Chapter Four
CHAPTER FOUR
TWISTING HER OFFICE chair back and forth underneath her the next morning, Everly stares out the floor to ceiling windows at the desert view behind her desk, rather than the computer screen as she should be. She’s relieved the weekend is over and the work week has started again; work is what she knows. Still, she can’t help but reflect back on the day of the party and how it went. She’s learned about redirection in therapy, and Carrie is adamant that redirecting her thoughts and preventing her tendency to ruminate on anxious topics will allow her to better handle her anxiety. It does seem to help when she can manage to actually do it, but unfortunately this morning does not look to be one of those days.
Interestingly though, her thoughts don’t stick to the things they normally would, namely, the guests and her interactions with them. She has this annoying habit of going over every single thing she said, they said, how she reacted, and what her future omniscient self thinks she should have done or said that would have been exceedingly better. This is useless of course, as it only serves to make her feel worse. Today though, her thoughts are circling around two people in particular, and one of them wasn’t a guest at said party.
Between her distress over the confounding situation with her long lost sister, and the depressing reality of not having a date with the hot delivery guy, she can’t help but wonder what she is even going to do with her life. Does her sister want a relationship now, after all these years? Does Asim think about her constantly after their brief time together, like she does him? She decides to put pen to paper and make a list.
Lists, she firmly believes, fix everything.
Thoughts about Addison:
She seems friendly and has gone out of her way to interact with me. She has good social skills and has clearly done well for herself. What does she want? Why is she here? Why now?
Options for next steps Don’t do anything to upset the balance, let it play out as it will. Reach out to her and follow up on the tentative plans to get together again. Check in on her at the hotel / assess her in another environment, then decide.
Thoughts about Asim:
He is a delivery driver for the plant shop. He is kind and charming. He’s the sexiest man I’ve ever seen. I have no idea how to contact him, other than ordering more plants, which I don’t need… Find someone else?
With her brain more organized, even if she doesn’t feel happier about the situation, she does have a clearer picture. Everly decides she can’t do anything about Asim, so she will leave that up to fate or the universe (or maybe Frankie) to decide for her. As far as Addison goes, well, she’s staying at the Sioria on the floor below Everly’s office. It would take only a couple of minutes to walk down there and see how she reacts.
Everly decides to give it a day. She doesn’t want to be too much too fast, and instead texts Addison a simple thank you for her help cleaning up after the party over the weekend, deciding to leave it at that for now. Spinning her chair around to her computer, she hopes she can actually focus on her work this time.
~~ ~
The next day, her first order of business is to follow up on her lists. Addison had sent a polite text back the day before, and Everly thinks an in-person visit is a good next step. As an early riser, Everly always gets to work before the morning shift starts, so she waits until a respectable hour to ensure she doesn’t wake her sister up too early. As the clock hands tick forward, Everly loses patience and figures nine am sounds good enough; giving herself a firm nod to solidify this decision, she stands up, sets her shoulders back, and murmurs a quick “I can do this. I am capable.” affirmation reminder.
Three minutes later, she’s taking a deep breath and knocking on the hotel room door, shifting from foot to foot while questioning every decision she has ever made in her life. She hears a muffled “Ev?” through the door before the sound of the locks, and then the door swings open.
Addison does not look like nine am is a respectable hour. Her curly brown hair is a lion's mane around her face, and one cheek is lined and puffy from sleeping on it.
“Is everything okay? What are you doing here?” Addison asks, one hand rubbing the sleep from her eye.
“Oh, yeah everything’s fine, great really. I just wanted to see how you were doing and ask if maybe you wanted to get coffee or something, but I can see you’re not really up yet.” Everly chuckles awkwardly, then clamps her mouth shut and bites her tongue before she really starts to ramble. They stand there in the doorway for a moment with the door cracked open and dead silence between them.
“Right. Coffee. I don’t drink coffee, but if you want to come in for a bit there’s complimentary tea. Which you know, obviously.” Addison doesn’t seem to be much better at this socializing thing than Everly is when they don’t have the party connecting them.
“Sure, I can come in for a few minutes. I don’t drink coffee either, actually,” Everly confesses. “I just figured that’s what people do so it made sense to ask.”
