Round Six
MAGGIE
“She died.” Alana delivers her news so easily. So freakin’ swiftly. And what the hell’s the matter with her? She delivers it with a smile. “Eight years ago.”
“But—” I swallow the aching, crumbling, fluffy lump of cake and search for sense. For answers. For reality. “That’s impossible.”
“Uh… nope. It’s not. Cos it happened.”
“B-but Jeremy is eight. And eight years ago, Aria was only twenty-four years old.”
“Twenty-five, actually.”
Alana’s baby fusses and squeaks, waking from her sleep with a start. She balls her fists and stretches her legs, and just a second after that, the sweetest, mouse-like cry emerges from the tightly bound fabric.
Alana goes to work untying the lengths, undoing a knot, and unraveling the yards-long material until finally, she reveals a rumpled baby with fuzzy blonde hair sweat-slicked against the back of her skull, and the imprint of Alana’s shirt on her chubby little cheek.
The sweet baby girl blinks owlishly, thick bow-shaped lips opening and closing, and perfect blue eyes going up to her mom, then across to me. She glances around the store while Alana bundles the wrap and sets it on an unused stool, then she looks back to her mom and squeaks.
Alana hitches her shirt up, flicks the front of her bra down, then mother and daughter connect while the adorable baby busily guzzles her next meal.
“That’s better, isn’t it?” She scoops one arm under the girl’s bottom and uses the other to support her back.
Her smile is serene, her happiness, palpable.
But then her eyes come back to me. “You okay over there? Processed things yet?”
“Aria died?” My breath escapes on a shaking exhale. “They didn’t divorce?”
“Nuh-uh.” She peeks across at her beeping phone, picking it up and tapping out a fast response to whatever text came in, then she locks the screen and brings her focus back to me.
“She gave birth to their beautiful baby boy. She even got to hold him for a few minutes and take a couple of pictures. But then…” She shrugs. “Things went bad.”
Tears sizzle in my eyes.
“They couldn’t figure it out,” she murmurs.
“They tried. It wasn’t anyone’s fault. Her body just couldn’t heal the way it was supposed to, and the bleed wasn’t obvious, not even to the super-experienced doctors on staff.
Ollie was young back then, still kinda new, but he still feels like her death was on him. ”
“O-Ollie?” My breath comes heavy. Fast. Sickly. “I don’t know who you—”
“Oliver Darling. Doctor,” she adds proudly.
“He and Billy had been best friends since forever, and Ollie basically considered Aria another one of his sisters, so when they turned up at the hospital, and she was in labor, Ollie jumped in and did what he’d trained to do.
Jeremy wasn’t the first baby he’d delivered.
Not even the twentieth. When things got tricky, he called Doctor Dawes in right away, since Dawes had delivered hundreds of babies by that point.
Even then, no one could figure out what was wrong. ”
“This is just…” My heart aches. It swells and throbs and burns deep in my chest. “She died the day her son was born? That’s…” I shake my head. “Oh my gosh, Alana! I was so mean!”
“I’m sure you—”
“I said she left his grumpy ass, and I was gonna call her to talk crap about his parenting.”
She grits her teeth. “Unfortunate.”
“I’m a monster!”
The bookstore door slings open, the bell above jingling noisily to announce Alana’s newest customer. “Who is a monster?” The person, the customer—the blonde—stalks in with a bright smile. “And why are they a monster?”
“I—I don’t…” Desperate, I bring my eyes back to Alana’s. “What?”
“You two technically haven’t met yet.” Alana gestures to the woman. “Eliza Darling, this is Maggie Sava.”
“Patrice Sava’s no-good, freeloadin’, gold diggin’ granddaughter.” She comes to a stop on my side of the counter and spins to lean against the heavy structure. “Hey there, Maggie Sava. Heard all about you from Jeremy already.”
“You…” Save me. Somebody. “Darling? Eliza Darling?”
“That’s my name,” she quips. “I usually charge folks a dollar each time they say it, though.”
Lost, I swing my eyes back to Alana’s.
“Ollie and Raquel’s little sister. She was an oopsie baby,” Alana snickers. “Twelve years behind Ollie.”
“I resent that.” Eliza pushes away from the counter and stops in front of the dessert display instead, folding at the hips and studying the offerings. “The things I would do for a jam donut, Lana.” She licks her lips and groans. “The nasty, nasty, hoe-girl things I would do just to taste it.”
“She… you…” Aria Sinclair died?! “I could buy it for you, I suppose. If you don’t have the money.”
She straightens her back and drapes her arms over the fridge, moaning deep in the back of her throat. “I got money. I don’t have clearance for jelly donuts.”
