Best Friends Forever_A Marriage Pact Romance

by Jess Bentley

  “No. Nope.”

  “Even though it is, like, exactly fifteen years,” she continues, bouncing her finger in the air like a conductor keeping time. “And life is, to put it mildly, underperforming?”

  I just shake my head, pushing the thoughts aside. I know that I brought him up a few times over the years, but I was usually drunk or depressed or lonely or something. Or even just doing it so Wanda would not try to set me up with guys all the time. He became a sort of imaginary boyfriend, and a very good reason to not have to deal with real men.

  “He probably doesn’t even remember me,” I say in a hushed tone, trying to keep my emotion out of it. “Besides, I used to weigh like fifteen pounds less! And I had really long hair!”

  “Yeah, I saw the pictures. You looked like an ad for those natural tobacco cigarettes, like some kind of hippie. But now you have boobs,” she observes wisely. “And an ass.”

  “Okay, yeah, there is that. But what if he forgot about me?”

  She smirks, reaching out to affectionately boop the end of my nose with her fingertip.

  “You are unforgettable, sweet cheeks, trust me.”

  “But Ethan!” I repeat, my voice rising as I run out of objections. “What if he has a concussion? We can’t let him go to sleep!”

  She squints at her cell phone, stabbing at it with her thumb. “Your Uber is seven minutes away. You better hurry.”

  “What? No! I told you, I’m not going!”

  “Ethan?” Wanda calls out into the living room. “Your mom is leaving! Come over here and give her a kiss and tell her to have a good time on her trip!”

  She crosses her arms, challenging me as Ethan shuffles obediently across the room. When he reaches me, he wraps his arms around my middle and squeezes, enveloping me in his comforting baby-animal smell. He comes up to my nose already, but he hunches down a little, so he doesn’t seem too big.

  “Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do, Mom!” he smirks as he untangles himself from the hug way too soon and trudges back off to his game.

  “Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do? Where does he even get that?” I stage-whisper to Wanda.

  “Four minutes,” she smirks. “Now, don’t do anything I wouldn’t do. That’s some real advice!”

  I roll my eyes. “I guess that gives me all kinds of wiggle room,” I sigh as I push away from the counter and head toward my room. She’s right, my bags are all packed, and I am ready to go. There’s nothing holding me back. Ethan is fine, despite everything. And you never know. It might be a trip worth taking.

  Chapter 7

  Clay

  The valet hustles around the front of the Jag as I angle it toward the lit walkway, while another opens Deborah’s door for her.

  “I’ll have it ready for you, Mr. Corwin,” the valet grins at me as I palm a twenty into his hand.

  “Thanks, Pete.”

  Deborah smooths her midnight-blue skirt over her thighs as she stands up straight, pausing to wait for me. I offer my elbow and she slips her soft hand neatly into the crook as we walk into the club restaurant.

  Everyone is so polite. I still marvel at that. The maître d’ looks excited to see me. He glances past the other couple standing in front of him to hold his arm out extravagantly for Deborah and me, leading us to the best table in the house. Snapping surreptitiously over his head, he signals a waiter to meet us before I’ve even gotten my suit jacket unbuttoned.

  “It smells so wonderful in here,” Deborah sighs as the maître d’ slides the chair under her bottom and unfolds her napkin with a flourish.

  “I recommend the oysters Rockefeller," he says with a smirk, “perhaps the tenderloin? The branzino is also very popular. Would you like me to reserve one for you?”

  Deborah wrinkled her nose. “That’s fish, right?”

  “I’ll just leave you in Dennis’s care,” the maître d’ answers, clasping his hands in front of his chin ingratiatingly and then prancing away toward the still-waiting couple.

  Dennis opens a wine list for me.

  “We will start with the oysters Rockefeller,” I suggest automatically, handing him back the menu. “And a bottle of… prosecco? Deborah?”

  She smiles prettily. “You know I love bubbles,” she simpers.

  “All right, then. A bottle of the Casanova, and I’ll have the tenderloin, and the lady will have the lamb.”

