The Third Best Thing

by Hughes, Maya

  “That’s my mom.” I’d promised myself I wouldn’t roll my eyes on Laura’s wedding day.

  “What a massive bitch.” Alexis’s spot on my shit list shifted a bit. “She’s the one getting married?”

  “Nope. My sister is getting married to my ex-kind-of-boyfriend.”

  Alexis’s eyes widened. “Seriously? At least it’s not your mom, I guess.”

  “Silver lining.” I huffed, the corner of my mouth lifting.

  “The mom who isn’t getting married—she’s in a white dress.”

  “Technically, it’s champagne.”

  Alexis squinted. “It looked pretty white to me.”

  I chuckled. “Me too.”

  “Damn.”

  “I’m glad you both had each other. I can’t imagine what it was like for you two growing up the way you did, but you don’t have to keep being the scared kid. Look at what Berk’s done. You can do the same.”

  “I don’t think I’d look nearly as good as he does in the uniform.” Her small, sad smile didn’t reach her eyes.

  “No one could.”

  “Julia,” Mom’s exasperated call split the peaceful air outside.

  “Give me five minutes.” My tone brooked no argument.

  Mom jolted, stuttering, before going back inside.

  “Want me to sleep with the groom? Give your sister a taste of her own medicine? Add some extra fun to the festive occasion?” Alexis swung her gaze around to me. “Really shake things up?”

  The seconds ticked by, and I’d like to say my immediate response was no, but damn if I didn’t think about it for a full five seconds. “Nah, I wouldn’t wish him on you.”

  “Fair enough.” She dropped her head.

  “Has he contacted you?” She ran her nails along the back of her hand.

  Razor blade to the heart.

  “No, but I want him to be happy. And so should you.”

  “You make him happy.”

  My smile was filled with a sadness that dredged the wells of my resolve. Just keep standing upright. “Not happy enough.”

  “Don’t let the shit with me screw this up. I’ve screwed up enough things in his life; I can’t add you to it too.”

  “And I have to think about what I need. He’s… it’s complicated, even more complicated than I want to admit, but I think it’s best that we not see each other right now.” It was the mature thing to do. The one that made the most sense. I needed to come first with someone, even if that someone was me.

  “Jules…” Laura walked up behind us looking like she’d seen a ghost. Her pale face looked even more stark under the sun-kissed makeup the artist had applied this morning.

  “Did mom give you one of her pep talks?” I’d been cornered by her for more than one and always felt like I was walking out of the rubble of a bombed-out building afterward.

  She stared down the path leading to the street. “Not mom.”

  “You’re scaring me.” I stepped in front of her and held onto both her shoulders. “What happened?”

  “I thought I’d sneak in a kiss from Chet before all the madness really settled in. I went to the little room they said he’d be in before the ceremony started.” She broke off from her thousand-yard stare and looked at me. “And he was getting a blow job from one of my college roommates. I invited her to the wedding, even gave her a plus one.”

  I wrapped my arms around her.

  “Seems like my offer came a little too late,” Alexis said.

  Laura broke our hug. “What offer?”

  “Don’t worry about it.” I waved her off. “What do you want to do?”

  “Do?”

  “You just caught Chet getting a blow job seconds before your wedding. What do you want to do, Laura?”

  “I—I don’t know.” She shook her head like she was in slow motion.

  “He’s cheated on you and you’re not even married yet. Is that the kind of life you want to live?”

  The distant crunch of leaves under tires, murmur of voices inside the church and my heart hammering in my ears were the only sounds. She stared over my shoulder at the end of the long driveway to the church.

  Meeting my gaze, a streak of conviction blazed across her eyes. “No.” She shook her head. “No, I don’t want any of it.”

  I grabbed her hand. “Then let’s get the hell out of here.”

  “How do we do that?” She looked to me with worry painted all over her face.

  Alexis jumped up and down with her hand raised in the air. “I’m excellent at causing disruptions. I’ll go in there and do my thing. You two grab what you need and get out of there.”

  Laura looked to me like I was the older sister. I squeezed her hand and walked back to the church. “Stay here, I’ll be right back.”

  I turned to Alexis. “You sure you’re up for this?”

  Alexis interlocked her hands and cracked her knuckles. “It’s what I do best.” Climbing the steps to the church, she messed up her hair. With a thumbs up over her shoulder to us, she burst through the doors of the church. “Chet, how could you? You told me you were going to marry me. And what about our baby?”

  A collective gasp so loud they probably heard it all over the tri-state area whooshed out of the doors.

  I ducked into the room where we’d stored everything for the ceremony and grabbed my purse and a set of keys to the classic car Chet had borrowed for their big drive to the reception. The voices in the church got louder. People shouting and scrambling bodies drowned out the organ music even before it came to an abrupt stop.

  Swinging the keys overhead, I joined Laura outside. “You ready?”

  She stared up at the looming and imposing church and looked back to me. “Ready.”

  “Let’s do this.”

