You’re such a good girl for Mommy.
Vera:
you are probably the closest thing I have to a daddy.
Tess:
Now go write Daddy some more words. And what do you think about making the trip to LA for a housewarming? I guess it’s more like a house reheating. A house microwave. You can spend the night. We can get high after the kids go to bed.
Vera:
can we watchDonnie Darko?
Tess:
You and that fucking movie.
Vera:
I’m starting to doubt your commitment to Sparkle Motion.
Decomposition Day 28
“Thisis the kind of thing I want to write,” I said as I dug another pickle from the very fancy jar Tess had been sipping from. She’d hosted her house reheating the weekend after Thanksgiving, and we were subsisting on leftover finger foods and charcuterie accoutrements.
“Absolute drivel that makes no money and the only people who like it just pretend to understand it?”
“You don’t understand my creative vision,” I said as we watched the credits forDonnie Darkoroll. “I want to make the kind of thing that you see when you’re nineteen and still quote random lines from because you can’t get it out of your head, so you make your best friend watch it with you twenty years later.”
She sighed and yanked the remote off the coffee table, which cost more than the value of my earthly belongings and which Tess said was originally chipped when it arrived, so she strong-armed the manufacturer into replacing it before she had to tap into a kid’s college fund, which she was not beyond doing.
“I’m turning onThePrincess Diaries,” she said, before chugging pickle juice straight from the jar. “My brain needs a detox. I’m way too high for Jake Gyllenhaal in a scary rabbit costume to be the last thing I see before I fall asleep.”
Decomposition Day 31
This morning before work, I began inputting the notes I’d compiled for my own project and since I wasn’t done, I put the laptop in my tote bag so I could continue during my lunch break.
Ruby brought by the draft of the wedding invitations she had commissioned.
She stood behind me as I studied the line drawing of the original Starlight Palms sign that framed the words on the invitation.
“I approve.” A slight feeling of melancholy settled in my chest. The sketch reminded me so much of the wedding chapel where Eli and I got married. “It’s perfect.”
“Good. Now, I need you to gather some quotes from a few different printers.”
“This feels like it should be paid labor,” I joked.
She shook her head and took the invitation from my desk before heading toward the door. “I’ve never been married, but I’m pretty sure that maids of honor are not typically compensated for their efforts.”
I looked up just in time to catch her before she disappeared down the hallway. “You’re having a bridal party?”
“Not a party,” she said. “Just you. Hollis has her niece.”
I swallowed back whatever feeling was ballooning in my chest, pressing tears into my eyes. “Well, in that case, I better send over some quotes for my services as maid of honor.”
She puckered her lips to temper her smile and shook her head.
* * *
