“I can’t just unsign them. There are people counting on this to work out, money already moving to make this happen.”
I spin around. “And I’m telling you, I’m counting on you to undo this. This isn’t just another building in a great walkable neighborhood. This is Nan’s Diner. This ismydiner.”
Hot tears are streaming down my face, my chest caught in a vice like pressure.
“I—I can’t.”
“You can’t or you won’t?”
His face answers for me. He won’t. This is the best—or at the very least has the potential to be the best. Words start scrolling through my brain like a news cast ticker tape. Few weeks of renovations. Perfect windows. Walkable location. Perfect for Flourish. He’s going to gut this place, destroy what stands to make room for what could be. Just like he tried to do with me.
“Lottie . . .”
“Fuck off, Noah.”
“Just give me a second to think.”
“No. I’m tired. I’m tired of giving and giving. Give you a chance, you said. Give you a day. Give you tomorrow. Trust you, because you were safe. I did that. And look what it fucking got me.I’mthe one losing here. I’m the one who needs a second. Not you. If you can’t see that, if you can’t see how utterly fucked this is, then not only are you more like your father than I ever thought you could be, we have no fucking business together.”
My chest is heaving with the ultimatum cast at his feet, and his face crumples under my insult. It was low for me to put him on equal footing with his father, but I can’t bring myself to backtrack.
“Lottie—”
“Don’t.”
I spin out of the kitchen, letting the door slam behind me. Wiping my eyes with the back of my hand, I scan the guests milling about and snacking on a fruit and cheese platter someone laid out. The pizza delivery guy is pushing in andHenrietta is directing him to stack the boxes on the counter. Everything is going just like I planned, but the sight of it makes me sick.
It’s ruined.
Sniffing, I keep to the wall and find my way back towards the bathroom where my bag is stashed. My phone is ringing, the sound of it mostly camouflaged by the party unfolding behind me. I pull it out just as it goes to voicemail, the screen lighting up with too many notifications. Twenty missed calls and a few dozen text messages from Kara. Ignoring a message from Noah, sent right before he walked in and ripped my dream from my raw, bleach burned fingertips, I tap on the first voicemail.
“Lottie. It’s Kara. God you already know that. Something’s happened to Nan. I’m waiting on the paramedics now. Call me back.”
My blood chills and I tap the next one. “Hey, they have her loaded up, and she regained consciousness when they put her in the ambulance. I really need you to call me back.”
“We’re headed to St. Joseph’s. Call me. Please.”
I don’t wait for the next message, or bother redialing; I run out to the party and scan for Henrietta. Her face falls from joy to panic when she sees me.
“I need your keys. Something happened to Nan. I have to go.”
“Oh,” she says, standing and rushing to her purse. “Oh my.”
Noah steps out of the kitchen, lowering his phone from his ear. God dammit. I figured he left. Wished it even.
“What happened?”
“Nothing. Go home Noah. This doesn’t concern you. This isn’t Flourish’s business.”
“Hey, let me?—”
“Fuck off.”
Henrietta flinches at my curse, but she offers her keys and I leave without explaining or looking back.
The drive is a blur as I reason with myself. One disaster at a time. I can’t think about Noah and his betrayal when something happened to Nan. Kara didn’t say what. Did she fall? Faint? Have a stroke? I squeeze the steering wheel, my chest twisting into the all too familiar vice grip as I try to hold it all together. Impossible, as the worst case scenarios scroll through on repeat.
Pulling Henrietta’s old Buick into the first parking spot I can find, I stumble in through the emergency room doors. The nurse at the desk stands up and words start tumbling out in an incoherent mess.
