Chapter 12
Juliet
My feet hurt. The muscles in the backs of my calves were sore. The backs of my thighs, too. Hell, the fronts of my thighs. With every movement, my body complained loudly that it wanted to lie down. Instead, I stood still.
“I think it looks good,” Mom said.
I glanced at myself in the dressing room mirror. I didn’t know if good was a word I’d use for how I looked in this dress—a bridesmaid dress.
As bridesmaid dresses went, it wasn’t a crime. There was no tulle, and there were no flounces. The other bridesmaids had picked the dress, and it was a slim-cut bodice flaring into a knee-length A-line skirt. It was lavender, and around the waist was a narrow belt of the same fabric. It looked like something from Mad Men, dressed up for a wedding.
I squirmed, flexing the aching muscles in my legs, and the seamstress tutted. “We need to make a few adjustments,” she said bluntly. “It’s too big here.” She hooked a finger into the extra fabric pooled unflatteringly around my boobs. “We’ll take it in. And we’ll take out the waist.” Her hard finger jabbed that body part, feeling the fabric. “We don’t want the seam to pop.”
There was nothing like a dress fitting, I realized, to make you feel inadequate.
The other bridesmaids sat on the sofas around the small room, waiting for their turn. A tray of mimosas sat on the table. Vicki was on a chair, wearing leggings and a sweatshirt, watching me with an unreadable expression. She hadn’t spoken to me yet today.
“Let’s see it with the shoes,” Mom said.
Hayley turned to the stack of shoe boxes, pulling out the one with my name written on it in Sharpie. Everyone was staring at me. They have nothing else to look at, I reminded myself. This is supposed to be, like, a fun thing. I think. I took the shoe box and pulled out the high heels inside. They were my size, because Mom knew my shoe size without asking. I hated high heels, but the hounds of hell couldn’t make me complain. I put the shoes on the floor and stepped into one, releasing a little groan as my calves screamed.
“Are you okay?” Mom asked.
“Yeah. Just a pulled muscle in my leg.” All of the muscles in both of my legs.
I had thought myself pretty fit for a woman who was allergic to any kind of gym. Playing onstage isn’t for the weak, and it burns calories like a motherfucker. I wasn’t an athlete, but I had assumed I could do whatever came my way.
Then Finn had taken me out dancing.
At a nightclub. An actual fucking nightclub. Had I ever been to a nightclub? Maybe when I was twenty-one, but not since. It was such a rich-asshole thing to do.
Finn had brought me to some dark, throbbing club where, in our early thirties, we were the oldest ones there. The kids had glow sticks. The cover charge was outrageous. The price of a drink made me gasp. I didn’t know any of the music. It smelled weird, I had no desire to see the bathrooms, and not only the guys gave me the creeps, but some of the girls did, too.
Finn pulled me onto the dance floor, and we danced our asses off until two in the morning.
It was surprising, but only at first. I had sunk into the rhythm, feeling everything—the fight with Vicki, the night, this weekend—roll off me and away. My body was already loosened from the—let’s face it—absolute wallbanger of an orgasm that I’d had. Finn had let me lower my guard and lose the automatic defenses every lone woman has at a nightclub. He’d stayed by me all night, losing himself the same as I did but never letting me out of his sight.
He was an incredible dancer, in full mastery of his body, his rhythm innate. When he put his arm around my waist and pulled me to him, our hips moved together without thought, his hand on my lower back, my hip. In the Uber back to the hotel, he’d admitted that he’d started dance lessons at age nine. You don’t get to be a pop star without dancing, singing, and music training, and to be a teen star, you put in those hours as a kid.
Even though we’d ground on each other for hours, and even though we’d done much more than that in my room, Finn didn’t try anything last night. He walked me to the door of my hotel room at the end of the night, then took the elevator to his penthouse suite. He didn’t even kiss me.
I had to do yet another set of calculations in my head. When a man takes you dancing, when he has his hands on you for hours on the dance floor, it’s because he expects to fuck you. That’s the deal. If he’d pressed me, I probably would have done it.
And then what? I knew what. This morning, I’d be putting it behind me, chalking it up as just another experience. Fun, probably fulfilling, but that was all. I’d be twisting it in my head, finding new ways to tell myself that Finn didn’t care about me really, that he couldn’t hurt me. That he hadn’t hurt me. That I was fine.
But he hadn’t even tried. After giving me an orgasm. What was going on? I didn’t know Finn’s language, couldn’t translate it.
I turned in the three-way mirror, looking at myself from a side angle with the shoes on. They looked nice. They were agony, but they looked nice.
“Lovely,” Mom said. “It just needs the bodice fixed.”
“Maybe I should stuff toilet paper in my bra instead,” I said.
Hayley snorted a laugh. The corner of Vicki’s mouth moved in a smile.
“Those 1950s bras,” Melanie said, cupping her hands to illustrate. “The ones shaped like cones.”
