Chapter Twenty-Three Buffalo, New York Present Day #2
“Don’t go anywhere,” Scarlett warned in a dangerous voice. “My friend’s going to order exactly what she wants and only what she wants. And we’ll sit here for as long as it takes for her to come up with it.”
“Actually, I have a few other things I need to do before—”
“See, Scarlett? She has other things to do. Other customers to serve. She can’t stand around at my beck and call all night just because I want her to.
” Chrissie turned to the waitress with a determined smile.
“The martini I ordered is just fine, thank you. Please tell the bartender I appreciate the twist of lime.”
The waitress would have scuttled gratefully away, but Scarlett wasn’t done yet.
“I couldn’t help noticing that you have a piano in the corner,” she said. “Would it be okay if my friend played a few songs? She went viral recently. Maybe you’ve seen the videos? It could be a real boost to your business.”
Chrissie didn’t give the waitress a chance to recognize her. She also didn’t give her a chance to take the drink away. Barely suppressing a grunt of rage, she kicked back the entire martini at once, letting the powerful wave of alcohol light her up from the inside.
“I don’t want to play the stupid piano, Scarlett, and I don’t want a different drink. I want you to stop acting like my whole life has been a waste just because I dared to live it differently than you.”
Instead of reeling back at the sudden venom in Chrissie’s voice, Scarlett leaned forward and clasped her hands on the table.
“Excellent. Now we’re getting somewhere. Tell me what else you’re feeling. Shout it from the rooftops if you have to.”
“Yeeeaah, I’m going to come back later.” The waitress snatched the empty glass as she dashed to safety on the other side of the bar. “And I’m taking all the projectiles with me. I’m getting way too old for this.”
Chrissie barely registered the woman’s absence. Despite the dim lighting and the general buzz of conversation in the background—or maybe because of it—the entire world reduced to just the two of them.
“You’re pissed at me, aren’t you?” Scarlett asked.
For the briefest moment, Chrissie could have sworn she looked pleased by this—happy, even.
“You want to scream and shout and tell me exactly how awful I am for putting you in this position. What kind of a best friend springs an assisted suicide on someone at the last possible second? Who would be awful enough to do that?”
Instead of answering, Chrissie dug into her purse and pulled out another piece of paper—this one with the name of the Royal Mills Motel emblazoned across the top.
Scarlett looked delighted at that, too—that Chrissie, in her fury, would resort to the same tactics that Scarlett had been using all along—but she didn’t care.
She was too busy writing underneath River’s line about Kat being lucky to have her.
Stand by your best friend even when she doesn’t deserve it.
“Oooh, nice.” Scarlett nodded at the page. “What else have you got for me?”
Tell her how much you sometimes hate her.
“Hurtful, but fair.”
Be true to yourself even if Scarlett refuses to accept it.
That gave Scarlett a moment’s pause. “What don’t I accept, Chrissie? How much I’m asking of you? How much I’ve always asked of you?”
Chrissie felt her eyes flood with tears, but she dashed them away.
Hot streaks clung to her cheeks, and she felt sure she’d ruined her mascara, but what did it matter?
There weren’t enough martinis in the world to wash away the feeling of despair that was starting to spread outward from her chest, weighing down every movement until she felt like she was swimming through wet cement.
“I hate playing the piano, Scarlett. Did you know that? I always have. I can’t sit at the keyboard and not feel that other person inside of me—the twin who never was, the brother I only knew for seven years—taking over.
” She held up a hand before Scarlett could say anything.
If she didn’t get this out now, she wasn’t sure when—or if—she ever would.
“I know you think it’s your fault I gave it up, that without your grandmother’s death or Kat to take care of, I’d have become this world-famous classical pianist traveling the world with you, but it’s not true.
The moment I moved out of that house and away from my parents was always going to be the end of that musical road for me. ”
“But you were so good.”
“Yeah, because I spent a literal eight thousand hours practicing. I did the math once. Two hours every single day for eleven years adds up. If my parents had given me a violin or a soccer ball instead, I’d have been just as technically proficient at those things.
All I wanted was for them to see me the way they saw Malcolm, to open up again after he closed them down, but they either couldn’t or wouldn’t, and I was too young to try any other method.
In the end, that’s all I have, Scarlett.
Technical proficiency. Without heart, it doesn’t mean anything. ”
“Chrissie, that’s awful.”
Chrissie rolled her eyes. “Of course it’s awful.
I was a child. One who was hurting just as much as they were.
But if you think me chaining myself to that same instrument for the next forty years will make up for what you did to me—for what you’re doing to me right now—then you’re just as bad as they are.
” She paused, considering. “You know what? It actually makes you worse. Because unlike them, you saw what their indifference did to me.”
“You mean I saved you from it.”
All of sudden, the waitress’s removal of the empty glass seemed like a wise move. “I beg your pardon?”
Scarlett’s strange, glinting delight in this conversation was back.
“You heard me, Chrissie. I’m the one who saved you from them.
I made it possible for you to come to my house after school every single day.
I gave you half my grandmother. And then I gave you half my grandmother’s money so you’d never have to go crawling back to them.
Say what you want about what I’ve done to you since then, but that means something. ”
Chrissie laughed. There was no humor in it, no joy. Just sound and air and the further cracking of a heart that had never been whole to begin with. “You’re a real piece of work, you know that, Scarlett Sanderson?”