Chapter 22 #2
“Oh, yeah. Totally. It is.” He looks again and laughs. “So what’s going on?”
“Look at the woman your grandfather has his arm around. Do you recognize her?”
“I hate to tell you this, but I’m not a time traveler, and I don’t know my grandparents' friends when they were younger. So, no—”
“Look at the photo again. Look what she’s wearing.”
“That’s a cute dress, I suppose.”
“Look at her face.”
I’m going to need you to give me more than this, Gina, because—”
“Look at her earrings.”
He stares at the earrings and shrugs. “She’s wearing dangly pineapple earrings.”
“Okay. Who wears crazy-ass earrings like that all the time?”
He stares at me. “Is this something I am…?” He pauses. “Wait. Amethyst,” he says. “I always notice that she’s got some crazy-ass earrings.” He frowns. “Wait—that’s Amethyst.”
“I’m almost confident that’s Amethyst,” I say, looking at him. “And look how she’s standing.”
“What do you mean?”
“She’s beaming. She’s standing there beaming, and your grandfather’s arm is around her. And you thought that was your grandma. You thought it was your grandma because of their body language, right?”
“They look like they’re together. Let me see that again,” he says, grabbing the photo from my hand. He stares at it and nods slowly. “So, wait. Amethyst and my grandfather used to date?”
“I think so. I think they used to be together. Now, I think it’s possible that your grandma stole Preston from Amethyst. And that would account for the reason why there’s this weird coldness between them. And that would account for her dreams.”
“Oh, what are you talking about? What dreams?”
“She’s always going on about how Shakespeare comes to her in her dreams. And I thought she was just, like, loony or crazy, right?
Like she was clairvoyant or something. But then I thought about it.
What if Shakespeare is not Shakespeare? What if it’s your granddad?
Your granddad loves Shakespeare. He’s always quoting him.
Everyone goes on about how much she loves Shakespeare.
Maybe she thinks of your granddad as Shakespeare.
Maybe that’s her nickname for him. Maybe she dreams of him.
Maybe she wishes that she were still with him. That he had chosen her.”
“Maybe—shit,” he says. “I knew it wasn’t about the theater.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Remember the other day, I went into the study, and they were arguing? And Granddad said she wanted a donation to the theater, and he didn’t want to give it to her.
And she was upset. I didn’t understand, because fifty grand is nothing for a Waverly.
We give more than that without a blink of an eye.
But it makes sense. What if they weren’t arguing about a donation? What if it was something else?”
“Holy shit. Do you think they’re still—”
“No, they’re not still dating. They couldn’t be. At least, I don’t think so. My grandma wouldn’t put up with that,” he says. “But maybe there’s not really been closure there.”
“Yeah, I’m thinking that must be the case. If she was dating your granddad, and he left her for someone else—which is horrible—why would she even still be here?”
“That doesn’t make sense to me either. Why would she still be here?”
“I don’t really understand,” I say. “I mean, I get that maybe her heart was broken. But why would you stay friends with these people?”
“But they’re not really friends,” he says. “We’ve both noticed that my grandma and Amethyst can’t seem to stand each other. And I’ve noticed a lot of times that Amethyst likes to act like she’s the lady of the house.”
“I see. I mean, shit. When I got here that first day, and I was like, ‘Are you Mrs. Waverly?’ she had this weird reaction. Holy shit. How did I miss this? I suck as a detective.”
“Well, we’re not detectives, so give yourself some grace.”
“Yeah, I guess so. Shit. They were together.”
The door opens, and we both freeze. Amethyst walks in. She looks at me, and she looks at him, and there’s a little smile on her face as she steps forward.
“Hey, Amethyst. I was just coming back down.”
“You looked like you had somewhere important to be, so I came to find you.”
“How did you know I was here?” I ask her.
“I was just curious. Because you asked me about Shakespeare, and not many people ask me to talk to them about Shakespeare coming to me in my dreams. You figured it out.”
All of a sudden, she looks older than her years. She looks at Hunter, she looks at me, and she just walks forward. I show her the photo in my hand.
“That’s you, right?”
“I was so young,” she says. “So in love. I thought my life was the stuff of books. I’ve always written poetry.
And your grandfather”—she looks at Hunter—“loved it. He always told me I was great. That I was the second coming of all these literary greats. And I believed him because I loved him. But I don’t know if he truly believed it, or if he was just saying that to get into my pants, or what.
I thought we’d get married. I thought I would be Mrs. Waverly.
Me—a poor girl from a working-class family.
But then he met Enid. And she wanted him.
She came from the right stock, and his parents approved of her.
She was the right one to continue on the Waverly name.
And I was just me. He told me he still loved me.
He told me it was always me. He said it was just on paper—that he had to marry her.
And so, I let him date her. And they got married.
And he didn’t even tell her that we were still in love.
That I was just by the wayside. And I waited, because I thought that he would come back to me.
But she knew. She knew he would never come back to me.
Even though we had… dalliances every now and then, it was still her he went back to. ”
My heart races.
Fuck. This was way more information than I thought I was going to get.
“And so, I finally woke up,” she continues. “I realized that I wasted my entire life waiting for a man who didn’t love me enough to actually want to be with me.
“And it doesn’t matter anymore. Because I’ve got real love. True love. Someone who sees me for me. Someone who wants to be with me. Someone who thinks that I am everything.
“And maybe I’m a fool. But what’s better than being an old fool? “Because I don’t care.”
“I’m sorry,” Hunter says. “I’m sorry that my grandfather did that to you.”
“It’s not your fault. You’re a good man,” she says, nodding slowly. “You’re the sort of man that I think deserves a life of happiness.”
“You, though, Gina… you’re full of deceptions, aren’t you?” She looks at me.
I freeze. I don’t know what she’s talking about. She couldn’t possibly know my secret.
“Amethyst, I know you’re upset that we’ve discovered your secret, but there’s no reason to speak to her like that.” Hunter puts his arm around me and squeezes.
“You don’t even know this lady, Hunter. You don’t know who she truly is.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Amethyst. I came here to write a story, and this is the path that my research has taken me to. I won’t include you. I mean, I doubt that the Waverlys would want me to include you.”
“My boyfriend told me all about you, Gina. I know exactly who you are.” I stare at her in confusion.
“What are you talking about? What did your boyfriend tell you about me? I don’t even know him.”
“You don’t know him?” She bursts out laughing. “You are just jealous that he chose me over you.”
“What?” I look over at Hunter, and he’s just shaking his head. But when he stills, I know the thought has hit him at exactly the same time as it’s hit me. “Holy shit,” I say out loud. We both look over at Amethyst, and she laughs girlishly.
“It’s knocked twenty years off me, it has,” she says, smiling widely. “Never thought I’d have a young man wanting me, but here we are. He loves me, and he wants me. And who am I to say no?”
“You’re dating Patrick,” I say in absolute shock. The entire room seems to grow smaller, because never in a million years had I expected that the person Patrick knew on the inside of the Waverly house was Amethyst.