She was smiling, not wide or certain, but it was there, that upward curve halfway between awe and disbelief. “Now you look like you’re the one about to hurl, Pruitt,” she whispered, her voice unsteady with nerves she was trying to pass off as sarcasm. “Don’t go getting all mushy on me now.”
I didn’t answer. I let the corner of my mouth pull up in return, my jaw clenched too tight to let anything else slip through.
Because whatever was shifting beneath the surface—whatever had cracked open in me the second that sound filled the room—it was already finding space I hadn’t offered, pushing against parts of myself I’d kept locked down for years. And it wasn’t going anywhere.
Neither was I.
***
“So let me get this straight,” Magnolia said, leaning across the bar at O’Malley’s like she was about to hear a murder confession. “She hitchhiked—from New York to Georgia—to rescue that scraggly little poodle she drags around like a designer handbag?”
I took a slow pull from my drink and nodded. “Swear to God. It was her grandmother’s dog, and when she found out her momma was going to ditch her, she popped her thumb out and made her way down south.”
Sutton clutched her chest. “That is… incredible.”
“Y’all know something crazy, too?” I set my drink down. “We went for a walk through the square after her appointment, andshe was telling me that one time she tackled a man trying to rob an influencer doing an outfit check video or, I don’t know, but she straight up linebacker wrestled him to the ground and got the girl’s purse back.”
Both of them stared at me, slack-jawed. Magnolia blinked first.
“She’s incredible,” she breathed.
“She’s done so much with her life, too,” I added, because apparently I wasn’t done. “She’s worked at pizza joints, salons, did hair and makeup for some off-Broadway thing Dig was in. She’s traveled all over the world, seen the Northern Lights, and the running of the bulls. Stuff we’d never even dream of doing. And, she caught every moment on her camera.”
Lee, who’d been half-listening from the next stool, let out a wheezy, full-body laugh that caught the attention of half the bar.
“What?” I asked, defensive but not really annoyed.
He jutted his chin at me, grinning. “Charlie, I’ve known you since you were a kid. And aside from that weird summer when my momma let you come along on all those estate dumpster dives, I don’t think I’ve ever heard you talk this much in one sitting.”
Magnolia pretended to clutch her pearls. “Oh my God, heistalking. I didn’t even notice until you said something. I wasriveted.”
I rolled my eyes and reached for my drink again, trying to tamp down the smile that was tugging at my mouth.
“She’s got stories,” I muttered. “And I just happen to like listening to them.”
Sutton leaned back in her chair, one eyebrow raised. “Too bad she’s got a boyfriend. Otherwise, I’d say Oscar the Grouch here finally met his match.”
I didn’t flinch or respond. I reached for another slice of pizza and shoved it in my mouth like that might muffle the sting. I’dforgotten all about the supposed boyfriend until Sutton just had to interrupt me and bring it back up.
“Boyfriend?” Lee asked, craning his neck to see Sutton behind me.
“I don’t buy it,” Magnolia said, her eyes locked on mine. “I think you saw what you wanted to see, Sutty.”
Sutton’s phone lit up and skidded once across the bar. She glanced at the screen and sighed. “LaMonte needs a warm body to fill in for Katie at the Telfair Ball. Looks like I’m it. Love you, losers.”
She kissed the side of my face with an exaggerated smack, wiping pizza grease off my cheek with her sleeve as she bolted out the door in a blur of urgency.
Lee stood, stretching with a dramatic sigh. “Guess I’d better head out too. I’m performing at said ball tonight with Ryan, and we are, how do you say, completely unprepared and wildly unrehearsed. Here’s hoping he’s not already drunk in a tux somewhere.”
Magnolia dismissed him with a flick of her hand, her expression unreadable. She stayed silent, still, watching him back out the door, that damn grin still tugging at his mouth, like she was the only one who could pull that kind of smirk from him. Her fingers curled slightly against the edge of the bar—the only sign she hadn’t taken a full breath since he walked in.
It reminded me of when we were kids, back when the two of them first started sneaking around. Making out in the back storage room of O’Malley’s, locking themselves in Magnolia’s bedroom, and pretending no one noticed.
We’d noticed.
She caught me watching and turned, her expression hardening. “Don’t start.”
I raised my hands. “Didn’t say a word.”
