Chapter 19 #2
Rosie chuckled and wafted her hand at the screen.
“I haven’t told her, if that’s what you’re asking.
She probably knows in the sense that she knows all women who spend any time around her fall in love with her.
” She pointed at Lori. “And you can’t tell Gabe.
Promise me you won’t spill your guts to your new best friend. ”
Lori started coughing hard. “Damn COVID,” she said when she’d finally stopped.
“Promise me.”
Lori sipped a glass of water. “I promise you Gabe isn’t my new best friend,” she said and winked. “I could never replace you. Gabe hates shopping, for starters, and I need your impeccable fashion sense in my life, always.”
Rosie arched her eyebrow and leaned in toward the screen until her nose touched it. “Promise me you won’t tell Gabe I’m in love with her best friend.”
“I promise.” Lori rolled her eyes. “But why aren’t you telling her?”
“Duh.” Rosie lightly tapped her forehead with her knuckles.
“Our situationship is supposed to be super simple. There’s certainly no room for complications like lovey-dovey feelings.
Shay has a very specific view of how intimate relationships work, and she’s convinced herself that they’re more trouble than they’re worth.
She’s got a lot of family stuff going on, and maybe, if she ever sorts through all that and its inherent baggage, she’ll come to realize that having a partner is more balanced than she thinks it is.
Right now, she just sees them as a black hole for her time and emotions, and she’s got enough of that with her family. ”
“Goodness.” Lori made a funny face. “Sounds like she needs you to be her therapist, not her bed buddy.”
“She could probably use some therapy, but couldn’t we all?
” Rosie rolled her neck and sighed. “And I like being her bed buddy best, so I’m just going to ride the train until it crashes.
I don’t want to miss a single moment of being with her.
My heart is going to break anyway; what’s the point in rushing that along? ”
“If that’s what you want, I’ll support you.” Lori held up her wine glass, and it went fuzzy as she tapped it close to the screen. “And when your heart’s breaking, I’ll be ready with a few bottles of this to drown the pain, just like you were when Katherine broke mine.”
Rosie almost choked on her drink. When she’d stopped spluttering, she widened her eyes and looked at Lori with her best serious face. “You just said her name.”
Lori laughed. “Katherine.”
“Oh my God, don’t say it again, or she’ll materialize right behind you. Since when did she stop being the lawyer?”
“Since we sold the Brewster. I closed the chapter and let it all go.” Lori bounced in her chair a little. “It feels good. She doesn’t hold any power over me anymore, so it doesn’t matter if I use her name or her job title. It means nothing.”
Rosie smiled and sighed deeply. “It’s so good to see you happy again. I thought that woman might’ve broken you for good.”
“No way.” Lori’s expression went all dreamy. “I had to heal so I could be with Gabe.”
Rosie pretended to gag. “Where’s the real Lori? This one’s way too soppy to be my best friend. You’ll be talking about fate and destiny next.”
Lori stuck out her tongue. “No, I won’t. But I do believe the right people come onto your path at the right time. And I was ready to move on when Gabe came into my life.”
“But why did she have to put Shay on my path when I’d just given up trying to find Princess Charming? Or is she just here to tease me?”
Lori pressed her lips together and wrinkled her nose. “I don’t have the answer to that. But it could be that you’re on her path to help her figure out her family stuff. And when all that is done, maybe she’ll be ready to be your Princess Charming.”
“That’s some romantic bull crap.” Rosie snorted. “The only way I can get a girlfriend is by being their therapist first to help them pick through and process their baggage. Great.”
Lori shrugged. “Maybe the reason you became a therapist was to find yourself a woman,” she said and laughed.
Rosie swatted at the screen, but Lori’s words brought her thoughts back to her mom, and her smile dropped. “You know why I got into therapy. Then I got disillusioned with it and left it behind. But while I was in Tijuana with Shay, we did a lot of talking—”
“That’s why you’ve fallen in love,” Lori said. “All the talking. You were fine when you were just having oodles of hot sex.”
