24
CHRIS
E FOUND THE cat in the library. Larissa was sitting on the floorW petting it. I left her there to go find her something to eat.
The plan to leave early to get food had turned into Mike showing no signs of leaving the tiki bar.
I found the caterer in the kitchen and asked if there was anything safe for Larissa. He said the pulled pork only had seasoned salt on it and their Hawaiian rolls were from a nut-free bakery. He found an unopened bag, then made some fresh coleslaw without the cashews. He added extra pineapple for the chocolate fountain that was uncontaminated. I found a can of soda, grabbed the food, and went back to the library.
“I got you something to eat,” I said.
She blinked at the plate from the spot on the floor, where she sat petting the cat. “Where?”
“Ran into the chef, told him about the allergy. It’s all safe.”
I watched her face transform. “Thank you,” she breathed.
I checked her EpiPen while she grabbed her food and took a bite of the sandwich. She closed her eyes while she chewed. “Oh, wow,” she
whispered. “I was so hungry.”
My jaw ticked.
Larissa was great about planning around her allergy, but she didn’t know the Maddoxes. She couldn’t text Joy and ask about the menu. But Mike could—and he didn’t.
I watched her eat like she was starving.
I knew her. It was Saturday, so she started at 6:00 a.m. and waited on tables until two. She probably did delivery orders or her secret shopper stuff until the last minute, then ran home, got ready, and came without eating.
She might have snacked or had breadsticks in her purse and a banana or
something, but she was hungry.
I tried to force down how I felt about this by pretending I needed to look at her EpiPen for longer than was humanly necessary. After I handed it back to her, I went to look at the bookshelves while she finished her plate just to give myself more time to recover.
Greg and Joy had a very nice house. A very nice everything, actually.
The place was a palace. We could get lost in here and no one would find us, which I was hoping for.
I’d gotten the sense Larissa needed a little break. Mike was buzzed, and she looked overstimulated and exasperated that he was being so loud. I didn’t blame her a bit. Mike was always like that when he drank too much.
Like a dial that got turned all the way up before he shorted out entirely. I had far too much experience with this.
Mike had a meltdown for three solid months after his high school injury.
He would drink until he passed out, got a DUI on prom night right before he turned eighteen. He’d straightened out after that. It had been well over a decade, but it’s not really something you forget.
After everything that happened at the end of senior year, working for Tony was the best-case scenario. His stepdad was a good guy and he looked out for him and kept him out of trouble when the rest of us weren’t there to help.
That had been my biggest fear going off to university—not being there to make sure Mike did okay. But he did. He worked those first few years, putting in the hours for his master plumber license and whether he liked to admit it or not, he was great at it. He was capable of a lot more than he gave himself credit for. Mike was good with people. You can’t teach that. His coworkers liked him, the rest of Tony’s crew respected him, and he was a good front person for the business.
I just wish he wanted the plumber thing. Or anything for that matter.
I pulled a first edition of Love Shows Up off the shelf and walked it across the room.
Larissa was sitting on the Oriental rug over by the fireplace, eating the last of the pineapple.
“Look at this,” I said, crouching to show it to her.
“By Joy Maddox,” she said, reading the cover. “Have you read it?”
“Yeah. It’s good. I can loan you my copy.”
“Okay, cool. Thanks for the food,” she said, setting her empty plate aside. “It was beef-stick-in-the-woods good.”
I chuckled and she smiled.
She went back to petting the cat and I went to return the book to the shelf. I was slipping it into its slot when the door to the library slid open and Jesse poked his head in.
“There you are. Where’s Larissa?” he whispered.
“She’s playing with the cat.”
He looked over my shoulder to make sure she was far enough away to be out of earshot and came back to me. “We gotta take Mike home.”
I drew my brows down. “What? Why?”
“He’s fucking wasted,” he said, lowering his voice. “He was doing
shots.”
“Shots?”
“Man, you missed a wild thirty minutes. Right after you left, he started arguing with some guy over protein powder. He was getting all loud. Then he did two shots of Jäger back-to-back, dropped and did a bunch of push- ups, got up, beat his chest like an ape, and went over to the bushes by the
gazebo. Becca and I followed him—”
He stopped.
“He pissed himself,” he said so low I almost didn’t hear him.
I stared. “He what?”
“All down the front of his pants,” he whispered. “And then he jumped in the pool so nobody would notice. We had to pull him out. He’s soaking wet,
his phone’s cracked—”
“What the hell…?”
“I don’t even know.” He was shaking his head. “It was like prom all over again. He’s fucking lost it.”
