25. Quinn
25
quinn
There are specific siblings you call for certain things.
When you need sunshine and rainbows, you call Ainsley.
When you need money, you call Simon.
When you need a slap across the head, that’s a Maeve call.
When you need to know a person’s detailed life history but only have a first name, you call Stella.
The problem is, when you need someone to get you drunk and tell you the hard truth, you call me.
Which is a problem, because I’m the one who needs to get drunk.
Correction: I am drunk. Now I just need a sibling to come over and tell me what the hell to do with my life.
To tell me to get my head out of my ass and stay in Rolling Hills.
And, to see if they know if I’m actually in love with Porter McCoy.
Because I think I am.
Fucking forehead kisses. They get you every time.
Which means that I have to tell my sisters the secret I’ve been keeping from them for eight years.
Quinn: SISTERS!!!! MOUNT UP!
Maeve: What the fuck, Quinn?
Stella: I know you keep bartender hours now, but you know the rest of us don’t.
Ainsley: Is everything okay?
Quinn: No, everything is not okay!
Stella: Are you drunk?
Quinn: Maybe. A little.
Ainsley: Where are you?
Quinn: The diner.
Stella: Why are you drunk at the diner?
Quinn: Because I can’t get drunk at the bar.
Maeve: Why can’t you get drunk at the bar?
Quinn: Because they know me there.
Stella: Everyone knows you, Quinn.
Quinn: Exactly. That’s why I have to be stealth. And you need to be stealth when you come meet me. Wear all black. Oh! Maybe we can?—
Maeve: Stop what you’re thinking right there. I’m a mother and married to a man who the tabloids love, I can’t be causing havoc in my hometown.
Stella: Also, who said we’re coming to meet you? I’m in my pajamas.
Quinn: Well then let’s have a slumber party! You come here and tell me what to do with my life, because I clearly can’t make that decision. And in the morning Charlie will make us waffles. What do ya say, sisters?
Maeve: I say you’re drunk. But I’m never going to pass up a chance to fix your life.
Quinn: There’s the Mama Maeve I know and love!
Ainsley: I’m coming in my pajamas.
Stella: I’m not even putting on a bra.
An hour later—which also could be counted in four shots of whiskey—my three sisters walk into the dimly lit diner, where I’m currently slouching in a booth with one phrase bouncing around in my head.
I’d miss you too…
What the fuck did he mean by that? Clearly, he heard what I said to Grace, but did he have to say it out loud? With a forehead kiss.
A forehead kiss!
I never understood the hype of those. They seemed kind of silly when I’d hear women talking about them. But I get it now. It’s because you can still feel it hours later. And somehow, it’s the most intimate thing we’ve done, which says a lot.
“Why are you down here?” Stella asks. “And why are the lights off?”
I shrug as I spin the shot glass around in my hand. “I didn’t expect to end up here, and I didn’t bring my apartment keys. But I knew Charlie hid a stash of booze in the cabinet, and I caught one of the cooks who was leaving. My timing was impeccable.”
Maeve slides in across from me. I know she chooses that seat because she likes to look me in the eye when she’s telling me what to do. “What happened?”
Ainsley places a tray of waters down before sitting next to me. “Or did it finally hit you that you need to make a decision about, well, everything?”
“Oh Ainsley Mae, so much has happened over the last two days that I don’t even know where to start.”
Maeve rips the shot glass from my hand and replaces it with a water. “At the beginning. Talk. Now.”
Because I’m drunk and slightly scared of Maeve in this moment, I do as she says. It’s a longer story than what I told Porter earlier, but that’s because drunk me keeps trailing off. But by the end, I tell them about Quinn’s Book Crew and my not-really, but kind of, offer from Shirley.
When I wrap it up, everyone’s eyes are on me, but it’s Stella’s that are making me curious.
“What?”
She tilts her head like she’s trying to figure out a clue. “There’s more.”
How does she know? I mean, I know there’s more, I’m just not ready to tell them yet, because if I say words out loud it makes them real. “There’s not anything more.”
Stella shakes her head. “Sorry, sis. Not buying it. Because while your little army of rebel readers is cute and all, and I can see where that, combined with your talk with Mrs. Metcalf, can have you a little flustered, it wouldn’t be driving you into the arms of Jack Daniels.”