  “Excellent choices, sir,” Dennis confirms before swooping away.

  “I do love the lamb,” she says, sliding her hand across the tablecloth and lacing her fingers against mine.

  “I know you do,” I shrug.

  “Such a gentleman,” she smiles. “I barely have to wish for something, and you make it happen. Just like that! Like a genie.”

  “I’ve been called worse,” I smile back.

  She leans her chin on her fist and stares around the restaurant, candlelight reflected in her big blue eyes. We’ve been here so many times I practically have the menu memorized, but there aren’t a lot of decent restaurants outside of St. Louis. This is just a few minutes from my house, and I rather enjoy the sound of sprinklers hitting the wide, manicured lawns late at night.

  I never really picked up the habit of golf, but I do enjoy networking with the players once they hit the bar. I’ve made a lot of very lucrative connections here. I might’ve even made more if I had cultivated the golf habit, but I don’t like doing things I’m bad at.

  Despite my calm exterior, I can feel my heart racing. The outline of the ring in my pocket presses hard against my thigh. This is a big deal.

  This is the right thing to do, I tell myself. This is the right moment to do it.

  “So, are you all jazzed up about the big reunion tomorrow?” she smirks, sort of killing the moment if I’m honest about it.

  “Jazzed up? Is that what the kids are saying these days?”

  “Oh, don’t pretend to be some old stick in the mud. Jazz is way older than you anyway. Are you excited?”

  I lean forward, fixing her in my stare. “I’m much more interested to know if you are excited, my dear.”

  “Oh, you!” she stage whispers. “You’re always so naughty!”

  “Yeah, well, the night is still young.”

  She shrugs prettily, pressing her cleavage dramatically out of her neckline, leaning forward with a flirty leer.

  “I love the way you look at me,” she murmurs.

  “Well, I love the way you look,” I answer.

  “I think you’re going to love the dress I have picked out for tomorrow,” she continues.

  Again, killing the mood. Is she doing it on purpose?

  “You don’t say?” I reply, sitting back and trying to smile through it. “Something new?”

  “Oh, just a little thing by Paule Ka. It will really look good when we hit the dance floor. There’s going to be a dance floor, isn’t there?”

  “Undoubtedly,” I grimace. “And did I get a good deal on this fashion show?”

  She rolls her eyes. “Of course you did, Clay. You’re an excellent shopper.”

  “Well, that is the important thing. That, and the way we look on the dance floor.”

  “Come on, spoilsport,” she scolds me. “I’ve never been to a class reunion before. This will be fun for me. It’s a chance to make everybody bitterly, horribly jealous of you. It sounds great!”

  “That sounds great to you? I don’t even think these people remember me, Deborah. They probably won’t even register my name long enough to become even moderately jealous of me. Probably not even slightly jealous.”

  “Are you kidding me? You’re the richest, sexiest, most successful man for a hundred miles. They’re going to be eating their hearts out.”

  “I don’t think that’s true… a hundred miles is a fairly large radius,” I mutter, but she’s not listening to me anymore.

  Her eyes are sweeping the room again, a habit I have noticed more and more. She loves talking about how successful I am. She loves the house, cars, the Ameri
can Express black card. She loves the trips. She loves the way her friends are envious of her life.

  That’s probably it. She’s not really looking forward to people being jealous of me, so much as she’s looking forward to people being jealous of her.

  That’s just an ugly truth, but one I’m prepared to live with. It’s not like I haven’t thought it through. And it’s not like any woman interested in me is going to overlook my wealth completely. It’s part of the deal. It doesn’t have to be ugly.

  She’s very easy to be around. She is undeniably beautiful. I can feel everyone in here glancing over at us from time to time, the way they always do. They’re probably trying to calculate her age. For the record, it’s twenty-four. And they’re probably judging me for that, at least a little bit. Fuck ‘em.

  “Deborah? Is everything all right?”

  She startles, glancing back at me guiltily before covering it with a brilliant smile. It happened so fast, I barely notice it. But automatically I look over my shoulder. Nothing really stands out… Just the bar, a couple of busboys, diners huddled together over candlelit tables.

