Chapter 7
Seven
If this were just Fran’s house, I’d walk right through that pretty yellow front door and demand my best friend answer all my questions. But as it is, it’s Fran’s house and some man that she married. Some soccer-playing, Tesoro-residing guy that I don’t really know.
And sure, Callum seems nice and he seems to know me. He brought me a diet Dr Pepper with half a lime without me even asking for it last week, but I still don’t know him.
Which is why I stand outside Fran’s house and knock. And knock. And knock.
I don’t know Callum’s schedule, and for all I know, he might like walking around his house on summer afternoons in the nude.
Fran flings the door open, and I halt my next pound just before hitting her right on the nose. “Rose,” she says with the smallest of huffs. Fran doesn’t really get mad—she’s much too sweet. That hasn’t changed. “Why are you thrashing on my door?”
“It was a knock,” I grouch.
“It was a dozen knocks. Just come inside. No need to knock at all.” She grabs me by the arm and yanks me into her home.
“What if Callum’s having an afternoon nap on the couch? I don’t know. He could nap naked.”
“Nap naked?” She drags me over to the couch and pulls me down on the cushion next to her. “He would never. If he’s going to nap nude, he’ll do it in our bedroom. Because you or—” She stops short, then puffs air from her nose and mouth. “People you won’t let me tell you about might walk in.”
“You know the rule. Doctor’s orders. Low pressure. Only give me what I want. I don’t need to know about every person I’ve met over the last six years. We both know my sanity can’t handle it.”
Fran groans and crosses her arms. “Fine.”
“With that said...” I nibble on my lip. “I am here to ask about one certain person.”
Fran straightens up. She’s been waiting for this day. The day that I decide to ask.
I straighten, too, and study my friend. “Margo.”
With that one word, Fran leaps to her feet and heads in the direction of the kitchen.
“Hey,” I say, following after her. “Did you hear me? I’m asking. You are allowed to tell me something,” I snap. “Let’s go.”
Fran whirls around, facing me with one crazed look in her eye. “I’ll tell you something... I’m pregnant.”
“What?” I scrunch my face, trying to make sense of her words.
“I… am… pregnant. It’s twins, maybe even triplets.” She sucks a breath in through her nose, stares at me, then pats her awfully flat tummy. No before or after bump present. “Qu—ads. Quadruple—”
“Liar.” I cross my arms and stare her down. Why is she lying to me?
“Am not.”
“Not normally. But you are not pregnant. If you were pregnant, you’d have hired dancers and there’d be balloons and a party and—you’d do some serious planning to tell me. You would never blurt out that you might be having quadruplets.”
Her jaw clenches and she grinds her teeth. “Fine. I’m not pregnant.” She leans her back against the kitchen counter. “I am pretty good at planning surprises.”
“Not the topic, Franny.” It’s something I’ve heard Callum call her. She would have hated the nickname six years ago, but today she doesn’t seem to mind. “Tell me about Margo.”
“Why?”
I reach for her hand and hold it in my own. “Because I want to know.” I press my lips together, waiting. When she doesn’t speak, I say, “I ran into Robert today.”
Fran’s gasp is shrill and jarring, and the sound has me jolting in place. “That lousy—”
“Hey,” I say, stopping her before she says something so very unFran-like. “He was nice.”
She glares at me. “Ask me anything else.”
“Fran,” I moan. “I want to know. For the first time since my accident, I want to know more. I ran into Robert, and my body didn’t revolt on me. It’s made me curious. I want more. You said you’d help me whenever I asked.”
“This isn’t helping.” She shakes her head, her tone so very serious.
“I know that I can rattle.” That’s putting it lightly. “And that it’s less than fun. But I think I can handle this. I won’t freak out. Promise.”
“Freak out?” she says, her voice shrill. “You’ve been having major panic attacks. You stop breathing. You break out in hives. You—”
“Fran,” I whine.
“And you think the worst time of your life isn’t going to make you freak out?”
