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“Maybe. Maybe not.”
Her voice lowered. “Even if he is, that still might not be enough.”
“I know that, too.”
She kissed my cheek. “I love you.”
Forty-Two
The phone interview with the city went disconcertingly well. If I still wanted it, I likely would have fumbled all my answers and paused for awkwardly long amounts of time, but as it was, the interviewer seemed impressed. At the end, he informed me their final decision would be made within the week, and I should expect a call toward the beginning of December.
Yet another bridge I’d cross when the time came.
“How’d it go?” Ivy asked as soon as I returned to my desk, her heels clacking my way.
“Really great, actually.”
Her lips pursed, and she leaned on my desk, facing away from Helen. “You still haven’t come to your senses?”
I glanced at my desk mate, but she had earbuds in. “I can’t work here forever.”
“Maybe not, but a city job will bleed you dry. The Shay Honeycutt I know don’t like idiocy or red tape.”
How did this woman get to know me so fast? “That’s fair.”
Her green eyes glinted. “I found the perfect dress for you. For the Shepherd ball.”
She thrust her phone in front of my face. On the screen, an anorexic woman in a sequined copper halter dress posed with her hand on her hip. The dress was magnificent—a million steps up from my copper cotillion gown—but I scrolled down and rolled my eyes at the price. “I can’t afford that.”
“I know. That’s why I bought it for you.” Her smiling mouth dropped open, as if to say Tada!
“What? Ivy, that’s too much!”
She crossed her arms. “I knew you’d say that, which is why I didn’t tell you before I bought it.”
I checked on Helen, still utterly uninterested in us. “You guys have got to stop buying me things! It’s too much.”
She snorted. “What else am I gonna do with all that money?”
“Well, you could help people in need.”
“You’re in need,” she said, then leaned closer. “Of a dress.”
My pride prickled at the assumption that I wouldn’t be able to afford a dress on my own. It might have been off-the-rack, but I would’ve found one. Probably.
And it would have kept you at Ravi’s even longer.
“I can’t accept this,” I said. “It’s one thing to accept free coffees and maybe even use this phone Shepherd pretends I’ll have to give back when I don’t work here anymore, but I can’t keep accepting your handouts.”
“It ain’t a handout. It’s helping a friend. But if it bothers you that much, I’ll keep the dress, and you can borrow it for the ball.”
That scenario was far more acceptable, though my hackles took a moment to settle. Pride was the deadliest of sins, and I needed to check myself. Was it wrong to borrow another dress from Ivy? Was it wrong to accept free coffee and let them pay for my dinner and attend charity galas in which someone else bought my seat?
The questions rankled, so I leapt to my usual question: What would Audra do?
The world ain’t kind to people like us, baby. Take any advantage you can get.
Ivy touched my arm. “You don’t have to feel guilty, darlin’. Sometimes it’s okay to let people take care of you.”