When did Stella become Maeve? “It’s nothing.”
God…why can’t I bring myself to tell them? I want to. That’s why I called them down here tonight. It’s on the tip of my tongue. But now that we’re here, I can’t seem to form the words.
“Bullshit,” Maeve says, her mean mom face on. “Tell us why we’re here and what’s really fucking you up right now.”
“It’s…” I try and rack my brain for the words. “I…Well, see, what hap-happened was…I’ve…Back a long time ago, in a galaxy…”
“Oh my gosh! Just say it!” Ainsley yells. “Say that you’ve been hooking up with Porter and now that you moved in with him things are weird. And I’m guessing because now that you’re drunk and have been crying, you realize you love him?”
I’m rarely shocked. Like, it takes a lot for me to be still and speechless.
But if I wasn’t sitting down right now, I would’ve pulled a fainting goat and dropped right down on this floor from Ainsley’s outburst.
“How…what…when…what the fuck, Ains?”
“Actually,” Stella says. “We all know.”
My head snaps to the other side of the booth, where both Stella and Maeve are fully smirking.
“What do you mean you all know? Who’s you all?”
“In our defense,” Stella begins. “We only just figured it out. But when we started piecing together the clues, we realized that if we would’ve talked much earlier, we could’ve solved this puzzle weeks ago.”
I try to open my mouth to say something, but when nothing comes up, Ainsley reaches over and helps snap it shut.
“There we go.”
“Can someone please fill me in, because I was supposed to be dropping the bombs on you guys tonight, not the other way around.”
“Gladly,” Stella says, sitting up a little straighter. “We all first noticed things the night we went to the bar when you first came back. Right after you quit. We thought it was weird that Porter brought over all that food.”
“Which we were thankful for,” Maeve said. “But we’ve been going to The Joint for years, and Porter has never brought over free food like that. Also, there were looks.”
“There were no looks.” I protest.
There were definitely looks.
“And then there was the night when I saw you driving away from mom and dad’s,” Ainsley says. “I might’ve never had a one-night stand, but I know that you only leave a house at two in the morning for one thing.”
“Maybe I needed something from the pharmacy?”
Ainsley quirks a brow. “Did you need something from the pharmacy?”
Stella holds up a finger. “That would be called a dick-scription, I believe. Take once a day for glowing skin and sore legs.”
The three sisters are cracking up at Stella’s joke, which I’d find funny if this didn’t have to do with me.
“Okay, enough!” I yell. “So what, because he brought us food, a few looks, and Ainsley saw me leaving the house for an unknown booty call, all of a sudden y’all knew?”
Maeve shakes her head. “You know, I had a suspicion last year. So after that night, I started a chat to ask them?—”
“Whoa!” I interrupt. “You have a side chat without me?” When the dust settles, that might be the thing I’m most mad about. Now I know how Simon feels.
“It was to confirm suspicions.”
“But still, that’s not confirmation,” I counter.
Stella is then all smiles. “That’s where I come in. Well, and Jenny.”
I’m slack-jawed as Stella tells me about how she put on her rhinestoned FBI hat to start investigating if there was something more between Porter and I. All it took was one visit to The Joint when Jenny was bartending to get all the dirt.
And not just from Jenny. Harry and George, too. The biker guys who come in on the weekends after rides. Even the customers who only come in once a month said they suspected something.
“So you’re telling me,” I say slowly, still processing. “That not only do you three know, but every customer at The Joint knows? Which means…”
“Every person in Rolling Hills knows.”
Ainsley wraps her arm around me. “Congratulations, sister. You and Porter are officially the worst-kept secret in Rolling Hills.”
I dramatically throw my head into my hands on the table. “We were so careful. So cool about it. For so long we did so good!”
“Apparently not cool enough,” Stella says. “The only thing that no one can put their finger on is how long it’s been going on.”
“Because if my suspicion was right,” Maeve continues. “Combined with stories that Stella heard at the bar…then this has been happening well before you came back to town.”
I nod. Guess I’m airing out all the secrets tonight. “I need y’all to promise that you’re not going to freak out when I tell you.”
Stella and Ainsley both draw Xs over their hearts. Maeve just lifts an eyebrow.
