‘No.’ He snorted. ‘Like…like the first time you tell someone you’re in love with them. Once you realise, you need to release it or you’re going to explode.’
‘I think I’d prefer the heart attack,’ I responded dryly. ‘Look, I’m honoured that you want my opinion on the ring, but we both know relationships aren’t my area of expertise, are they?’
‘They could be if you wanted them to be.’
If only it were that easy.
‘Matrimony isn’t for everyone,’ I said absently as I noticed a book on the opposite side of the table with an image of rolling hills and the author’s name picked out in bold font. As bold as the author herself: it was one of Noelle’s. I found my hand reaching for it, slowly, as though she might leap out from beneath the table and cry out ‘Gotcha’. When I had it firmly in my grasp, I tested the weight of it. How odd to hold a downloaded version of her crazy brain in the palm of my hand. I wondered if it ever occurred to the other people browsing in the shop that the author of this book was a royal pain in the arse.
‘If you say so,’ Nick said. ‘Look, call me when you find him.’
I blinked at the abrupt return to the previous topic of conversation. ‘Okay.’
‘No. I mean it, Stephen. I want to know how you are. It’s okay if it’s messing with your head. Let me be there for you, the way you would have been there for me after Mum, if I’d let you.’
I released a slow breath through my nose. I didn’t want to push him away when he was being so honest with me. I knew what it cost him to talk about that, so I nodded and said the only thing I could, which was the truth. ‘I just want it over with, Nick. I want to deal with it and put it behind me.’ Put my biological father behind me.
And then I could get back to my uncomplicated life.
‘And – just to make sure I’ve understood correctly—’ Kaylee said softly as she watched me slide the poster onto the Xerox machine at the public library, ‘this is all to help that cute British guy who you don’t like, and who doesn’t like you?’
‘That’s about the size of it,’ I agreed. ‘But only because it’s going to help me too.’
My index finger danced over the numbers on the screen as I debated whether fifty or one hundred was the best number of copies to make. Little Italy wasn’t a big neighbourhood, but if we got a tip-off for another area, then a few extras would be useful. I compromised and decided on seventy-five, hitting ‘copy’.
Sun was streaming in the window behind Kaylee, lighting the edges of her black hair auburn, a halo of dust motes floating above her. Knowing she spent most mornings here doing the research for her historical novel, as soon as I’d finished perfecting the poster on my laptop using one of those clever ageing apps, I headed down here and surprised her with her favourite butterscotch Frappuccino as a thank you for the Friday-night bar-counselling session, while I got my copies done. Now she was playing with the paper straw in the top, ice rattling in the bottom, and looking at me with concern.
‘Are you sure? I know I said to give yourself some space to think but I didn’t really mean…’ she waved her hand in a circle towards the machine, which was whirring and spitting out warm A4 sheets of paper ‘…this.’
‘Trust me, Kay, this is going to work. I can feel it.’
‘Yes, but haveyoudone any actual work?’
‘A bit,’ I hedged, thinking of the Post-it Notes on my wall – they totally counted. ‘And I’m going straight back home to get down to it after I’ve done this. I swear.’
‘You’re not going to stick these up around town?’
‘No. I have two delivery boys for that who’ll be turning up any minute now.’ I took the pile of paper off the tray and carried it over to the table where Kaylee was set up.
‘The twins?’ She smirked, dropping into her chair. I nodded, counting out a couple dozen for my bag, then splitting the stack and turning one pile sideways on top of the other, ready to pass to my brothers. ‘How d’you rope them into that? Are you paying them?’
‘Oh hell no. When we went out for tacos the other night, they had too many beers and spilled alotof college stories they don’t want Mom and Dad to know about. Those boys will never learn that even though I’m smaller I have eight years more experience of holding my liquor.’
‘You’re such a mean big sister.’
‘Kaylee, if you had four brothers you would do wicked, wicked things to maintain your sanity and status within the pack too, I’m telling you.’
I left her in the library to research the intricacies of British politics for her historical novel and met my brothers outside. Despite the extortion, they were both in good moods, with college finals over and less than two weeks left before the summer break started at the end of June. I still warned them they better not dump the flyers and when they gave me their word they wouldn’t, I promised I’d keep their sordid secrets and bring my special white chocolate and honeycomb cookies when I saw them at Daisy’s softball jamboree at the weekend.
Then I went home, just like I’d told Kaylee I would, with every intention of getting down to some work on my novel.
I opened my front door and it was like wading through soup to get to my air-conditioning unit and try to get it working. I swore the make-up was melting off my face. By the time I’d given up and was pushing open my window instead, trying to get some of the stuffy air out, my cell phone rang.
‘Oh my God, Noelle, talk to me,’ my eldest sister Lucy said as soon as I answered. ‘About anything that isn’t babies or diapers or sleep deprivation.’
‘Lucy, are you okay?’ I waved to Mr Biggins and flicked my blind down. It really would have been nice to be able to keep it open and get some more air in the place, without having him there, watching.
‘Yeah. Brigid’s gone down for a nap and I have about forty-five minutes to be a person and not a mom.’
