Chapter 33
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
The Airport
“You look like a different person,” Wyn said as she pulled back from hugging me.
“So, you didn’t like the old version of me?” I asked, pushing up the glasses from the end of my nose.
“You know I didn’t mean it that way,” Wyn said. “I just mean you finally look happy. I haven’t seen you happy in a really long time.”
“Hey, what are we, chopped liver?” Hadley asked, moving in for a hug.
“Ew, chopped liver.” Salem pressed a hand to her mouth.
“Looking a little green,” Wyn said as she hugged her.
I grabbed her wheely suitcase and dragged it to the back of Hadley’s SUV.
“It’s September. Why is it so blisteringly hot?” Wyn asked.
“Random heat wave,” Salem said as she climbed into the vehicle. “The last three days have been completely miserable. I’m living off ice cream.”
“That doesn’t sound so bad,” Wyn said. She took the spot behind Hadley so she could stretch out her long legs.
“It’s been terrible,” Hadley said. “Everyone’s a little bit irritable. Even Jane.”
“You sure that doesn’t have to do with her puking her guts up every morning?” Wyn asked as she buckled herself in.
“That’s part of it, for sure,” Salem allowed. “But it’s more than that. This heat wave has like, put a hot blanket all over town. People are getting into yelling matches over parking spots. I thought Gracie was going to have to break up a fist fight over lemon tarts. It’s been wild.”
“In Huckleberry Hill? Really? That’s something I’d expect from city folk,” Wyn said.
“No one is safe from the heat wave,” Hadley explained.
Wyn looked at me and raised her brows. “What about you? You haven’t said much about this heat wave.”
“Oh, yeah. I’ve been irritable,” I lied.
Hard to be irritable when Brooks and I were reaching for each other in the night. Our bodies slick with sweat and need.
My cheeks heated.
“Liar, liar, pants on fire.” Wyn touched my face with her finger. “I was promised snacks. Where are they?”
“Uh, we ate them while we waited for your plane to arrive,” Salem admitted.
“Can we hit Hawthorne’s on the way?” Wyn asked. “I’m starving. I won’t make it to dinner without a snack.”
“Okay, but we can’t tell Muddy,” Salem said. “She’ll be mad that we hit a drive-thru when she’s preparing a feast for you.”
“I won’t tell if you won’t,” Wyn said.
“They just added a cinnamon apple cider milkshake to the menu,” Hadley said.
“It’s not as good as the pumpkin spice,” Salem countered.
“Well, the only thing to do is taste test,” Wyn said. “God, it’s so good to be here. Video chat is not cutting it.”
I reached over and squeezed her hand. “I’m glad you’re finally here, too.”
“So aside from the heat wave that’s affecting everyone, what else is going on?” Wyn asked.
“I can’t fit into my party dress,” Hadley said. “I tried it on yesterday and it wouldn’t zip.”
“Hence the added cranky,” Salem said.
“No chance you’re carrying twins, are you?” Wyn asked.
“Do I look like I’m carrying twins?” Hadley snapped.
“I don’t know,” Wyn said with a shrug. “But you just said—”
“Do you know anything about pregnant women?” I asked with a raise of my brows.
“Clearly not,” Wyn stated. “I didn’t mean you looked big. I just meant—”
“I know what you meant,” Hadley said with a sigh. “Sorry, girl. I’m not myself.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Wyn said. “I’m not going to take anything personally from you two for the next several months.”
“I’m already uncomfortable,” Hadley explained. “I have to sleep on my back. I share my bed with a goat and a six-foot-three cowboy. And when we have sex, I have to get on top. And everything looks strange from that angle.”
“Where are the Aussie puppies?” Wyn asked. “Are they no longer sleeping in the cabin?”
“They’ve finally moved to the barn,” Hadley explained. “Thank goodness too, because I don’t know what I’d do right now if they still wanted to sleep on the bed.”
“Why didn’t you bring Mildred?” I asked.
“Because she’s not my dog,” Wyn said.
“She seems like your dog,” Salem said. “You take care of her like she’s your dog.”
“She’s not, unfortunately. And I do feel like part of me is missing,” Wyn said. “That little monster has been my companion since the three of you ditched me.”
