“She’s right, sweetheart!” Dad chimed in.
I laughed and wished I could be there to hug them. I always missed my parents, but I especially missed them when I needed pep talks like this.
We caught up about what everyone in the neighborhood was up to and whether I was getting enough to eat, and ended the call with a promise to talk soon about Dad’s surgery. Only half an hour of talking to my parents had improved my mood significantly, even if I still felt weird about my dream.
It was bad enough I had to be around Levi in the real world. Did I have to dream about him too?
Worse, did I have to enjoy it so damn much?
Chapter 7
Levi
I took a sip of my coffee and leaned back in my chair, frustrated. The Black Mountain Brewery office was my oasis. At least, it was supposed to be. It occupied the two floors above the brewery, and the tangy smell of toasting hops perfumed the main floor offices and meeting rooms. The executive offices were on the top floor and were, for the most part, odor free.
Garrick and my dad and I each had a private space joined by a communal lounge.
I spent a lot of my time in the lounge. Its black leather couches and polished black marble floor made it feel like a volcanic cave. A couple of years ago we commissioned a local artist to paint a mural of the Cascade Mountains on the inside wall. Across from it, a wall of glass looked east toward the city, with Mount Saint Helens and Mount Hood in the distance. I met clients in my office but did my best work here, at the small glass desk propped in front of the window. Anytime I needed a break I could just look up and stare out at the craggy, snowy peaks. Just like I did now.
The sunlight gilded the young leaves of the maple trees below the window, and a gentle breeze urged them to stir and dance. The rippling leaves and fresh spring grass held the promise of a beautiful summer to come. But even this scene didn’t boost my mood.
I was distracted. My thoughts kept looping back from figures and spreadsheets to Val’s curvaceous wedding planner. With Dad and Garrick out at meetings all morning, by all rights, it should have been a productive, relaxing day. A quiet day. But one comment from Garrick this morning about how Frankie and Val had plans today was enough to steal my concentration.
I kept thinking about her lips, her long, silky hair and how it would feel wrapped around my fist. I didn’t understand it. I despised this woman—why couldn’t I get her out of my head?
I plunged back into work with a frustrated sigh and shoved Frankie far out of view.
Just as I was getting into a groove, I heard the elevator buzz up to the top level. Dad and Garrick’s boisterous conversation announced their arrival long before the doors slid open, and I turned my head to greet them as they walked into the lounge.
They stopped talking and smiled when they saw me.
“Hey bro,” said Garrick.
“How was the meeting?” I asked.
Garrick and Dad strode to the coffee pot and each poured a cup. Both added milk, and Dad stirred in some sugar, something he only did at work since he’d never get away with it in front of my mother.
“Boring,” Garrick replied, taking a tentative sip of his coffee. He sidled over to the far couch and sank down with a sigh. “You wouldn’t believe how eager the reps were to get our support. Apparently, nobody else will touch them. It’s a hard time for new music festivals at the moment.”
Dad followed and took the opposite side of the couch. He tossed his feet up on the glass coffee table and rested his cup on his round belly.
“No more talk of music festivals,” he declared. “I’m tired of being reminded how old and out of it I am.”
I chuckled. “You own a brewery. You’re about as in as they get.”
“Like you’d know,” Garrick said dryly.
I frowned. Dad and Garrick exchanged a cheeky, almost identical smile. It was easy to tell they were father and son. Their eyes always shone with humor, and now that Garrick was nearing thirty, his were beginning to crinkle in the same way. If my brother didn’t watch himself, he’d wind up looking exactly like my dad in thirty years—beer belly and all.
“Getting much done in here?” Dad asked.
I turned back to my computer and shrugged. “Could be worse.”
I thought they might go to their separate offices and leave me in peace, but that turned out to be wishful thinking. Dad and Garrick always talked fast and drank their coffee slow. I became childishly determined to wait them out. Their background chatter wasn’t that bad, anyway. I was used to tuning them out.
Only when they started talking about the wedding did it become impossible to do so.
“Where is Val today?” Dad asked. “Will she be stopping by?”
Val sometimes came by on Fridays to see Garrick, and anytime she did Dad liked to tease her about trying to steal our secrets.
“Probably not. She and Frankie are out doing a cake tasting.”
“And they didn’t invite me along?” Dad complained.
Garrick chuckled. “If your next slice of cake were at the wedding it would be too soon.”
“What kind are you thinking of getting?” Dad asked. “Give me something to look forward to.”
I stared hard at the mountains and tried to block out the conversation behind me. I did not succeed.
“Val wants red velvet, she thinks it’ll look good with all the pearl accents. I voted for fun-fetti, but she shot that down.”
Dad made a noise of contentment. “Your mother and I had vanilla with the most delicious buttercream icing I’ve ever tasted.”
“That’s funny that you say that, Val originally was leaning in the direction of something buttercream, but she saw a red velvet cake on Pinterest for a winter wedding and fell in love.”
I couldn’t take it anymore.
I whipped around and glared at them. “I am at work. In a brewery. If I can’t escape wedding talk here, where can I?”
Dad and Garrick were silent for a moment, then both burst into giggles.