I dragged a hand down my mouth. “He started back on his Prozac. It can make you drunker. And Larissa said they didn’t eat anything. Maybe he just didn’t realize how it would hit him?”
Jesse nodded like he wanted that to be the excuse. We all wanted that to be it.
“He’s a hot mess,” he said. “I put him in the truck to drive him home, but Larissa took his keys.”
“She’s not going in that truck with him,” I said. It wasn’t even a
discussion. If Mike was that erratic, I wasn’t letting her anywhere near him.
“No, I agree,” he said. “You take her home. Becca and I got Mike.”
I nodded. “Okay, give me a second.” I closed the door.
I stood there for a moment, trying to tamp down my feelings. Maybe it was the empty stomach exacerbating Mike’s behavior. Or maybe it was the three cocktails and two shots.
What the hell was he thinking? He was supposed to get Larissa home.
What was the plan there? And he was gonna drop his pants and pee in the bushes? In the damn yard in front of everyone? Were we six?
What if we hadn’t been here? What if Larissa had to deal with this shit by herself?
Maybe he wouldn’t have gotten like this if it were just the two of them.
Surely he wouldn’t put her in this situation if nobody else was around. He would have practiced more restraint or been more conservative with the drinks or had more self-control if a handful of other designated drivers weren’t here to fish him out of the pool and get her home safely.
I had to believe that was true. Because dwelling on what I actually thought would have happened was too upsetting.
I made my way back to the far corner of the library to tell Larissa. I tried to deliver this news as casually as I could.
“Hey,” I said, coming around the sofa. “Jesse’s taking Mike home early.
He had a little too much to drink. I need the keys to the truck.”
She blinked up at me. “What happened?”
“Nothing, it’s not a big deal. I just think the empty stomach didn’t mix well with the liquor.”
She studied me like she was trying to decide if I was filtering. I hoped to God she didn’t ask me for more information. As irritated as I was by this, I didn’t want to throw him under the bus and I didn’t want to lie to her.
She started to get up. “I’ll go home with him—”
“No, they got him. He just needs to sleep it off. I’ll drive you home.”
“Did he throw up or something?”
“No, no. He’s just ready to go.”
She looked at me another moment, still trying to figure out if there was more. She must have decided she didn’t want to know. She reached into her purse and pulled out the keys to the truck.
“I’ll be right back,” I said.
I handed them to Jesse through the door. “Text me when you get him home,” I whispered. “I’ll check on him tomorrow. And if he’s too drunk, get
Donna or Janessa up to stay with him.”
He nodded and took off.
When I came back into the room, Larissa was texting someone. “He didn’t pick up,” she said.
“He’s really out of it,” I said. “Don’t worry, they’ll take care of him.”
She pressed her lips into a line and nodded, her eyes fixed on an antique globe in the corner. “He doesn’t do this a lot, right?” She looked at me.
“Drink too much?”
I paused. What to say to this?
Did I think Mike was an alcoholic? No. Did I think he had a tendency to overdo it occasionally? Yes. Was this starting to become a problem? Maybe.
“I think you should talk to him if it’s bothering you,” I said.
I was going to talk to him too.
She chewed her lip and nodded.
Then we just stood there.
“Sorry you have to drive me home,” she said, glancing at me. “I know
how much you hate that.”
“Knock it off.”
“Are you even the closest one to my house?” she said, putting a thumb over her shoulder. “Because I can ask around.”
“Are you done abusing me now? Can we get going?”
She crossed her arms. “Wow. In such a rush to get rid of me.”
“Do you blame me? Look how mean you are.”
She was laughing as she walked past me to the door.
I followed her down the hall and she turned to walk backward. “Can I
ask you a favor?”
“What?”
“Can we take a little detour?”
“For?”
“I got a secret shop request for a picture of a billboard,” she said. “It’s sort of on the way.”
I looked at my watch in an attempt to pretend the time mattered. “I don’t
know…”
“Please, Chris? It’s fifteen dollars.”
I let out a dramatic breath. “You are a force of inconvenience.”
She grinned because she knew I was full of shit and turned back around.
I followed her out to my car, smiling in the wake of her perfume.
Fifteen minutes later we were in a vacant parking lot, facing a lit-up Toilet King billboard.
“This is what you have to take a picture of?” I asked.
She tucked her leg under her on the seat. “Yeah. They want a picture of
it after eleven. So in ten minutes.”
“Did Tony request this?”
“No, the billboard company.”
I put the car in park and unbuckled my seat belt.
“What do you think of him?” I asked, nodding at the billboard.