Addison just nods, opening the door wider for Everly and waving one arm around as she walks back into the kitchen area of the suite. She has one of the nicer ones, with an open kitchen and breakfast nook, spacious sitting area, bedroom and connected bath. They do their best at small talk while the water heats to a boil, commenting on the weather this time of year, how it’s just as Addison remembers it being, then take their tea to the balcony to enjoy said crisp morning weather.
Everly wants to ask so many questions, but isn’t sure where to start, or if she even should. She confirms how long Addison is staying (until New Year’s Day), if she has other plans (nothing set in stone), and Addison again asks about the hotel and comments on how stunning the updates and new designs are. After a moment of finger-tapping silence in which they both take too-hot sips of tea, Addison clears her throat, drawing Everly’s attention again.
“Are you still friends with Frankie?” Addison asks.
“Oh, yeah, they’re doing great. Running the coffee shop these days,” Everly replies.
“Oh no way!” Addison’s eyes light up and she looks fully awake for the first time this morning. “Did they buy it?”
Everly hums in confirmation, a proud smile curving her lips.
Addison sits back with a smile. “Good for them, that’s really cool. I’ll have to stop by before I leave.”
“They’d like that. They were asking about you,” Everly says, doing a double take when Addison’s cheeks turn pink.
“Oh.” Addison clears her throat but changes the subject before Everly manages to figure out why that topic turned awkward too. “How are the rest of the local businesses doing?”
“Great for the most part. Crooked Books is still up and running. I guess I don’t really go anywhere else all that often.”
“Is Mrs. Langdon any less grouchy these days?”
Everly laughs, and it finally breaks some of the tension between them. “Not even a little bit.”
The conversation flows easier as they spend a little more time together, but it still feels weird, almost unnatural, to be so disconnected from someone she used to know better than herself.
The sisters schedule a time for Addison to come back to the house for dinner and drinks before she leaves, and they both end up with shy grins on their faces. Everly thanks her for the tea, debates offering a hug but decides it doesn’t fit the moment, and offers a warm smile instead as she leaves. She walks back up to her office with a little more of a bounce in her step than she had on the way down a half hour prior.
~~~
Everly likes to think she’s managing her anxious thoughts better today than she has been the rest of this week, despite the fact that she has no evidence to back up this belief. She’s distracted randomly throughout the day for no reason at all, other than that she imagines she might run into him, her Hot Delivery Guy, who she would almost think was a figment of her imagination if she didn’t have the plants at her house to prove the existence of someone, at least. So really, no, she’s not actually getting a handle on things, but when she puts her mind to it, Everly is exceptionally good at pretending she does.
Later that afternoon, Everly skips out of work early to hang out with Frankie, who she hasn’t seen since the party, although they do call or text multiple times a day whether they see each other or not.
Frankie owns the local coffeehouse a couple blocks down, also on the main street of their little downtown area. It’s right next to their favorite bookstore, Crooked Books, run by Mrs. Langdon. She’s this quirky old lady, who they are pretty sure has lived forever and is most likely a witch, with wild, curly red hair and a no nonsense attitude. Naturally, she has two cats that live in the bookstore, Luna and Harriet. They’re about as sociable as she is. Mrs. Langdon doesn’t allow for any “hooliganism” in her bookstore, which includes but is not limited to: carrying pens, markers, tape, drinks or liquids or food of any kind, sneezing, coughing, running, shouting or talking at any volume above a politely soft conversational level, along with anything else she might deem “ruckus” in the moment.
Truly it’s a miracle her little store is still in business, as Everly and Frankie have seen her tossing many tourists and locals alike out her front door with words along the lines of “unacceptable” and “intolerable” accompanying her signature scowl as she does it. They always wonder about those events, but don’t ask, since she seems to have a soft spot for the two of them, and they don’t want to push their luck. Everly and Frankie are sometimes allowed to bring their tea and coffee in—so long as it has a tight lid and they only drink it over the welcome mat, and leave it on the side table next to the front door when they aren’t drinking it.
Sometimes the cats wander by them, without hissing or evil eyes, and one time Luna even let Everly pet her, which Frankie said was definitely a sign of their favor and probably why Mrs. Langdon tolerates their brand of “shenanigans”. Everly thinks she just likes drama. Even still, they tread carefully, because being banned from the only bookstore in town would be an absolute tragedy.
