CHAPTER FIVE
After Adrian’s announcement, I had a strange mixture of emotions. I was happy for him and Colette, but disappointed that I’d never get a chance to go out on a date with him to see if there could be anything between us. Excited that my pitch had worked, worried that Adrian might not react well to it. Unaware of my inner turmoil, my colleagues congratulated me and offered help if I needed it.
They were excited because this event was unlike anything else that we had ever done. To be honest, corporate events were boring. There was very little opportunity to put our own spin or design on it. Typically there was a seminar/conference with speakers and we provided snacks and swag. That was it. There were no decorations other than a banner or a backdrop, or basics like a podium and an AV system. Everything had to be professional.
Translation—sterile and boring.
But a rich teenager’s birthday party? That could be a lot of fun.
I had lunch with Vella again and found myself distracted. I shouldn’t have been surprised that Adrian was getting engaged. It made sense. He and Colette had been dating for a long time, and she was a great person. Marriage was the next logical step. Of course he wanted to marry Colette, and of course she would want to marry Adrian. I completely understood it.
It still made me a bit sad.
“Earth to Everly!” Vella said, waving her hand in front of my face. “You’re not still moping about that lump of clay getting engaged, are you?”
“Lump of clay?” I repeated. “What does that mean?”
“That is a man not yet fully formed. He needs a lot of molding and spending time in a kiln before he’ll actually be relationship material. I don’t envy that French chick.”
That was the problem—I did envy Colette. Being jealous of someone while still liking them as a person was a very confusing problem to have.
I wanted to change the subject. “So I now have to design and plan a luxury birthday party based on a culture I know next to nothing about. I should have pitched something British themed.”
“What do you know about British culture?”
My mind went blank. “Uh, Doctor Who , those guards with the big hats, and the royal family.”
Vella made a scoffing sound. “Americans caring about British royals is like asking Protestants to be super invested in the pope. I wouldn’t have allowed that theme. No culture who calls cookies ‘biscuits’ should be a theme of anything.”
I laughed, knowing she was teasing me because she knew how much I loved all royal families worldwide. “Seriously, though, I am going to have to study Monterran culture.”
“Good thing we have the internet.”
“No, I need to experience it. I’ve always been more of an auditory and tactile learner. I do better having someone explain things to me, or physically doing stuff myself.”
She narrowed her eyes at me. “And how are you planning on experiencing Monterra? Are you going to fly there?”
Ha. Even if I put all six of my credit cards together, I still wouldn’t have enough money to buy a ticket to Monterra. “I wish, but that won’t happen. My lack of knowledge is concerning, though. I don’t even know how they celebrate birthdays.”
Vella picked up her phone, typed something, and then studied her screen for a bit. “I looked it up. Monterrans celebrate birthdays with a birthday cake and by singing ‘Happy Birthday to You’ in Italian. The party is planned. You’re welcome.”
Our lunch came out—she had ordered a salad, while I’d gotten the hamburger and fries. She gave my food a wistful look and sighed.
“I get your jealousy,” I told her, while pointing at her food. “That looks like the lunch of someone whose doctor told them they would die if they didn’t make major changes to their eating habits.”
She grumbled in response but ate her slightly wilted lettuce. “I can’t eat things that used to be alive.”
“Lettuce and tomatoes used to be alive.”
If Vella rolled her eyes any harder, she was going to spin the earth off its axis. “You know what I mean. I’ve watched too many YouTube videos. I can’t eat meat. Even if it does smell really delicious.”
Her phone buzzed and she checked it. “Why am I getting messages from your office manager to contribute money for birthday cupcakes? I don’t even know who Dan from Accounting is.” Her eyes widened. “They want me to pitch in one hundred dollars? For cupcakes?”
I shrugged. Elevated liked big parties. The bigger the better.
“What is in those cupcakes?” she asked in disbelief.
“Gold flakes and cocaine,” I promptly replied and she laughed.
Joking with her made me feel better, a fact she seemed to pick up on quickly. “Does this mean you’re over Adrian now?”
Was I over the crush I’d nursed for the last four years? Not so much. “Teasing you doesn’t mean I’m suddenly done with my residual feelings.”
“That’s too bad. Because now that I’ve worked with him, I have to tell you, I don’t get it.”
I had a french fry halfway to my mouth when she said this, and I froze. “What do you mean?”
“I’d like to tell you, but my New Year’s resolution was to stop insulting people at work.” She paused. “But given that it’s been over ten months since New Year’s Eve and I’ve already broken it repeatedly, here it is. Adrian is not very bright.”
Indignation swelled up in my chest. “He is, too!”
“You really do always try to find the best in others. It must be so exhausting and disappointing.”
I’d actually discovered the opposite to be true. I had faith in other people, and I’d found them to generally be who I thought they were.
“I’ve been going through his social media,” she said, gearing up for what was presumably going to be a long rant. “He wears sunglasses inside and calls people ‘doll’ and ‘champ.’ He posts pictures of his food every day. It’s not like his four hundred and sixty-two pictures of lobster risotto are going to wind up at MoMA.”
“That doesn’t mean he’s not smart.”
“He is absolutely the kind of guy who has unironically called a woman ‘milady’ at some point in his life. He’s a human golden retriever. And not the lovable, adorable kind, but the inbred one that isn’t very smart. His brain cells have to huddle together for warmth. And he’s lazy and lets you do everything for him while he takes all the credit.”
