Last on the List (Wait With Me #5)(4)

“Be right out!” I call loudly before grabbing an arm full of clothes on hangers. When I emerge, I peer over the top of my sweatshirts to find my childhood bestie sacked out on my bed, popping one of my sour gummy worms into her mouth. “The guesthouse was a perk of the nanny job I accepted. And really, the only reason I agreed to interview in the first place.”

“And because you’re ready for a freaking job,” my older sister’s voice chirps as she pokes her head into my room.

Rolling my eyes, I hook the clothes on a metal bar inside a garment box I picked up earlier today. “I get it, Bec…you’re sick of me.”

“I’m not sick of you.” She pins me with a look. “However, I didn’t fully expect my sister to be such an active part of my first year of marriage.”

My shoulders sag. “Jacob loves me. We play gin rummy together all the time.”

“Exactly,” Rebecca scoffs. “Maybe I’d like to play gin rummy with my husband?”

“Would you?” I ask, surprised by that remark. Rebecca is more of a Netflix and do her nails type of girl.

“God no, I hate cards.” She confirms my suspicion. “But that doesn’t take away from the fact that this is the perfect job to get you moving again. There’s taking a break, and then there’s taking a break.”

“That’s what I’ve been saying!” Dakota agrees, licking the sour sugar off her fingers.

“Well…I’m still in the middle of my Great Defrost,” I huff out defensively and move toward the bed to snatch my gummy worms out of my former best friend’s hands. “And moving back in with Mom and Dad would have been hell.”

Rebecca sighs knowingly. Our parents are good people, but they live on acreage outside of Boulder with a few farm animals they raise as a hobby along with their day jobs. And as much as I loved doing chores for our small flock of ewes who were all labeled with old lady names before and after school when I was a kid, it just wasn’t what I was up for when I moved back home.

Which means that ever since I quit my job in Denver and moved back to Boulder, my mom has been watching me like a ticking time bomb, just waiting to see what I’m going to do with my life next.

“Please just don’t screw this up,” Rebecca adds, tapping the doorframe. “Max Fletcher, uptight as he may be, is a very well-connected customer. Rich clients have rich friends, and those are the kind of referrals I need for my agency, okay?”

“You know what, Bec?” I scratch my head, my face growing serious. “Until you told me not to screw it up, I had totally planned on screwing it up. So I’m glad you made that distinction before I move in there tomorrow. We really dodged a bullet.”

She shoots me a lethal glare. “Just be professional, Cozy. I know how you can be sometimes.”

My jaw drops as she leaves me with that bolstering remark. I point at the empty doorway. “Can you believe her?”

Dakota shifts uncomfortably. “Maybe this job opportunity is good timing. I’m sensing a bit of tension between the Barlow sisters.”

I prop my hands on my hips, glowering at my sister’s guest room littered with my stuff. “I swear she doesn’t know me as an adult at all. Why would she act like I don’t know how to be professional?”

“Well…” Dakota’s traitorous voice rises in pitch.

I shoot her accusing eyes. “What?”

She winces slightly. “Don’t get me wrong, I love your ‘Great Defrost Cozy.’ It’s reminiscent of the original Cozy Cassie who I thought was gone forever from our childhood. But a lot has happened in the past six months. You changed from a woman we barely saw for years and was too busy to let her childhood bestie visit her in Denver to…whatever this version of yourself is. It’s a lot to take in.”

“I know, I know,” I mumble, shaking away the memory that always causes a pit to form in my stomach. “But don’t worry because Denver Cozy is long gone. And I have my Cozy Cassie hips back to prove it.” I bite the head off a gummy worm to accentuate my point before tossing the bag back onto the bed. I glance at myself in the mirror and tug at my oversized sweatshirt. I’ve gained a solid ten pounds since moving in with my sister, but it doesn’t bother me. It’s a sign that I’m happy. The slimmer version of myself that I was in Denver was stress-induced. I’d much rather be plus-sized and happy than mid-sized and miserable.

I retreat into my closet for a second armful.

“I do agree with your sister that it was time you finally got a job,” Dakota calls to me. “Selling your homemade charcuterie boards every other week was not going to get you out of Rebecca’s house anytime soon.”

“You know I don’t make my boards for the money,” I huff, nearly tripping on a dress that gets tangled under my feet as I come walking back out. “In fact, I wouldn’t sell any of my boards if you’d stop telling people about my hobby.”

“I know it’s your ‘therapy.’” Dakota finger quotes. “But you’re too good at it not to do something with it. I’m telling you, if you worked on those boards more than a few hours a week, you could turn your hobby into a legitimate business. I could help you set up an Etsy shop. Hell, you could sell the boards in my store!”

I eye my best friend with a look that tells her this conversation needs to stop. “This is my year of doing less. It’s like a gap year, remember?”