Chapter 27
Chapter Twenty-Seven
FRANKIE
T here’s nothing I hate more than feeling like I’ve been played. I’ve got no evidence, only vibes, but my instincts have been sharpened by my time in court and I’d swear that Ted just manipulated me into agreeing to organize the crush. My guess is that he’s convinced it’s vital to the community that an Armstrong family member runs the event, and the only Armstrong family member who’s present and not pregnant is me.
Chiara may also have hinted to him that I would prefer to see the baby once it had been cleaned of birth goo and swaddled in a fresh cotton wrap. That isn’t entirely untrue. Mostly, I’d prefer to avoid listening to my sister in pain and worrying whether everything is going to be okay with her and the baby. If I’m running the crush celebrations, I’ll be too busy to settle into full worry mode. I’ll be able to reduce it to a mild background anxiety. As I said, I don’t really know Ted but I do know he reads people well. And with Chiara feeding him intel behind the scenes, he’d be perfectly placed to play me like a Hammond organ.
Okay, so Ted couldn’t have known for sure that I’d accompany Danny, but maybe he had enough Chiara-intel to assume it was likely that I would. Maybe he even contrived the sale of that Rolls Royce to lure Danny into coming, so that I’d come with him? Now, that’s clutching at straws but it’s not entirely impossible. Ted might not even have an “acquaintance”. It might be his car and he might have five others, one in each of the other garages, so he could happily part with one. He distracted Danny and charmed me with tiny cakes, and I fell right into his genteel trap, curse him.
Ugh. No point in keeping up this line of thought because it’s done now. Ted got his wish – I’ve taken on the organization of the crush. I’ve roped Danny in, too, and now we’re both committed. No doubt Chiara will have texted Ted the instant Danny and I left the bar, so we can’t back out. Curse them both.
But to be honest, my irritation at being used isn’t my biggest concern. This afternoon, I got a proper glimpse into Danny’s world, where money is plentiful and huge numbers change hands with barely a blink. All right, Danny was astounded by what happened, but it wasn’t completely foreign to him, was it? When I inherited fifty grand from my late aunt, I thought it was a fortune. It allowed me to put a deposit on a house, which I didn’t think I’d be able to do for at least another decade. Yet Danny made close to that amount in a single afternoon, and given what he told me about his business, a quick calculation tells me he could earn well over five times my annual salary. And who knows what kind of trust-fund income might be coming his way?
It’s hard to tell how much money the Durants have, because having got to know the family a little better, my conclusion is they’re what I call conservative rich. They think expensive cars and designer-label clothes are vulgar. They’d never own yachts or helicopters, and they certainly would not have gold taps in the bathrooms. They ensure any philanthropic work they do flies under the radar, no names on buildings or charitable foundations. God forbid that their photographs ever appear in the society pages.
But even if they’re not the kind to flash the cash around, my guess is they still have, in Danny’s words, a load of moolah. And today, I got to see how people like that operate, which is a stratosphere above anything I’ve experienced. I can guess why it shook me up so much. Danny and I might find we’re perfectly compatible in every way, but I’m not sure I could ever feel comfortable in his world.
I’ve talked about my fears before, of being vulnerable, of being rejected. But my greatest fear is being forced to be someone other than my true self. And I would have to make so many compromises to fit in Danny’s life. His family might have accepted Shelby but I am a whole different ball game. Shelby wins even the most curmudgeonly people over because she’s relentlessly positive like Dad, whereas I tend to be cautious and suspicious and keep my distance.
And despite the fact she makes no effort at all, Shelby fits society’s conventions about attractiveness. She and Nate were the picture-perfect couple on their wedding day, like they might as well have been standing on the cake. Danny likes to look good, and he cares what people think of him. It’s possible that how I look and who I am might not measure up. And I refuse to be with someone whose life pressures mean they can’t accept everything about me. That they can’t recognize and honor my whole true self.
Danny noticed I was quiet on the drive back, but I told him I was thinking about what was involved with the crush. We sat with Nate and Shelby, ate our burgers, made jokes about the effects of spicy pickle. Danny was surprisingly low key about the sale of the Rolls, and now he’s off completing paperwork and I’m trying to focus on Lorelai and Rory.
“We should watch The Lost Boys movie,” I say. “Lorelai’s dad is the head vampire in it.”
“Ew no!” Shelby protests. “I can barely cope with the scary bits in Ghostbusters !”
I laugh. “There are no scary bits in Ghostbusters .”
“My point exactly!” says Shelby.
“Weirdo.”
“ You’re a weirdo.”
Nate’s in the kitchen doing … something.
