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“Who did she even sucker — who is she engaged to?”
“Sutton,really? You’d think Savannah was on the other side of the world. Macon St. James, of course.”
The breath left my body with such force that the phone almost slipped from my hand. It felt like someone had punched me in the gut. My skin was suddenly too tight, and I couldn’t seem to get my breath back.
“Sutton?”
“I’m so sorry, Mama, but I have to go. Meetings. I’ll talk to my boss today about working remotely for a while.”
“Thank you, sugar plum. It would be a big help. I love you.”
“Love you too.”
I hit the end button and my hand dropped to my lap lifelessly. I stared blindly at my screen. Sissy was engaged to Macon.Engaged to Maconplayed over and over and over in my head until it was a deafening drone that drowned out everything else.
“Oh, donuts! And they’re for me!” Maxine’s gleeful voice cut through the noise in my mind. I blinked slowly, like I was waking up from a deep sleep.
“You!” I turned my panicked, crazy eyes on Maxine. “This is all your fault.”
“Me?” Maxine startled, placing a hand on her chest. “What did I do?”
“You started with all this ‘my life’s in a rut, I’m craving change’ nonsense. You put all your crazy out into the universe, and the universe came for me instead!”
That last part may have been at a volume not appropriate for a work setting.
“Are you high?” Maxine asked, looking at me like I’d just sprouted a second head — which was fair.
“She was staring at her computer for ten solid minutes before you got here. Sometimes her mouth was moving but no sound was coming out.”
My head pivoted to Jin, who had arrived undetected at some point during my freakout.
“And you didn’t say anything?” Maxine’s question might have sounded more accusatory if she hadn’t said it around a mouthful of donut.
Jin shrugged, eyeballing the donut in her hand.
“I said hi but she didn’t respond. Can I have a donut?”
Maxine shot him a withering look, turning her attention back to me.
“What’s going on? You look like someone just told you that Henry Cavill was getting married.”
I let out a slightly hysterical laugh. “Close. My dad fell through a rotted floor, and it sounds like he messed up his leg pretty good.”
Maxine and Jin were both looking at me like I was speaking a different language.
“And?” Maxine prompted. “How is that close to Henry Cavill getting married?”
“Mama just told me Sissy’s engaged to Macon St. James.”
“Oh, I see.” Maxine nodded her head, taking another bite of donut.
“Do you actually understand what is happening here?” Jin questioned her, looking skeptical.
“No, not a single clue, but it’s best not to upset the crazy lady,” Maxine stage whispered.
I bent forward until my forehead was resting on my desk. “This isn’t happening. This isn’t happening. This isn’t happening,” I chanted, rolling my forehead back and forth on the faux wood surface.
“Do something!” I heard Jin say, presumably issuing the command to Maxine.
