Your New Best Friend

by Jayne Denker

  "Let's go back to the house instead," she says to Conn, crossing her arms and hunching delicately. "We still have to talk—don't forget."

  "Sure," Conn concedes without hesitation, and we all start trudging back down the beach.

  Talk? About what? I'm dying to ask. I can't ask. It can't be anything good. My stomach churns as I get more and more riled up at this whole situation. It took years for Conn to get over his ex. I should know—I witnessed it. Hell, I helped him through it. And now that he's back on an even keel, here comes Sasha to knock him askew again.

  Sasha and Hannah walk ahead of Conn and me. From the snatches of conversation that come back to me on the wind, I can tell Hannah is in the middle of relating the saga of her and Marty. Sasha is hanging on every word, which makes Hannah glow.

  As I'm trying to decide whether to jump in to try to diffuse the glamour fogging Hannah's brain, Conn says, "Thanks for the birthday text. Where'd you find an emoji of a unicorn jumping out of a cake?"

  "I never reveal my sources."

  "I don't suppose I get a cupcake this year, huh?" He stops walking and gives me an endearing grin, but I'm feeling a little too salty to succumb to his charms.

  "Looks like you've already got all the cupcake you can handle, mister."

  "What?" he drawls, smiling wider and stuffing his hands into his pockets.

  Connacht Garvey does many things very well, but pulling off "disingenuous" isn't one of them. It's unnerving—he's always such a straight shooter that when he decides to skirt an issue, especially one involving a skirt, he's about as smooth as Vernon.

  "Don't even try it," I hiss. "What do you take me for?"

  "You're going to have to be more specific, Abbott. Use your words, now."

  "Stop it. You know what I'm talking about. What's with all the kissy-face with Sasha? It wasn't too long ago you described her as…what was it…a 'frozen-hearted harpy'? And now you're besties?"

  "Oh, come on. There was no 'kissy-face.' And may I point out using that term is trivializing your argument."

  "I know what I just saw."

  "You're exaggerating."

  "And you're playing dumb. A romantic stroll on the beach? Your fifth wheel nowhere to be found?"

  "You're right here."

  That stings. "Jack!"

  "Oh, right. We left him several tequila shots deep in a political argument with some of the gang at DBC. What's the big deal?"

  "Cut the crap, Conn. What's her agenda? What's she doing here? Are you sleeping with her again or not?"

  Conn's jaw drops, and I fall silent. Over the shush of the waves, quieter now that we're farther away from the water line, comes the sound of Sasha's uncharacteristically strident voice shouting from Conn's deck.

  "Hurry up, you two! We're going to light the chiminea. Conn, do you have any marshmallows?"

  Like Sasha eats marshmallows.

  His eyes stay locked on mine as he calls back brusquely, "We'll be there in a minute."

  I wait. After a moment or two he looks off and up, at the sparks spitting from the bonfire in the distance, at the dim stars in the dark sky, anywhere as long as it isn't at me.

  "Conn…" I begin uncertainly, while at the same time he mutters, "Wow."

  "I know. I'm sorry—"

  "See, that's the thing. You're not."

  "No, really, I—"

  "You just asked for—no, demanded—details of my sex life, and you actually expect an answer." He laughs a little, but there's no humor in it.

  "I don't."

  He doesn't hear me. "What is with you lately? It's like a theme: 'Melanie Takes an Unnatural Interest in Conn's Love Life.' I mean, first you make a very big point of telling Hannah I'm not available—"

  "For her own protection. She's still recovering from her breakup, and I didn't want her to mistake a crush for—"

  "Come on. Why would you take it seriously? Hannah doesn't even take it seriously."

  He's right. Hannah admires Conn because he's a smart, friendly, good-looking guy, but it's obvious her heart is still with Marty (I'm no dummy). I don't bother telling Conn any of that. He's not waiting for me to respond anyway.

  "Then you warn me Taylor is after me, which is completely insane, and now Sasha?"

  "I—"

  "What I want to know is…why? Really. What makes you think you have the right to tell me who I can and can't spend time with?"

  "Because we're friends! And…and friends look out for one another."

  "Seriously? That's your reason?"

