Chapter 15
Fifteen
Now
CJ
Liv’s already holding her hands up in surrender as she enters the kitchen.
"Before you yell at me," she says, "I had no choice."
I stomp over to my now-former best friend to wave my gloved finger in her face. "You had no choice but to conspire with my biggest enemy—"
"Second biggest.“ She gestures at the hot pepper factory I’ve got going on behind me.
“—my second-biggest enemy on an elaborate plan that runs parallel to my elaborate plan without mentioning anything to me or trying to stop him or, I dunno, giving either of us a heads-up?"
Liv sucks in her bottom lip, then releases it with a pop.
"Yep," she says. "That's pretty much the long and short of it."
I throw my hands in the air. "Why? I thought we told each other everything.”
“Everything?” Her arched eyebrow shuts me up.
“I mean, mostly. Almost everything!”
“Right. Almost,” she says. "As I recall, I told you every last embarrassing thing I went through with Jonesy and Snake-Hips Santa, including—"
Her cheeks turn pink, and it fries the majority of my anger.
Since we met in college over ten years ago and became sister soulmates, Liv’s been the well-behaved one to my loose cannon.
Surprise was an understatement when she confessed that she let the Santa Claus stripper get her off in the VIP room of Crimson Lounge last December, only to discover that the dancer with the talented fingers was also the hot waiter she was obsessed with.
Her grand love story made my entire dating history seem tame.
“Anyway,” she says, pressing the backs of her hands to her flushed face, “I’ve been an open book, but you clam up every time someone says Wyatt's name.
In fact, the last time I brought him up, you shoved your fingers in your ears and started singing Taylor Swift at the top of your lungs until I stopped. "
“Which should be a sign that I want nothing to do with him.” I flounce back to the tray I’m building. “So what makes you th—”
“The geese are loose!”
Drea’s shout rings through the kitchen, and all activity grinds to a halt. I haven’t known the girl long, but I’m guessing this is the most excited she’s been in her whole life; the grumpy cat expression she and her big brother have in common is nowhere in sight.
“You guys, Wyatt’s chasing them! Come on!”
Liv and I exchange a glance, then scramble out of the kitchen after her, all three of us skidding to a stop behind an open-mouthed Becks.
The ballroom’s in shambles as all six geese a-laying waddle their way through the horrified crowd, honking and hissing at the humans in pursuit.
“What happened?” I ask in awe.
Becks doesn’t turn away from the chaos as one of the servers launches himself at a goose that’s paused to nudge a dropped napkin while the guests at the nearby tables scream in terror and scrambles to stand on her chair.
The goose darts away, and the server hits the floor with an oof.
“One of the ballerinas pirouetted into the holding pen and”—Becks mimics an explosion—“geese. Everywhere.”
“It’s so beautiful,” Drea whispers, and all I can do is nod. Then my mind blanks because there’s Wyatt.
His jacket’s off, and he’s brandishing it like a matador in an attempt to direct one of the birds toward its frazzled handler. He’s apparently some kind of poultry whisperer because the capture effort is successful, leaving the room with one less loose goose.
When he pauses to push his hair off his forehead, he notices the four of us gawking and winks. “Don’t worry, ladies. No geese will be harmed.”
Liv and his sisters applaud while everything south of my navel starts to glow like lit coals.
His white shirt clings to his shoulders and arms, his goddamn sleeves are rolled up, and I’m hit with the inconvenient reminder of how easily he carried me over the 5K finish line two years ago like I weighed nothing, which I absolutely do not.
Dammit. Nobody should be having these kinds of thoughts about their enemy while he’s sprinting after geese with his forearms on display like a Victorian woman flashing ankle.
“He looks so much better than last summer.”
I didn’t mean to say it out loud, but on the heels of the memory of Wyatt running with me like a bona fide superhero is the memory of the alley last year when I was startled by his weight loss.
Becks hears me and nods. “Doesn’t he? It was scary there for a while. Mom looked better and better, but Wyatt just kept getting worse.”
