.
If Daisy were here, she would’ve elbowed her back. All I did was shift even closer to Mom, spelling out P-A-T-I-E-N-C-E over and over again in my head.
“My birthday party is next weekend, though,” Ms. Jennings went on thoughtfully. “Perhaps I need something to properly liven it up!”
I reached for one of the cucumber sandwiches on the table in front of me, quickly taking a bite to hide my smile. Ms. Jennings’s idea of livening things up probably involved alcohol. Something harder than champagne mixed with OJ.
“You already have the ballroom booked,” Ms. Conan said, her voice distinctly sharp compared to Ms. Jennings’s. She’d only had one mimosa flute. “But do keep it PG, Allyson. We don’t know if the Pembletons will be there.”
“The Pembletons.” Ms. Jennings leaned into the table, her eyes finding me across it. “Surely they’ll come if Nellie invites their son.”
All the eyes on the table shifted to me.
Immediately, I thought through my plan of attack. I tapped my napkin to my lips. “I can ask him. I’m sure they’d be interested. Carter has said they’ve been wanting to get out of the house more this summer.”
“Have you met Carter more since Senior Night?” Mrs. Holland asked, seeming genuinely interested. She probably was—she didn’t have a daughter in the running for Carter’s attention.
“We’ve met a few times,” I admitted. “He came by the house the other day.”
Lydia stiffened. “He did?”
Ms. Jennings gave a gleeful gasp. “Oh, he likes you, Nellie! No wonder, of course. The most beautiful girl at Alderton-Du Ponte!”
For a split second, I froze, because I didn’t know how to react to such a compliment when Lydia sat at my side, and her mother sat at her other shoulder. If I ducked my head, it’d look too bashful. If I denied it, I was sure they wouldn’t think it to be genuine.
I didn’t have to worry about it for long, though. Lydia abruptly lifted her arm. This time her elbow painfully cut into my ribs, jostling the arm that held my orange juice flute. Some of the liquid sloshed over into my lap.
“Sorry!” she exclaimed. “I’m sorry, Eleanor.”
If she’d thought it through, she’d have let me squirm more. She’d have let Ms. Jennings’s comment hang in the air, shift in her seat, and seem hurt that I’d be compared to her. She’d have played the victim. Not the bully. But that was Lydia—she never thought things through.
“So sorry that you’ve been doing it for the last hour,” Ms. Jennings muttered into her flute.
“It’s cramped, is all.” Lydia’s voice was defensive, but light. She had on a pretty smile while she passed me a napkin. “But I like it. I like being able to chat with everyone.”
She’d expertly shifted the conversation off Carter, unintentionally working in my favor, and I made sure it couldn’t go back. “Mrs. Conan,” I said as I dabbed at my lap. “How’s Annalise’s baby doing?”
The subject change did exactly what I’d wanted it to. Her expression sparked to life, and everyone leaned toward her now.
“Annalise FaceTimed me just last night to show us little Flora,” Mrs. Conan gushed about her daughter and new granddaughter, a smile across her mauve painted lips. “You should see our little flower bloom. We’re so blessed!”
The ladies loved gushing over their successful daughters.
Annalise, who’d married some heir of an oil rig from California, just had her first baby a month ago.
Mrs. Holland’s daughter, Caroline, was dating some start-up CEO she’d met in New York City, and things were “getting serious.” Mrs. Flannagan’s daughter, Fiona, had “finally gotten her head on her shoulders” and moved to France to help with the family winery.
Everyone had glowing things to say about their daughters, and the listeners ate it up.
Except when it came to Destelle. Destelle was hardly ever asked about.
Well, and Margot Massey, daughter of the Massey Hotel & Suites next door, but that was a different story.
But that was why it was a shock when Mrs. Conan asked, “Alice, how is Destelle doing?”
Mom was clearly caught off guard by the question. “She’s good,” Mom said after swallowing her bite of croissant. She wiped her fingers on her napkin, and I could see them tremble. “She’s actually going to be coming home next month for the twins’ graduation.”
