Chapter 11
Chapter eleven
LEE
Ileft Maggie’s and took a walk down by the river, not ready to go back to the hotel. Not ready to face whatever I was avoiding. Ryan, who’d given my mother’s party the slip in favor of a historical trolley ride through the city, texted to say he was stopping by a bar before heading back. Typical.
I paused at one of the old picnic benches by the water, the kind Maggie and I would hang out on as kids, and sank into it like it could somehow offer me answers.
The sun had just dipped below the horizon, casting the city in shadows that stretched long over the river.
I stared out at the dark water, watching as the city flicked on its lights, like Savannah was starting to wake up as the night crept in.
My phone buzzed again, snapping me out of my thoughts.
“Hey, baby,” Janelle’s voice was smooth, cool, but there was something else underneath it. Something familiar I wasn’t sure I was ready to deal with. “How was your momma’s party? I was waiting to hear from you.”
I let the words hang there, like a reminder of everything I was trying not to think about. There was an ache in my chest, something I couldn’t ignore anymore, even though I was pretty damn good at it.
I pressed the phone to my ear, but all I could hear was the city, the rush of the river, and the whisper of my own thoughts.
Thoughts of her.
In all the excitement that came with the day, I had forgotten to call Janelle before the party started.
Instead, I was creeping around my parents’ house, stalking my ex-girlfriend until I found her in a bathtub, then watching with amusement when my idiot brother tried to pull a fast one on her and she wasn’t having it.
My whole day had been centered around Magnolia, but that was nothing new when I was on my home turf.
“I’m sorry, doll. Today just got the best of me, I guess. How’s Nash?”
Janelle yammered on about her trip to the gym, brunch with the girls, and the four hours she spent shooting some outfits for an upcoming Instagram promotion. The more she talked, the more my mind drifted back to Maggie.
“Are you listening, sugar?” she cooed. I’d caught the tail end of her saying something about the paparazzi.
My phone buzzed again with a text from Ryan.
RYAN: Turns out, this bar I’m at is owned by a gorgeous redhead. She looks crazy familiar. You should stop by.
I glanced down at the message, and a knot tightened in my stomach. He was at O’Malley’s. And Lord only knew what was going to come out of his mouth.
“Janelle, I have to run. My momma needs some help cleaning up after the party. I’ll call you later,” I said, hopping off the picnic bench and moving as fast as my feet would take me toward Magnolia’s bar.
“Love you,” she said, for the first time in our quick courtship.
“Same, bye.” I didn’t know what possessed me to say it, but I did.
And it was obvious that I didn’t feel it, so saying it was stupid. I’d probably just opened a door I wouldn’t be able to shut without a major fight. It felt uncomfortable. Guilty. A flicker of regret passed through me as I imagined the hope on her face just before I hung up on her.
But that feeling was short-lived because I moved briskly through the darkened streets of Savannah toward that old bar on McDonough Street. I stopped by Sixpence Pub quickly for a bourbon in a to-go cup, trying to appear like I had been out on the town instead of sulking down by the river.
I’d been up in the apartment earlier, but pushing open the door to the bar felt surreal.
Back in high school, the bar was like our unofficial hangout spot—a common room for the five of us.
Cole let Charlie, Dane, and me hook up a video game system to the big TV while the girls did homework—or secretly plotted our demise.
We’d all munch on pizza from Vinnie Van Go Go’s and sip cold sodas from the fountain behind the bar, the place buzzing with the kind of energy only teenagers can bring.
I stepped into the dark barroom, surveying the empty pub before me. Ryan sat at the long wooden bar to my right, and the tables that peppered the length of the room were empty. As was the stage.
When Cole was running things and the bar was in its prime, local acts from all over Georgia would come to sing at O’Malley’s. I remember begging Cole to let me grace the stage.
“Welcome to O’Malley’s,” a short, voluptuous bartender called as I let myself in.
Her hair was tied up in space-knots on the top of her head, and she had her O’Malley’s t-shirt cut to reveal her ample cleavage and tied tightly in the back to show off her abs.
At first glance, she looked somewhat familiar, but I couldn’t place her.
I scanned the bar for Maggie and found her doing busy work on the other side of the room.
“What’s up, my man!” Ryan hollered, and Maggie, who was busily washing dishes, finally looked up. Her face fell.