  "Okay, maybe all the stuff with Hannah and Taylor was…misguided. But Sasha? After she broke your heart, you're going to let her waltz back in here and—"

  "I think that's my business, don't you?"

  "Oh, here we go again. Your business. In case you've forgotten, I was right here when you moved back home. I saw what was left of you when she got through with you. I saw you at your worst—because of her—and I helped you put your life back together…"

  I don't need to say this. Conn knows. He still gives me grief about it, teasing me about how I kept bothering him, being obnoxiously cheerful, invading his personal space when all he wanted to do was sulk in his house with only his equally grumpy cat for company. I saw him through his darkest moods. I have a right to express an opinion about this.

  "Why would you think I wouldn't have something to say when she turns up out of the blue with that…that look in her eye?"

  "Oh, you always have something to say," he snaps. "But for your information she didn't 'turn up out of the blue.' I invited her."

  I can feel my mouth working, but nothing's coming out. Finally I manage a few weak words. "You…you want her here?" Now it's my turn to look away. I cast my eyes down at the sand, clumped in little hills from the many feet that have kicked through it today. I focus on a bent cigarette butt poking out of a nearby mini-dune. "Well then." I take a deep, slow breath. "You're right. I overstepped. Forget I said anything."

  I turn to go, but Conn reaches out to stop me. "Hey. It's not like that."

  Flinching, I pull away so he doesn't actually touch me. "Don't. You're right—you don't owe me any explanation. It's my own fault that I think you do."

  "But you're upset that she's here."

  "Of course I am!" I erupt. "I know how this goes. She's going to do it again."

  "Do what again?"

  "Dazzle you, blind you…what she always does. And then…" The tendons in my neck ache from the strain of trying not to shout, trying to hold it together, the pressure on my heart so intense I think it's going to burst. "Take you away. I couldn't stand that because you wouldn't be…" I stop again, choking on unshed tears, horrified at the thought that's surfaced.

  "What?" he demands. "Wouldn't be what?"

  Mine.

  "Around anymore," I say instead. "And it wouldn't…be the same. It wouldn't be right. Conn, I…I need you here."

  "You need me here? For what?"

  Everything. I don't dare answer. I don't know what to say that won't sound presumptuous, stupid, proprietary—everything I have no right to feel, but I'm feeling anyway. I need him here because…

  "Melanie?"

  Conn's voice sounds distant, muffled. It's drowned out by the thundering of my heart, the roiling of my insides, and the chaos of my own thoughts. I need to respond. I have to acknowledge Conn is talking to me.

  "I'm so sorry," I fight out, with effort. "Really. Please believe me."

  "Okay. It's okay. I get it. You're looking out for me, like you said."

  No. I'm not. I'm looking out for me, trying to catch the pieces of my shattered heart that are falling through my fingers as I realize. This isn't about Sasha, not really. It's about any woman coming between me and Conn. He really has been everything to me, for a long time. Once he was the cool kid I idolized. Then he was the young man I admired. But recently? So much more. A really good friend…at the very least. Normally I don't let myself think any further than that.

  Now he's lookin
g at me fondly, a warm light in his eyes as he shakes his head in wonder. "Yeah, that's us: I pull you back from whatever virtual cliff you're about to wander off of, and you keep my head on straight. I'm glad you care about me." Then he winks. "You, er, do care, don't you? That's what you were going for, right?"

  I start nodding, almost violently, like I can't control my body. "I…I love you."

  Apparently, I can't control my thoughts either, because that one actually comes out.

  My eyes are wide when I look at him, stinging when they're hit by a salt-laden breeze. The lobster roll I had for dinner is threatening to make a grand reappearance on my shoes. For quite possibly the first time in my life, I'm terrified. I didn't tack on "you doofus" like I usually do. Because this time…I mean it. I mean really mean it.

  Conn is smiling, genuinely and almost bashfully. I don't move—I can't—so he reaches out and pulls me into a hug. I'm stiff as a board, not even able to raise my arms to hug him back, because now it's not just Conn holding me. It's Conn. The man I…love?

  Ho-ly…this is bad. This is really bad.

  One ear is mushed into his chest, and he's covering the other as he cradles my head with his hand, but I'm still able to hear what he says next: "And I love you right back. We…" He hesitates long enough to make me wonder what he's trying to say. "We make a…a good team, don't we?"