The words were said in a joking tone, but I knew Wyn was hurt. She felt left out. Like her life was moving in a different direction than the three of us. And she wasn’t wrong. I’d felt like that too.
But now that I had Brooks . . . I understood what had happened to Salem and Hadley.
It wasn’t just that they moved away. It was that they’d fallen in love. That changed everything. That changed your North Star.
We hit the Hawthorne’s drive-thru and sat in the parking lot to eat our meals.
“Fried cheese curds,” Wyn said with a sigh. “God bless the state of Idaho.”
Salem sniggered. “Pass them back up front.”
Wyn handed her the paper bag and then rubbed her greasy fingers together. I gave her a napkin.
“So, when’s your meeting with Mr. Perkins?” Wyn asked me.
“Next Thursday,” I said. “Midmorning.”
“So, after I go back to New York,” Wyn said.
“Yep.” I nodded and took a sip of my butterscotch shake.
Wyn was staying the long weekend for the shower, but she was flying back on Tuesday.
“Ksenia already has two friends waiting to move into our room,” Wyn said to me. “Can you believe it?”
“Wow,” I murmured. “It really is the end of an era.”
“It was the end of an era when Hadley moved home. We just didn’t know it yet,” Wyn said.
I held out the bag of onion rings to her, but she shook her head.
“I feel like we need to have a ceremony or something,” Hadley said. “Tonight, around the campfire. We all say goodbye to the apartment that was our home for so long.”
“You sentimental fool, you,” Salem teased, but then her smile dimmed. “Did you ever think when you two were asking for roommates, that we’d become lifelong friends?”
Wyn looked out the side window when she replied, “No. I had no idea.”
I reached over and took her hand in mine. “You know that’s not changing, right? We’re still going to be lifelong friends.”
“Yeah, I know,” Wyn said, but her tone lacked belief.
I frowned.
“Wyn,” Salem began.
“Look, I’m really happy for you. All of you. But . . . let’s be realistic.” Wyn peered at me when she spoke. “Two of you are married and having babies. Poet’s on the same track.”
Hadley wiped her hands on a napkin. “Just because we’re married and having babies doesn’t mean—”
“It does mean,” Wyn interrupted. “You’re in a different phase of life. You’re in a different state. There’s friendship glue and then there’s life partner glue. And there’s baby glue. How do I compete with that?”
The three of us fell silent. We didn’t know what to say because Wyn was right, to some degree.
Finally, I spoke. “You forgot the most important glue. Family. We’re family, Wyn. The four of us. No husbands or babies are going to change that.”
“Yeah,” Salem said, her head nodding vigorously. “Life changes, we’ll change. But this. The four of us. No. I’m not letting you off the hook so easily. Sorry. You can have your feelings. Have all the feelings. But you’re stuck with us, ‘til death do us part.”
Wyn looked at Hadley who nodded.
Then she stared at me. “You mean that?”
“Of course we mean that, you idiot,” I teased. “Now if we could only get you to move to Huckleberry Hill . . .”
“And again, what would I do here?” she asked. “I’m a nanny.”
“Hello, babies on the way?” Salem stated, pointing to herself and Hadley.
“That’s not all you are,” I said. “Haven’t you learned by now that we’re more than our jobs?”
“Easy for you to say,” she muttered. “You’ve got a cowboy-biker sugar daddy.”
I snorted.
“What’s really keeping you in New York?” Salem asked. “The dating pool is shit. You’re having zero luck. And you don’t really love your job.”
“I like the money,” she stated. “The money is nice.”
“Money is nice,” I agreed. “But you’re so damn worried about the four of us not being the four of us. So why don’t you just give in and move here and figure out the rest.”
“And what if I do that?” she asked. “What if I move here and there’s still no one to date? Dating is a numbers game. And your pinhead of a town has everything anyone could ever want but numbers.”
“Quality over quantity,” Hadley said. “How’s the quantity situation been working out for you by the way?”
Wyn fell silent.
“Just think about it,” I pressed.
“Oh, I have been. Believe me. I’ve been thinking about it since Salem decided to move back here,” Wyn said. “I just haven’t figured out how to make it work.”
“Sometimes you gotta leap and then figure it out after the fact,” I said. “Ask me how I know.”