“Come on, Levi, we’re just excited,” Dad said.
“I’m excited for Garrick too, but I manage to contain myself during the hours from nine to five.”
“Looking forward to the big day, are you?” Dad asked with a twinkle in his eye. “You bringing along a special lady?”
I rolled my eyes. “No.”
I turned my back to them to signal that the conversation was over.
Garrick lowered his voice just enough to make it sound like he was telling Dad a secret, but not enough to keep me from hearing it. “The only reason Levi isn’t bringing a date is that he’s got his eye on the wedding planner.”
I kept my eyes focused on my laptop screen, gritting my teeth. “I most certainly do not.”
My raised hackles were not enough to deter him. “Of course you do,” Garrick said. “You should have seen him last time we got drinks, Dad. He was smitten.”
“Smitten?” I snapped.
Okay, now I’d had enough. Garrick might not know it, but he was prodding a tender spot, and I was going to make damn sure he left well enough alone in the future.
“Let me make this clear,” I said, raising my voice but still not turning around. “The only thing I might feel for that girl is sorry for her. She couldn’t find anyone to marry herself so now she tricks luckier girls into thinking she likes them so she can lurk in the background of their wedding photos and dig a deep hole in their pockets. I wouldn’t take that girl out if I was the tide.”
Garrick and Dad made no reply. In fact, they’d gone so silent that I wondered if they’d left somewhere in the middle of my tirade. I thought I’d heard footsteps.
I turned around and my stomach clenched.
Val was standing just inside the room with her hands in fists at her sides. Beside her, Frankie clutched a cake box and stared at me like I was the most abominable person in the world. Hell, I felt like it.
I rose to my feet and picked up my laptop, heading straight past the t
wo girls and to the fire stairs.
The worst part of the way Frankie looked at me wasn’t that she now hated me more than ever. I could have taken that in stride. No, the worst part was the raw hurt that darkened her eyes. Nothing I said or did in the past had visibly shaken her, and she always came back with fire and sass. This time I’d gone too far. All I’d wanted was to get Garrick off my back.
I took my laptop to the park near the brewery but didn’t get anything done. I considered going back to apologize no less than five times but always stopped myself before I did.
What did I care if I hurt her feelings? I meant what I said, so why should I have to apologize for it? It was better if she hated me. Then at least she might abandon all thoughts of trying to befriend me or establish some sort of camaraderie between us. If she hadn’t already. In the long run, this would be better for both of us.
After a couple hours of staring down at my computer my neck started to ache, and I figured it was safe to go back to the office.
It was quiet inside when I came back. My dad and Garrick were still sitting in the lounge, but they went silent as I left the elevator and darted into my office. Neither of them said a word to me. I doubt any of us knew what there was to say.
Chapter 8
Frankie
I was becoming the backspace queen. Every time I typed a sentence, my ring finger inevitably stretched over to the rectangular key and jabbed away at it with a vengeance. I would start typing again. I would backspace again.
Writing a blog post shouldn’t be this hard, especially when it was an entry responding to a reader question. I loved these types of posts because it was much easier for me to respond to a question than it was to plan a topic and outline an entire entry from scratch. So why was I having such a hard time?
Who was I kidding? I knew why. It was the nature of the question. The bride had a troublesome bridesmaid on her hands and wanted to know how I would approach the issue without making things worse and ruining her big day. The reluctant bridesmaid was a member of the groom’s family and was angry that they’d scheduled the wedding during the first week of her first year of college. The brat was acting out to the point where the bride wondered if she was trying to get kicked out of the wedding.
It was a similar problem to the one I was facing with Levi, but at least this bride knew why the girl was cranky.
My responding blog post would address the concerns of this bride while inserting some general tips on how to manage moody members of any wedding party. I was often surprised by how selfish and unreasonable the closest people to the bride and groom could be, and had defused a handful of unruly relatives in my day. It had the potential to be a great post. Too bad I couldn’t get past the first sentence.
I closed my laptop with a sigh and leaned back, letting my eyelids drift down. I didn’t want to admit that Levi’s comment yesterday had gotten to me, but here I was.
Blocked. Hurt. Frustrated because I was blocked and hurt.
Who cared if the human equivalent to a honey badger thought I wasn’t worth his time? The only person whose opinion mattered in this scenario was Val’s. She adored me, and I adored her, and together we were building my most beautiful wedding yet. Levi thought he knew me, but he had no idea who I was or what I wanted in life. He based his presumptions on nothing more than his bitter view of the world.
Problem was, Levi’s rejection hit on an old wound.
That’s the funny thing about rejection, isn’t it? It sucks no matter who’s doing it, and when it happens you can’t help but think about all the other times you weren’t good enough, wondering what about your personality, your looks, your actions, drove those people away.
I could tell myself that Levi’s comments were his problem and not mine until the cows came home, but it wouldn’t stop me from wondering if maybe he saw the same unacceptable thing in me that my husband had.
Aaron.
My hands gripped the sides of my chair, and my eyes flicked open.