  Maybe not anymore, because the way he loves me and the way I love him…for the first time in our lives, they're not the same.

  I squeak something unintelligible into his shirt, all the while trying to ignore his familiar scent, the hard muscles beneath the fabric, the way he holds me.

  Then his arms tighten around me, and I feel the vibration of his voice all the way to my core as he says, "Melanie…"

  "Hey, you two!" Whatever he's going to say is interrupted by the arrival of a painfully chipper Sasha. "What's going on?"

  I stiffen all over again, but she's not suspicious, not even when she finds us locked in an embrace on the beach. Of course she isn't. I'm only little Melanie, after all. Hardly a threat to her and Conn.

  As if to confirm that, Conn answers cheerfully, "Our usual little lovefest."

  "Oh? I hope I wasn't interrupting." Pleasantly teasing, not even a hint of jealousy. I'm insulted.

  Conn releases me from his hug and, with one friendly, brisk rub between my shoulder blades, says, "You know me and Melanie. We fight, we make up. She loves me, really."

  "Of course she does!" Sasha drapes an arm over my shoulders and turns me toward Conn's house. "It's been that way for as long as you've known each other. Hasn't it, sweetie?"

  Damn, the woman has pincers for hands. She squeezes my arm like she's trying to snap it off just below the shoulder socket. Maybe there's some jealousy there after all? But her expression is mild and neutral. Conn doesn't follow us. I don't dare look back. I can't look at him now.

  I'm not sure I'm ever going to be able to look at him the same way again.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  "Melanie!"

  For a moment I think it's Conn calling to me from down on the sand, and I tense up. Sasha's gone into the house with Hannah. I'm still on the deck, trying—and failing—to draw air into my lungs. I'm afraid he's going to come up the stairs and confront me about my feelings for him…even though he has no idea what those feelings really are. My brain is hash. I'm not used to being this out of control, and it's wrecking me.

  But the voice calling my name is coming from in front of me, not behind me. Jack lurches down the steps from the road, looking like a marionette whose operator has gotten its strings tangled. His knees buckle, his legs bow, his arms flail before they catch hold of the railing. Several tequila shots? Is there a word for many severals?

  He hugs me, leaning heavily until I feel my knees start to give. "Hey, beautiful. I've been looking for you all night."

  Where? At the bottom of a shot glass? How flattering. I start to peel him off me while trying to make sure he stays upright, when I suddenly have help.

  "Oookay, let's get you level, big boy."

  Jack's face lights up again. "Sasha! Hey, beautiful. I've been looking for you all night."

  Nice.

  "It looks like your night's over. Let's get you back to the inn, all right?"

  I seize on this opportunity to get away from the Garvey home—and its owner—as quickly as possible. "I can drive him, Sasha. No need for you to go out of your way." We can dump Jack in the back seat, where he'll likely pass out. Then all I'll have to do is find someone at the inn strong enough to haul his ass out of the car and up to his room.

  "Thanks, sweetie, but I'm going there myself."

  "You're staying at the inn too?"

  Huh. Jack managing to get a room during peak season is surprising; Sasha getting one as well is…waaaait a minute.

  Sasha nods, preoccupied with guiding Jack through the door, which Hannah holds open from inside. Sasha thanks Hannah, but Jack doesn't even notice she's there, mainly because, aside from the amount of alcohol coursing through his veins, Jack's hanging on Sasha completely, acting more than a little familiar, with his nose buried in Sasha's neck and his hand in the vicinity of her navel. She's propping him up and nudging his lips away from her ear as she tries to guide him into the house. Almost like she's used to it.

  The minute Sasha and Jack are in Conn's house, I pull Hannah out of it.

  "We've got to go. Now."

  "You want to go back through the festival? I'd love to see more of it now that we don't have to watch over Bram. Where is he, anyway? Did he find the kids again?"

  Dear, sweet Hannah. The poor girl has no idea why I'm dragging her up the road from the beach house. I'm on sensory overload. I need to sort out all this out. And for that, I need…

  "Snacks," I demand, as we enter the barricaded area filled with festivalgoers. "No, wine first. I need wine for this."

