Chapter 23 #2
Frannie has to turn away from Mr. Wurch’s glowering face, because Bridgette and Michael are sneaking up on either side of him, and she’s going to lose it. She looks up at Elsa, who hasn’t moved back at all, putting them chest to chest.
She doesn’t have time to feel any of her complicated feelings, because Mr. Wurch lets out an enormous shout, and Brad, Gretchen, and Henry all yelp in response.
Frannie doesn’t think about it, burying her face in Elsa’s shoulder to stifle her laughter. She feels Elsa’s hand come to rest on the back of her head, hears her snickering in her ear.
“Serves him right,” she whispers.
Frannie pulls back after a moment, unsure how she would explain leaning into her ghost girlfriend if caught, but not before Elsa’s hand migrates to Frannie’s cheek. Frannie can’t help but smile at her, even with everything still heavy between them.
And doesn’t that say something?
“Meet you on the third floor?” Elsa asks.
Frannie nods once, and then she’s gone.
Swallowing hard to force down her laughter, Frannie turns back to the group. Brad has his arm around Gretchen, who’s leaning into him, panting. She has the camera pointed at Henry and Mr. Wurch, who are holding on to each other.
Mr. Wurch glares at all of them, like they are in fact responsible for his hauntings. Dislike thrums through her. This is the man who used to harass Elsa and Joan. He deserves everything he gets, and she’ll never feel bad about it.
Gretchen straightens up first, moving forward to get Mr. Wurch’s consent to use him in the pilot. Henry walks back to Frannie, shaking his head.
“You really don’t seem that concerned,” he says, eyebrows raised.
Frannie shrugs with all the innocence she can muster. “Like you said, stuff moves around, right?”
Henry narrows his eyes and Frannie takes it, giving nothing away. Her book is pure fiction. That’s her story, and she’s sticking to it, despite all evidence to the contrary.
They leave Mr. Wurch, who goes grumbling into his apartment, and head for the stairs.
Brad’s got his hand on Gretchen’s back, the two of them whispering together, with Frannie and Henry trailing behind them.
Her phone still in hand, Frannie snaps a picture of Gretchen’s head turned to look at Brad, both of them ridiculously besotted despite the haunting.
She has a feeling viewers will be tuning in for more than the ghosts.
Gretchen pushes Brad ahead of her when they reach the third floor, and he gestures for Henry to join him.
Frannie follows behind the group, listening with one ear while Henry gives Brad some background on the Dakota’s history.
He mentions construction accidents far less than Michael usually does, and with none of his gruesome glee.
Frannie pulls out her phone. Henry blocked off the whole day, but she should still check to make sure they aren’t missing anything. She’s not expecting anything in her personal email, so the subject line SECOND OFFER has her walking into the wall where the hallway shifts right by a few feet.
She lets out a quiet oof, still staring down at her phone.
“Frannie?” Gretchen asks.
“Um,” Frannie says, thumb hovering over the email.
No one’s supposed to make an offer until next week, during the auction.
She opens the email and gapes down at her phone. It’s a preempt offer from Peristyle, for $350,000.
“Now that’s what I’m talking about!” Henry exclaims ahead of her.
Damn, Maribel cc’d him on the email.
Frannie looks up to find Gretchen pointing the camera at her, Brad behind her, and behind him, Henry pumping his fist and waving his phone like it’s his accomplishment.
It’s not funny, but slightly hysterical laughter bubbles up anyway, and she has to plant a hand on the wall to hold herself up.
“What’s so funny?” Gretchen presses.
“Frannie just got a preempt offer for 100K more than the last one,” Henry says.
She’s laughing too hard to scold him for telling. Tears are rolling down her cheeks. Holy shit, what is her life?
And then the lights start strobing around them.
“Oh my God!” Brad exclaims. “Gretch, are you getting this?”
Through blurry eyes, Frannie watches Gretchen nod as she and Brad gape at the hallway light show.
Elsa, Michael, and Bridgette appear between Frannie and Gretchen. The kids are jumping up and down, cheering silently, while Elsa stands there beaming at her. Frannie manages to haul herself upright, phone clutched almost painfully in her hand.
“Okay, so you’re not going to say yes.” Henry pushes past Gretchen and Brad, who are too focused on the frantic lights to pay any attention to how he shivers when he passes through Elsa, Michael, and Bridgette.
Is walking through them cold? Or does it feel warm, and smooth, and lovely, the way Elsa’s smile does? She looks so proud of Frannie. So happy.
