Falling for Mr. Wrong(20)
And all she wanted to do was let him. All. Night. Long.
When Danny returned from paying the check, they left. He offered for Harper to go back with him, but she told him it was late and she was tired. She drove down the darkened beach road to her house, hoping against hope that she’d spy Noah’s car waiting out in front of her place. She didn’t want to admit she was disappointed he wasn’t there.
Good thing she didn’t have his phone number. She had enough alcohol in her to loosen her tongue and bolster her bravado, and she’d likely have dialed his number for a booty call of epic proportions that she’d live to regret.
Instead, she’d settle for her pocket rocket and thoughts of Noah pressing himself deep within her wet body. It wasn’t nearly as satisfactory but was a far better way to salvage her dignity.
*
After Noah ran away, Harper had burrowed in for the long haul, spending much of her time crying or preparing to cry or finishing up a cry. Her eyes were so swollen half the time her mother had started fretting that if the tears didn’t stop soon, she’d be unable to see. Easy for her to say. Her job search ground to a halt—who would hire someone who looked like a leaf-tailed gecko, all bloodshot and swollen and bulgy-eyed. It was not a “hire me” kind of look.
Besides, it’s not as if she could generate the give-a-shit about a career, a future, a life. Her entire foundation had crumbled beneath her feet, and it was gonna take awhile to rebuild whatever she could. She was grateful to her parents for letting her hole up in her bedroom. Her mom worked overtime trying to find something—anything—that Harper would eat. She lost thirty pounds before she knew it, which normally would make any girl slightly thrilled, but in this case, the cost was too high. She’d take the thirty pounds she didn’t need to lose right on back if it meant this all hadn’t happened.
Allie had taken great care of Harper in those dark days. And she had a group of girlfriends from high school who tried to rally around her, inviting her out for drinks or dinner, the occasional beach bonfire. But soon they drifted away, one by one. You can only take the word “no” so many times before you take it to heart. No one, but maybe Allie, was going to beg her to come out and play. Harper had needed to figure this out herself: how to no longer be Harper and Noah, but instead, plain old Harper.
Months had passed, and she slowly graduated to sitting in the dark watching violent movies on TV. She couldn’t muster up the interest in any movie in which a couple even had a one-night stand, let alone an actual relationship. Even in the slasher movies, if there was a couple there, she was yelling at the TV screen, warning the girl about the inevitably untrustworthy guy she was dating, not about the scary masked psychopath with the chainsaw lurking around the corner. Usually she took an odd pleasure in seeing the boyfriend killed. It wasn’t a healthy time for Harper Landry.
The only other thing she could abide watching were those awful home-shopping channels. She felt a solidarity knowing that other sad, lonely people were wide awake at 3:00 a.m. debating whether they needed Joan Rivers’ pavé Bluebird of Happiness brooch. Because it seemed as if that would be the only happiness she would possess, so maybe she did need to shell out nearly a hundred and fifty bucks for it. Only she didn’t have a hundred and fifty bucks. Her bank account was as bare bones as Harper’s body was.
One day, after seeing Joan Rivers’ QVC jewelry show for about the fortieth time, she had a revelation. She didn’t need the Joan Rivers enamel Rose Garden Statement necklace. She wasn’t even clear on what a statement necklace was and whether she had a statement to make. She didn’t want Joan’s simulated Opal and Crystal Beetle brooch. She hated beetles—why would she want to wear it as a fashion statement? And truthfully, she was pavé’d out. But she was bored. And inspired.
After all, Joan Rivers didn’t come into this world a jewelry maven, yet here she was making a fortune with it. Harper had always had a crafty side: for instance, she knitted a mean sweater—sadly, she’d made Noah several over the years. And she wanted them back, dammit. She was sorely tempted to march over to his house and ask his mother to pony them up. But going to the Gunderson home would only sadden her, so instead, she hoped that his closet would become infested with moths so they’d eat the sweaters and be happy.
Harper had even dabbled in making jewelry at summer camp. She made so many of those embroidery thread bracelets she’d started selling them and did a brisk business during lunch break in middle school. Her handiwork was showcased on wrists throughout the population of Verity Beach Junior High School, home of the Fighting Seahorses. Seriously, that was their mascot. Well, if she could successfully manipulate all of those tiny threads into complicated patterns as a tween, surely now as a full-grown adult she could figure out how to make real jewelry that women her age would want. No pavé for her; rather she was going to make beachy, natural-looking jewelry that she’d want to wear.
At first she made simpler beaded things: drop earrings, bracelets, necklaces. But as her interest grew, she started taking classes and learned how to make her own silver jewelry. Her parents were just happy she had started washing her hair on a regular basis, and her father was downright elated when she started trying to sell her creations, being that they were taking up most of the space in the family dining room.
She opened an Etsy store and started marketing her products with ads on Facebook, and soon, her designs took off. She was receiving so many orders she had to find someone to help her manage the sales and shipping. And her parents gently encouraged her to find somewhere other than their home to create her masterpieces.