That one stung a little. “You don’t understand. Adrian and I are a team. We do things together. His success is my success.”
My phone beeped with a message, and my cheeks flushed when I realized who it was from. As if he’d somehow intuited that we’d been discussing him.
“Is that your assignment?” she asked. “What are you supposed to bring to the birthday celebration for Dan from Accounting? The Mona Lisa and a Fabergé egg?”
I didn’t want to lie to her, but I also didn’t want her to see the text. I wasn’t sure what to do.
Vella noticed my expression and took my phone from my hand, while I protested. “Hey!”
She started reading Adrian’s text out loud. “Hey doll, could you feed the kids and get my dry cleaning? I also need you to be at my apartment tomorrow between noon and four o’clock because I have an electrician coming to install some new lights for the aquarium. Could you also water my plants and grab my mail while I’m gone?”
My cheeks got even hotter.
“Are you kidding me with this?” she said, squeezing my phone so tightly I worried she was going to break it. “Are you going to scrub his toilets and wash his windows, too?”
“I don’t do windows,” I tried to joke, but she wasn’t having it. “It’s fine. I don’t mind helping him out.” I didn’t mention that I had done these sorts of things for him many, many times. Because I sensed she wouldn’t be happy about that.
At all.
“You’re like his girlfriend with none of the benefits,” she muttered. “And who are ‘the kids’?”
“He has a pet python and some sharks.”
For a second she didn’t speak, her mouth opening and shutting again like she was trying to form words but couldn’t. Her voice returned quickly. “Nobody should own a shark! Just so you know, they say the type of pet you have is a representation of who you are as a person.” I made a dissenting noise at this, but she pressed on. “I guess the kind of people who have decided it’s okay to own a shark should be allowed to because, more likely than not, this is going to end up in some kind of Darwinian natural-selection situation.”
I tried to say something, but she kept going. “A shark is the kind of pet a serial killer would own.”
“He’s not a serial killer.”
“Yay for him?” she said sarcastically. “One point in the pro column—he doesn’t unalive people. It doesn’t outweigh all the negatives. It’s like you’re his beck-and-call girl.”
“I am most definitely not his call girl,” I responded.
“No, but you’d like to be.”
That was so ridiculous it didn’t even merit a response. When Vella got worked up like this, it wasn’t worth arguing with her. I just nodded and said nothing.
She didn’t understand how things were between me and Adrian. As I’d said, we were a team. I liked that he relied on me. Needed me.
I enjoyed being useful and good at my job.
“Just so you know, I don’t like him,” she added.
“But you don’t like anybody.” It was hard to take her judgment of Adrian seriously, given that she had been at Elevated for only two days and really did hate everybody else in the world besides me.
Vella studied me for a moment, chewing on her lettuce the same way an evil, demented bunny might. “Regardless of how you feel about him, the bottom line here is that Adrian’s getting married to someone else. You need to move past it.”
She was right. Even if I didn’t want to admit it, I had to find a way to go forward and let go of this silly crush.
“Do you have plans tonight?” she asked. I was immediately suspicious.
“Yes, I do.”
“Sitting alone in the dark and drinking excessive amounts of beer while watching videos of royal weddings does not constitute plans.”
“Sure it does.”
“Nope. We’re going out and having a good time.”
I started to protest. “But I won’t have—”
Vella held up her hand. “Adrian’s out of town. You don’t have hours and hours of sitting at your desk waiting on him ahead of you. You’ll get to leave the office at a reasonable hour, and you can come out and have irresponsible fun like the twentysomething that you are.”
Again, she was right. My schedule had opened up considerably. Without having Adrian here assigning me busywork or needing me to babysit his time, remind him constantly about meetings, or follow up with vendors for him, I could go out and act my age.
I did have Hyacinth’s party to plan, but I already had a bunch of vendors in mind that would be responsive and easy to work with. I couldn’t imagine that Hyacinth was going to change her mind multiple times about what she wanted, as she’d barely agreed to the theme I’d presented.
And now I was going to have a full eight hours at the office to devote to her event.
“Okay.” I nodded. “Let’s go out.”
“Yes!” Vella pumped her fist in triumph, as if she’d just won a victory. “But on one condition, though.”
Uh-oh. “What condition?”
“You have to speak to at least one man before the night’s over.”
I nodded. I could manage that.
“An attractive, age-appropriate man,” she added on, trying to close off any loopholes. “You’re not going to chat up some middle-aged bartender and claim that it counts.”
That made my stomach feel a little queasy. It had been an actual eternity since I’d spoken to a cute guy outside of the office. I’d had zero work-life balance for so many years that I was pretty sure the part of me that knew how to flirt had dried up completely, like the Sahara.
“And bonus points if you get his number.”
“Sure.” I was as likely to run into the Easter Bunny as I was to get a hot guy’s phone number, so it was easier just to placate her.
Vella was still revved up, though. “Because you know the best way to get over someone—”
I interrupted her. “Is this where you tell me it’s to get under someone else?”
She pressed her lips together. “No. The best way to get over someone is to light his hair on fire.”
That made me laugh.
She smiled slightly, then let out a long sigh. “You’ve turned me into your unintentional cheerleader, Everly. Because you are altering the core of my personality, the least you can do is to get out there and find the man of your dreams. If for no other reason than I wouldn’t mind having the apartment to myself a few times a week.”
No way was that going to happen.
Poor Vella was about to be so disappointed.