Chapter 31
Chapter
Thirty-One
PEARL
“ L uca, I’m home. You can go,” Pearl called as she shoved open the front door.
“Thanks,” Luca said, already heading out the back door.
AB cartwheeled through the living room. “AP, I’m gonna watch cartoons in my bedroom.”
“Watch the ones that rot your brain, okay?” Pearl called, shuffling through the mail she’d grabbed on her way in.
“Pearl,” Reed said, pushing through the door behind her. “Let’s talk about this.”
She’d been kind of a bitch on the ride over— okay, a huge bitch —but he’d made Violet sad and he’d lied to his parents.
And he hadn’t even introduced me as…whatever we are. I was just Luca’s little fuck-up sister.
It wasn’t the first time she’d been hidden from someone’s parents, but she hoped it would be the last.
“Since you’re so creative with the truth, is there anything you’ve forgotten to tell me ?” she said, spinning to face him.
He looked hurt. “Of course not. You’d never judge me for what I needed.”
She rolled her eyes.
“Pearl—”
She put a hand up to silence him as a pink envelope caught her eye. It was addressed to Blackbird Bakery from the Department of Public Health.
It had a red “Due” mark on it. She tore it open.
She was being fined ?
“‘Due to the risk posed to the public health at the Firefly Festival, please pay the following Public Health Department fines.’ Those motherfuckers want five thousand dollars,” she gasped.
Three various fines were listed for offenses Pearl didn’t even understand. A lack of license, not properly handling food as a food vendor, lack of secondary insurance.
She was gonna pass out, vomit, and then scream, in that order.
“But they said I didn’t need a license. We were a goods booth, not a food vendor,” she mumbled, flipping through the pages. They and the organizers had decided that at the final registration.
“I'm sure it’ll be fine. This sounds like a mistake,” Reed said, placating her, as he read the letter.
She pulled at her shirt, not able to breathe.
“Hey,” Reed said, concerned. “You okay?”
“No, it’s not a mistake,” she said, snatching the letter from him. “Because when you’re a fuck-up, bad things happen to you. The organizer said I wasn’t technically a food vendor, but clearly I shouldn’t have relied on a bow-tied man who didn't know what he was talking about. My credit card doesn’t even have a five-thousand-dollar limit.” The nest egg she’d built to try to actually do something with her life? Fucking gone.
Opening my own bakery was a terrible fucking idea. I should have never even tried.
“It’ll be fine,” Reed said, his voice still calm. “It’s only five thousand. I can pay it for you.”
“I need to handle this. It’s my mess,” she said, getting mad.
And defensive. And embarrassed.
“But I can fix it for you.” He looked bewildered at her anger.
“I don’t want to owe you anything. I’ll find the money for it somewhere.”
He shrugged as if she was being ridiculous. “We’re partners. It’s a gift; it’s no big deal.”
She seethed with rage. “It’s a big deal to me,” she finally yelled. “Why can’t you be mad with me? I don’t want to fight my battles alone for the rest of my life.”
“I am literally offering to fix it,” he said, pointing at the paper in frustration. “Is this really about the fine? Or are you still mad about Violet? And me lying to my parents?”
I’m just Luca’s pot-smoking little sister, a secret, clingy part of her whispered. He’s ashamed of you.
He didn’t even say anything to his parents about me.
This whole thing poked a giant sharp stick on the purple bruise of her ego.
“You’re embarrassed about your life here. Like we’re some place where a big-city failure goes. Where all the fuck-ups live.”
“Pearl, I don’t think that. Wait.” His hands came to her upper arms, his fingers stroking her skin. “You’re upset because I didn’t say you were my…girlfriend? Aren’t you?” Reed said, hitting the nail on the unspoken head.
His eyes could see right into her soul. “I wasn’t sure what to call you. We haven’t talked about it. I didn’t want to assume.”
But you told me you loved me.
Pearl shrugged, feeling caught.
And petty. And clingy. And mad.
She stormed into the kitchen. “What about when we have kids? You can stand up to random drunks in bars, but not your dad? I want someone who will fight for me when it matters. And I don’t think you can.”
She hoped she’d hurt his feelings like he’d hurt hers.
“I’ve been fighting my whole life”—his voice wavered and tears shimmered in his eyes—“just to figure out how to live it like everybody else. It’s like everyone else got this handbook on how to be ‘normal’”—his fingers came up for air quotes—“but they skipped me. You, however, push people away and it’s this quirk everyone loves. Oh, that’s just Pearl , they say as they flock to you.”