Drea wraps an arm around her sister’s waist. “He fought through it,” she says.
“He always does.” Becks rests her head on Drea’s shoulder as they watch their brother capture another goose and Darby hustles the now-sobbing kiddie ballerinas out of the ballroom.
“So he’s… better… now?” I ask hesitantly.
“Oh, yeah,” Drea confirms. “Back to being Wyatt.”
“Ladies and gentlemen!” Howard’s amplified voice pierces the hubbub. “Your patience, please! The situation’s in hand, and we’ll be back to normal in a jif.”
“A jif?” Drea asks.
“Who gave Howard a microphone?” I ask.
Liv stands on her toes to peer over the crowd. “Looks like he bullied it out of the event coordinator.”
Sure enough, Howard’s standing next to poor Julia, holding a lavalier mic so close to his mouth that every p pops unpleasantly.
The frazzled Oakwood employee manages to wrestle the mic-pack out of his hands and clip it properly to his lapel, which only serves to amplify every muttered curse.
It also picks up the slide and rustle of his jacket against the mic as he waves his arms in a useless attempt at directing the search-and-contain team.
Thankfully, Julia manages to signal Patty, who’s running the AV booth in the back corner near the kitchen, and Queen Patty kills the feed.
“Awww, boo.” Becks pouts. “I think it’s over.”
The goosey reign of terror does seem to be at an end, as with a final bit of the protesting, the last honking bird is escorted to the pen with its brethren.
Although Julia reaches for the mic pack still attached to Howard’s lapel, he bats her hand away and stomps back to his table and lord only knows what kind of speech he might have planned for later in the night.
“Well,” I sigh. “It was nice while it lasted.”
The sisters bop off to resume their server duties, and I’m about to do the same when Liv stops me. “Don’t go too far.”
“Why? I was thinking about changing.” I glance down at my elfiness. “As hot as this look is, the food’s all spiked, and I have a kickass party dress waiting for me.”
“Of course! But you're going to want to stick around for eight maids a-milking."
“Really?” I hate how curious I am about what else Wyatt’s got planned. “Is it cows? Did he raid a dairy farm?"
"Even better.” Liv crooks a finger. "Come on."
We circle the perimeter of the room until we reach the hidey-hole between the two big Christmas trees. Between the twinkling lights and the sharp pine smell, it’s not the worst place to pass the time while we wait for Wyatt’s next stroke of “Twelve Days” genius.
“Getting back to the subject at hand…” she starts, and I groan.
“No! Please, no more Wyatt lectures.” I drop my head into my hands. “I don’t care, okay? I know everything I need to know, and I don’t want to talk about it any more than I already have.”
“You haven’t talked about it at all, though.” Liv sounds hurt, which hurts me. So I listen. “Since we were eighteen, I watched you get into fights and hold grudges and cut people out of your life, and when you do, they just… cease to exist for you. You don’t think about them at all.”
“True,” I say. “My MAGA aunt? That asshole Richie? Miss Stephenson, who put me in the slow readers group in first grade? I don’t know them.”
“Of course you don’t. You’re an international assassin.”
“I’m a corporate consultant, actually.”
She waves off my correction. “But here’s the thing…
you think about Wyatt. He exists for you, which means it’s not just hate.
My guess is that he hurt you somehow, and that means at some point, he had the power to hurt you.
I don’t know how or what or why, but I know it’s way more complicated than just hate for you. ”
My jaw falls progressively closer to the floor as my supersmart best friend lands punch after punch to my tender underbelly.
"How did you—"
“Best friend privilege.” She squeezes my hand. “And I hate that you left me in the dark about whatever happened between you two.”
“I’m sorry, love.” I wrap her into a hug but prop my chin on her shoulder instead of burying my face into her neck like I want to out of respect for the amount of glittery makeup I’m wearing.
“I did some things I'm not proud of, maybe the worst things I've ever done. He’s right to think terrible things about me.” A sob catches in my throat. Carrying this thing with Wyatt’s been so fucking lonely, but I didn’t realize how much until right now.