  43

  Berk

  Jogging across the street, I straightened the bow I’d tied around the box cradled in my arms. The lump in my throat grew with each step I took until it was hard to breathe. The steps groaned under my weight and I prayed Jules hadn’t heard, probably at her spot in the kitchen in front of the oven, sliding in a cookie sheet full of treats that would taste even better than the last ones, excited to share them with whoever needed a little piece of heaven to brighten their day.

  Alexis told me she’d gone to see her, completely following along with her promise of total honesty. More of my life’s baggage forced onto Jules. The look in her eyes as I’d lashed out, trying to bury my own pain. It was still hard to think about.

  I’d carved out a part of my heart when I pushed her away. When I didn’t believe her. There wasn’t anything I wouldn’t give to erase that from her mind, but I could do something small that might give her a bit of the memories she’d missed out on.

  Crouching, I set the box down. Part of me wanted to stay to see her face, but the protector in me didn’t want to hurt her any more. The last thing she needed was me standing there waiting for my pat on the back for this. I’d done this because it was the right thing to do, not to win her back or get credit. She deserved it and she should always get all the goodness there was in the world—end of story.

  I stared at the door with a longing stronger than any I’d experienced before. I wanted to find my mom and be there for Alexis, but I wanted Jules just as much. Those feelings were different, making me crazy when I wasn’t near her. I needed her, but she didn’t need someone like me fucking up her life and hurting her.

  I’d held her in my arms, brushed away her tears and found myself in her. I’d had a home, something I’d longed for since I could remember, and I’d thrown it away.

  Walking backward, I had one foot on the top step when the door swung open.

  Jules came out with a plastic container tucked under her arm, fixing her glove, and froze with it halfway on, staring back at me wide-eyed.

  The coward in me wanted to make a break for it. Just sprint down the block like a lunatic caught peeking in a window or checking door handles for an unlocked one.

  “
Berk.” Her breath came out in a single puff.

  “Hey, Jules.”

  “There you are. I’ve been dreaming about these all day.” A male voice punched right through our little bubble of past mistakes and heartache.

  “Hey, Nigel. I was on my way to you.”

  My stomach knotted. Who was this guy? Was she moving on already?

  He had that perfectly layered t-shirt-sweater-coat combo that always made me feel like I’d stepped inside a furnace.

  “Not quickly enough.” He hit the steps with his gaze squarely trained on Jules. Not until he got to the second to last one did he even look at me. I’d looked at her the same damn way.

  “Hey, I’m Nigel.” With his hand out like he expected me to shake it, he stared at me.

  Nigel had perfectly-aligned teeth that looked like they’d been brushed and flossed since his first tooth came in. And exactly the kind of guy who’d dote on Jules.

  Had the air suddenly been sucked out of the atmosphere? “Berk.” I squeezed his hand.

  He shook his hand when I let it go. “Great grip you’ve got there. Now, for the reason I came.” His gaze wasn’t on me anymore. He walked toward her with his arms extended like he was going to wrap her up in his embrace. She’d moved on already.

  “Megan’s been bugging me all damn day to get over here and get these from you.”

  “It’s no chicken soup, but I hope it helps. They’re still piping hot, so she should be happy.” Jules put the container in his hands.

  Confusion set in.

  “If someone had run them over with their car, she’d be out on the street with a spatula to scrape them up.” He laughed. “Thanks, Jules, you’re the best.” The lean in for a kiss was so fast, I nearly snatched the back of his collar. I’d followed him all the way up from the step.

  But it landed solidly on her cheek.

  “Don’t worry about it. It’s kind of my thing.” She did a little cute head tilt.

  Nigel turned around. “Nice to meet you, Berk with the crazy grip. I’ve got to get these back to my girlfriend.” He shook the cookie box and took off down the stairs.

  “His girlfriend.”

  Jules rocked up on her toes and nodded. “His girlfriend, Megan. My partner for Buchanan’s class.”

  My partner had made a deal to do all the work this semester if it meant he had a free pass to any Brothel parties we had for the year. Easiest trade of my life.

  “Oh.”

  “Did you think he was here for me?” Her half-huff, half laugh and eye roll oozed disbelief.

  “What’s it going to take to get you to see how irresistible you are?”

  She snorted and dropped her gaze and caught the box out of the corner of her eye from the speed of her double take. Sucking in a breath, she dropped, picking up the box like it held the Queen’s Crown Jewels.

  “Is this…” Her eyes were riveted to the box, taking in every fold and crease. She ran her fingers down the spines of the books reverently, as though touching them too hard might wash away the memory of her father’s touch. “The books. How did you get them?”

  This time when she looked at me with tears in her eyes, it tapped a place deep inside. One where I was sharing those happy memories with her, even though I’d never been there when she last read these.

  “Your sister helped me get them.”

  “She did?” Jules clutched them tight against her chest, teary eyed with a look of awe on her face. “I haven’t heard from her since we Thelma-and-Louised it out of her wedding. Things got a little awkward once we got back to the house. There were presents everywhere. Wedding stuff. Laura said she needed to be alone for a bit, I didn’t know if she was mad at me.”

  “Making a big choice like that doesn’t happen without some second guessing, but people can change, grow. Family dynamics are always hard and complicated, but she wanted to do this for you, she just needed a little help.” Help like a window jimmied open, three locks picked, one drawer brute-forced open, and someone to vault over the back fence when their mom came home earlier than expected.