She scoffed.
“They do,” he said, getting mad. “You think it’s a coincidence people couldn’t wait to order from you? To invite you for drinks? People don’t like me enough, Pearl. Even my own parents, I have to be careful to be perfect so they’ll love me. I can’t lose the few relationships I have. They’re too precious. So, no, I don’t rock the boat when I don’t have to.”
“I fuck up constantly. I have a hard life. No rich relatives to make my dreams happen,” she added with venom, knowing it would be hurtful. “You’re better off without me. No point in loving someone who fucks up so much.”
She wanted to push him away, wanted to prove to herself he didn’t actually love her, like poking a bruise to see if it would hurt. Like an idiot.
She wanted to protect herself one last time.
“Pearl, I know you’re upset. Let me just pay this fine for now and we can talk about it later.”
“You’re asking too much. This has all just been too much. You’re being too…”
She stopped, but the verbal punch had landed right where she’d wanted it to.
He took a step back, rubbing his chest.
With a sad, longing look, he walked out the door without another word.
Good job.
Bruise? Pushed. Heart? Broken. Dreams?
Well, they were never for me anyway, were they?
She wanted to scream, cry, throw something.
Pearl clutched the kitchen island with shaking hands. Everything had gone to shit.
“AP?”
“Hey, nugget,” Pearl said, trying to get her emotions in check as she turned around to AB. “Brain rotted ye?—”
But Pearl stopped as she registered a broken unicorn piggy bank in AB’s hands.
“You can have my money,” AB whispered, wide-eyed. She held out the two broken halves of the unicorn that had inspired her obsession—a chunky purple piggy bank—as pennies and quarters spilled to the tile.
Pearl’s heart shattered into a thousand tiny blackened pennies as she took the sharp porcelain from her.
A small trickle of blood ran down AB’s fingers. She’d cut herself breaking it open. “Oh no, oh sweetie, don’t move.”
Oh no, oh no.
Pearl’s heart was in her throat, and her fingers shook as she grabbed band-aids and antiseptic.
I literally hurt AB by not keeping my shit together.
“Were you eavesdropping?” Pearl asked gently as she cleaned AB’s fingers.
AB nodded her head, pouting. “You need money.”
Pearl put two band-aids on AB’s fingers and pulled AB into her lap. “Annabelle, you don’t ever have to worry about that, okay? I will always figure it out, and your dad will always take care of you.”
She pushed AB’s hair back as a tear fell down her little cheek.
“I broke my unicorn.” AB’s face melted into a sob. “I mess’tup.” Her cracked voice crushed all the breath out of Pearl’s body.
Pearl fought back tears.
She tucked AB’s head under her chin and rocked her. “Sweetie, we all mess up. I do it all the time.”
“But you—won’t—love me,” AB hiccuped.
“What?” Pearl looked at her in utter confusion.
“You messed up and Uncle Reed can’t love you.”
Well, fuck. Why did little ears have to hear so well?
“Hey, I promise you, best-friend-pink-ring promise”—Pearl held up her pink rubber ring to the matching one on AB’s hand—“you can make a bajillion mistakes and I will still love you. Promise.”
AB sniffed and nodded. “You can do a bajillion, too?”
She saw a lot of herself in AB. She was a weird, smart little girl who liked creepy doll heads, had obsessive interests, and a larger frame with a cute little belly like Pearl had had at her age.
She would never lie to her.
She’d never want AB to think that she shouldn’t believe in herself just because she made a few mistakes. Or a lot.
She wanted AB to love herself. Wanted her to know she was perfect and to reach for anything she wanted in life.
Who won when you didn’t like yourself? The patriarchy? The benefactors of a capitalist hellscape?
Maybe even if I’m the only one who loves me, maybe that’s enough. Maybe that’s more important than anybody else, actually.
Being your number one fan does seem like sort of a punk move.
“Yeah. I guess I can make mistakes. You’re pretty smart, huh, kid?” She squeezed AB to her, bouncing her until she giggled. She kissed her forehead.
She could make a thousand more mistakes and people would still like her. The important people, like AB, and Luca.
And maybe Reed.
But she had to figure out how to fix her own mistakes. If I’m good at making them, I gotta be good at fixing them.
The Parkers were smart, and they’d always encouraged her.
Bloom carried all sorts of chocolates and locally made things. They could carry her stuff too, right? That would help make a dent in the fine if the Health Department wouldn’t waive the fine.
She sighed as she held a still sniffling AB, plotting out how she could make all her fuck-ups right.