She’s not, I wanted to say. She’ll say she is, but she won’t.
“We haven’t seen her in ages,” Lydia said, leaning around me to grin at my mother. “When was the last time she was home?”
“Annalise’s wedding,” Mrs. Conan supplied. “Almost three years ago. And even then, she didn’t mingle with us. She didn’t fill us in at all on how life is going for her. I had so many questions!”
Mrs. Holland lowered her voice. “Like… is she still with that tattooed singer?”
“Are they still just dating?” Mrs. Johnson scrunched her nose. “He hasn’t even bothered to propose yet?”
“I always tell my daughter,” Mrs. Holland began, shaking her head. “Men will never buy the cow if they get the milk for free!”
“Oh, honey.” Despite how much Ms. Jennings had drunk so far, her voice was solid. “If men only commit for milk, no wonder your husband’s had a wandering eye.”
Mrs. Holland gasped, and Mrs. Conan shot Ms. Jennings a glare that froze the atmosphere further.
“Your nephew’s back in town, isn’t he, Ally?
” Mrs. Conan asked Ms. Jennings, raising a thin eyebrow.
We were inching a bit closer to cat-fight territory.
“Caught me right off guard when I realized that’s who that was.
He looks like trouble—even more than before. ”
Ms. Jennings wrinkled her nose. “Bah. You make it sound like he set a litter of kittens on fire.”
“No, just the entire serenity garden,” Mrs. Holland muttered.
A few of the women gave thin laughs.
“How do you feel about him being back, Eleanor?” Mrs. Conan asked, like she’d only just remembered I sat beside my mother. “After all, you were the one he trapped in there.”
Beside me, Lydia’s hand slid over my wrist, her skin like ice. “You must be so uncomfortable,” she murmured.
The orange juice in my mouth turned sour. Trapped in there. As if Beck had held me down while the bush caught fire. As if I hadn’t been the one to actually light the flame. “It was a long time ago,” I managed. “I barely remember.”
“Barely remember?” Mrs. Holland echoed, eyes widening. It was easy to tell which mimosa had tipped her from chatty into reckless. “Rebecca, you were the one who found them, weren’t you?”
Now my stomach dropped further. Mrs. Johnson popped a grape into her mouth, not looking over at me once. “Oh, I remember it perfectly. I’d stepped outside for a—ahem—breath of fresh air, and I could just see the flames billowing up. It was quite the visual, let me tell you!”
I stared at Lydia’s mother, my heart rate climbing. She wouldn’t say it, I told myself, over and over until I believed it. She wouldn’t.
Her fingers fumbled for another grape from the dish. “Eleanor—oh, you were just crying your eyes out. Broke my heart.”
I had been crying, but that’d been after she’d found me. After she’d grabbed me. I thought you were better than your sister, kissing bad boys.
Pressure built in my chest. “It—it all was just an accident—”
“How do you accidentally light an entire garden on fire?” Mrs. Johnson let out a loud laugh.
I could see, in that moment, just how drunk she’d gotten off her mimosa flutes.
“All the award-winning rosebushes, up in smoke! You know, I always say that’s what Ms. Nancy’s last straw was. Those were her pride and joy!”
Ms. Jennings scoffed. “Nancy didn’t give a crap about those rosebushes, Rebecca.”
Beck’s voice slithered through my mind, low and furious. Have you moved on from ruining my life?
It was me, I nearly cried, just to burst the tension in my chest. I did it. I lit the bushes on fire. But I couldn’t get my lips to part. The guilt choked me, leaving me suffering in silence.
“No wonder his parents had a difficult time deciding who’d take him after that.” Mrs. Johnson said with a curl of her lip. “I would have, too.”
Mrs. Conan muttered into her mimosa, “Surprised they hadn’t done it sooner.”