  “Thank you, Berk. This… I don’t have words for it. Thank you.” The streetlights made her eyes sparkle. Her mossy green gaze was like a lake on a summer’s day, and I never wanted to leave.

  “You deserved them. I can’t believe I ever thought your mom was nice.”

  She snorted. “You don’t exactly have the best track record with character assessment.” Her eyes widened and she shook her head, taking a step forward and holding out her hand. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that. Alexis came to me to apologize. She seemed sincere, like she’s learned a lot with this whole experience.”

  “I didn’t put her up to that. I didn’t want her to bother you after… you know.”

  “I know.” A sad, glum nod to go along with the melancholy space between us that was never there before.

  “There’s been… Talking about my character assessment ability—” I took a breath to gather my thoughts. Don’t hold back now. “There have been other people in the past who’ve tried to get between us. They’d hone in on the fact that we weren’t blood related and use that as a reason she shouldn’t matter to me and I shouldn’t matter to her.”

  “That had to be hard.”

  “It was, but it doesn’t excuse what she did. And I don’t expect you to forgive her. She’s—she’s got a lot of work to do. How’ve you been?” I reached out my hand before shoving it into my pocket.

  “Okay. How about you?” She lifted her gaze to mine.

  “Honestly?”

  “Always.”

  “I feel like someone’s run over my heart with a tire made of cleats. I keep waking up in the middle of the night and looking out the window at your room and I want to be in there with you. I want to be holding you and rubbing that spot on your nose with the freckle cluster that kind of looks like a tiny strawberry.”

  She lifted her hand and rubbed it along the bridge of her nose.

  “And I want to call you, or even write you letters, because I miss you, Frenchie. I miss you so much that even with all the people I’ve lost in my life, it’s you who keeps me up at night because you’re part of my heart. You’re part of my soul and I swear…” I choked through the words, pushing past the tightness in my throat and the tears in my eyes.

  “I promised I wouldn’t do this, that I’d give you space and not make showing up here like this, but fuck it. I love you so much that my future that was once so crystal clear is a wasteland stretching on as far as I can see when I try to picture it now without you.”

  “You’ve got a great future ahead of you. You’ve already made it through so much.”

  “It doesn’t mean anything if I can’t get another private dance lesson, if I can’t sit at our kitchen table and watch you work your magic, if I can’t hold you in my arms and tell you how much I love you.”

  She opened her mouth, but I charged forward, needing her to hear everything.

  “People fuck up and who knows what the future holds. And before you say anything, I want you to know, Alexis is family, but you’re my forever. I can’t promise she won’t fuck up, same as I can’t promise I won’t fuck up. But I can promise that I’ll always believe you and love you. The blinders are off when it comes to her, but she’s still going to be part of my life. No more rescuing, no more trying to keep her out of trouble, but she’s my sister.” The muscles in my neck strained and I tried to keep my breathing under control. This could be a deal breaker, but I had to be honest with Jules.

  “I never wanted to come between you.”

  “I know that. I know.”

  “These past few days…” She hugged the book box tighter to her chest. “I’ve missed you so much too.” Her watery smile was the first ray of sunshine after a turbulent storm. A ray of hope. “And the future I’d never been able to picture for myself was clear after I walked out your door. It was bleak, lonely, and not filled with even half the love I feel for you.”

  I rushed forward
and wrapped my arms around her. The hard edges of the box dug into my chest, but I didn’t care. I’d sit on a bed of nails to be this close to her again.

  She laughed, skimming her fingers along my jaw and looking into my eyes with that kind of open love that made her Jules. I’d never take it for granted again.

  “And you were never the third best thing in my life, Jules. Never. I’d never play a game again, if it meant I could be here with you.”

  She brushed her fingers against my lips. “It was never about forcing you to choose. There’s enough room in here for more than me.” Her hand slid down to my chest.

  “I know, but everything else falls away when I’m with you, and I don’t ever want to lose that.”

  “Neither do I, but I have one important question for you.” Her lips thinned to a line, her face transforming into finals-week seriousness. She lifted her chin, meeting my gaze. “Ready for another dance lesson?”

  I laughed, rubbing my nose against hers. “Always.”

  44

  Berk

  My hand shook in hers. She covered mine with both of her mitten-covered ones. Letting go with one hand, she picked up the present from her seat. The one she’d held on to the whole way here.

  The afternoon air was sharp and crisp. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky; even though our breath hung in clouds in front of our faces, the sun shone.

  A tremor rolled through my body. Her fingers tightened around mine, running along the back of my hand. She reached up and put her other hand around my arm, molding herself to my side like she was prepared to jump out and protect me if I needed it. And I did.

  We walked into the caretaker’s office. This time I wasn’t teetering on the edge and soaked completely through.

  My Adam’s apple bobbed. I cleared my throat, trying to form the words. “Can you please let me know where Elizabeth Vaughn is?”

  The caretaker looked up from his desk and his eyes widened. “You’re back.” He leaned over and opened a drawer. “You left so quickly last time, I wasn’t sure if you’d be back.”