Lisa’s understanding nod and accompanying smile was warped with sadness. “I wish like hell that you’d never had to come and you could have gone to Michigan for the summer.” She squeezed Willow’s biceps. “But I’m so glad I got to see you for more than a week. You know, you two can always come stay with me. I’ve got a guest room.” She laughed. “Well, actually it was my room. I’m sleeping in the guest room for now. But that means you’d have the big closet.”
Willow’s face fell when the realization hit her. “Lise?—”
“I’ll be okay,” Lisa said as she waved off the grief. “Someday I’ll get back in there. Today’s just not that day.”
The front door opened again as Cynthia let herself in. She didn’t hug Willow, or even look me in the eye.
Which meant she had no idea that Willow didn’t know what had happened between us.
“Hi, Mom!” Willow said, chipper as ever. “Is Amber coming?”
Cynthia glanced at her watch. “She should be on her way. She was driving back from Topeka.”
My blood went from a simmer to a rolling boil as the room went quiet. Everyone knew why Amber was in Topeka.
When Willow said she wanted to have everyone over before we left town, I waited for her to say she had invited Greg too. But she never did. He had broken her.
Well, really GregandCynthia did. They made that choice before Shep or Willow ever had a say in the situation.
“Cynthia, it’s good to see you,” Lisa said with a kind smile.
Willow’s mom nearly jumped out of her skin, like she hadn’t noticed Lisa was even in the room.
“Lisa,” Cynthia said. “You’re . . . here.”
Willow huffed and pinched the bridge of her nose. “Can we all get along for—like—twenty minutes? I just wanted to see everyone before we leave.”
A car rattled to a stop in the driveway. Willow sighed and plastered on a smile as Amber let herself in.
Amber stopped dead in her tracks and looked at Lisa. “What areyoudoing here?” she asked as she smacked her gum.
Willow’s eye began to twitch.
“It’s good to see you, Amber. You look really nice today,” Lisa said.
Amber’s eyes flicked up and down, assessing Lisa. “Are you still in mourning or something?”
Lisa looked down at her black scrubs. “I just came from work.”
“Then why are you in all black?” she sneered.
Lisa smiled. “They let us wear black scrubs in the ED because it hides all the blood and bodily fluids.”
Amber looked a little nauseous at that, and Willow tried to hide her laugh.
The room felt like a powder keg waiting to go off. Everyone knew too much and Willow didn’t know nearly enough. I needed to tell her, but with Cynthia and Lisa in the room, it felt intrusive to speak up about that kind of life-altering information.
And then there was Amber . . .
I assumed she had been in Topeka visiting Greg. I had no idea if she would smell the blood in the water and attack.
And then there was Greg.
I had hunted down his information, but hadn’t gotten the chance to thoroughly eviscerate him yet.
“Can we get on with whatever this is?” Amber said. “I have a nail appointment I need to get to.”
“Of course you do,” Willow muttered under her breath.
