Chapter 6
Chapter Six
Frankie
Aya perched on the stool beside me as her wife, Kirby, leaned across the bar at the Salty Dog. The two of them were British, though they’d both lived on Prickle Island as a couple for the last thirty years. It would’ve been sweet to see this loving middle-aged couple if I hadn’t just had my heart stomped all over. Instead, the little, secret looks they gave each other across the bar made me sad.
"She gave you earplugs?" Kirby asked incredulously with a shake of her head. She had shortly cropped coils of obsidian hair and an easy-going smile that many bartenders used to listening to people’s woes had—part bartender, part therapist. “The summer hasn't even started yet,” she added with a tsk, pretending to be offended. “This place is quiet as a graveyard until the first day of summer vacation. And even then, we close up at 1 am, nothing crazy.”
"Besides.” Aya nudged me with her elbow. “We'll be long asleep before it gets rowdy anyway.”
"How does it work, you two having such different schedules?" I wondered aloud. “You'd be like two ships passing in the night."
"We actually are both pretty nocturnal.” Aya gave her wife another adoring look, pouring more salt in my wounds.
I hated how bitter it made me feel, seeing the two of them. It would've been easier to pretend love didn't exist at all than that it just didn't exist for me. This was supposed to be Jake and me. We were supposed to be a happily married couple, giving each other these secret looks, building a life together. He’d ripped my whole future from me.
"I do a split shift," Aya said. "Most of the time I'm done by 8 am and Kirby and I sleep most of the day and get to spend the afternoons together before work." She looked at me. "As a chef and an avid baker, I'd imagine you're used to keeping all sorts of hours too."
I chuckled at the “avid baker” line. I might have nervously chatted their ears off about different methods for making sourdough before I’d finally calmed down enough to settle into actual conversation.
“Yeah, my mornings are so early, some consider them late nights too,” I said. "I used to wake up at 3 am to get the dough out of the curing baskets." I pursed my lips, considering. “But I think I won’t get up until 5 for this job.”
“What a rogue,” Kirby said, throwing a bar rag over her shoulder and scooping ice into a tall glass.
I sighed, thinking of my kitchen back at Frankie’s Café. I’d never have one of those sacred early mornings baking in that kitchen ever again.
"That was one hell of a sigh," Kirby said, sliding a fruity wine spritzer across the bar to me. "Spill.”
I told the two of them about Jake, about the sudden breakup, about the run-in with his new fiancée, though I carefully left out the part about Finch rescuing me. These two seemed to be like honorary aunties of the Lachlan family, and I didn’t want to be dragging someone they’d known from infancy into my own drama. Aya and Kirby gasped and groaned at all the appropriate times, validating the whole story.
"You know the hot, young thing won't last," Aya said with a wave of her hand. "How old is he?"
"Forty-one,” I said, “Twelve years older than me.” They both grimaced at that. “When I was twenty-one, I’d thought it was a charming age gap, that I was just so mature that the only man I was interested in was someone serious.” I could tell they were wearily disappointed in that statement. I wondered how many similar stories they’d heard from across this bar. “I thought he was responsible and mature. I thought I was making a smart decision for my future in picking him . . .”
“Oh, honey.” Aya groaned.
"Yeah, there's no way that rebound fiancée is going to last," Kirby said. “Talk about a midlife crisis. He will be crawling back to you before you know it."
"Do you think so?" I hated how hopeful I sounded. Did I even want that?
“Not that you should take a sleazeball like that back,” Aya added.
“Either way, you need to win the breakup.” Kirby pointed at me. “There is no sweeter victory than when someone breaks up with you and you just start thriving —even if it’s pretend.” She tipped her chin to my phone of the bar. “You need to find someone to make him jealous. Eye candy you can post all over your socials of a hot guy?—”
"Or girl or person," Aya interjected, and the two of them studied me for a second as if trying to discern who would be my perfect match.
"You need to find a nice, sexy, ten levels up of a person and plaster them all over like a freaking ‘I’m winning at life’ billboard.”