“Eight years.”
There’s silence for a second before Ainsley whoops in a cheer. “I win!”
Of course my siblings would take bets on this. Hell, if this wasn’t about me, I would’ve organized the pool. “What was your guess?”
“Right on the money,” she says. “When we were chatting, for some reason I remembered the night of Porter’s dad’s funeral. I never thought about it until we started putting the pieces into place, but you two were both gone for a long time that night. And because I was the only sober one there, I think I’m the only one who realized it. I always thought it was coincidence until…”
“Until you realized the only relationship I’ve had in that amount of time was a friends-with-benefits who I used to have a crush on in high school?”
Ainsley nods. “Exactly.”
“You liked Porter?” Stella asks. “How did I never know that?”
“One, most girls did. He was that guy. And two, because she never told anyone,” Maeve says. “Because our sister here turned him down every time he asked her out.”
“What! Why?”
I look to Maeve, who probably knows the answer, even though I’ve never said the words out loud. Back then I told her I didn’t like him like that. We both knew I was lying, but she never called me out on it. But since tonight seems to be about truths, might as well be honest with them.
And to myself.
“Because back then, I was convinced that guys like Porter McCoy didn’t date the Big Girl Bankses of the world. And I thought that if I said no, I’d save myself the eventual heartbreak when he woke up from the weird dream state he was living in where he asked me out on a date.”
“You know that makes zero sense,” Stella says.
“To sixteen-year-old Quinn it did,” I defend. “I convinced myself it was going to happen.”
“But why?” Ainsley asked. “You were Quinn Banks!”
“Exactly,” I say, but not with the enthusiasm that Ainsley just had. “I was Quinn Banks.”
“What does that mean?” Ainsley asks. “I’m not being funny. Talk to us Quinn, because I have a feeling whatever that girl was going through, you’re still battling that demon.”
God, she’s right. Did she transfer to the psych floor at some point?
“I learned early on that being funny got me attention,” I begin.
“A case study should be done about how stereotypical middle child you are,” Maeve jokes.
“Exactly. Once in elementary school, a kid called me fat. A little bully being mean. But instead of telling the teacher, or calling him a name, I pulled a prank. Now, instead of kids laughing at me because a kid was being mean, they laughed with me because of the awesome funny thing I did. And thus began thirty-plus years of using humor, pranks, and sarcasm to deflect any words that could be thrown at me.”
“Honestly, that makes complete sense,” Stella says.
“In high school, I realized that my pranks came with popularity. All of a sudden, I was a little cool. Seniors knew who I was, and not because I was Simon or Maeve’s younger sibling. The day Porter started hanging around me, I didn’t know what to do. I mean, he was hot, you know?”
“Still is,” Stella says with a smile.
“You don’t have to tell me. He does this?—”
“Quinn!” Maeve yells. “Focus.”
“Oh. Sorry. Where was I?”
“Porter started talking to you and you freaked the fuck out.”
“Oh! Yes, anyway. When he asked me out, I couldn’t believe he was serious. I thought he was being nice. Or he was bored. Because I knew the name Big Girl Banks was being thrown around in his circles. And in my mind, no one with that nickname really could go out with a guy like Porter.”
“Oh, Quinn,” Ainsley gives me a side hug. “I hate that people made you feel like that.”
“If it had only stopped there, I probably would’ve been okay. In college, I tried to start dating. I felt confident. It was a new start. People didn’t know about my antics in Knoxville.”
“You tried to date when we were in college?” Maeve asks. “Did I never meet any of them?”
I shake my head. “No, because there weren’t any. You don’t get dates when stereotypical sorority girls exist. I wasn’t skinny or perky. I wasn’t in a sorority. I was a big girl with a weird sense of humor who cursed more than the baseball team.”
I pause for a second when I feel Maeve take a hold of my hand across the table. “Take your time.”
I nod and suck in a breath, knowing it’ll just be easier if I keep it going.
“College came and went, and then I needed to figure out what was next. I didn’t want to stay in Knoxville, and all I could think was that if I moved back here, I’d forever be Big Girl Banks, the girl who once hid all the spoons in the cafeteria. I needed a fresh start, and the dart hit Arizona.”