“C-clearance? From who?”
“Chris.”
“He’s your…” God. Why won’t my brain work? “Is a man controlling what you eat, Eliza? Because that’s not okay. If you want to eat something, you can. It’s your life and your bod—”
“It’s a tragedy.” She blinks wide puppy-dog eyes and drops her lips into a pout. “He’s so mean to me.”
The door opens again; the bell screams in protest. “Who’s mean to you?”
“Fox,” Alana grins, her smile growing larger with each new addition to the store. “Meet Maggie. Maggie, meet Fox. She’s Chris’ wife.”
“You’re Chris’… you’re…” I study Eliza again. “Her husband is controlling your diet?”
“Right?” She slithers my way and folds over my mutilated cupcake. Stopping with her nose a mere eighth of an inch from the dessert, she inhales so deeply, the cupcake actually moves. “Oh my gosh. Is this what heaven smells like?”
“She’s got a fight coming up.” Fox saunters across the store in heels and a cute little baby bump pushing her otherwise straight-up-and-down body into something a little curvier.
She wears a body-hugging dress that stops six inches above her knees, and smells of something fruity and delicious as she comes to the counter.
Her shoulder brushes mine, then her hand swings out and snatches the cupcake away from Eliza’s greedy nose.
“No sugar for the champ. Chris worked hard on her training schedule, and cupcakes are absolutely forbidden until after fight night.”
“Y-you’re a fighter?” I search Eliza’s pouty expression, her bright blue Darling eyes, and her long blonde hair tied into two braids. “And you have a fight coming up?” I gulp. “Soon?”
“I love what I do, but I hate when Chris controls my sugar intake.”
“I just told Maggie about Aria,” Alana announces.
Together, Eliza and Fox grit their teeth.
“Jeremy said he heard you and his dad arguing.” Eliza licks the tip of her finger, presses it over a teeny-tiny crumb on the counter, and eats the morsel shamelessly.
“Then he said how they visited his mom’s grave, and Billy told Aria you were probably gonna call CPS on him.
” She flashes a bright, beautiful smile. “Then he asked me what CPS meant.”
“Oh. My. God.” I drop my elbows to the counter and my palms to my eye sockets. “It’s me. I’m the monster!”
“Nah.” Fox picks at my cupcake, too. It’s communal now.
“Ramone told us how Billy manhandled you at your place the night you got to town, so everyone basically figured you were entitled to a free jab at our second-favorite detective. Dude’s too grumpy for his own good. He needed to be slapped down a little.”
“Slapped down?” I stand tall again. “Slapping him down might mean telling him his lawn sucks, even though we all know it’s the best on the street.
Slapping him down is teasing him about a booger stuck on his face.
What I did was…” I exhale a nauseating breath.
“Oh my gosh. I owe him a massive apology.”
“You don’t wanna do that,” Eliza snickers. “Billy hates dogs shittin’ on his lawn, the book club bitches, gossip… and sympathy. He hates those things equally. Rocking up to his house with wringing hands and I’m sorrys is literally the last thing you should do.”
“You probably should just take a dump on his lawn,” Fox inserts. “It would be less horrifying to that poor man.”
“It’s true.” Alana unlatches her baby and flicks her bra up in one smooth move, passing her daughter to Fox in the next, and fixing her top, all in under a second.
Her process is so fluid, so practiced, as Fox pats the gas straight out of the infant’s little belly.
“Believe it or not, but Billy is always grumpy these days. He doesn’t save it just for you.
But also, you should know he’s smiled more this week than usual. ”
“He’s…” I peer right and meet Fox’s friendly eyes, then left, to Eliza’s. Finally, I look back at Alana and gulp. “What?”
“Dude hates sympathy! Hates it. Everyone in Plainview knows his business, and the book club bitches especially like nattering at him about how unfortunate his life is and blah blah blah. But you didn’t know about Aria, which means you didn’t stare at him with those sympathetic eyes.
Guess who he enjoys arguing with most of all? ”
“That nosy neighbor of his,” Eliza taunts.
“He comes into the gym several days a week for Jeremy’s karate classes.
Usually, he sticks around for the hour, but he’d stare at his phone and do everything he could to avoid talking to literally anyone.
But this week, he’s just…” She shrugs. “Smilier. And when Jeremy told the entire class about the beauuuutiful Miss Sava living next door, Billy even joined in and clarified some of Jeremy’s rendition of the story. ”
“He…” I’m done. I’m deceased. Someone dig a hole and put me in it. “I-I don’t get it.”