“Ma petite chouespeaks le French! Oooh la la!”
Olivia groaned and pushed him away. “This is never going to work. No one will believe I’m dating such a cheeseball.” But then she stole a quick glance back at Lulu, who whispered something to a smiling Bill, then stepped back, beaming. It was the happiest Olivia had seen her mother look in a long time.
I guess it’s worth a shot. She took Zack’s hand and thought,As the French say,courage.
CHAPTER FIFTEENMarigold
Marigold wondered if there was a word for the strange feeling that came over her as Hugo parked in front of Viana’s Tavern. It wasn’t déjà vu because, of course, she’d been here before. But the familiarity felt more like something left over from a dream than an actual memory.
Hugo had agreed to let her crash at his place but explained that he’d already made plans to do pub trivia that night. “That’s fine,” Marigold had said. “Just drop me off at your house first. I can hang out there.”
“No, you should come. My friends would love to see you.”
He’d sounded convincing back at the shipyard, and Hugo’s friends had made her feel welcome and comfortable during their whirlwind romance. But now that she and Hugo had arrived, Marigold felt a lot less confident. Inside the bar were the closest friends of the man she’d run out on. Hugo seemed to have gotten over it, but it seemed unlikely that his buddies would’ve beenquite so quick to forgive and forget. And now she had to face them at trivia night, of all places.
Trivia was Marigold’s kryptonite; it made her feel far more exposed than any of the tiny outfits she’d been paid to model over the years. Jonathan was part of a team that competed at a famously difficult pub quiz in the Village where NYU grad students duked it out against what remained of the downtown intelligentsia. Marigold attended occasionally when she couldn’t come up with a convincing excuse to skip out and had consistently mortified herself until she decided it was safer to stay mute. No one ever made fun of her or even expressed frustration when she supplied a wrong answer, but somehow, their kindness—Jonathan’s in particular—stung more than an eye roll.
“How much did you tell everyone about why I’m here?” Marigold asked as she unclipped her seat belt.
“I said you’d come to sort out some divorce paperwork. I didn’t mention that you’re getting married tomorrow. That didn’t seem like my news to share.” Hugo opened the driver-side door, then paused. “Ready?”
Marigold nodded though she felt anything but ready.
The bar looked the same as she’d remembered, with its cracked vinyl booths, enormous jukebox, old beer ads, and fishing paraphernalia on the walls. The crowd was the usual mix of locals in windbreakers and work boots, and tourists who were easily identifiable in the brand-new sweatshirts they always bought in town when the temperature dropped in the afternoon. Hugo led her over to a table where four people were already seated: Hugo’s cousin Jay, and Jay’s girlfriend, Ruby, who also happened to be Hugo’s high school sweetheart (“It’s not as weird as you think,” Ruby had explained once. “In a town this small, you’re lucky toavoid your own cousins, forget about your ex’s cousins”), and his friends Wes and Lauren.
“You guys remember Marigold,” Hugo said evenly.
Marigold raised her hand in greeting. “Hi.”
“Marigold!” Ruby stood and pulled Marigold into a tight hug. “It’s great to see you.” The others remained seated but gave her warm smiles.
“What do you want to drink?” Hugo asked her.
“I’ll get this round,” Marigold said. “I insist.” She’d rather let the group whisper about her in her absence than try to make small talk without Hugo.
When she returned with her and Hugo’s beers, Wes was writing their team name on their answer sheet:Stay Marigold, Ponyboy. “We’re usuallyTrivia Newton-John, but we change it up when we have special guests,” he explained.
“I’m honored,” Marigold said, although she didn’t fully understand the pony thing. Was this a jab about her being rich?
To her relief, Hugo squinted at the sheet and said, “I don’t get it.”
“FromThe Outsiders!” Wes said. “You know that famous line, ‘Stay gold, Ponyboy’?”
“Oh, right.” Hugo nodded. “That’s a good one.”
Wes gave him a curious look, but before he could say anything, the quiz began. It was just as difficult as Jonathan’s, maybe even more so because so many of the pop culture questions—the only category in which Marigold ever dared attempt an answer—were skewed toward Canadian references. Even those were few and far between, though, with more esoteric subjects taking precedence. Hugo seemed undaunted, easily summoning answers like “the Second Punic War” and “Ode on a Grecian Urn.”
No one seemed to notice, let alone care, that Marigold wasn’t providing any answers. It wasn’t that Jonathan ever seemed frustrated, exactly. But whenever a question came up that he thought Marigold should know, he’d prod her like an encouraging teacher. “We saw this painting at the Met, remember? When we went for that exhibition?” Or, worse, “Didn’t you say you’d read this one?” about a book Natalie had summarized for her.
Instead of debating the answers until the last possible second, Hugo’s team would discuss, write down a response, and then go back to whatever they’d been talking about: Ruby’s latest work drama (the owner of the veterinary practice had been caught stealing drugs), Wes’s home brewery, the camping trip they were leaving for on Sunday, or whether Lauren’s American boyfriend was using her as a route to Canadian citizenship. “That’s one thing we can’t accuse you of, Marigold!” Jay said, prompting a look from Ruby. “What? What’d I say?”
“Just ignore him,” Ruby said with a sigh. “He knows not what he says.”
“I don’t get it,” Jay continued. “I meant that she clearlywasn’tone of those Americans looking for Canadian citizenship or else she never would’ve run off!”
Marigold shot a nervous glance at Hugo, but he’d gone around to the other end of the table to work on some physics equation with Wes and was thankfully too engrossed in the math to notice.
“No, you’re right.” Marigold flashed a smile at Jay. “That wasn’t on my mind. Though if I’d had a crystal ball, it might’ve been.”