  “Oh… I thought I saw my parents,” she explains in a rush.

  I glance back again to see if anybody looks like her parents. It wouldn’t be completely strange, since I suppose they could have driven sixty miles for dinner, but also doesn’t seem completely plausible either. The bartender gives me a halfhearted salute which I almost return before turning back around.

  “I don’t see them. Are you sure?”

  She shrugs and shakes her head, loosening curls from the clip behind her ear.

  “No. Just some other old couple. You know what? I think I’m gonna run to the ladies room before the wine gets here. I’ll just be a moment.”

  “Certainly, Deborah,” I murmur, standing up when she does and kissing her gently on the forehead before she rushes away.

  Dennis returns with the Casanova and holds it out for me. “Would you like to wait for lady?”

  “No, thank you. You can go ahead,” I answer distractedly. “Actually, I’m just going to go to the bar and grab a scotch. Please pour. I won’t be a moment.”

  Dennis shakes his head, confused. “Sir? I can get that for you.”

  “Oh, it’s all right,” I answer as I drop my linen napkin on the tablecloth. “I like to look a man in the eyes when he’s pouring my Scotch.”

  The bartender watches me cross the room, polishing a rocks glass with a lily-white cloth. He looks to be about twenty-five, maybe twenty-eight at the oldest. He has that sunburnt look of a golfer. Hair that is thick and sun-lightened, but only for a few more years. It sort of makes me feel good to know that he’s going to have a giant bald spot before he’s forty.

  “Johnny Walker Black,” I announce as I come up to the bar. He lays the rocks glass in front of me, giving it a quarter turn before withdrawing his hand.

  “Rocks?” he asks.

  “Neat,” I answer.

  His hands are steady when he pours out the amber liquid into the glass. I down the drink in one shot, savoring the earthy burn at the back of my tongue.

  “What’s your name?”

  “Josh.”

  I look him up and down, trying to imagine what this all looks like. Twenty-four-year-old woman, dating a thirty-six-year-old man. Well, I suppose I started dating her when she was twenty-two. Practically a kid. I didn’t know much when I was twenty-two. I was still very much a kid. I didn’t know anything about anything.

  Now she’s been dating this older guy who gives her everything she wants, tells her everything she wants, basically wraps up the whole world in a bow. I can see where that would give someone a false sense of confidence. Maybe even cynicism. I could see how that could ruin a young woman and her sense of proportion.

  “How long have you been banging my girlfriend, Josh?”

  Josh stops wiping the glass, squaring off his jaw.

  “How… How did you…”

  I sigh, rotating the glass on the gleaming bar top between my fingers. What am I feeling? Is this sadness? I don’t think so. If anything, I feel a little satisfied, like I just solved a puzzle that had been lingering too long on my to-do list. Suddenly all those faraway glances make sense. The fervent desire to wear a different outfit every day. That all makes sense. I’m sure the longer I think about it, more pieces will slide into place also.

  Tale as old as time: gold digger meets wealthy man. But this time, the gold digger will have to find some other treasure.

  “Good luck, Josh. You should try getting a better job. She’s very expensive.”

  As I turn around to walk back to the table, I see Dennis staring at me, confused. Deborah has returned, and she is obviously alarmed. I walk right up to her and cup her elbows in my hands, drawing her to me so I can kiss the top of her hair.

  “Give her anything she wants, Dennis. Put it on my bill. Josh, too. I hope he is not allergic to oysters or anything.”

  Her eyes are wide with alarm. “Clay? What are you talking about? What’s going on?”

  “Oh, here’s cab fare,” I smile, dropping a hundred-dollar bill on the table before turning away. “I’ll have the black card canceled in a few moments. You can keep the dresses.”

  As I return to the front door, the maître d’ gestures frantically toward the valet. Through some mysterious telepathic communication, he seems completely prepared to handle everything I need.

  The ring still burns in my pocket as I slip back behind the wheel of the Jag. As I roll back out onto the dark, country road, I hit the gas hard and just let the engine roar like it’s supposed to.