“Settle down, you two!” he calls out.
“Weirdo,” whispers Shelby. “And you can’t hit me! I’m an invalid!”
I might have lifted up a cushion.
“Don’t make me come in there!” calls Nate.
Shelby and I exchange a grin and settle down to watch Gilmore Girls . Rory’s in a bad mood. Luke’s offering her pie.
“Does Luke remind you of Cam?” Shelby says.
“Apart from the flannel shirts, absolutely not,” I reply. “Cam would never run a diner, for one. He’d have to talk to more than one person a month.”
Shelby goes quiet. Too quiet. Something’s bothering her.
“What’s up?” I demand. “Spit it out.”
My sister screws up her face apologetically. “Cam thinks I should tell Mom right now about the pre-eclampsia. He says the baby’s birth will be more important to her than any pilgrimage, and because there’s a strong chance the baby will come early, I shouldn’t risk leaving it too late to tell her in case she can’t organize her travel back home in time.”
I don’t know why, but I’m suddenly furious. That’s not Shelby’s fault, so I take a deep breath before answering.
“Cam’s an expert on Mom now, is he?”
Not deep enough. I sound very snippy. “Sorry,” I mutter, ungraciously.
“It’s okay,” says Shelby. “I was cross at him, too.”
“You were?” Shelby being cross comes round about as frequently as Halley’s comet.
“Because I felt bad because he’s right. I’ve been super selfish,” says Shelby. “I’ve been using the importance of Mom’s trip as an excuse to put off telling her because I hate feeling bad about her feeling bad whenever she’s at the winery. But that’s my issue to deal with and I shouldn’t make it Mom’s problem, too. She deserves better.”
Unraveled, it’s a fair point. “So, you’ll tell her?”
On the TV, Lorelai and her mother are having a to-and-fro. Our mom is not the kind of person you to-and-fro with. She’s the kind who makes you herbal tea and threatens to read your aura.
“That’s what I’m worried about: I’m not sure how to tell her!” says Shelby. “She hasn’t got her phone with her, and she didn’t leave me a copy of her itinerary. This was meant to be a proper pilgrimage, with no outside distractions.”
“Did she leave an itinerary with Cam?” I’m back to being snippy.
“He’d give it to me if she had.”
Shelby rests both hands lightly on her baby bump, caressing it. As I watch, I see the bump shift, as if a tiny internal earthquake has caused the surface to ripple like a wave. It shouldn’t be a surprise, but it is. There’s a real, live baby in there! My niece-slash-nephew! The first Armstrong-Durant grandchild!
Mom’s first grandchild…
Damn it.
“You know which route she’s taking, though, don’t you?” I ask.
“I think so. She said she was starting in France, and that the whole walk is about three hundred miles. She’s spreading it out over two months, so she can get to know the towns along the way. There are set places people stop at, apparently, and she wants to spend a few days in each one.”
“There you go,” I say. “If we look online, we can figure out how far she might have come, and where the next stop is. We might even be able to find out where people doing the walk usually stay. If not, we’ll just call every hotel. We’ll track her down.”
Shelby’s smiling and frowning at me. “Are you okay with this?”
“Doesn’t matter,” I say. “It’s the right thing to do.”
“I’m glad you’re here,” says my sister. “I couldn’t have managed all this without you.”
That’s definitely not true, but I appreciate the vote of confidence. I want to tell her about taking on the crush, but Danny and I agreed that he should tell Ava first. He said he’d call her this evening, and that he hoped Chiara hadn’t beaten him to it, otherwise he’d be getting a snake bite burn first opportunity. I said I thought Chiara knew the score on that front, but he shouldn’t wait too long.
I check my phone but there’s no text from Danny yet, and I’m not sure if I want to text him first. It’s ironic. I can come up with a plan to track down my mother like I’m Carmen Sandiego, but I still can’t figure out how to navigate my own feelings.
Shelby’s cueing up episode five. I usually love Gilmore Girls, but tonight, it makes me feel like I’m gently drowning in a giant tub of molasses. Could be worse, I guess. Could be in a tub of lima bean puree.
My phone buzzes. Text from Danny.
Told Ava. She seems OK. Going 2 watch my back tho.
I text back.
Sleep with 1 eye open. C u tmrow. If u survive the night.
He texts back the scream-face emoji and two love hearts. Funny guy.
“Ready?” Shelby’s poised to hit play on the remote.
Good question. Not sure what my answer would be if she was asking me about my life. But seeing it’s about the goings on in Stars Hollow, I feel reasonably safe making a commitment.
“Sure,” I say. “Let’s do it.”