It was funny how well I glazed over the details of my heartbreak in my own mind. Even when telling Valerie about what happened, I never conjured up his name, his face. He was a phantom of my past and for the most part stayed formless and dormant, haunting the corners of my mind but never slinking forward into the light. He stood there now, front and center, smiling at me the way he smiled at everything.
Aaron had been a smiler. He smiled all through our relationship, never breathing a word of the unhappiness he claimed to have harbored inside for months until I caught them out. Only after I caught them did Aaron admit that I’d been living in a daydream of a happy marriage. Out of nowhere, he could suddenly rattle off lists of faults I didn’t know I had, ones I might’ve been able to work on if he’d brought them up before. I hadn’t realized that it showed how miserable I was at my job, or how that affected him. He didn’t tell me he hated how confrontational I was, or that the structure I placed in our home made him feel boxed in. Suddenly I was on my own with nothing to keep me company at night but a fat, steaming pile of rejection.
I cursed Levi for making me think about Aaron and his stupid, dimpled smile. I was a different person than I was in those days. I was stronger now. I shouldn’t be letting myself get pulled down to the same dark place I’d been when I walked into my home and found my husband and best friend doing the naked tango.
I got up and walked to the coffee machine. I needed to shake myself out of this, otherwise I was going to spend the rest of the day spiraling and I’d never get any work done. I had a business now, one that made me happy and hopefully wouldn’t cause me to push anyone I loved away. I didn’t blame myself for Aaron cheating on me—that was on him and him alone—but it would have been nice to know there were things I could have done to be a better me.
I sat back down at my desk and refocused on the task in front of me. Soon I was right back to where I started though since the thought of troublemaking wedding parties brought Levi back to the forefront of my mind. I wondered if I could get a dartboard with his face on it. Would that help? Maybe a punching bag...
Footsteps approached me from behind, and someone tapped twice on the top of my head. “Knock knock.”
I looked up and grinned. “Valerie! What are you doing here?”
She came around the side of the desk and presented me with a box of four cupcakes from one of my favorite bakeries in town.
“I thought I might drop in, see if you wanted to come out for a coffee?” She grinned and gestured to the empty Word document on my screen. “That is if you’re not too busy.”
I laughed. Valerie’s smiling face was just what the doctor ordered, and the cupcakes weren’t too far off the mark either.
“I would love to go for a coffee. Thank you so much for the cupcakes, though I’m not sure what I’ve done to deserve them.”
“I just felt like treating my maid of honor, is that so strange? I was going to bring you beer, but I know how much you prefer the competition’s.” She poked me in the arm.
Her excuse was as transparent as a sheet of glass. Val felt bad for the whole Levi debacle from yesterday. Everyone seemed to, except Levi. Garrick and Gerhart both apologized profusely after Levi stormed out, but I’d begged them not to worry about it. I was a master of putting on a brave front and they seemed satisfied that no harm had been done. I had a feeling Val was not so easily convinced.
I grabbed my sweater, and we headed out onto the rainy streets, huddling together under Val’s umbrella. Spring meant the weather was so unpredictable it was almost predictable. It was sunny and warm yesterday? That indicated today would be rainier than the set of Singing in the Rain. Obviously.
I pulled Val into a coffee shop a block down the road. The aroma of roasting beans and cinnamon curled around us and a smile broke out on my face. There were worse places one could be caught in a downpour.
We each ordered an Americano and grabbed a seat by the window, where we could watch hipsters and tourists hurry down the street, while more
seasoned west coasters strutted with raincoats zipped to their chins and their heads held high.
Valerie’s blonde bob had curled a bit in the damp and she combed her fingers through it to break it into waves.
“Have you had a chance to look at the websites of those stylists I sent you?” I asked.
Val nodded. “I have, but we’re not talking about wedding stuff today.”
“We’re not?”
The last time we’d hung out without talking about the wedding was our first meeting, so this caught me by surprise. I’d never had a client show up at my office to take me out for coffee before unless they had something wedding-specific on their minds.
Val cradled her mug in her hands and her brow creased. “I wanted to see how you were feeling after what Levi said yesterday.”
Another first. A client wanted to meet up specially to talk to me about my feelings. I always got along well with my clients, but it was unusual for us to develop any deeper a relationship than one would have with a favorite hairdresser. Then again, if anyone were going to break that boundary, it would be Valerie. Our relationship was starting to feel less like a business one and more like a genuine friendship, and though I knew I should be careful with how attached I grew, I couldn’t help but smile at her concern.
“That’s sweet of you to ask, but I’m okay,” I said.
She gave me a flat look. “I saw your face yesterday. Broke my damn heart. I wanted to talk to you afterward, but you seemed pretty determined to get home, and I didn’t want to press it.” She shrugged. “If you don’t want to talk about it, that’s fine, but I wanted you to know that what he said was uncalled for and not even slightly accurate.”
“I know. Levi’s a bitter person. Bitter people have bitter thoughts.”
“If only they’d keep those thoughts to themselves.” She brought her mug to her lips and drank. I followed her lead.
“It’s not you,” she said after a short silence. “There’s no excuse for Levi’s actions, but I’m going to tell you something that might help it not sting so bad.”
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