Chapter 22
“I know it takes some faith,” I explain across the teak table in Amber Allister’s conference room. “But I really think Instagram is going to be huge for interior design.”
For the world.
“If you let me take charge of our blog and socials, I can promise”—literally promise—“significant growth of our client list over the next three years.”
I picture our projects piled up ahead, filling our website, dotting the city, lining Orange County’s most iconic streets.
I can’t give away too much—in case I start my own business from scratch, all over again, in this world—but in the meantime, Amber’s trust is worth everything and what I need to succeed. She’s the one who gives me wings.
I owe her my whole career.
Ten years my senior, Amber looks like she could be my older sister, down to our fashion sense. Waved blonde hair, white prairie dresses, camel slides—today it’s almost embarrassing and totally accidental. It happens often. We look more like twins than my own twins sometimes.
She leans back, capping her pen. “Your initiative is impressive. And I swear, it’s almost like you read my mind with some of your concepts.”
I’m trying not to cheat in this area, but I really—in many cases—know what she’s going to think before she thinks it. Because we’ve already tackled the projects. Together. Transformed dumpster fires into diamonds, innovated a furniture line, transformed the definition of inspired coastal design.
And now, finally, I’m ahead of her time, as much as it seems like she has the obvious lead.
Gosh, I am loving this job.
Don’t blow this, you crazy time traveler, you.
I smile. “Is that a yes to my proposal?”
She drains the rest of her water bottle. “It’s a heck yes. Why not? You have my full permission to take over as our new head of social media. Let’s recap in December. If it’s trending in the right direction, we’ll talk about a raise for you.”
I squeal, returning to my small cubicle.
It’s tight, but it’s mine.
I pick up my buzzing phone.
It’s Holden.
We’ve been texting—a lot. Daily. Sometimes hourly. Fine, constantly, since the kiss. Sometimes tiny flirty things, sometimes random parts of our days. We are building back a real connection, one I am feeling in every pore.
By now, it’s been a week since our kiss on the beach, and we’re meeting for lunch today. He’s back in Orange County for business.
Holden: Hi! Let me know how your meeting goes, beautiful girl.
I smile. He used to call me that.
Sutton: It was so good. Couldn’t have gone better. Thanks for asking :)
Holden: Pain du Monde? Fashion Island? Noon?
Sutton: Yes! Perfect. Excited to see you.
Holden: I promise not to kiss you again. Just kidding. It’s all I think about.
Deep breath.
Same.
Sutton: ;) Can’t wait to see you.
Quinn and I have entered an interesting dance—and I wouldn’t say it’s my favorite.
She’s side-eyeing my relationship as much as I’m judging hers.
She thinks I’m letting my heart slip into dangerous territory—and I respond by reiterating what the angel told me, that I’m free to explore other relationships.
I conveniently leave out the warning to exercise caution, that every encounter here holds matter and meaning. Quinn has been warning me plenty.
“But explore with him?” Quinn argued last night. “I just don’t get it. Wouldn’t you rather discover something—someone—new? Holden never seemed like ‘freedom’ for you. More like the diametrical opposite.”
Admittedly I winced at that, but her disapproval was not a deterrent. Holden remained a vortex, irresistible, tugging on something inside me. I needed to find out what.
Meanwhile, I’m tiptoeing like a tightrope artist on the line of how to handle the Alan thing. You marry him, but he sucks just feels harsh. Like me with Holden—and whatever I might still need to gain from this relationship—she deserves to explore it with honesty and independence.
At the right time, I can lean further into my own warnings for Quinn about Alan, but I’m also secretly hoping for a moment alone with the guy.
It’s something I’ve never had, not ever, in a real way.
I want to grill him like a hamburger patty.
Give him the Sutton hot-seat experience, barbecue tools scattered out on the table.
At noon, I stride through the open air of Fashion Island, the pristine coastal outdoor mall, with the high spring sun on my freckled face.
I beat Holden to the restaurant this time, slightly heartbroken that they ever shut down this incredible chain —restaurant, known by regulars as PDM.
Mahogany wood, enthusiastic employees, a tuna sandwich to kill for.
With a free cookie, at that. I still crave that cookie sometimes.
I insist on buying Holden’s lunch, because he’s on my turf—but he insists harder, and I pretend to hate it while secretly admiring what a gentleman he has become.
I’m loving our time together.
He’s witty, attentive, and warm.
Lighting me up in ways I haven’t felt in too long.
Everything I remember about falling so hard for him in the first place—minus the sullen moods and ghostlike behavior.
I fully realize I’m sinking.
But what choice do I have?
I’m simply here, moving forward, embracing my opportunities.
If Holden was handsome in a tux and cute in sweats, he’s just plain sexy in his designer suit. Navy blue, with a white shirt, brown belt and shoes. He recently got a haircut, framing his Theo James–lookalike face even tighter.
I want to resist him.
I can’t.
He kisses my cheek and orders the same thing I do.
My mouth is full of my favorite tuna sandwich when he says he has an idea.
“Hear me out,” he says, sounding professional.
I nod, all ears.
Fists on the table, he spills it.
“Coachella. I can get tickets through a guy at my work.” He pauses. “It’s in a week.”