“I know it’s been scary. But I want to know,” I whisper.
“Why can’t I tell you all the good things? Why this?”
Sliding up next to her, I wrap one arm around her back. I lean my head on my best friend’s shoulder. “I’m ready for you to answer this one question. Right now.”
“The last thing I ever wanted is for you to relive this.”
“It’ll be different this time,” I tell her.
We make our way back into the living room and settle onto Fran’s plush couch. I cross my legs like a grade schooler during story time and sit facing my friend. I need to see her for this. I need to understand how we feel about this. Because my own feelings are blind and oblivious.
With both my hands in hers, she begins. “You student taught at that prestigious school in South Reno—Clark Elementary.” She says this like I should know.
With the exception of Sierra View, I don’t know any of the elementary schools in Reno.
“Margo was your mentor teacher.” She exhales a trembling breath.
“The two of you hit it off from the get-go. You loved her. You said you wanted to teach just like her.”
“We were friends.” The word “were” is a given. We clearly aren’t friends now.
I was friends with Robert’s wife. Weird.
“You were. You guys even went out a few times. Robert told you that you shouldn’t be hanging out with your mentor teacher. That it was unprofessional—”
“He might have been right. That’s kind of like socializing with your boss.”
“She wasn’t your boss,” she protests. “She was a mentor, and you were very professional.”
“Okay… Then what?”
Her jaw clenches. “Then she met Robert.”
“Oh.” I blink. I had just assumed that she and Robert got together long after he and I were done.
But then Fran had used words to describe our breakup like messy and if murder were morally acceptable, Robert Pattinson would be a dead man.
So—I should have seen this coming. Truly, I should have. And yet somehow, I didn’t.
“Yeah. But it was bad, Rose. Like, Robert didn’t just cheat on you, he lied and lied and lied.
He left you believing you could never trust your instincts again.
He pushed all his bad behavior to the side and made you believe that if you’d been different, if you’d been better, that the two of you would still be together. ”
“Ouch,” I say, rubbing the space over my chest where my heart must reside. Because the idea of Robert behaving so badly hurts. Physically.
“Then—”
Oh, there’s more. Great.
“Margo had told people about them being a thing. Your whole school knew they were together. Your students knew. All while you were in the dark. While you were still with Robert.” She cringes and blows out a tired breath.
“We found out later she let people believe that Robert had broken things off with you and you were being hostile about it all. When really, you had no idea he was seeing someone on the side.”
The pinching pain in my chest grows. “I don’t know Margo. But that doesn’t sound like Robert.”
Fran’s nose wrinkles and her lip curls. “It sounds exactly like Robert. You lost job opportunities because of him. Because of their lies.”
I can’t quite grasp the story she’s painting me.
It’s painful, but it doesn’t feel like it’s mine.
It’s like I’m hearing a story about someone else’s life.
Someone else’s Robert. I’m trying to process when there’s a knock at Fran’s door.
One knock and then a blonde with a baby carrier comes walking right into my best friend’s house.
“Hey,” she says, a pretty smile on her face, her voice winded. “She napped but—” Her eyes land on me and stick there. Whatever else she planned to say is lost to us all.
The blonde from the café last week.
“Oh,” she says. “Hello.” Her throat bobs with a swallow. Clearly, her saying my name at the café was unplanned. She knows the drill. She’s been informed. But like me, she wasn’t prepared for our unexpected meeting. She sets the baby carrier down.
“Hey, Stell.” Fran stiffens. “Sorry, I didn’t realize what time it was.” She stands but glances down at me. “I’m babysitting. Um… Rosalie, this is Stella Graves. She’s married to another Red Tail player. That’s how we met.” Fran’s words are clipped and unnatural.
Of course they are—I’ve met this woman before. I just don’t remember meeting her.
Still, the lousy acting continues. Stella holds out a hand toward me. “Um. Hello,” she says, her eyes locked on my face. “It’s… nice to meet you.”
