Chapter 32
Thirty-Two
Scarlett
23 Years Old
The moment the keynote speaker started droning on about the latest scientific discoveries, Scarlett tuned him out like she had that catalytic AP Chemistry class from back in high school. She knew she should be paying attention, especially because those scientific discoveries were of great importance to her brother’s foundation, but she was fairly certain that Colin and his coworkers were the only people at the gala who could understand a word of what Dr. Seymour Bishop was saying. She thought at one point she had heard the word “covalent,” and that was about as far as she could pinpoint what he was talking about. The only thing that she could focus on was Colin, both the past and present versions of him. Any mention of science had her thinking of sex performance charts, which meant she thought of them with the slightest provocation (as Colin had once told her: everything is science). What she now knew he was hiding under his shirt thanks to an electrical fire—undoubtedly science.
With her routine up in the air and her mind untethered by the studio, Scarlett’s imagination had run completely rampant. Lately, she felt like she was always on the brink of doing something reckless.
She had peeked at Colin’s table enough times to know that he had brought his sister to the gala with him, and the fundraising coordinator’s son seemed to know Colin well enough to sit at the table animatedly chatting with him for the majority of the dinner and introductory speeches. A small pang of sadness pricked her heart at the thought that she no longer knew what they could be talking about. The dynamic he had with his family was still the same, though, familiar in all the ways that she used to enjoy and find comfort in.
A cleared throat beside Scarlett made her pull her attention away from Colin’s table. Harper was staring at her with wide, expectant eyes and nodding her head toward the stage. There was something Scarlett was supposed to be doing, and given the blank stares in the crowd and the emptiness of the stage, she had clearly missed whatever was going on. When had Dr. Bishop even finished his speech? It must have been sometime between her reminiscing on her first chemistry lesson and her prom night.
“Beautiful painting!” a voice shouted from somewhere behind her. She whipped around to find Colin looking in her direction with raised eyebrows and a lift of his program sheet.
“Amazing!” The fundraising coordinator’s son echoed the sentiment.
“I definitely want to know more about it!” Pearl agreed in a loud voice, making all three of them sound like hecklers at a comedy show. Harper had her hand pressed into her mouth to stop a laugh from escaping, and in all the commotion, Scarlett finally found the one brain cell in her head dedicated to remembering things, picked up her clipboard with her speech, and jumped up from her seat to bolt toward the stage.
The microphone made a loud feedback noise when Scarlett tapped it to check it was working, and the entire crowd winced. “Everything is going so swimmingly,” she said with a nervous edge. Chuckling from the audience made her loosen her shoulders a bit. “I guess I’m supposed to talk about the painting I made for one of the auction pieces.” She twisted a bit to gaze at the displayed canvas sitting on the corner of the stage in its large ornate frame before peeking at her notes. “Originally, it was supposed to be a basic portrait, but I spent months dragging my feet and staring blankly at an old photo of my brother smiling up at a camera like he didn’t have a care in the world, and I could not bring myself to—” She swallowed and choked back her emotion as she held up the photo she was supposed to copy and knew that the same photo must be projected on the screen behind her as planned.
“I didn’t want to paint him because he seemed so perfect on his own. I remember when this picture was taken, because it was my birthday. I remember being so jealous of all the attention he was getting at my party because it was just a few days after he was formally diagnosed. I was so young and didn’t really realize the severity of what was going on at the time. I just knew it was my birthday, and everyone was sad but Tucker. Now I wish I could give my brother a hundred more of my birthdays.” She wiped at the tears starting to streak down her face and shook her head to clear it. “Someone I know suggested that I didn’t need to make his portrait perfect, I just needed to make it my own, and I think Tucker would have agreed.”
Scarlett found Colin at his table with his eyes closed, slowly rocking in his chair, and she felt the corners of her mouth tip up. It was like she could see him absorbing every word. To someone who didn’t know him, it might look like he wasn’t paying attention, but she knew he was.
“So, I made it my own. Despite having photo evidence, I actually remember his shirt being blue that day, not red, so I rewrote history a bit and gave him a blue shirt.” A small laugh escaped Scarlett’s mouth, and she found Pearl’s smiling face in the crowd, then Harper’s, giving her a tear-filled and encouraging nod. “The florals splitting his face and taking over half of the frame represent the life my brother brought to every room. The life he still brings to a room, even in his passing. The legacy he left behind and all the change he’s making. There’s a white rose for each of the birthdays he’s missed, and a carnation for every child this foundation has sponsored since we were founded. Eighty-three children. Some of whom are no longer with us. All lives we’ve changed from the donations received from people like you. For every ten thousand dollars we’ve raised for Sloan CRO to find a cure, I’ve painted a daisy, which doesn’t have a huge significance except that ‘daisy’ kind of sounds like ‘day,’ and I hope the funding is getting us one day closer to a cure.”
The room was so quiet, but all eyes were focused on her, except for Colin, still swaying in his seat. His eyes were no longer closed, but he was staring intently off to the side. He and everyone else were hanging on her every word.