“Anyone have Madonna’s number handy?” I asked. “I think she owns a few.”
Melanie laughed. Petra gave me a grin in the mirror.
“Girl, you’re lucky,” Hayley said. “You don’t even need Spanx under that. I’ve had two kids. Spanx are what get me through life.”
“Same,” Vicki said from her chair. “Spanx should be sponsoring this wedding.”
“Do you know what boobs do after you have kids?” Hayley asked. She pointed down, lowering her hand dramatically. I snorted a laugh.
The seamstress ignored us, wrapping her measuring tape around my chest. The tape went right over my nipples. She peered at the numbers, frowning.
“I get it,” I said drily. “You don’t have to rub it in.”
Even Mom laughed at that one.
Finally, I was done. I stepped out of the shoes and changed out of the dress, putting on my sweatpants and tank top again. I popped two aspirin from my purse and washed them down with one of the mimosas, which I downed in a gulp.
I sank onto a sofa, my muscles weeping in gratitude. It was Hayley’s turn to stand in front of the mirrors in her dress. She had a mother’s body, with a soft belly, generous boobs, and thick upper arms. She had tied her brown hair in a messy knot on top of her head.
She let out a gusty sigh as she looked in the mirror. “I’ve been trying to diet, I swear.”
Petra blew out a raspberry.
“Don’t diet,” I told Hayley. “You look hot.”
She looked at me in surprise. I winked.
“Well, well.” Hayley struck a sassy pose that exasperated the seamstress. “At least someone thinks I’m sexy.”
“You know it, baby,” I said.
She straightened again, smiling, and I knew that though it was a joke, she felt a little bit better about how she looked in the mirror as she changed the subject. “Petra, Finn Wiley is still single. This is your chance,” she said.
Vicki groaned. “Hayley, stop.”
“What? I’m married, not blind. You know my position on this, Vicks. Your brother-in-law is hot, and I’m allowed to say it when it’s just us girls.” She looked at Petra. “You’re single, Pet. This wedding is your shot to land a hot new boyfriend. Get on it.”
I froze in my seat, clutched by unreasonable panic. Finn and Petra? He hadn’t said anything except Petra is nice. Had I missed something?
“I just got out of a relationship,” Petra said, her tone implying that they’d had this conversation more than once already. “Besides, Finn doesn’t see me that way.”
“He’d see you that way if he saw you naked,” Hayley said. She lifted her arms at the urge of the seamstress. Her expression was calm, as if she too found this conversation familiar. “Get out of your shell. Make some moves on him. Dazzle him. Find a way to at least show him your tits.”
“Goodness,” Mom said.
“Your ex is an asshole,” Melanie said to Petra. “Dating a celebrity is the best revenge.”
Petra sunk lower in her seat. I could tell she hated this conversation. “I’m not getting into another relationship,” she said.
“Then hook up with him, Pet,” Hayley said patiently. “Use him as a rebound. He’s hot, and he’s right there.”
I was starting to get annoyed. Finn wasn’t some piece of meat to be carved up. Also, Petra was uncomfortable. I took another look at her slouching posture and decided to rescue her. “What am I, a ghost?” I said flippantly. “Maybe I’ll jump his bones.”
The reaction in the room was telling. Petra’s posture eased. Hayley made a sound that was exactly like a scoff. Like the idea of me and Finn was funny.
And Vicki…Vicki looked both horrified and dismayed. Like me assaulting Alistair’s brother was her worst nightmare, the most humiliating thing she could think of. And the fact that I’d suggested it—crass, punk Jules, doing her embarrassing shit yet again—was a disappointment.
I’m not like that, I wanted to shout at her. Except I was. Finn had been in my bed last night, his weight on me, his fingers doing magical things that sent me into another dimension. He’d showed up without my asking or inviting him, but that didn’t matter, because I hadn’t kicked him out. The look on my sister’s face said that I should have.
And I wasn’t fucking sorry.
“Josie, you’re single,” Hayley said to Mom, because she had already dismissed the idea of me and Finn as ridiculous. “Why don’t you get yourself a younger man?”
“Goodness,” Mom said again.
“Josie, are we scandalizing you?” Hayley asked, amused.
“I think Finn is sweet,” Mom said, tugging at Hayley’s hem and turning toward the shoe boxes to find Hayley’s heels. “He deserves to find someone nice after all he’s been through. He’s handsome, sure, but he’s far too young for me, and you know it. He’s not my type.”
Hayley’s eyes went wide. “Wait. What is your type?”
“Help.” Vicki put her hands over her ears. “I don’t want to have this conversation.”
“Speak for yourself,” I said. “I want to know Mom’s type.”
“Stop it.” Mom waved me off, blushing. Holy shit, Mom had a type. What was it? She hadn’t dated while we were growing up. She always said that after Dad left, her only priority was raising us girls. She must have dated someone, sometime, but she’d kept quiet about it in front of us.