Rosie wouldn’t deny it. “Of course it’s all the talking. The amazing sex has just compounded my feelings.” She grinned. “Shay is fantastic in bed. And on desks. And in showers. And—”
“If we’d been having this conversation three months ago, I might’ve been jealous, but I’ve got my own sex machine now, so I’m not… Although, I probably wouldn’t have been jealous, because I didn’t know what I was missing until Gabe.” Lori motioned with her finger. “Carry on.”
“I was saying that all the talking made me remember how much I loved being a therapist. Now that Mom’s gone, I feel like…” Rosie leaned back in the chair, grabbed her wine glass, and took a long drink. She couldn’t finish that sentence, couldn’t be that selfish.
“Hey, please don’t do that,” Lori said when Rosie didn’t continue. “You don’t ever need to censor yourself with me.”
Rosie bit her bottom lip, unsure if she could say the words out loud for the first time.
Doing that would make them all the more real.
“I feel like I’ve got a clean slate, and everything I do can be for me.
It can be because I want to do it, not because I feel like I have to do it, or because Mom needs me to do it. Does that make sense?”
Lori gave her a small smile. “All of it makes sense. I’ve always thought you were a great therapist, Rosie.
I mean, I’m sure you’re great at being a marketeer too—you’ve certainly got Gabe and the gang excited about those tools—but I feel like therapy’s a calling more than a career, you know?
So are you saying that you want to go back to being a therapist again? ”
“I’m not sure. I haven’t had time to think about it properly, since I’ve only just become aware of it.
” Rosie glanced at the urn on the bookshelf.
She’d put it in five different places before settling on that position, as temporary as it might be.
Everywhere else had creeped her out. “I’ve had other things on my mind. ”
“Is she there?” Lori shuddered visibly when Rosie nodded and jutted her chin toward it. “How are you feeling about everything? About your mom?”
Rosie topped up her wine glass before answering. “I’m grieving in a way, but I think I’ve been grieving all my life for the mom I never had. It could be that I’m all cried out.”
“Have you cried?”
She nodded. “But I find myself wondering what I’m crying for. It can’t be for all the good times we had—”
“God knows, the only good thing your mom ever did was give birth to you.”
Rosie couldn’t argue with that. And she appreciated that Lori always had her back. “Do you think your parents will adopt me now that I’m an orphan?”
“I don’t see why not. I’ve always wanted a sister.” Lori chuckled. “It figures that you’ve processed quickly. Your relationship had been bare minimum for a while now.”
“Yeah, I guess it has. I’ve been pulling away since college, but I’ve never been quite able to make that final separation.” She shrugged. “Now I don’t have to because Mom’s done it for me.”
“Did you get the full story of how she died?”
Rosie recounted the details of her mom’s demise.
When she finished, she waved the piece of paper with her mom’s last wishes on it.
“Now I’ve got the memorial to organize, which includes some weird-ass requests, including black roses, which I don’t think even exist. And her estate to finalize, though that shouldn’t take long since she didn’t own anything, and I’ll bet that if she had anything of value at her house, Keith will already have taken it. Not that I have that address anyway.”
“So you never met this guy?” Lori asked.
“Nope. I suppose I should be grateful that he even called me. He could’ve just left her there in Mexico, and I would never have known what happened.”
“Small mercies.. How did Aunt Sheila react?”
“She didn’t. Not really. It was like I’d told her I painted my nails a different color.” Rosie shrugged. “She just wasn’t interested.”
“Is she coming to the memorial?”
“She said she would, yes.”
Lori took another sip of her wine, and Rosie took the opportunity to drink away some of the bile that had risen when she thought of Keith. She hadn’t spoken to him for long, but he’d managed to leave quite the impression.
“So what do you need me to do?” Lori pulled a notepad into focus and held a pen in the air. “I’m poised and ready to scribble.”
Rosie waved the offer away. “That’s okay. You’re sick. I can handle it on my own.”
Lori shook her head and wagged her finger. “I tested negative today. I’ve just got this nasty cough and some residual symptoms, but I’ll be fine. I’m really sorry that I couldn’t go with you to Tijuana, but nothing’s stopping me from helping you any way you need.”