“Tony? He’s a cool guy. He tips really well when he comes into the diner,” she said. “I wish Mike would work for him more.”
I looked at her. “Why?”
“It just seems more stable than the training. He doesn’t always have clients.”
I looked back out at the billboard. “How does this work exactly? Like how do we know someone else isn’t going to show up to take the same picture?”
“You claim the job. Then you have a window of time to complete it.”
“What’s the window for this one?”
“Two hours. Nobody else can claim a job you’ve already signed up for until the time runs out.”
I narrowed my eyes at the billboard. “I wonder if they want to see if the light stays on.”
“Probably. Have you ever seen a Toilet King billboard that wasn’t lit up
twenty-four seven?”
I bobbed my head. “True.”
We sat there in silence, looking at Tony in his Henry Tudor costume holding a toilet plunger over a poop-filled bowl.
“Want to listen to some music?” I asked.
“Sure. What’s in your playlist?”
“Nothing I’m going to play for you,” I said, turning on the radio.
She gasped. “Why?”
“You’re going to make fun of me.”
“Awwwww, come on. It can’t be more embarrassing than stabby sticks.”
I gave her an amused look. “Why are you laughing at my trauma?”
“Well, when you say it like that, I sound like a jerk. I’m not going to
stop though.”
I chuckled.
“Is it show tunes?” she asked. “Electronic dance music? The soundtrack for Frozen—”
“Hey, the soundtrack for Frozen was excellent.”
“So it’s that.”
“What’s in your playlist?” I asked. “Show me your phone.”
“I’ll show you mine if you show me yours.”
“Fine,” I said.
“Fine.”
We both keyed in our passwords and then handed them over.
We went quiet studying each other’s list.
“It is show tunes,” she said.
“So?”
“I’m half inclined to believe you planted this here.”
“You think I listened to hundreds of hours of Hamilton just to confuse
you?”
“Okay. Good point.”
I smiled. “What’s this one?” I asked. “‘Sliver’ by Lola Simone.”
“Play it. It’s really pretty. Part of her comeback album.”
We returned each other’s phones and I looked up the song on mine and played it over the Bluetooth.
A simple guitar intro, steady, ethereal voice. I loved it.
We listened to it, watching the moths flutter in the light of the billboard.
Neither of us said a word, just enjoyed the song.
I wondered offhandedly if this would have happened that night after the concert if I’d been the one to drive her home. Would we have talked about music and ended up exchanging phones and picking a song to play?
I found myself thinking a lot about that night lately. I wished I didn’t.
There was no point dwelling on what-ifs. I did it with Mom and it only filled me with guilt and regret.
I think that’s just the way the human brain works though. Circling back over the mistakes we’ve made. Trying to learn so we do it better next time.
I wouldn’t get a next time. Not for either scenario.
The song ended right as the clock hit 11:00. Larissa lifted her phone to take a picture. “Easiest fifteen dollars I’ve ever made,” she said, sending the image to the company that asked for it.
“How much did you make today toward the hundred?”
She twisted her lips thinking about it. “I did a delivery order before the party, got a ten-dollar tip. So twenty-five?”
“Are there other requests? For billboard pictures?”
“Oh yeah. Lots. They’re not on the way home though, they’re kind of all over.”
“And they all want pictures after eleven? That’s it?”
“That’s it.”
I put my seat belt on. “Let’s do them.”
She blinked at me. “What?”
“Let’s go do them. Unless you need to get home,” I said.
She shook her head. “No, I don’t. But… are you sure? You want to drive me around taking pictures of billboards? Don’t you have to sleep?”
“I’m not tired.”
She gave me a look like she didn’t believe me.
“I’m really not,” I said. But I would have done it anyway, even if I were.
I wanted to help her.
She studied me in the faint glow of the billboard like she was trying to decide if I meant it.
By the way she always balked at help, I wondered if it got offered enough. It didn’t seem natural for her to take it. She didn’t want the ride to the hospital, I’d had to coax her to breakfast, force myself into her apartment to get her luggage. Anytime she took anything from anyone, she was apologetic and it felt like a last resort.
I think she’d been on her own a long time. Used to doing everything herself. Maybe because people let her down? Her dad. Her mom wasn’t always dependable.
Mike wasn’t always dependable either. I hated to say it, but he wasn’t.
I would not let her down. Ever.
In fact, I think this was the moment that cemented that for me. Where I knew I would do things for her without asking. Without her knowing, even.
Because even the act of accepting help took a toll on her. And her life
deserved to be a little easier. Even if she didn’t know who was making it
that way.
Or why.