Sweet Forty-Two(83)

I sat forward, placing my forearms on my knees. “She hasn’t been texting me for the last few days. And, I’ve been home, smartass. I’ve only stayed here one night.”

She threw her head back, growling and sighing to the ceiling. “You know ... I’m the last person in this little group here that should be qualifying Georgia’s character, since I was such a raging bitch to her when we first met, but you know she wasn’t being malicious, right? At least not from the story. It’s only your version I’ve heard, anyway, and that’s the impression that I get.”

“Mighty Mighty Bosstones. Nice reference, Em. What was that ... 1997?” Bo cracked a smile, setting his fourth bottle of beer in the sand. I laughed, picking up my fifth.

“Dear God, drink some water, lightweights.” She couldn’t help but chuckle along with us.

I cleared my throat. “You’re right. She wasn’t malicious, I get that.”

“So why are you here? You’re not the theatrical ty-... oh, wait ... there was that hiding in Ireland bit.” Ember shrugged and polished off her wine.

The air was cold coming off of the bay, and I pulled the hood on my sweatshirt over my head, scoffing at my flair for the dramatic.

“I’m just licking my wounds. Animals do that, you know—run off to a cave somewhere and come out when they’re all better.”

Bo sighed, like he already regretted what he was about to say. “You know you’re not going to feel better until you talk to her.”

Ember’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. “Says the guy who spent two months stalking his ex-girlfriend at the club where she sang.”

“Worked out for you two, didn’t it?” I air-toasted them and finished the rest of my beer.

“Barely.” Bo shook his head. His voice was low and serious. “Sure we both did some healing and growing in the three months we were apart, but I promise you I would have rather done that healing and growing with her by my side, no matter how uncomfortable it would have been at first.”

Ember rose from her seat and placed herself in Bo’s lap, nuzzling into his neck as he wrapped his arms around her. “And, let’s address the elephant on the beach here. Haven’t you said that you learned from Rae to live every second? Not like it’s your last, or anything, but just live. Don’t you say there’s no point in wasting seconds not living when living is what we’ve been charged to do?”

I winced as Ember spewed my well-rehearsed mantra back at me, and my stomach turned as I realized I’d used similar words to hurt Georgia a few days ago in my apartment. I turned them around and threw them back at her from my own anger.

“When does the bakery open?” Bo asked.

“I’ll make you cupcakes, calm down,” Ember teased. He stuck his tongue out at her.

“No, I mean, Regan, you were a huge part of giving her the courage to push forward there, right?”

I nodded and shrugged. My noncommittal stance as the knife in my stomach twisted left and right.

Bo continued, “Don’t you think you should be there to support her on that day?”

“The girl can hold a grudge, Bo. I mean, she has to, she doesn’t have many friends.”

Ember scrunched her nose. “She’s friends with CJ, for Christ’s sake, how big of a grudge can she hold? Just because she doesn’t have a ton of friends doesn’t mean she holds a grudge. Look at you, you’re private but not a grudge holder.”

“I really do like her, guys.”

Ember sighed. “No, you love her. At least that’s what’s brewing in there. You’re not a like kind of guy. You don’t put your emotions on the line for like.”

“Argh,” I pinched the bridge of my nose, “what if I really, really f*cked up? She has trust issues and, shit, I kicked her out of my apartment.”

Ember sat forward. “Well, it’s safe to say you f*cked up, Regan, but so did she, kind of. She was scared, you were insecure, it’s just ... nonsense.”

“What’d you say?” My eyes shot to her.

“Uh ... nonsense?”

“Ha!” I clapped my hands and stood up. “You’re brilliant. I gotta go.”

“Oh, no you don’t,” Bo nearly yelled. “You just swallowed five beers. Tomorrow. You can ride in on your white horse tomorrow.”

He was right, said my head, as it seemed to move separately from my body. I sat down in a loud thump and looked at the love birds perched on their Adirondack chair together.

“Rabbit.” I smiled.

“What?” they said in unison.

“Bo said white horse ... it’s a rabbit.”

“Christ, you’re weird.” Ember stood and gathered the bottles from around the chairs. “It’s my hypothesis that you and Georgia will do just fine together.”





The next day I left as soon as my eyes opened for the first time which was, regrettably, five in the morning. I knew that would be my only chance that day to talk with Georgia, since she was doing her day-long introductory class today at the bakery.

She’d already be in the kitchen, whisking and whipping away, so I wasn’t worried about waking her up, though if I had to, I’d do exactly that to get her to listen to me.

I slammed my hand against the steering wheel in frustration at what a jackass I’d been to her. Just because two people don’t trust on the same timeline doesn’t mean one is more or less trustworthy than the other. I’d quantified Georgia’s trust and told her, in not so many words, that her total wasn’t good enough, high enough, for me.