Everly walks the couple blocks to Roasted Coffee House and enjoys how it has been a perfectly normal day so far, with no distracting men or stupid sexy arm muscles intruding where they don’t belong. Frankie is actually working for once when she arrives, and she can see them wiping down tables through the window. The door tinkles softly as she opens it, and Frankie immediately comes over and flips the handmade door sign to “closed.”
“Frankie,” Everly draws out the end of their name in a frustrated whine. “Honestly, I have no idea how you make any money closing at random hours all the time! I did not come over here just to feel guilty about you closing down the shop because of me.”
“I don’t know why you assume it’s about you,” Frankie complains with a glower. “I have stuff going on too, you know.”
“Oh my gosh, I didn’t even think. Of course it’s not about me, what’s going on?”
They smirk back over their shoulder as they walk behind the counter to brew Everly a cup of her favorite Jasmine Green tea.
“I’m good actually. It was busy this morning but no one has been in for a minute, so I was going to close down early anyways to go wander around next door, see if Mrs. Langdon got any new smut.” They laugh when Everly pretends to smack at their arm over the counter for making her think something was wrong.
“That’s literally exactly what I need. Maybe she’ll have a cute holiday novella, or a hockey romance.” Everly is definitely on board with these new afternoon plans.
“Uh huh, feeling in the mood for a sexy strong guy after flirting with that delivery driver last weekend? I know how you feel about your hot hockey daddies, I’ll keep an eye out for you.”
When they turn around to wink at her, Frankie throws their head back and cackles at how red Everly's entire face and neck have turned. She cannot believe them. Why are they even friends? Yet for some reason, instead of stomping out the door like she considers doing, she leans back against the counter and waits for her friend to finish the tea.
They end up sitting around the coffeehouse and chatting for a bit instead of going next door right away. It’s such a peaceful afternoon, Everly just wants to enjoy a bit of down time with her friend and relax without any stress hanging over her. They chat about the coffeehouse and some of Frankie’s weird customers, and annoying customers, and the regulars they love. Frankie always has wild ideas of adventures and trips and projects they want to do, but really Frankie just loves to dream and hasn’t ever set foot outside their small town. Everly can’t deny it’s fun to imagine though, and some of her favorite moments are spent with Frankie talking about the most ludicrous and unrealistic “dream vacations” that they will never go on. She even enjoys the comfortable silences they sit in together sometimes.
Everly breaks one such silence. “I saw Addison today.”
“Oh yeah? How did that go?” Frankie sits up a bit and tips up their chin, eyebrows slightly pinched in concern.
Everly sighs and slumps back into the soft leather chair, cupping the dregs of her tea in both hands.
“I don’t know how to talk to her. It’s just so weird, you know? My long lost sister randomly being back and for no reason, what am I supposed to do? What am I supposed to say? I don’t know why she came to the party or what she expects or what she even wants from me. It’s kinda freaking me out.”
Frankie nods and their lips pull down to one side thoughtfully. “Maybe she doesn’t know either. It’s a strange situation, that’s for sure. What do you want to do?”
“What do I want to do?” Everly blinks a few times. What kind of a question is that? How is she supposed to know what she wants to do?
“Yeah, what do you want to do? Do you want to talk to her? Try to get closer, or do you want to keep your distance?” Everly can clearly see that Frankie is trying not to smile, and she can’t help but feel like she walked into a trap somehow. Frankie tilts their head into their hand and waits.
“I guess… I do want to know her. We used to be really close, and I have so many questions. I don’t know if I should ask them though.” Everly considers this, realizing that maybe she does want a relationship with her sister. She can’t think of a good reason not to, other than that it triggers her anxiety to think about it. Carrie would tell her to face her scary emotions, and in this situation, Everly supposes that means facing vulnerability and the possibility of opening up to someone who could hurt her.
“There you go.” Frankie nods their head once, a solid confirmation. “It sounds to me like your heart knows what you want, you just gotta listen .”
Everly squints her eyes. Listen? She thought she knew where this conversation was going, but now she’s not so sure. Sometimes Frankie’s logic can be a bit hard to follow.
A slow smile creeps across Frankie’s face, causing Everly to lean away from them in slight alarm.
“Listen to your heart!” they belt out, as they jump up and grab Everly’s hand, pulling her to her feet with them. “When it’s talking to you, listen to your heart, there’s nothing else you can do!”
Frankie spins Everly around on their way to the door, laughing and waving off her accusation that they’re singing the wrong lyrics as they make their way next door for some perfect afternoon book shopping.