Page 25 of Heartache & Playdates
I cleared my throat as I changed the subject. “Why did you say it surprised you that your name was on the list of attendees?”
“Oh, um, because Nonna RSVP’d for me. She can’t work her TV remote but somehow figured out how to scan the invite barcode and book the hotel room.”
“Wait, so if you didn’t plan on coming…how did she…?”
“Get me from New York to California. Well, she called three days ago and told me that she fell and hurt her hip and couldn’t walk. I was on the next flight and when I got here, she answered the door standing up. Apparently, she’d made a miraculous recovery. Then she told me, since I was here, I should go to my reunion.”
I grinned. “I always liked Nonna.”
“The feeling was mutual.”
“How is she doing?”
“Good enough to plot and scheme to get me to this.”
Even though she was joking, I could see the worry in her eyes.
“Is she okay?”
“She’s a lot thinner than the last time I saw her. And I don’t know. I mean, she’s ninety years old and still living alone.” She bit the inside of her cheek, the way she used to do when she was studying.
Seeing her do it transported me back in time to the countless hours I’d studied her while she was studying her books. Schoolwork had always been easy for me. From the time I could remember, I was able to teach myself whatever I wanted to learn.
I’d always considered my high intelligence as my superpower. In one of the articles I was featured in, the writer compared me to Batman, which Nick and Alex got a lot of entertainment from giving me crap about. But, like I told them, look at the facts. I did have a shitty upbringing. I am a billionaire. I used my resources to help those who weren’t privileged and those in trouble.
But whether it was a superpower or not, the truth was I’d never had to work hard at school. What took some people hours, took me minutes. I remember watchingGood Will Huntingthe first time with Lizzy because she said the main character reminded her of me, there was one scene that stood out to me. Matt Damon’s character explained to Minnie Driver how his brain worked. He said that Beethoven, Chopin they looked at a piano and could just play. He couldn’t hit the ball out of Fenway and when he looked at a piano he saw chopsticks, but he could do an O chem paper in under an hour. When it came to stuff like that, he could just play.
I’d never heard it explained so clearly, and that’s exactly how it had always been for me. I could always just play.
I used the extra time I had on my hands while she did her homework to stare at Peyton. I memorized every freckle on her face, there were ten. Six scattered across her nose, three on her left cheek, and one on her right. The curve of her nose, her lips, her chin, her cheekbones were seared into my memory.
And besides biting the inside of her cheek when she was worried or considering something, twitching her nose before she lied, and her hands trembling when she was nervous, mad or turned on, she blinked twice before she yawned. She tilted her head to the left when she was mad and to the right when she was happy. And she sighed with a little hum when she was sad.
She glanced up at me and sighed with a little hum. “I don’t know for how much longer she’ll be able to do that.”
“There are some really good retirement homes in the city. I know one in particular that Alex owns.”
“Alex? Alex Vaughn?”
I nodded.
“Alex Vaughnowns a retirement home?”
“Yeah, he met a man at his grief support group, and I guess he bonded with him. When Mr. Williams ended up having to go into a senior living facility, Alex bought it so that he could make sure his friend was taken care of.”
Her brows furrowed. “Grief support group?”
“Ash and AJ died.”
She stopped dancing and her lips parted in a silent gasp. Her eyes searched mine in confusion and shock. “What? When? How?”
“You didn’t hear about that?”
“No. I haven’t kept up with…anyone.”
“They died about six years ago. Ash and AJ were crossing the street and a truck hit them, they didn’t survive. Ash was nine months pregnant. Her baby, Lexi, survived.”
Her fingers gripped my shoulders as she shook her head back and forth slowly. “I had no idea, I would have…I don’t know what I would have done. AJ was such a sweet baby, and Ash… I was sure she was going to rule the world one day.”