I took a seat next to Ryan, and Maggie quietly fixed me a Jack and Coke, setting it in front of me after finishing what she was doing.
“Thought I got rid of you today.” Her tone was aggressive, but I saw the small trace of a smile playing at the corners of her lips.
“Well, we can’t let this clown out on the loose unattended, can we?” I patted Ryan’s back, and then leaned into my drink and took a generous sip.
“It’s nice to see you in here again,” Maggie said.
She looked a little more relaxed, as she normally did when she was behind the bar, and it was as if the moment that passed between us less than an hour ago hadn’t even happened.
She leaned over the bar and shot a quick, sideways glance at Ryan. “Your friend is very, very drunk.”
As if on cue, Ryan shot his head up. “Hey, where’s the chef? She’s smoking hot.”
Maggie and I both scoffed and rolled our eyes.
“Well, she should be gracing us with her presence momentarily. She’s just finishing things up at the Wilder house.” Maggie vigorously wiped at nothing on the bar, shooting glances at the door every now and again.
“Is my brother stopping by? Maybe we should go,” I offered when I caught on.
“I don’t think so. I haven’t heard from him since, well, the incident.” She let out a long sigh and topped off her own glass with some Diet Coke.
“Oh snap, did I miss some drama today?” Ryan perked up, and the familiar-looking bartender slowly made her way down to our end of the bar so she didn’t miss any of the good gossip.
“Nope. No drama, just a good ole fashioned Savannah shindig.” Magnolia shot daggers at her employee, who scooted back toward the opposite end of the bar to continue her side work.
“I’m sorry,” was all I could offer, and Magnolia shrugged, locking eyes with me while sipping her drink.
“Stop apologizing,” she said quietly. For the first time, I noticed how tired she looked. It had to be a lot, juggling the bar, a boyfriend, her social life, and the contributions to Savannah society that my mother had roped her into.
I shot her a sly smile. “I just can’t think of anything better to say, I guess.”
“Kasey here has it bad for your brother. Let’s not give her any more ammunition.” Magnolia turned to busy herself by the register, and I studied Kasey a bit.
It took me a moment to place her, but then it all came back.
She went to high school with us and had the biggest crush on my brother.
Of course, time and circumstance made her look somewhat older and a little worse for wear.
I remembered a few early mornings when Dane was home for his holiday breaks, and she would creep down the staircase of my parents’ house, slowly and quietly so she didn’t wake Momma and have to face her wrath.
Deciding not to let Magnolia in on that little tidbit, I changed the subject. “So, how long have y’all been seeing each other?”
Magnolia let out a long, dramatic groan. She knew this was coming at some point. If I wanted her friendship back—and I absolutely did, more than anything—I was going to have to accept the world she was living in now.
A world in which I no longer existed.
She finally looked up at me, a hint of weariness washing over her.
“A few months. Things got a little murky after my uncle passed away, so I wouldn’t exactly call that period romantic, but he was by my side the entire time.
Never left it. I don’t know if that was because of the friendship we’d had all our lives or our new dating relationship; it’s hard to tell.
He helped get everything together for the memorial, helped out with the bar when I had a few nervous breakdowns here and there. He’s a great person. I just…”
“I should have called. I’m really sorry about that,” I interrupted, partly because I don’t think she really heard me when I told her so outside of Clary’s and partly because I didn’t want to hear her go on about her relationship with my brother anymore.
Even though I was the idiot who asked in the first place.
“Saying sorry again, huh? But you should have, you’re right.” She leaned over the bar again, resting her chin on her hands. “But that’s in the past, and there’s nothing either of us can do about it now. What’s done is done.”
Our eyes met again, and we held each other’s gaze for a few beats, silently sharing a conversation only we could hear. Regret and sorrow hung heavily between us.
And a tinge of forgiveness.
She may not have wanted me to say that I was sorry a thousand times over, but I was.
And she knew it. When you’d been friends with the same group of people your whole life, sometimes you didn’t have to say the big things over and over because you’d been there through everything.
Through braces and puberty, through first kisses and fights.
First loves, first breakups, and first heartbreaks.
We’d done that all together. So, when you told someone you’d known your whole life that you were sorry, they knew when you meant it.
And if they loved you, like they’d always loved you, they’d forgive you.