I almost spit out my generous bite. I lean back into the wood booth, rolling my eyes to the roof.
“Come on,” he says. “Have you ever been?”
Tassels, feathers, microshorts, blue hair, bras as shirts, drunk kids, and outhouses?
No, Holden Locke, I have not.
I’ve been changing diapers, paying a mortgage, and holding down a whole life, bro.
“Do I strike you as a Coachella person?” I wonder incredulously.
He shrugs. “You’ve always had great taste in music.”
I sip my Diet Coke.
I have never been to Coachella. I have always been a bit curious. I have always thought I had pretty good taste in music. “Who’s in the lineup?”
“That’s the best part. Radiohead, Bon Iver, and—wait for it—Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg.”
I almost jump out of my chair. “Stop it! They perform at Coachella? I thought it was all, like, artsy festival bands only known by the diehards.”
At least, back then.
As in, right now.
“Oh my gosh,” I say, getting excited. “Remember Snoop and Dre’s Super Bowl halftime show? How unreal was that? Full-body chills.” I was still reliving it, honestly. Along with every other millennial with a pulse.
He frowns. “Dre and Snoop have never done the Super Bowl.”
“Yes, they have,” I insist. “Are you kidding? Only the best Super Bowl halftime performance to ever—”
Oh.
Snap.
In ten years.
I scramble. “You know what, you’re right.” I gulp down more soda. “Ha! I must be thinking of someone else. Um, anyway.”
I consider his offer—a getaway in the desert heat with my crush. “This isn’t the worst idea you’ve ever had.”
“Why, thank you.”
“Where would we stay?”
“That’s where it gets even better. This young partner at my firm usually goes to Coachella—and stays in his Palm Desert house. At the last minute, he can’t go, so he has four tickets, and we can use his house for free.”
My jaw slacks. Every age of Sutton knows that this is a generous offer.
I think immediately of Quinn and Alan, noodle the notion around in my head.
They’re Holden’s tickets; I don’t want to be presumptuous.
But obviously, Quinn and Alan will pay for them—and what a great time we’d have.
Alan the Accountant at Coachella makes sense like Snoop Dogg at the ballet, but the bonding time would be priceless.
Quinn’s schedule might be an issue, but it’s worth a try.
“Any chance we could invite Quinn and the guy she’s dating?”
“Sure.” He shrugs. “Why not?”
“You don’t have anyone else in mind?”
“This is a very last-minute trip,” he says. “Only one on my mind is you.”
My heart beats.
Too fast.
“Girls’ rooms, guys’ rooms,” I say. “No funny business.”
He holds up his hands. “Would have assumed, my lady.”
I smile and sniff at the world’s best free cookie.
“What’s the best concert you’ve ever been to?” I ask him, taking a bite.
“Easy,” he says, hands crooked behind his head. “John Mayer at Staples Center two years ago. That guy is a genius. The musicality and the performance—his songs. I mean, he’s a little odd when he talks between songs, can get kind of dark. But that’s most musicians.”
“You’d know,” I tease, zero percent surprised by this response. “I love that you finally got to see him.”
“Yeah.” Something like sadness flickers over his eyes, but I don’t know him well enough yet, again, to know what it means. “What about you? Best concert?”
“Easy,” I say, no hesitation. “Coldplay at the Rose Bowl. Otherworldly. It’s the one time in my life I felt like I was literally on another planet.”
You know, except for right now.
I go on. “Everyone was wearing these glow-in-the dark bracelets that were programmed to change colors to different songs throughout the night. So it was this spectacular, unifying light show along with the concert. The volume, the expansiveness of the sky, the way everyone knew every single word to the songs . . . I’ll never forget it. ”
Reid standing behind me, hands on my hips and breath in my ear.
“You’re my sky full of stars,” he sang.
My hands on his, my face tilted skyward, both of us dizzy with love and the music. The night was our first date in months—our first overnight since the twins. Gratitude throbbed within me for all we’d managed together.
“I wanna die in your arms,” I sang back, smile reaching my ears.
The wave of euphoria wallops me now, before ebbing away, leaving me here on dry shore.
Here on this harsh wooden bench. He’s gone. Reid’s gone. The universe has stopped conspiring for us.
I swallow and straighten.
Holden is frowning. “Your musical facts today, girlfriend,” he says, taking a sip of his water. “Lucky I’m back in your life.”
“What do you mean?”
“Coldplay has never played at the Rose Bowl.”
My heart jumps.
Dang it.
I need to stop talking.
“Um . . . are you sure?” I fiddle with the straw in my soda.
“Dead sure. That’s an iconic venue. I wouldn’t miss it.”
“Ha! Oh. Well.” My cheeks blaze. “Must’ve been somewhere else in LA.”
He looks unconvinced but doesn’t press—and at least I can thank him for snapping me back to the present, out of the spell of that memory with the love of my other life. My current reality sits here now in his suit, smoldering across our sandwiches.
With one fun invitation.
I don’t care.
Go on and tear me apart.
I force myself to brighten with the shine of at least one star, even if it’s not a whole sky full.
“Anyway! Are we doing this?” I ask, injecting my voice with sparkle and possibility. “Are we doing Coachella?”
“Sounds like the desert is calling.”
You only live twice.