“It still pains me to know that’s how you picked where to go,” Maeve says.
“I know, but it worked. That’s when I thought I truly found where I was supposed to be. I was a teacher. I had my degree. It was a new city, where no one knew who I was. I even started dating.”
I trail off, remembering the douchebag that really I need to thank for starting this whole saga.
“The guy I caught cheating on you,” Stella says.
I see light turn on for Maeve. “The night of Porter’s dad’s funeral.”
“And then you disappeared for a while…”
I nod, not needing to confirm anything. “That was the first night. We thought it was going to be a one-and-done.”
“Until it wasn’t.”
I tap my nose to Stella’s observation. “One time became two. Two became three. Before I knew it, every time I was home, it happened.”
“Wow,” Ainsley says. “That often? For that long?”
“I don’t know whether to be mad or impressed.”
Same, Stella. Same.
“That’s our history. Things started hot when I came back to town, but I cut everything off when I moved in. I thought we could quit cold turkey. And we have, don’t get me wrong. It’s just… Tonight he kissed my forehead and said that he’d miss me if I moved. And he stood up to Emily the other day for me at the diner and that was hot as fuck, watching him go all alpha like that. And oh, did I tell you he always tries to slide me a water because he’s insistent that I’m dehydrated?”
I didn’t expect a rousing answer to that last question, but I didn’t expect silence either. “What? Why are y’all looking at me like that?”
“Are you serious?” Stella asks. “Do you really not know?”
“Clearly I don’t, or y’all wouldn’t be here.”
The three of them have a silent conversation in front of me—kind of rude—before I’m struck on the back of the head by a hand I didn’t see coming.
“Ouch! Ainsley!” I rub the back of it because I didn’t know she could hit, let alone hard. “What’s that for?”
“Because, we love you, but you’re being an idiot.”
“Harsh words from the nice one,” I say.
“Okay, you want harsh words? Listen up.”
Oh shit. Mama Maeve’s being mean.
“You love Porter. You don’t know it yet, which is fine, but you do. I’m going to guess he loves you because forehead kisses aren’t casual. And I’ve seen the way you look at him and now that I know what the looks mean…well, frankly, you’ve loved him for a lot longer than before tonight, and you’re just a little slow to the game.”
Ainsley chimes in. “And then there’s the fact that you send us twenty pictures a day of a baby that’s not yours, so I know you’ve grown attached to that little angel.”
“And let’s talk about the job,” Stella says. “I know you think everyone in this town still think you’re the hot mess from high school, but it sounds like the perfect job is at your feet, and only idiots would pass that by. And you, my sister, are no idiot. Though maybe you are if you didn’t know that you’ve been in love with Porter for years.”
I hear my sisters’ words. I really do. But…
“Whatever you’re thinking, stop it,” Stella says. “Speak the words out loud. Don’t be in your head.”
Damn them for knowing me so well.
“It’s just…can I come home? I know I can, but it’s fucking terrifying. And Porter? What if he doesn’t want this? What if I’m making it up? What if he still is just being the nice guy from high school and I’m reading things wrong?”
“Or, what if you’re wrong.”
I look over to Ainsley, who’s apparently channeling her inner Maeve right now. “Excuse me?”
“I said what if you’re wrong. What if everyone wants you back? What if Porter wants you to stay? What if the school would love to have someone with your experience? What if for once in your life you stop thinking that everyone is still calling you names and you finally see that everyone wants you here, where you belong?”
I know I’m still a little drunk, but Ainsley’s words are blowing my mind.
“Damn…” I say. “I expect that shit from Maeve.”
She laughs and takes my other hand. “Well, I had to get mean to get through to you. I apologize.”
“Don’t,” I say as I wrap my arms around her. “It’s what I needed to hear.”
The rest of the night is spent sobering me up, and stealing leftover pie from the coolers, as I tell them the rest of the Porter story over the years. The details I wanted to share but didn’t. The times we almost got caught. We laugh, and I do feel lighter when we say our goodbyes.
But still, as I walk up to Porter’s house, there’s one question I can’t get out of my mind: What if?
What if I move back?
What if I tell Porter I want more?
What if I let myself be brave and do things I never thought I’d do?
What if I’m vulnerable?
Just…what if?