Bobby looked like he was itching to find his badge, but all he said was “If you want to show her she made a mistake, maybe you should focus on doing your own work, achieving something that will prove to everyone that she made a mistake by leaving you out.”He let a beat pass, and then he added, “Or you could do the healthy, mature thing and just let this go.”He ruffled my hair and said, “I’m gonna get you a cookie, sweetheart.”
He was barely out the door when I said, “That ‘let it go’ stuff is nonsense, right?”
Fox flipped a hand in Bobby’s direction.“He doesn’t know what he’s talking about.He does have a point, though, about showing up Pippi.”
“Like what?How?”An idea sparked.“Like throw our own book launch party and gallery event?”
“Exactly,” Fox said.“The only problem is you don’t have a book.”
“Okay, well, Idohave a book—”
“And you’ve never sold a book.”
“I actually have several agents who might be interested.Well, I mean, I sent them a query letter—”
“No prospects, nothing on the horizon, really no hope at all.”
My normal tendency would have been to bicker about this last bit, but then I realized we were losing the thread.“Fox, focus: Pippi.”
Their eyes narrowed.“What about that short story?You’ve got a short story just sitting around, don’t you?”
“Oh, yeah, I guess—”
“Perfect.You’re going to make it the start of an anthology.And we can use my gallery for the event.”
I squirmed to the edge of the chesterfield.“Okay.Wait, this might actually be something.”
“Of course it’s going to be something,” Fox said.“It’s going to be atremendoussomething.Now, we’ll need to find other local artists who can collaborate.And other writers.”
“Hear me out: what about the college?I’m already plugged in over there, and I can reach out to the faculty, even some of the more talented students.I bet there are a lot of writers—talentedwriters—Pippi totally snubbed.”
“Perfect.”Fox actually cackled.“And there are alotof artists on the coast, brilliant artists, who aren’t doing watercolors of majestic cliffs and all that other horse plop tourists buy.”
(Fox didn’t actually sayhorse plop.)
“I bet if we ask Indira to help, she’d cater,” I said.
“Of course she will,” Fox said.“And it’ll be better than whatever slop Pippi had at her event.”
“And Millie would probably help with decorating.”
“I’lldecorate,” Fox said.“Millie may assist me.”
“What about catering staff?Oh shoot!”(Not quite what I said.) “Keme and Bobby would help!And they’d look so good in tuxes!”
That might have revealed a bit more of my Bobby-as-007 fantasy than I had intended, but Fox only squinted at me and said, “That is literally genius.”
“All the stories for the anthology could be gritty,” I said.“Neo-noir.‘Coastal Crime,’ that’s what we could call it.Or something like that.”
“Trust me,” Fox said, “the pieces I curate for this collaboration are going to be real art.They’re going to shake people’s foundations.They’re going to be disturbing.They’re going to make a statement, and people won’t be able to look away.”
“I mean, not too gritty,” I said.“Like, I don’t want them to bedarkdark.”
“How much nudity is too much?”Fox asked.“Will there be children?”
“Is ‘Coastal Crime’ already taken?Should the theme be cozy noir?”
At that point, Bobby came back with my cookie.And because he knew me and he loved me and he accepted me for who I was, he broughttwocookies.
