"Maaah," she responds, which clearly means "no."
"I'll get the ladder," Tommy sighs.
While he's gone, I sit on the wet grass—because of course it's still damp from the early November morning dew—and look up at my escape artist goat.
"You know what, Buttercup?You've got the right idea.Run away.Climb things.Refuse to come down."I pull my knees to my chest."Maybe I should join you up there.We could start a new life.Just two girls, living on a shed roof, eating coffee filters."
My phone buzzes.
Luke.
Trying to clean up things at the office.Board was not happy about the ambassador.How's your morning?
I look down at myself—muddy, grass-stained, wearing his shirt, having just been told I'm going to lose everything—and type back.
Great!Super great.Buttercup learned to climb.
Three dots appear immediately.Climb what?
I take a photo of Buttercup on the shed roof and send it.
His response is almost instantaneous.
Of course she did.Need help?
Yes, I think.
I need fifty thousand dollars and a new roof and an electrical panel that won't burn down my heritage and probably therapy for why I'm talking to a goat about my problems.
Instead, I type.
ME:Tommy's on it.You focus on freeing future ambassadors.
LUKE:I’d rather focus on you.
My heart does that triple-beating flip it's been doing lately.The flip that makes me forget I'm a walking, talking natural disaster masquerading as a functional adult.
I start to text back when another message comes in.
LUKE:Dinner tonight?Somewhere without goats?
I can’t.I won’t.
I shouldn’t.It’s important to stop this before the Sterling man with the sterling reputation realizes what a sinking ship he's attached himself to.
Before my failures drag down his reputation and his company.
"I can't.I have to..."I pause, trying to think of an excuse that isn't 'sit in my office and calculate exactly how screwed I am.'
LUKE:Sage?
ME:I have to run payroll.And inventory.And...inn things.
LUKE:Inn things.
ME:Very important inn things.
LUKE:Sage, what's wrong?
