“You don’t seem like the type to betray your friends,” I say, watching her carefully.
“But I did.”
“On purpose?”
She pulls her knees back to her chest and eyes the chicken, who’s watching us like wearethe dessert. “My two best friends—they’reeverything,” she says. “I love my brother, but he’s…hard sometimes. Laney and Sabrina are the sisters I never had. We’ve been inseparable since third grade. They know me. They’ve protected me. They’ve been there for me for the very worst moments of my life, like when my mom died, but this—this was my fault. Sabrina didn’t tell me everything she knew about Cha—about my ex, because she knew I didn’t want to hear it.”
“That was her choice. Not yours.”
“Butshe was right. I didn’t want to hear it. I was so in love with the idea of being married and having kids and living in their grandparents’ house, but upgraded to be surrounded by the white picket fence, that I didn’t want to consider that I was marrying the wrong person. And you know the worst part?”
I shake my head.
“I think I always knew he wasn’t right for me, but every time I’d think about breaking up with him, I’d start calculating how long it would take me to meet someone new, fall in love, get engaged, and get married and start a family, and I’d start thinking I was already too old. And then he’d make an offhand comment about how I was too skinny, or how I was too neurotic, or how I was too naïve, and I’d question if anyone elsecouldlove me.Seven years. We spentseven yearswith me thinking I was lucky I got back together with a man who said he wanted to eventually marry me and have kids with me, all of it to end like this.”
“Gotbacktogether?”
“We were high school sweethearts,” she whispers. “Broke up in college when we went to different schools and he said he wanted to date other women. But we graduated and both moved back home and then—then I took him back. I was so stupid.”
“BaGOOOOOCK!” the chicken yells.
“What she said,” I agree. “Gotta be easier on yourself.”
“I asked my other best friend to babysit my brother during my wedding week so he wouldn’t fight with my ex. Who does that? Who asks a friend to babysit your adult brother so he won’t accidentally upset your groom?”
I squeeze her hand. “Take it from someone who’s gotten married at least two dozen times when I say no one’s at their best at weddings.”
She makes a strangled noise that’s somewhere between a laugh and a gasp. “You have not been married two dozen times.”
“I have on screen. And if you think parents and the bridal party are bad at weddings, you should see how producers and directors act.”
“Oh my god.”
I’m being absolutely ridiculous.
But you know what?
She’s smiling again. Laughing even as she wipes her eyes. “Are you always like this?”
“Absolutely.”
The chicken snorts in my direction.
“Happy clucking to you too,” I tell it.
It doesn’t like that.
It doesn’t like thatat all.
Swear the thing bends over, lowers its head, and charges straight for me, wings flapping,ba-gock-ing its head off.
Emma shrieks and leaps to her feet.
I shriek and dive out of the way too.
“This is why they don’t want chickens on the island here,” I tell her while the chicken readjusts its course and charges me again.
“Dessert!” she cries. “Toss it some of the banana cake!”