I looked at Vicki, but she had shut her eyes, miming that she didn’t want to know. I racked my memory for any men Mom could have been sneaking around with. A neighbor? A coworker? Was she going to bars? Oh, Jesus—was Mom on the apps?
“Changing the subject,” Melanie said. She turned to me. “I’ve been dying to ask. What is Denver Gilchrist like in person?”
Jesus, these women were man-crazy. It felt like high school.
“Denver is my coworker,” I said firmly. “He has a girlfriend.” I didn’t want my family thinking me more of a slut than they already did, and I wasn’t here to dish dirt about the Road Kings, even if I had any. Besides, it was the truth. Denver’s girlfriend, Callie, was a pianist. She was quiet, introverted, and talented, and Denver adored her beyond all reason. If he was aware that any other women existed, he gave no sign of it.
“Okay, so you’re not fooling around with him,” Melanie said. “Got it. But what’s he like?”
I shook my head. Being starstruck wasn’t my style, and I’d spent dozens of hours with Denver by now. With all of the band. Denver was sexy and he was an incredible vocalist. He had been prolific lately, writing one song after another. He was also moody, distracted, and usually lost somewhere in his own head. He was a picky eater and he liked silly jokes. One day he’d be in a dark mood that only Callie could pull him out of, and the next he’d be sweet again. He napped in the songwriting room sometimes, one arm flung over his eyes. He had no blood family, and he loved his bandmates like brothers.
“He’s just a guy,” I said, unable to put all of that into words. “They all are. They’re the best band I’ve ever played with. They work hard, but they’re also fun.”
“Are there groupies?” Melanie asked, and for a second that question shocked me. The idea of groupies was so far from what the Road Kings were about. “No,” I replied. “No groupies, no drugs. Just music. We’ve been deep in rehearsals, and we just played our first gig. It went well. We lined up some nights at the Paramount.”
“You’re playing the Paramount?” Petra asked. “That’s so cool.”
Everyone was looking at me. Mom and Vicki were listening, which was weird. Mom and Vicki never asked about my music, never listened to what I had to say about it. At least, they hadn’t years ago, when I’d given up trying.
I smiled at Petra. “It is cool. I’ve played the Paramount before.”
Vicki’s voice was quiet. “Years ago.”
The Muffins had played the Paramount. It was a venue that held three thousand people, and we’d played it at the biggest we’d ever been, opening for Sleater-Kinney for two nights. Those two nights were the top of my punk rock career.
“Yeah,” I said, agreeing with Vicki. “Years ago.”
In the hallway outside the dressing room, I texted Finn, because my need for him was weirdly desperate. I wanted to hear from him, even if it was just a few words in writing.
Juliet: How are your blue balls today?
His reply was immediate.
Finn: It’s a serious medical condition. Don’t make fun.
I felt myself grinning at my phone.
Juliet: Just wank it in the shower and you’ll be fine.
Finn: Thank you for the advice. When was the last time an actual, real live man gave you an orgasm, by the way?
Juliet: I haven’t been counting, but it was more than one president ago.
His reply was a sad-face emoji, which made me laugh.
Juliet: Are you doing your tux fitting with Alistair?
Finn: Seriously? That was hours ago. Our fitting took ten minutes, tops.
Well, hell. Vicki had all of these bridesmaids, so we were making a day of it. Alistair only had Finn, and they had gotten it over with in minutes. Men.
Juliet: So where are you, then?
Finn: Alistair and I have the kids. We just left Home Depot.
Juliet: Home Depot? Do kids like Home Depot?
Finn: You’re asking me? I’m just following the actual dad on this expedition. They seemed to like it fine. Now we’re going to the grocery store.
Juliet: So parenthood is mostly about running errands?
Finn: That’s what I gather, yes. Are you still at the fitting?
Juliet: Almost done, and then we’re going for dinner. Are you coming to that?
Finn: No, I’m sticking with Alistair. He’s the childcare parent for the weekend. He says it’s to free Vicki up to spend time with her friends. And with you.
I stared at those words, overanalyzing them as if they were from a boy I liked. Had Vicki mentioned spending time with me specifically? Or had she only said she wanted to spend time with her wedding party? Had I screwed it up by making the crack about jumping Finn?
The world doesn’t revolve around you, Jules!
She wasn’t impressed with me. We had almost bitten each other’s heads off last night. She had probably arranged with Alistair to keep the kids so she could see Melanie, Hayley, and Petra. They were her friends, as she’d shouted at me last night. They mattered.
Well, fuck it. I had never made Vicki or Mom happy, and I wasn’t starting now. I craved Finn, even though I’d last seen him at two this morning, when he’d left me at my door.
And I was very, very bad at following rules.
I sent him another message.
Juliet: I want to see you later, jackass.
Finn: Good. You know where to find me. I’ll be in my suite by seven.