I knew it was because she had to be angry, had to feel so betrayed by what Everett and I had done, that the only way forward was to pretend it hadn’t happened. But the longer we didn’t talk about it, the more I felt like I had to atone for it, until that was a new, permanent facet of our relationship. I would forever need to prove to Laurel how sorry I was. It was why this week had seemed so perfect. Here, maybe, was an opportunity to finally settle things. If we went back to how we all once were—FaceTiming every month, texting every day, going on this trip every year—the small, proverbial step she’d taken back from me would disappear.
I’d let my anger at Everett get in the way of the most important goal this week. I wouldn’t let it happen again.
“Cooper’s cute,” I muse idly as Laurel blends her eyeshadow, hoping to draw her back in, out of her anger at me.
It seems to work. Her eye catches mine again in the mirror and she smiles—a real smile, not the distracted one she’s been wearing so often this week.
“I knew you’d like him,” she says. “I bet you two will be making out in his kitchen by the end of the night.”
“Okay, let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” I say. “I don’t even know if he can properly poach an egg yet.”
“Can’t marry a man who makes a bad egg,” Laurel parrots, half rolling her eyes in a jovial way. I laugh, and lean into the mirror next to her.
This, I think as we keep getting ready, laughing like we used to when we were in college. Our rooms were across from each other, and we’d huddle in front of the shitty, ten-dollar full-length mirror that sat at the end of the hall. Zoey was usually with us, refilling cups with cheap liquor and juice, whatever we had on hand. Laurel would ask to do my makeup until I’d give in and let her while I played music on my phone. If Davi or Gabe came upstairs we’d shoo them away. The second floor was girls only on those nights, some small oasis just for the three of us.
Sothis, this tiny moment with Laurel, is exactly the type of thing I won’t give up for anything—or anyone.
Cooper’s house is a rambling ranch-style home six miles away, tucked down a road lined with orange trees and perched high enough that he has a spectacular view of the ocean. A huge deck wraps its way around three sides of it, floor-to-ceiling windows reflecting the sky.
Gabe lets out a low whistle as we all climb out of the car. “You could fit three of my house in this yard alone,” he says.
“What kind of chef did you say he was, exactly?” I mutter in Laurel’s ear as we walk up to the house. I’m carrying a bottle of wine, Laurel balancing a bouquet of flowers in the crook of her arm. The sweet scent of citrus mingles with salty air as we start up the front steps.
“He got this house in the divorce,” she hisses back as Davi rings the doorbell. “But a very successful one. The last restaurant he worked in got a Michelin star while he was there. You should see the house his ex-wife got.”
My mouth curves down, eyebrows raising in an impressed frown. “Suddenly my cookbook feels pretty stupid.”
Laurel makes a tsking sound, elbowing me.
“Your cookbook isn’t stupid.” I jump a little, twisting to see Everett standing behind us. I hadn’t even realized he was there.
“Thanks,” I say after a second of staring at him, his eyes gone a little shadowed. He nods as the door swings open.
“Welcome!” Cooper says, throwing an arm wide in greeting. “Come in, come in.” He’s wearing beige pants and a navy-blue cashmere polo, the sleeves tight against his biceps. “Good to see you,” he says as I walk by, leaning in a little closer than he did to anyone else.
“Good to see you too,” I say, pausing in the doorway to look up at him. His eyes crinkle as he smiles, a dimple appearing in his cheek. He’d called me yesterday to confirm tonight’s menu, and I hadn’t hated hearing his voice over the phone. What I said to Laurel earlier was true. Cooper is cute. I can get on board with this, especially if it means distracting from Everett.
But like he heard my thoughts, Everett clears his throat behind me.
“Come in!” Cooper booms again, turning his attention to Everett as I hustle forward after Laurel.
Cooper takes our things and hangs them in a coat closet by the door, thanks us for the wine and flowers, which he grabs a cool ceramic vase for from a bookshelf in the entryway before gesturing for us to follow him.
“This is the place,” he says, sweeping a hand out as we pass by a huge sunken living room, dark beams on the ceiling catching the light filtering in through the windows. He leads us over to a wet bar in one corner, where he sets the flowers and the vase. “Dining room is through there,” he says, nodding toward the room adjacent. “And kitchen,” he says, seemingly directly to me, “is that way. But what are we drinking, first?”He examines the wine bottles we handed him, a red and the sparkling white the captain’s cousin makes. “Seems like we should save these for dinner.”
“Actually, Hugh’s Hooch is great at any time of the day,” Davi says, leaning forward to point at the label on the sparkling wine that had, our first summer here, readHugh’s Hoochin Sharpie but is now professionally designed and named.
“Oh, I know Hugh’s work when I see it,” Cooper says, setting the wine on the counter. “Sure you want to dive in now?”
“He’s kidding,” Laurel says, which I’m not entirely sure Davi was. “If I remember correctly, you make the best Manhattan on the West Coast.”
“My specialty,” Cooper says. Gabe and I exchange a glance, and I’m relieved to know I’m not the only one who’s feeling like things are suddenly a little different than they were before we got here. This is a side of Laurel I don’t think anyone—save Everett, maybe—is very familiar with. Some subtle shift in her mannerisms, away from the girl who ate Funyuns for breakfast and more toward someone who loves a Manhattan made by a Michelin-star chef at his wet bar in his multi-million-dollar Malibu home.
Cooper makes everyone drinks before leading Laurel, Gabe, Davi, and Everett toward the pool patio, leaving them at a table there and walking me toward the kitchen.
“Oh my god,” I say, rushing over to the six-burner Wolf range as soon as we walk in. “My kingdom for this stove.”
“Wouldn’t cook on anything else,” Cooper says. I eye the rest of the kitchen, clocking what we have in common. Design-wise it’s a little industrial for my liking, but he has good taste in appliances, though I think he must have taken out an insurance policy on this kitchen alone.
