Page 25 of The Write Stuff

“It’s not as if I need a babysitter,” she reminded me. “I’ll be able to entertain myself. We’ll be roommates. It will be fun.”

“A roommate pays half the rent,” I pointed out.

She pretended she didn’t hear me. “I’ll be in touch and let you know my travel plans. I can’t wait until Mom hears about us living together. I bet she’ll visit us for a change.”

I wasn’t sure that I wanted Mom in Savannah when Huxley was running around. What if his mother decided to visit him? That would be a catastrophe to end all catastrophes.

“Lucy —”

“Bye.” She hung up before I could say anything else.

Briefly, I closed my eyes. Lucy being in Savannah was going to make things worse. I didn’t need her hunting down Huxley and kicking him in the knee because he stole a Kit Kat from her. That was something she had actually done when she was four. I had my doubts that Huxley would be happy to see her too.

Although picturing his face when Lucy showed up to give him a hard time made me smile. Maybe having my sister stay with me for a few weeks — just until she found a new gig — wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world after all.

7

SEVEN

Living at The Landings had its advantages. There were multiple restaurants with good food, and everybody rode around in golf carts. Bree had insisted on taking hers with her when selling, even though she and Brody went everywhere together. She said she needed one “just in case.” It was Barbie pink, and she’d decked it out with decals, so I didn’t really want her golf cart anyway. I would have taken Brody’s, though. It would have beaten shopping for one of my own.

Bree invited herself along when I picked out my ride. She knew a woman.

No, literally. Her golf cart saleswoman was a former resident of The Landings, and had helped Bree break HOA rules. Apparently, it had been her life’s mission to drive the board nuts before getting divorced and moving. She was more than happy to lend her expertise — she’d been on the board for a time — to Bree as a form of torture to the people she used to consider friends.

Bree had a lot of ideas about what my golf cart should look like. I shot them all down.

“Blue is boring,” she insisted as I pulled out a credit card to pay. My golf cart wouldn’t be ready for a few days, and then they would deliver it. I couldn’t believe how expensive golf carts were. Seeing how traffic zipped around the community, however, a golf cart was clearly the way to go.

“I happen to like blue,” I replied, shaking my head. I liked her, but she was a lot. I had no idea how Brody put up with her. He, of course, was head over heels. Between Bree and Brontë, he was in heaven. He constantly walked around with a smile on his face. It would have been disturbing if I didn’t know how happy he was.

Had I ever been that happy? I couldn’t think of a time. I didn’t consider myself an unhappy person, but the sort of happiness he exuded was otherworldly. It wasn’t just him, either. Nathan seemed just as happy, and everything I’d heard about Nathan — he’d been a notorious womanizer for years — made me think it would have been impossible for him to be as happy as he appeared to be. Yet I never saw the man without a smile on his face.

“You at least need some decals,” Bree insisted. “I mean … blue is so boring without decals.” She did a shimmying dance over to the decal display. “Look. There’s a Klingon. You should totally get that one.” She didn’t look at me when she said it, but it was obvious she was fishing for information.

“I am not getting a Klingon. I hate science fiction.”

Bree turned, slowly, and narrowed her eyes. “Does your mother know that?”

“My mother doesn’t hold my entertainment choices against me.” I took the receipt, smiled at the saleswoman, then started toward the door. “I’m not getting decals.”

“Oh, I was wrong,” Bree said as she reluctantly followed. “Blue isn’t boring. You are.”

I stopped on the sidewalk outside the store and stared down at her. “You’re a pain in the ass,” I said finally. “Has anybody ever told you that?”

“Just everybody who has ever met me.”

“Even Brody?”

“Oh, Brody thought I was the biggest pain in his ass in the world when we met.”

“And then he fell in love a week later?”

“Oh, no.” Her smile slipped. “He hated me for years. There was this incident with coffee at a convention. He was convinced I was trying to ruin his life. It was a whole thing.”

I vaguely remembered the coffee story. “And how did you guys end up falling in love again?”

She shrugged. “Well, he almost hit me with his golf cart — I was on my scooter, which I love, but he won’t let me ride any longer because he says I’m going to end up a statistic — and we fought. Then we kept running into each other.” Her smile was sloppy. “Sometimes, when it’s meant to be, it just happens.”