“I think my brother would be proud of what we’ve accomplished. I think he would also tell me I’m gross for getting all sappy.” The audience laughed, and Scarlett finally let herself smile all the way. “This painting represents everything important to this foundation and everything wonderful about my brother all in one. As we carry on with the music and dancing portion of the evening, there are several silent auction pieces lining the room for you to bid on, among them, this painting. I hope you’ll consider donating tonight. If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that sometimes changing the world is as simple as changing one person’s life. That, and changing the world often requires a lot of money.” The crowd laughed, and she beamed across the ballroom. “And as we round out the speaking portion of the evening, I wish you all an open-bar-filled night to loosen you up as you dance and network. Thank you all for coming.”
The DJ immediately started up the music from the booth on the corner of the stage, and Scarlett was grateful that it took away some of the pressure of her walking down the steps. Chatter and the usually nervous energy of a room reluctant to dance followed her back to her seat. Dancing had been removed and added back to the event list multiple times, but she had gotten the board to agree with it by insisting that unlike other galas, this one would be fun. The set list would milk the generational bond between old and millennial music to keep people drifting down nostalgia lane. Like a wedding, minus the songs that had people screaming about sweat dripping down their balls. All of this coupled with the biggest donation of the evening—the alcohol—would keep the checkbooks opened. Or, at least, she hoped it would. The dance floor was still empty.
“Harper,” Scarlett whispered to her sister. “Go dance with your husband.”
“Do I have to?” Harper whined. “I’ve been here since noon. I’m exhausted.”
“It’s a slow song, and I don’t have a partner, so yes. Someone has to start this off.”
“I can be your partner.” The deep tenor of Colin’s voice beside her chair made Scarlett’s face instantly heat. Her body continued to react to him no matter how much she begged it not to, and it was beyond frustrating. Earlier, when she had brushed against him while he fixed the mic stand, she thought she might combust. No words formed on her lips as she stared up at him. He was looking down at his hands and fidgeting with them, and she wondered if his body had the same reaction to hers as she had to him. Touch starved and all the while knowing that it would be a terrible choice to go back down that road. “I’m asking you to dance if that was not clear. I figured I’d ask because I want to, but obviously you don’t have to say yes.”
Scarlett looked at the empty dance floor, back at Colin, and then back at the dance floor once more, fighting with herself on her answer. If she had an ounce of self-preservation, she would say no, but the voice telling her that Colin could help her get the party started was making a strong case. “Okay,” Scarlett finally decided, slowly getting out of her chair. She didn’t dare look at her sister, who she imagined was shooting daggers at Colin.
“Really?” A smile bloomed across Colin’s face, and he held out a hand to her. She took it gingerly and stepped away from her table.
“Just one song,” Scarlett said, grimacing as they made their way onto the wide-open dance floor. “Or at least until other people start dancing, too. I thought people would be into this, and it looks like I was wrong.”
Colin dropped her hand, and the whiplash had her wanting to turn right back around to go sit at her table again. “I’ll get people to dance,” he declared. He jogged back over to his table, stranded in the middle of the floor alone. Not two seconds after agreeing to dance with him, she was already regretting saying yes. She pinched the bridge of her nose and let out a slow breath, steeling herself against the abandonment. “Did you drink enough water?” Scarlett’s hand fell away from her face, and she looked over to find Colin beside her again. “Do you need to drink some before we dance?”
“We’re still dancing?”
“Yes? Did you change your mind?” The confusion was clear as day on his face.
“You asked me to dance, then immediately left,” Scarlett clarified.
Colin shook his head. “No, you said you needed people to dance, so I just told my sister and Camden to dance.” He gestured to where Pearl was being spun around by the fundraising coordinator’s son in the very center of the floor. “I’m not going to leave, I promise.”
Scarlett watched as Pearl giggled on a particularly aggressive spin. A slow breath released from Scarlett’s lungs. “One dance,” she decided. Colin held his hand out again. Folding her fingers in his felt equal parts natural and like a precursor to something terrible. She had to remind herself that no matter how charming Colin could be, he would eventually leave, and the best thing for her to do was to never go far enough with him that she would be disappointed when he inevitably left her high and dry.
But when Colin pulled her in, his free hand finding her waist with a firm touch, Scarlett found herself responding in kind, her palm resting on his shoulder and her stiff fingers relaxing into his warmth. “I only know how to waltz.”
“Uh… I don’t know how to do that.” Scarlett bit her lip. “I didn’t know we were going to do an actual dance, I thought we were just going to freestyle.”
“I don’t freestyle,” Colin said simply. “I’ll lead. Follow me?”
“I’m going to have to because I don’t know what’s happening.”
“It’s a box step in a one, two, three, one, two, three count. I practiced a bit with a YouTube video before we got here.” Colin looked down at his feet and lifted one foot, holding it in the air. “You’ll do the opposite. Step back.”
After several box steps, Scarlett started to move without direction. Colin’s hand somehow ended up at the small of her back, and she let their bodies move closer together with the music. Once she was confident enough, Colin added exactly two variations to their box step, one spinning her under his arm and the other rolling her out and back in. He wasn’t bad at dancing, albeit extremely technical, but the last time she had danced with him was at their senior prom, and dancing was the least important thing that had happened that night.