“I am so far from winning at life,” I grumbled.
“Pff,” Kirby balked, waving her hand. “Post all the photos of you living on a luxury island, feeding tigers and monkeys, and making award-winning food to the adoration of thousands per day, with some sexy French bartender.”
“Sexy French bartender?” I asked.
“We know people,” Aya said with a shrug. “I bet Chloe would pretend to be her girlfriend, or . . . what about Francois?”
“Ooh Francois, he’s working at the Holloways’ this year. I’ll ask him.”
“No, no.” I waved my arms into an X. “Listen, you two paint a very nice picture, and I really appreciate all of your support,” I said, looking between the two of them. “But let me just lick my wounds for a little before you pair me up with Francois or Chloe or whoever.”
“Good to know that both are an option,” Kirby said with a wink.
I’d always known I’d liked women, but I’d never dated one before so it’d never really felt like something worth advertising. I’d paired up with Jake right after college, and it’d just seemed like, decisions had been made. I’d been sorted. I hadn’t needed to pick apart my sexuality anymore even if when I dreamed about being with someone, I only ever dreamed about women. Yep, best not to scrutinize that revelation too closely.
“Take as much time as you need,” Aya said, rubbing a hand across my back. “A lot of broken hearts have sat on these bar stools. We’re very good listeners, okay?”
I almost wanted to cry as I sipped on my drink and nodded. “Thank you.”
“If we’re coming on too strong, just tell us to back off,” Kirby added. “We have a tendency to adopt all of the zoo staff, but we’re nosy bitches at the best of times so just tell us to leave you alone if we’re prying.”
“No, it’s really nice actually,” I said. “Thanks.”
These two felt more maternal toward me than my own mom ever had. I loved my parents, they were good people and they always supported me and my siblings in theory, but they were never really interested in our lives. They didn't think parents should be friends with their children. They were good caregivers, but not particularly loving, and that had left all of us kind of adrift when we’d left home. Now they lived in the Caribbean and hardly ever called except for holidays. I kept slightly closer tabs on my siblings, but no more than any other social media friend from high school.
I thought I'd make my own family . . . with Jake.
Maybe Kirby was right. Maybe I still could have Jake. Maybe I just needed someone to make him jealous enough to come crawling back. I’d seen the way he’d looked at Finch when she’d put her arm around my waist—he’d been angry, jealous, possessive. Maybe I just needed to push him a little further and he'd remember the life we'd built together. I could start a new Frankie's 2.0, and we could get married and have kids and stick to all the plans I'd been grabbing onto for the last eight years . . . or maybe I should put Nair in his shampoo, rotten fish in his ventilation systems, and destroy him piece by piece like the asshole he was. I still hadn’t decided.
I raised my glass to Aya and Kirby. "Thank you for letting me stay here this summer. I’m looking forward to getting to know you two better.”
They clinked their glasses with mine. "We only let serious staff members stay here. Evie must really like you to even suggest it.” Kirby took a swig of her beer. “With all of your accolades, I can see why.”
"I'm excited to have a fellow staff member that doesn't have Lachlan as a surname," Aya said. “You, me, Kirby, and Mateo are seriously outnumbered by the Lachlan clan."
"Also, technically Hawk’s girlfriend, Hannah, isn’t a Lachlan,” Kirby cut in.
“Yet,” Aya said. “I give it less than two years.”
“There’s too many names to remember.” I groaned, rubbing my temples.
“I’ll draw you a diagram,” Aya said, and I gave her a grateful look.
“I need to go do inventory before bed." Kirby leaned over the bar and kissed Aya and then looked at me. "And if you have any leftover muffins at the end of your workdays, I'm quite partial to raspberry white chocolate," she added with a grin.
Aya shouldered me. “You're about to become everyone's favorite person.”
“You’re the second person today to tell me that.” I offered her a half-smile. My first thought was too pathetic to say aloud: I only wanted to be one man's favorite person, and right now he was engaged to someone else.