  Chapter 8

  Penny

  Once I get to the St. Louis airport, I can already feel the air is different. I’m back in middle America. Back in the heartland, as they say. My “home.”

  It kind of makes me shiver.

  The lady at the car rental counter is uncomfortable in her bright yellow uniform, I can tell. She pops her gum from between her molars as she unfolds a map in a practiced way and circles a few things with her pen, drawing lines between them with way too much pressure. After I sign the rental agreement, she gives me a prepackaged smile and gestures toward the parking lot, telling me to pass the competing rental car signs until I get to the one where my car will be.

  I don’t travel very often, but this all seems sort of familiar. I’ve been up and down the East Coast for work, usually within a few hours. Usually with Wanda, I just realized. She’s like my better half, probably the kind of woman I imagine I am when I’m not being pushed around by my boss or Ethan’s teachers or life in general. Wanda doesn’t take any crap from anybody. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I always think that is me, too.

  It’s late, and it’s still Friday. I activate the GPS instructions with my thumb and follow the handy dashboard screen to the highway that will lead me back to Beaumont, Illinois. Home of Justice College and the Kirkman School of Management. Or, it’s probably more precise to say Beaumont is Justice College. I don’t think the town would exist if the college didn’t.

  The pit of my stomach is all knotted and tense, getting worse with every passing mile. I open the window to inhale the misty farm and asphalt smells of the long stretch of highway between here and there. Unlike the East Coast, the landscape here is really flat, so flat I could probably see Beaumont on the horizon if I squinted.

  I really don’t want to do this. It seems incredibly pointless. If Nathan hadn’t been such a complete jackass to me today, I’m sure I could have withstood Wanda’s peer pressure. But now I am thinking this is kind of a vacation. And I deserve a vacation.

  Besides, I already paid for it. It’s not like I have limitless vacation funds rolling around my bank account.

  Which reminds me, I should probably feel bad about that too. I’m about to see a bunch of people I knew from fifteen years ago, when we had no idea how everything would turn out. Some of them are probably rich. Some of them are probably married lottery winners with new ti
ts and mutual funds and extra cars that they keep in their third and fourth garages just for fun.

  And here I come: single mother with a two-bedroom house, nonexistent love life, and a frustratingly dead-end career.

  At least I got tits, I remind myself. After I had Ethan, I got to keep the maternity boobs indefinitely. So that’s nice.

  Just smile and nod, I tell myself. People only want to talk about themselves anyway. If anybody asks, I can lie. Or I can change the subject back to them. That always works.

  I have used that trick at least a thousand times. It’s one of the reasons I’m so successful at my job, though you wouldn’t know it if you talked to Nathan. People like me because they can brag to me. I’m interested. Or at least I pretend to be interested. I make a safe space for them to talk about how great they are. Really can’t go wrong with that.

  The hazy smudge on the horizon tells me that yes, I am getting closer to Beaumont. Somewhere along here there’s supposed to be a Motel 6 coming up. I have a reservation. Yes, a reservation in a Motel 6, which strikes me as funny somehow. Motel 6 seems like the sort of thing you just pop into when you’ve had too much to drink after line dancing way out in the boonies. Like, who goes to Motel 6 on purpose?

  This girl, that’s who. The kind of girl who has a coupon, that’s who.

  Finally I do see the yellow sign for the motel rising high in the air. There is a truck stop sign just below it and the golden arches of a McDonald’s, which makes my stomach grumble. It’s late. Too late for French fries, I am sure.

  On the other side, I spot a billboard for Crosswind Estates, which is a surprise. After all this time? My mom mentioned it right after I graduated, because it was an ambitious project that took a lot of legwork with the county and no less than six farmers’ land. One of those farmers was a good friend of my mom, and she had all kinds of gripes about the entire process. In the end, she did decide to sell her land, but she got an extra 10 percent just for being a pain in the ass. That’s an important lesson, my mom had told me at the time. Don’t be afraid to ask for what you really want.