Chapter 11 #2
He looks from me to the urn to Anna, back to the urn, back to me. “I’m sorry for your loss. And really sorry we can’t accommodate your friend’s wish. Please let me make it up to you with a bottle from our special reserve.”
Anna takes a step forward. “Holly, Jack has connections. I’m sure he can help.”
“No,” I say in the same tone I use when one of the kids at school is pushing the limits of my patience.
“What if we—” Anna starts.
“Anna, I’ve got this.”
She huffs with an irritated side-eye.
She’s not wrong. I shouldn’t be talking to her like I do with my kids. She has a very good point about Jack and his connections. But the last time Anna interfered with our plans and my personal relationships, it ended in disaster.
“We could,” Anna tries again. I turn and give her a withering look. She responds with a challenging lift of eyebrows but instead of arguing, she swishes her skirt again and marches toward the patio.
“Again, please accept my apologies. I know this is difficult. What can I bring you?” Henri asks. His smile is sad and sincere, and I feel the fight drain from me.
I ask for the Pinot Noir and, at his insistence, a charcuterie platter before making my way to the bathroom. I need to compose myself before talking to Anna.
I close myself into the furthest stall, relishing the momentary isolation.
Anna had followed me into the airport bathroom, twice.
Then into the bathroom at the rest area before we crossed the Golden Gate Bridge.
There’d been the taxi to the airport, the flight, the drive here.
I just need to breathe without her in my space.
“Sorry, Z, but this is just a bit more togetherness than I’m ready for,” I say into the quiet of the bathroom. “I don’t know how to deal with her. She means well. But I just can’t.”
I lean against the door, allowing my head to fall back gently. “God, Z, how did we get here? Yeah, yeah, planes, trains, and automobiles. Minus the train. Unless you have some crazy plan in that letter we’re to read next.”
I’ve gotten so used to seeing Anna as the villain, as the spoiled, selfish socialite who cared more about her social media presence than about her best friends. Zoe insisted that it had been a careless mistake, fueled by alcohol and the prodding of our overexuberant party companions.
Maybe it had been.
“You weren’t impacted the way I was by that mistake, though.
You didn’t have to piece your life back together, Zoe.
I know you think the friendship we had should outweigh one mistake, and if it had been anything else, maybe I could have chalked it up to Anna being Anna.
But that’s what we always did. We always gave Anna the hall pass for anything that went sideways. Because it was Anna.”
I swallow hard as emotion and exhaustion collide.
“But doesn’t it go both ways? Shouldn’t Anna have had more respect for our friendship and the things she knew were important to us, to me?”
Someone clears their throat in one of the stalls and flushes. My face heats with embarrassment.
So much for assuming I was alone given the lack of people in the tasting room.
“Shit.” I exhale, and I can see the smile spread on Zoe’s face as she realizes she’s softened me, again.
I wait until I hear the water run then shut off, and the door whoosh closed behind whoever was in here before I leave the stall. I splash water on my cheeks and take three deep breaths.
In the main room, Henri is back to arranging glasses and talking to a young woman in jeans and a polo shirt with the winery logo.
She smiles at me with a mixture of curiosity and pity.
I suspect he told her we were here with our dead friend.
Maybe she told him about the conversation I was having in the bathroom with said dead friend.
Through the open French doors, I see Anna seated at a table at the edge of the patio, the urn cradled in the crook of her elbow.
I stop mid-stride, caught by her pensive expression, the tenderness with which she’s looking at the urn.
The raw emotion on her face bottoms out whatever anger I’d been feeling.
As I weave through the room and into the shady late-afternoon light, I turn over the words to apologize for being short-tempered. I can at least give her that.
But just before I reach the table, Anna tilts the phone and leans into the urn. She gives her head a quick shake, her perfect highlights capturing the golden rays of the setting sun.
Of course. She’s not staring into the distance, remembering our time here with Zoe. She was waiting for the optimal moment for a selfie.
Anna and her damn social media.
I swallow the apology that was on the tip of my tongue and yank at the chair across from her, wincing as the metal legs scrape the stone pavers.
Anna’s gaze flies up to mine with surprise. Her arm falls to her side in an attempt to hide her phone.
From my bag, my phone pings with an incoming message. I drop into the chair and read the text from Jack.
Hey. So, Henri from Chateau L called.
“Shit.”
“What’s wrong?” Anna asks. I notice she’s put her phone away.
“Nothing.” I text, Ignore the call. We’re fine.
Jack: Anything I can do?
Me: Ignore the call.
Jack: Hols?
Me: Jacks!
My fingers release anxiety, anger, and need onto the minuscule keyboard. Because, yes, I don’t want Anna intruding into my personal life, not on this trip. But this is Jack. And next to Zoe, Jack is the only person who can instantly put me at ease. “What’s going on, Holly? You’re scowling.”
I can’t believe that guy called Jack.
Worse, I can’t believe I almost let Zoe convince me there was a smidge of hope.