It twists at her stomach.
“Frannie.”
Frannie stops staring at Elsa and brings her eyes to meet Henry’s. “What?”
“Maribel already said it in the email, but we’re not going to say yes just because Peristyle offered. We wait until the auction.”
“But won’t they rescind it if we don’t take the preempt?”
Maribel explained preempts as take-it-or-leave-it offers, usually for enough money to get your book off the table with other publishers, but only if you sell before auction.
“If everyone reacts the way Wellesley and Peristyle have, the auction will go way higher than this,” Henry says firmly.
That buzzing is back in her head.
“If it does, Peristyle will come back with another offer. And if they don’t—that’s their loss. Don’t blink now. I know it’s tempting, but write Maribel back and say we’re sticking with the auction, okay?”
Frannie tries to nod, but she’s frozen up. How much more money?
Elsa’s palm glides up and down her back. Instead of startling her, it helps ground Frannie, and she brings her cell phone up with shaking hands.
“Okay. Right. Yeah, you’re right,” she says to Henry. “I’ll, um, just—”
“I’ve got your ghost crew,” Henry says. Frannie meets his eyes and he reaches out to pat her shoulder.
Elsa dodges out of the way and Frannie lets out a high, cracked giggle. Henry just smiles and turns around, walking back through Bridgette and Michael with another shiver.
Elsa takes her elbow and guides her to lean against the wall. Henry ushers Brad and Gretchen farther down the hall, giving Frannie some privacy. She waits until they turn the next corner and then lets herself wilt, looking up at Elsa.
“Congratulations,” Elsa whispers.
Frannie stares at her, her brain stalling out with everything she wants to say. She’s not ready to tell Elsa her plan, not yet. It’s too new, too messy, too intangible. And she doesn’t know how to put the confused, gnarled ball of anger and gratitude in her head into words.
“You should send the email,” Elsa prompts, her hands twitching at her sides, like she wants to reach out and touch Frannie but doesn’t know if she should.
Frannie doesn’t know if she should either. If it’s right to act like there isn’t all the … everything between them. She doesn’t know how to talk about it, but she needs to do something.
She snags her fingers into the bottom of Elsa’s turtleneck, yanking her forward into a bruising kiss. Elsa’s hands bracket Frannie’s head. Frannie drops her phone to the carpet with a thunk, her hands gliding up to hold Elsa to her by her jaw. Frannie bites softly at her bottom lip.
The little groan Elsa lets out shoots along Frannie’s spine, warmth spiraling out from her belly. It’s heady and hot and more frantic than she can ever remember feeling.
“Um.”
They break apart immediately, turning to look at Michael and Bridgette. Michael’s got one of his eyebrows raised. Like mother, like son. Bridgette’s wrinkling her nose, her arms crossed over her chest.
“Someone could come back,” Michael offers, his voice so sardonic that Frannie can’t help bursting into laughter, again.
Elsa leans forward to pin Frannie back against the wall, ducking her face into Frannie’s shoulder to giggle into her neck.
Slowly, they calm down and pull apart. Elsa bends and grabs Frannie’s phone, taking her dear sweet time standing up, sure to brush herself against every inch of Frannie she can. It’s delicious, and cruel, and Frannie takes the phone with narrowed eyes, both of them still breathing hard.
“We’ll let you turn down a $350,000 offer,” Elsa says.
Frannie hesitates, something catching in her chest. She looks from the phone, to Elsa, to the kids. “You think I should take it?”
“Hell no,” Elsa says quickly. “No, I just—I’m so proud of you for getting it.”
Frannie meets her eyes. “Oh.”
“Yes, oh,” Elsa says, smiling slightly.
“We’re proud of you too,” Bridgette says archly.
Frannie holds Elsa’s gaze for a moment, at a loss for how to have any real conversation right now.
“Frannie knows,” Elsa says, turning to the kids.
“I do,” Frannie says, shaking it off and stepping out from Elsa’s orbit to walk over and give both kids a hug. “Thank you, guys. And you’re crushing it with the haunting.”
They cling to her there in the middle of the hallway, grinning up at her.
She needs to turn down this offer, so she can get others—bigger, better ones.
So she can get that apartment and make sure this is what she gets to have every day.
If Elsa’s decided she’s not allowed to stay in the Dakota Building forever, then Frannie’s making the executive decision that none of them are.
She’s not going to focus on how her decision is infinitely more difficult to orchestrate.
“Okay, I’m gonna send this email, and then I’ll see you guys when we get down to the basement?”