“You not coming turned out just fine.” Images of Shay, mostly naked, and all the positions they’d taken each other in, covering almost the entire hotel room flicked through her mind, and she grinned. “Is it bad that I had such a good time with Shay when I was handling my mom’s death?”
“No. I think celebrating you’re alive is the best thing to do when you’re dealing with someone else’s death.”
Rosie liked the instant nature of Lori’s response. “That sounds like a bumper sticker.”
Lori laughed. “It’d have to be a pretty big sticker.”
“Anyway, enough about me.” Rosie shifted to lay on the couch to get more comfortable. “Tell me what’s been going on with you and Gabe.”
Lori groaned and harrumphed. “I haven’t been able to see her, except on screen and through the window when she brought Max back from Ellery’s.”
“Wait—what? Is Max okay? Did something happen while I was away?”
“Yeah,” Lori said. “Gabe was exercising Max off the lead, and he jumped over one of the fences. But he landed funny and went lame, and Gabe had to carry him back.” She clearly tried to suppress a grin.
“And that makes you smile because?”
“Because Max weighs seventy-five pounds, and Gabe carried him for over a mile.” Lori flexed her arm and sighed deeply. “I do love her muscles…”
Rosie rolled her eyes. Gabe’s arms were almost bigger than her thighs. That kind of physique had never done anything for Rosie, but Shay’s lithe, yoga body was another matter entirely. She snapped herself out of her little fantasy and refocused. “And Max?”
“Gabe took him to Ellery for an X-ray, but it was just a bad sprain, so she bandaged him up and sent him home. Now he has the cone of shame on his neck and is staying with Beth for a few days. She says he’s feeling very sorry for himself and keeps trying to bite it off.”
Rosie chuckled at the image. “Even a gorgeous dog like Max can’t make one of those look good,” she said. “How did Gabe react?”
“She acted like she was okay, but I think she was disintegrating inside. After everything that they’ve already been through together, they didn’t need a broken leg or a torn CCL. She wanted to take care of Max herself, but the garage was too busy.”
Rosie dipped her chin and fought to relax the tightening vice around her chest. “Because Shay was with me.”
“Stop that.” Lori wafted at the screen again. “We had plenty of people here to care for Max. Shay was the only one able to care for you.”
Rosie sucked in a breath and nodded, recognizing the reaction borne from years of not being important enough to her mom to care for her. Maybe now that her mom was gone, she might be able to finally rid herself of that stubborn behavior pattern. “So how long before Max is fully recovered?”
“About a month, to be safe.”
“That’s good,” Rosie said. “And Gabe? How long before she’s safe to see you in the flesh again?”
“She’s coming over tonight.” Lori wiggled her eyebrows. “I can’t wait.”
“Given the size of her truck, I suppose Gabe doesn’t need a U-Haul, but when is she moving in?”
Lori shook her head. “That won’t be happening for a while. It’s going great, and neither of us want to rush anything.”
“Isn’t she already staying at your place most nights?”
“You’re getting insider information.” Lori grumbled. “But it’s wrong. She’s not here every night.”
Rosie narrowed her eyes and pointed at the screen. “But your little pouty face tells me you want her to be, even though you don’t want to rush things.”
“Yes,” Lori said. “I know, they’re polar opposites.
But this is Gabe’s first serious relationship, and I’m trying to stay a little cautious after the divorce.
Of course I want to dive headfirst into a new life, but taking things slow isn’t so bad.
I look forward to the time we spend together even more. ”
Rosie could relate wholeheartedly to that last part, though she didn’t want to say that and bring the conversation back to her again.
When Shay had dropped Rosie off at home, she’d declined the offer to come in.
Even though Rosie had expected that response, it still stung.
She wanted as much time with Shay as possible because it was only a matter of time before she realized their situationship had been complicated by Rosie inconveniently falling in love.
Once she figured that out, Shay would bolt faster than her muscle car could do zero to sixty, leaving Rosie to pick up the pieces of her broken heart again. Except this time, Rosie had a feeling it would hurt a whole lot more than it ever had before.