I give the pretty blonde a quick handshake, and then I bolt for the front door. My heart thumps rapidly and my breaths struggle to come. I feel sick. My body revolts against me. I wipe at an escaped tear skidding down my cheek and attempt to avoid the panic rising through me. “I need to go.”
“Oh no. Don’t go, Rose.” Fran follows after me.
“I’m leaving.” Stella’s hands flail. “You stay. I’ll go.”
I shake my head, which only causes another tear to fall. I peer back at the women, both with tears in their eyes.
It’s strange and odd having a woman you don’t know cry for you—or about you. And it doesn’t help the panic racing through my veins.
“I can’t stay,” I say. And then I’m gone.
I sit inside my car until the panic subsides.
I’m not crying over Robert—I didn’t live through the horror Fran relayed to me. It’s like it was someone else’s life and I heard the story for the first time. That wasn’t my Robert Pattinson. Maybe it was the vampire.
When my breathing is even, I walk up to my house and open the door to the small two-bedroom house that Gram and I are renting together.
If anyone has reason to mourn their relationship, it’s her.
The sweet woman sitting on our couch, feet up on the coffee table, a green avocado mask covering her face with holes only for her eyes, lips, and nostrils, lost the love of her life after sixty years of marriage.
“Rosalie?” she says, sounding like a second-rate ventriloquist.
“It’s me, Gram.”
She keeps her eyes shut but pats the space on the couch next to her. Opera music plays softly over the speakers in our small living room and the lights are dimmed. Grammy is apparently giving herself a spa afternoon.
I plop down next to her, and she opens one eye to peek at me. Sitting up straighter, she blinks her blue-gray eyes open and looks at me. “What’s wrong, my dear?”
“Do you know about Margo?”
“Of course I know about Margo.”
I nod. I’m not mad at her or anyone else. I’m not blaming anyone—though it sounds like I should be blaming Robert. I just don’t know how to. He felt like the regular old Robert today. Not some beast who cheated on his long-term girlfriend. Maybe Fran has misinformation.
“Was it really as awful as Fran made it out to be?”
Grammy’s avocado brows lift on her head. “That friend of yours is overly optimistic about everything. I’m guessing it was much worse than what she presented.”
I scoff and lay my head back, shutting my eyes and wishing I had a gooey mask like Gram’s to block out the world for a time. “I don’t remember feeling hurt or betrayed. It’s an awful story. It’s sad. It’s so wrong. But I didn’t live it.”
“You did—”
“Okay, well, I don’t remember living it. Fran said it changed me.” I lick my lips and peek at Grammy.
“It did. Robert might as well have been a vampire. He sucked the life right out of you. Do not allow him to do it again, dearest. Yes, it made you stronger in the end. But it took a long time to heal, and it made you wary of love.”
I nod. I guess that makes sense. “I just can’t imagine Robert being so cold, so unkind.”
“And maybe that’s the bright side of all this—”
“Bright side,” I sneer, but Grammy holds up a hand. She isn’t finished.
“You are not carrying around the heartache you held before.”
“But according to you, I shouldn’t have the strength that time gave me either.”
She tilts her head in a half nod. “You have plenty of other trials forcing you to be strong, Rose. Don’t worry about that.” She squeezes my fingers, then stands. “Time to remove my mask.”
“Gram,” I say before she can leave. “Do you know anyone named Stella?”
“Of course I do. She’s my pottery teacher.”
I laugh, feeling the tiniest bit lighter. “You take pottery lessons?”
“I’m quite good at the wheel,” she says. “Next time, you can come along. You are the one who got me started.”
My mouth drops, but no words escape. Me? I got her started in pottery? Was that before or after we lost Gramps? My brain hurts—literally from attempting to remember so many things today.
“When I come back, I want to hear about the redhead.” Grammy waves a hand at me. “Did you see him again? Let’s forget about Robert and Margo and talk all about the hunky hunk from the café.”