“Beckham—” The name came out of me like it’d been punched from my lungs, barely making it through my closing throat. I bolstered myself to get through the next lies. “Apologized, actually. He said that it was an accident. He’s been nothing but respectful since.”
“See?” Ms. Jennings lifted her flute. “Respectful. How do you spell that, Nell?”
Even amidst my building panic, I could spell, “R-E-S-P-E-C-T-F-U-L.”
“You could take to learning it, ladies.”
I imagined this was how Beck felt the other day, sitting at the table with a chest that felt like it was about to explode.
I couldn’t stand it any longer. “I’m going to run to the bathroom.
” I shoved my chair back, making sure my foot stomped on Lydia’s as I did so.
She yelped, the sound drowned out by the tear of my chair legs across the floor.
Mom tried to catch at my arm again, tried to turn and peek at my expression, but I kept it locked down.
Leaving the room wasn’t the smartest thing, because now the ladies would assume I’d left because I couldn’t bear to listen to the memories their words dredged up. Right, but wrong. Their claims of what happened were wrong, but the way I felt was right.
That day in the garden had been blurry, almost like the smoke that clogged the air still curled in my head.
I’d lit the one rose on the bushes on fire with Beck’s lighter, but had quickly blown it out, too afraid of getting in trouble.
Or I’d thought I’d blown it out. But while my back had been turned, the flame bloomed once more, swallowing up the immaculate rosebush wall as if it were made of nothing more than paper.
Beck had pulled me back, away from the flames, positioning himself between them and me. It felt like an eternity before Mrs. Johnson rushed over with a fire extinguisher, one she’d gotten from the ADP hallway, and saved the day.
Saved and doomed it, both at the same time.
I thought you were better than your sister, kissing bad boys.
I could not be like my sister.
I drew in breath after shallow breath, pressing my palms to the wall. I’d been wrong when I’d told Beck everyone had forgotten about what’d happened—they hadn’t. Instead, it was rooted in their minds, built with each embellishment.
Beck hadn’t lit the garden on fire.
I had. It’d been an accident, but blaming him hadn’t been.
And it was the biggest regret of my life.
“Ugh, Eleanor!” I jumped as Ms. Jennings came out into the hallway, stumbling a little in her heels as she turned. “Don’t end up like those airheads. No humanity toward a child, I swear. I’m more motherly than they are, and I never even had children!”
My throat felt impossibly tight, like a hand squeezed around it.
“Not your mother, of course.” Ms. Jennings pressed the backs of her fingers to her cheek. “Your mother is just protective of you. I understand that.”
Do you know? I wanted to ask Ms. Jennings. Fear kept my mouth shut. Do you know the truth?
Ms. Jennings blinked against the way the boozy mimosas hit her, but her gaze was still focused on my necklace at my throat.
“Oh, dear, your clasp is showing.” Ms. Jennings’s fingers were gentle as she readjusted the clasp to the back of my neck.
“There. Perfect.” She didn’t immediately pull back, though.
Her finger traced the pendants, lingering on the four-leaf clover.
“Beck’s lucky to have you,” I finally managed to get out. “The way you defend him.”
“You did too, in there.” Her eyes lifted, tracing mine. Despite how tipsy she was, it felt like she could read me clearly. “I’m grateful for it. He’s had… a rough time. College was hard.”
“Why did he come to stay with you? Why not his parents?”
“Like I said.” Ms. Jennings drew her hand away from my necklace and gave her head a little shake. “I’m more of a parent than most of the people around here. And that is truly messed up.”
She stumbled down the hallway, her heels clacking unevenly, and she nearly ran into an Alderton-Du Ponte employee. I knew I should’ve offered to escort her wherever she was going, should’ve offered my arm to steady her, but I only leaned more of my weight against the wall.
Whenever I’d imagined Beck these past four years, I’d pictured him doing well. Happy. Making new friends at school, maybe playing a sport.
Not hurting. Not hollow.
Have you moved on from ruining my life?