Liv pushes me back to look me in the eyes. “Really?”
“He did terrible things right back,” I say quickly, defensively. Then I sigh and let it all out. “I fell in love with him the night we met."
Her hands fall from my shoulders in shock. “You? My chronically single, flings-only friend?”
“Yeah.” I swipe roughly at the tears on my eyelashes.
“And then we—” I shake my head. “It doesn’t matter now.
But I tried to fix it, and it just made things worse.
Now every time we see each other, it's like we go out of our way to add to the misery, but underneath it all, I think he might actually be the guy that I met that night. And it makes me so furious and so sad for both of us. And then Reese—”
I’m horrified by the tears that escape to track down my cheeks, and now Liv’s the one wrapping me into a hug.
"He wasn't with her by the time Hollis and I got together, but she sounds horrible. Easily ninety-eight-point-three percent less awesome than you.”
“One-point-seven percent as awesome as me still sounds too high.” I sniffle. “They're actually a lot alike in some ways and really different in others. More importantly, she's a heinous snake who stole something massive from me, and if I were a slightly more evil person, she'd be next on my list."
"Yeah, well, she lost Wyatt,” Liv says, "but I'm not sure you ever did. Not like she has.”
I give a watery laugh. "Sure. One amazing night and then seven years of open hostility, insults, and warfare. And now tonight…”
“Tonight?” she asks.
I try not to smile, but it slips onto my face anyway. ”It's been fun,“ I confess. ”Fighting with him is fun. It lets me forget how he feels about me for a little bit.”
“I bet it's the same for him.”
I nod, brushing the tears from my face
“It’s more than just hate, Livvy,” I whisper.
“I know,” she whispers back. “And that’s why Hollis and I agreed to keep you both in the dark. Wy broke up with Reese and didn’t look back, but when your name comes up, he turns into a Shakespearean insult generator.”
“Oh, great.”
“And you,” she continues, “act like a wet cat stuffed in a bag when anyone breathes his name in your presence. Hol and I love you both and know that you’re both going to be in our lives, so we want you to work it out, one way or another.”
“What if that ends up being a murder-suicide?”
She rolls her eyes. “Drama queen. I’m just saying, if you get a chance to talk to him tonight, really talk to him, take it. And listen when he tries to talk."
"Tell him that," I mutter.
“Trust me, my man is on it.” The walkie-talkie on her hip squawks, and before I ask why I didn’t get one of those, she shushes me. “It’s time!”
Max and his band bring the volume down for the next “Twelve Days” verse as eight women walk into the room holding infants. I recognize two of them as friendly acquaintances from volunteering around town, and one of them I know from my short work on the Sounder audit before I got booted.
"What are they—" I start, and then clap my hands over my mouth in delight when all eight women calmly sit down at the empty table in the center of the room, unbutton their shirts, and start breastfeeding their babies.
"Eight motherfucking maids a-milking," I say slowly.
"Even better," Liv says smugly. “It’s a protest against Sounder.”
I gasp. “That’s right! Howard shortened the parental leave last year and removed the lactation room, right?”
“Welcome to the nurse-in,” she says as a dozen more Sounder employees distribute fliers to the guests. Liv darts out of our hidey-hole and grabs one for me.
“Incredible,” I breathe as I review the sheet with their concisely stated concerns and the request that Sounder return to the humane policies from before. “Good for them.” If I wasn’t already so damn conspicuous, I’d grab a stack of flyers and help them wallpaper the room.
“Want to guess whose idea this was?"
I look up from the flyer and shake my head. ”Please, no. I can’t take any more.”
Liv pats my cheek. “Then I won’t say it.”
“Fuck. He’s such a good guy.” I press my hands to my heart to hold in the confusing swirl of emotions.
“You should go get changed into that gorgeous dress,” Liv says.
Oh no. Now I’m picturing Wyatt seeing me in it, his eyes darkening with—
“Dammit,” I mutter. “Okay. I’ll need help with the zipper, though. Can you do it, or send in one of the girls?”
She salutes. “Get going. I’ll send someone in.”