Rolling down my window to better hear the music, I’m reminded of something Chris Rose once wrote about how we do things down here in the Big Easy.We dance even if there’s no radio. We drink at funerals. We talk too much and laugh too loud and live too large, and frankly, we’re suspicious of others who don’t.
Amen, brother. Amen.
If I can take pleasure in nothing else today, I can take pleasure in this. This quintessentially New Orleans tradition. This proof that in a country where too many cities are carbon copies of each other, my hometown is unapologetically unique.
After the procession passes, we carry on to the hospital. But not ten minutes after going inside, we’re back in Maggie’s SUV.
She turns to me. “What do you think? Where would he go?”
Dr. Beckett met us in the hall outside Cash’s room to tell us Cash had checked himself out. (Against medical advice.) Not that I’m surprised. Cash has never been one to sit stillorlisten to reason. Plus, I hate to say it, but he was probably hankering for a stiff drink.
“He’ll have gone home,” I assure her.
She puts the car in gear and points us toward The Quarter. A few blocks later, I notice she’s white-knuckling the steering wheel, so I’m not shocked when she says, “About yesterday morning…”
Clenching my teeth, I stare out the window at the old-fashioned buildings of the Vieux Carré. Winters here are easy, so the wrought-iron balconies are still stacked with outdoor furniture and huge ferns are still dripping with bright green fronds. Carnival season will be starting soon, and the houses and the storefronts are already festooning themselves in the purple, green, and gold hues of Mardi Gras.
She continues, “I wanted to tell you that—”
“You wanted to tell me that you were okay turning your affection my way when you thought Cash was a dead end,” I cut her off, speaking the words myself so I don’t have to hear her say them. “But the minute you found out he was acting up ’cause he’s sad and sick as opposed to acting up ’cause he doesn’t want anything more to do with you, you swung right ’round and aimed your heart straight back at him.”
She palms the locket hanging around her neck and frowns at me. “That’s not it at all. I’m not saying I’m still holding out hope he’ll want to pick up where we left off in high school. I’m saying that with all he’s already going through, we shouldn’t add to his burden by changing the dynamic between us. I’m saying that once he’s better,thenyou and I can see if—”
“Bullshit, Maggie May!” She blinks. In all the years we’ve known each other, I don’t recollect ever raising my voice to her. “Are you really sitting over there asking me to believe that if Cash was healthy, if he stopped drinking and decided to fly right, you wouldn’t be itching to see if there could be more between you? You wouldn’t be back to standing too close to him, to constantly touching him despite him saying he doesn’t want you like that?”
“I—” she starts and then immediately stops, something that looks a lot indecision skittering behind her eyes.
Even though I expected it, it still hits me like a tidal wave, pressing me down, sucking me under. A few days ago, when I didn’t know what it was to kiss her, before I allowed myself to dream the impossible dream, I might have been strong enough to kick back to the surface.
Not now.
Now all I can manage is a bitter, “That’s what I thought.”
“Come on, Luc!” She slaps the steering wheel. “It’s not that easy, and you know it!”
“Itisthat easy. For me. ’Cause I’ve always known exactly what I want. I wish to God you could say the same thing.”
Chapter Seventy-two
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Cash
It’s easy to do the wrong things in life. Making the right choices is often so much harder.
Coming back to New Orleans was the right choice. So was bringing Luc and Maggie together again. But when they pull next to the curb, hop from Maggie’s SUV, and start heading my way, the first thing I notice is there’s tension between them. And it’s making Maggie look at Luc the way she used to look at me. With a breathless sort of expectation mixed with a smidge of confusion.
Seeing that look aimed at someone else—even if that someone else is my best friend—fills me with equal amounts of hope and dread. Hope because…this is as it should be. Hell, it’s what I’ve been pushing for. Dread because…despite everything, I still want her for myself. Deep down, under all the right choices, I want her to be mine. And it would be so easy—and so,sowrong—to tell her that.
The heart is a merciless and stubborn thing.
Standing from my perch on the stoop, I take a deep breath and glance above the rooftops across the way to where the sun is sinking low. The birds are singing at full volume, getting their last bit of energy out before turning in for the night. And the smell of dying flowers drifts on the cool breeze.
Maggie smiles up at me and the sight of that beloved gap between her teeth has a familiar pain tweaking the center of my chest. In contrast, Luc isn’t smiling. His eyes travel over me, making rest stops at my jeans, which hang loose around my waist, and the glue they used to close my head wound, which makes the skin around it look angry and pinched.
He doesn’t comment on my appearance. He doesn’t need to. We both know I look like a bucket of shit. There’s no sense in belaboring the point. There’s also no mistaking the worry that wrinkles his brow.
“I’m fine,” I assure him, trotting down the steps so I can pull him into a hug.
