Livvy blinked open her crusty eyes, jerking when she found her mother hovering over her. “What?”
Her mom held out her cell phone. “Sadia. She says she tried to call you and that it’s important.”
She rose on her elbow. “I’ll call her back later,” she whispered.
“Did you not hear her say it’s important?” Sadia snapped with uncharacteristic impatience.
Damn it. Livvy’d forgotten about her mother’s fondness for speakerphone.
With a sigh, she accepted the phone. Her mother silently hobbled out of the room.
“Hello,” she said, her raspy voice startling even her.
“My God, where have you been?”
Livvy sat up and scrubbed at the goop that had sealed her eyes shut. She’d come home yesterday in a daze, barely acknowledged her mother and Maile sitting on the sofa in the living room, and made her way upstairs only to engage in more ofthe same crying she’d done in her brother’s hotel room. She’d tried to tell herself there was value to discovering all this stuff with Nicholas and someday she’d look back on this as a period of massive growth as a human, but all of that was really hard to swallow when she was hurting so fucking much. “What’s up?”
“Listen, you need to get down here.”
“Down where?”
“To Chandler’s.”
The word drove a knife in her already fragile soul. She groaned and fell to her back. “Not now, Sadia.”
“No, you really need to.”
“I can’t go to Chandler’s.”
“Livvy. I really think you’ll want to.”
“Why?”
“It’s closed, and there’s a sign on the entrance with your name on it.”
“Wait.” She sat up with a jerk and swung her legs over the side of the bed. “What?”
“You heard me. It’s giant. Like, A-plus signage.” Sadia paused. “At some point, you and I are going to have a long talk about what’s been happening with you and Nicholas and why you wouldn’t confide in your best friend about it.”
Oof. Livvy winced at the frostiness layering Sadia’s words. “Because you would want to shiv him?” she ventured.
“Only if he was hurting you.”
He’ll always hurt me.
“Get down here, Livvy. I really don’t know whatto make of this, but the man clearly wants to talk to you.” The phone went dead.
The silent line galvanized her into moving, like Sadia’s urgency had been transferred to her. Livvy pulled on her leggings from the night before and ran a brush through her hair, forgoing makeup in favor of running out the door. She was aware she looked like a mess, but she didn’t have time to don her usual armor.
It wasn’t until she tried to start her car that she remembered Ruthie wasn’t doing so hot. The poor girl sputtered and died. As preoccupied as Livvy was, a spurt of sadness coursed through her and she stroked the car’s steering wheel. Silly to feel sentimental over a car, but her parents had given Ruthie to her. She’d seen Livvy through everything.
A horn cut through her sadness, and she glanced out her window to find Maile and her mom sitting next to her in their little Kia. Livvy got out of Ruthie and Maile rolled down her window. “We’ll give you a ride.”
“How did you... ?” Oh. Speakerphone. The invention of the devil. “Guys, actually, I can drive myself.”
“For crying out loud, Olivia, get in the car,” Tani said, with great impatience. “And don’t frown so much. You’re already getting wrinkles.”
Do not get sidetracked by that beautiful blunt criticism.
