“But bullshit,” she scoffs. “She’s a perfectly respectable woman so there’s nothing they could use against you, Cole. Sure, her grandmother is a piece of work, but they can’t hold that against her, just like no one could hold Millie’s parents against her.”
“Millie hated Holly, Brittany,” I say, my voice tight.
Recognition fills her eyes. “Oh. So you found out about that.”
“You knew?” I ask in shock. “And you didn’t tell me? Fuck! You' acted like you approved of Holly!”
Brittany heaves out a long sigh. “Cole. They were in high school. And I think hate is too strong of a word. More like jealous.”
“Why?” My walk in the woods with Holly happened months before I started going out with Millie, and I had very little contact with Holly after that. Holly’s hateful attitude made sure of it.
“Because she could sense Holly liked you, and she felt threatened by that. She worried that if Holly caught your attention, you’d dump her like a hot potato.”
“That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. I was head over heels for Millie. As far as I was concerned, there was no one else but her.”
“And I tried to tell her that, but you know teenage girls.”
“But Millie was nice enough to Holly when she came in after we opened Ziggy’s.”
“That’s because she’d grown up, Cole. She knew you only had eyes for her, but to be honest, I think she still worried some.”
I turn my back to the room and rest my butt against the counter. “All the more reason to break up with Holly.” The confirmation is like the killing blow to my heart.
Brittany’s quiet for a moment, then says softly, “You know, we have a way of putting our dead loved ones on pedestals and making them out to be perfect, but you had a knack for doing it while Millie was still living.”
My face scrunches. “What are you talking about?”
“Millie loved you too, but not the way you loved her. She thought she had too much Labelle blood in her. Sometimes I wondered if she deserved you. She wanted this place, and you jumped in because it’s what she wanted. Not whatyouwanted.”
“That’s not fair,” I say, turning back to face her. I’m shocked she’s talking about her best friend this way. “Webothwanted it.”
She nods, but I can tell it’s to placate me. “She wanted a baby, but she pushed the majority of Jane’s care on you.”
“That’s not true. Millie wasn’t all that into babies, and I love them. We both agreed it would be better that way.Mutuallyagreed. She loved Jane. With all her heart.”
“She did. And she loved you too. More than she’d ever loved anyone. But she was raised by the Labelles, Cole. Loving didn’t come easily for her.”
Brittany’s right. Millie had admitted it multiple times, and it scared her. She always worried that she didn’t love me enough. That she wouldn’t love Jane enough. I’d assured her time and time again that she loved usenough. That she was more than enough.
Brittany gestures around the room. “This place was her true love because it was the only thing that made her feel like she’d proven her parents wrong. That she’d beaten them.”
I knew Millie felt like owning Ziggy’s was her way of proving to her parents that she’d amounted to something after quitting college, but I never felt like she loved Ziggy’s more than me. I always felt loved by Millie, but I’d come to accept that the brewery was just as important. It was something she’d owned outside of her parents, and she felt a tremendous sense of pride in that. She also knew that opening Ziggy’s was just the beginning. She was always scheming up new ways to bring in customers and keep them coming back. I was the one to let things fall into autopilot after she’d died. I’m happy with the status quo, but Millie was always trying to figure out how to make it bigger and better. Kind of like Brittany’s been doing lately.
“You know what I think?” Brittany asks. “I think you know all of this deep in your heart, and part of the reason you haven’t dated anyone is because you’re afraid no one else will love you the same way you love. Putting everything into it.”
My mouth drops open, because I can see a grain of truth in her words. Part of the reason I like it being just Jane and me is because I don’t want either of us to feel like we’re in second place to someone—orsomething—else.
Deep in my gut, I know Holly would never love me—or us—that way. She proved that the night she came over when we were sick. Didn’t she just prove it again today, when she assured Jane they’d still be friends right after I ripped her heart out?
“I loved Millie like a sister,” Brittany says, her eyes full of tears, “but she wasn’t perfect, Cole. You have to stop pretending that she was. Make your decisions based on what’s best for you and Jane, not what you think Millie would have wanted.”
The sad thing is, I think she’s right. About all of it. Holly is perfect for us, but I probably just blew that to kingdom come. How do I make things right?
Then I know. It’s time to unblock Cherrybomb.
