“Steel Magnolias.”
“Action movie?” he asks her.
“Nope.”
“Damn it,” he snaps.
Zoey breaks out into a fit of giggles, and I know everything’s going to be okay.
20
OLIVER
I walkinto the bathroom and find Lulu in front of the mirror.
“It’s worse than I thought,” she says, staring at me in the reflection.
I come up behind her and wrap my arms around her shoulders, meeting her gaze. I wish I could erase the day and everything that happened to her. “You always look beautiful.”
She steps backward and leans against me, resting her head on my shoulder. “You clearly need glasses, Oli.”
“Eyesight’s perfect, sweetheart.”
“I do look kind of badass, don’t I?”
“Toughest woman I’ve ever seen.”
“I’ve had a black eye before,” she admits, peering up at me. “Only once and only one eye. First time having a matching set.”
“What happened?” I ask, wanting to keep her mind off what happened today. She’ll have time to process it all later, and I’ll be there to pick up the pieces when she does.
“There was this mean girl at school who kept picking on Zoey. She would shit-talk her every day. Zoey would always walk home at the end of the day in tears. I could only take it for so long before I decided I would have a little talk with Marly. That’s her name, Marly Milano.”
“I’m guessing the talk didn’t go well.”
“Wrong.”
“Then how did you end up with a black eye?” I ask, turning her around so I can undress her.
“What are you doing?” she asks as my fingers touch the bottom of her shirt.
“Taking care of you, and that starts with a bath.”
“I can get undressed.”
“You talk, I’ll do the rest.”
She stares at me for a second and I think she’s about to argue, but she doesn’t. “Marly was a talker, and I mean, the girl wouldn’t shut up. She thought she could talk to me like she did to Zoey. I had none of it.” She pauses for a moment as I lift her shirt over her head.
“Who made the first strike?”
“Marly attacked me with her mouth, so I introduced her to my fist.”
I crouch down and work the button of her jeans. “Did she win?”
“Bite your tongue,” she says, placing her hands on my shoulders to step out of her pants. “She got the first blow, but I got the last.”
“Who looked worse?” I ask, keeping her talking as I toss her jeans to the floor where her shirt landed.