  "Melanie, what in the world is going on? You've been weird ever since we finished up with Bram."

  "I know. I'm sorry. He's fine. He met Zoë. They're stargazing as we speak, and everything's perfect with them. He prefers to go by Vernon again, by the way. Now…wine. Need." Then I add, belatedly, "Please."

  I push through a group of people milling around in front of a winery's tasting table, Hannah close behind. The pourer perks up at the two new arrivals. "Can I interest you in white or red tonight?"

  "Yes," I answer distractedly, and grab two already full plastic cups lined up behind a little tented card reading Chardonnay. I push one into Hannah's hand and chug the other.

  "Okay, wait," my friend says. "Something's going on."

  I slam another white. Gewürztraminer, I think. I don't really care, to be honest.

  "Uh, miss? Would you like to know a little bit more about—"

  "We're fine. Citrusy notes. Vanilla. Starburst…pink, if I'm not mistaken." Who cares what it really tastes like? I feel bad about torpedoing the girl's perkiness, impressively still in play this many hours into the festival, but hey, I'm having a crisis. "What's over here?" I ask, moving on to the reds.

  "Melanie." Hannah follows me but only to tug me away from the wine.

  "Is it time for snacks? I think it's time for snacks."

  Cradling several plastic cups in the crook of my arm and hooking a few more with my fingers, I push back out into the crowd, ignoring a plaintive voice behind me calling, "Um, miss?" What? I didn't take an entire bottle. She should admire my restraint.

  "Okay, stop." Hannah takes a few samples away from me and dumps them into a nearby trash can.

  "Hey!"

  "Sit! Stay!"

  I obey, dropping onto a nearby bench.

  "Tell me what's going on. Right now."

  "I need a gyro."

  Hannah never loses it, but I can tell she's reaching the limits of her patience now. Sighing, she says, "I will get you a gyro. Then we're going to talk. Understand?"

  I nod, and she crosses the street to Zelda the Greek's food truck. The owner
is neither named Zelda nor is she Greek, but her tzatziki sauce is to die for, so nobody questions. They just eat. By the time Hannah comes back with a drippy gyro wrapped in foil, I've polished off the wine she didn't take from me. The gyro is as big as my head. I will eat all of it, I've decided.

  "Let's walk," I say, picking pieces off the pita. "I need to get out of this crowd." As we head for the pier, I decide to tell Hannah my suspicions about Sasha but nothing else. "Okay. I know you think I don't like Sasha because I'm jealous of her."

  "Are you?"

  "No." Yes. "Not really." Yes, really. I can't start off with wall-to-wall lies, so I amend my answer. "Maybe a little. But that's beside the point. What's more important is I don't trust her." I fill Hannah in on how overly familiar Sasha behaved toward Conn on the beach before Hannah arrived, and share my theory that she's trying to get something out of him or is even trying to get him back. "I know," I say quickly. "It's none of my business. Conn certainly would be the first person to tell me so. But Sasha's not good for him. You'd know what I mean if you saw Broken Conn after they divorced. But it started long before that, and I knew it. I knew all of it. They had a mess of a marriage and an awful divorce…because of me."

  Hannah throws me a puzzled half smile. "You think an awful lot of yourself sometimes, don't you?"

  "Hannah, listen. They never should have gotten married in the first place. It's my fault they went through with it, and I've regretted it ever since."

  I feel funny saying all this. It's been twelve years, and I haven't told a soul—not even Taylor, and she knows more of my dirty secrets than anyone else on the planet. Should I let this one out now? Well, if it saves Conn from another round of misery with Sasha, it's worth every ounce of my discomfort. I dive in.

  I'm not a big fan of revisiting my teen years, what with the whole parents-divorcing-and-mom-leaving kickoff in my thirteenth year, followed by the "reign of terror" era with Taylor. It was only natural that I gravitated toward Taylor's strong personality because she helped me forget about life at home, but for the amount of trouble we got into, it definitely wasn't worth it. Fortunately, it only took a couple of years for me to realize that kind of behavior really wasn't "me," and by the time I was closing in on my seventeenth birthday, I had calmed down quite a bit. I was starting my junior year in high school, focusing on getting my grades up, when Conn and Sasha set the date for their wedding, scheduling it for the following summer.