Cade just held her.
“I’ll text you my exercise routine. It’s very self-actualized. And fuck Ruth’s new adventure,” Cade murmured. “What if Ruth went to France, but you could never write or Zoom or anything? You’d be sad, but you’d still believe in France. It wouldn’t mean you thought she didn’t exist anymore.”
Selena stopped trying not to cry and sobbed against Cade’s chest.
“Ruth’s gone…and the casseroles…and cancer.” It didn’t even make sense to Selena. “And my ex called me…and I didn’t eat the poke, and the tuna died…and Ruth was going to hang Christmas tree ornaments…and her store.” And you’re going to evict me. “And the urn…it’s so small…how can it be so small?”
Cade nestled Selena’s head against her shoulder. She didn’t say, shh or don’t cry or my mother died of cancer, let me tell you the gory details.
Slowly, Selena’s sobs subsided. She could feel hard muscle against her cheek. She could feel her breath match the rise and fall of Cade’s. In and out. And she wanted to say something like, I feel like we met in a past life or please make love to me with the biggest dildo we can find so that I can be so full there’s no room to think.
Not appropriate either way.
“I do believe in France,” Selena said.
Cade stroked a piece of hair off Selena’s cheek. “See? You get to be sad because Ruth died,” she said. “You just do. And it’s sweet that everyone threw a party if that’s what she wanted.”
Reluctantly Selena pulled away. “Thank you.”
Cade looked down at the ground. She was wet from rain and her workout, and her clothes stuck to her.
“Would you like to go inside?” Cade asked. “I could make you a cup of tea.”
Inside, Cade took a blanket off Ruth’s sofa and handed it to Selena. Cade was dripping rain too, but she didn’t seem to notice the chill as she busied about the kitchen.
“There’re so many teacups, but I don’t see any tea,” Cade said.
Cute. Ruth’s teacups were all for whiskey drinking.
“I guess maybe a coffee?” Cade said.
Selena held up a bottle of Sadfire Whiskey to stop her.
“It’s like tea,” she said.
Cade sat down across from her. Selena poured herself a teacup full of whiskey. Cade poured a tiny bit into her own cup.
“You remind me of Becket,” Selena said. “Becket’s good in a crisis.”
“Paperwork, yes. I don’t know how good I’d be in an earthquake,” Cade said ruefully.
“I guess it’s not a crisis anymore,” Selena said. “Everything was a crisis before Ruth died. I was here.” That was one thing Selena knew. She’d been with Ruth until the end, even if she hadn’t cleaned the house or paid for the funeral. Who knew it was so expensive to die? “Now, nothing is.”
“How’d you meet Ruth?” Cade asked.
Selena pulled Ruth’s blanket around her.
“She was friends with Becket. My ex broke up with me, and I didn’t have any place to live. Beck was probably sick of me sleeping on her couch, so she said, Ruth, I’ve got this great person who could live in your in-law. Ruth and I…I’d never had a mother really, and she’d never had a daughter. I live here and work at Ruth’s boutique.”
Lived. Worked.
“My aunt said you were a painter.”
“No.”
Cade took a sip of her whiskey and raised her eyebrows approvingly. It was Sadfire. Even if you drank Boones Country Kwencher—which Cade surely didn’t—you had to admit Sadfire was good.
“Do you want to do anything?” Cade asked. “To memorialize Ruth…a toast or a moment of silence?”
Selena wiped some rainwater off her face with the edge of the blanket.
“Photo albums?” she suggested.
“Of course.”
“I’ll get them,” Selena said.
“I’m going to change real quick.” Cade indicated her own damp tank, then looked away. “Do you want, um, clothing?”
Cade’s shy chivalry made Selena smile.
“I am wearing clothing.”
“More clothing?”
“I’ll run back to my place and grab something.”
“I can loan you a sweatshirt.”
A moment later, Selena returned with one of Ruth’s overpacked photo albums, and Cade returned wearing slacks and a gray sweater. She held out a pair of sweatpants and a sweatshirt to Selena. Neatly folded.
Her clothes.
If it had been Ruth, Selena would have stripped right there, but Cade seemed to have trouble looking at her when she wasn’t wearing a blanket, so Selena trailed the blanket into the living room to change. Cade’s clothing was incredibly soft. It smelled faintly of expensive cologne. Selena pressed her face to the sweatshirt. It smelled the way forests really smelled, clean without being soapy, not the piney imitation you got in candles.
“I got this one because it might have pictures of you,” Selena said. “As an adorable little kid.”
She set it on the table and sat next to Cade. She thought Cade stiffened at her closeness, but when she looked over, Cade was smiling.
“I was never an adorable little kid,” Cade said.
“I’m sure you were adorable.”
Selena opened the album. She and Ruth had sat at this table looking at albums like this. So many nights. So much laughter. Selena turned the first page. There was a picture of Ruth and her brother when they were young.
“Your dad,” Selena said.
Cade groaned. “That mustache makes him look like a pirate.”
Selena flipped through a few more pages. There was Ruth’s house before the wisteria grew in. There was Ruth sunbathing naked.
Cade covered the picture with her hand. “No one should see their aunt naked.”
“It’s okay. She was a nudist.”
Cade scrunched up her nose. “That doesn’t make it better. That just means there’s going to be more pictures.”
The next photograph was a child with a boyish haircut and a girl’s swimsuit running through a sprinkler in Ruth’s yard. The girl’s mouth was open wide, her arms and legs going in every direction, pom-poms in each hand. Selena waited for Cade to recognize herself. Cade’s expression remained neutral.
“Yard looked nice back then,” Cade said.
“And?” Selena said.
“What?” Cade looked at her innocently.
“It’s you.”
Cade pretended to study the picture closely.
“That must be some child my aunt picked up off the street. I have never had pom-poms,” Cade said with mock indignation. Then a shadow passed across her face. “I played banker.”
Ruth had always said her niece worked too hard.
“Where are the pictures of you?” Cade asked. “Did you know my aunt long enough to do something embarrassing with pom-poms?”
Selena leaned her shoulder against Cade’s for just a second. “What day don’t I do something embarrassing with pom-poms?” Selena turned the page.
They looked through three more albums. Selena could tell Cade was tired, but Cade didn’t leave the table until Selena said she’d better get back to the in-law apartment. They both rose. Cade held out her hand to shake Selena’s, then they both laughed at the formality, and Cade hugged her, politely this time. Just an acquaintance-friend shoulder-hug.
“How long are you staying for?” Selena asked.
“I fly out on a redeye tomorrow.”
“You want to get lunch? Do shots at a dive bar?”
Cade shook her head.
“I’ve got so much I have to sort out before I go. Ruth’s papers are…the papers of a true Elgin. And I have to see her lawyer tomorrow and make sure nothing goes to probate.”
Becket would have told Selena that now was a good time to ask Cade when Selena was getting evicted and whether she’d get her last paycheck from Ruth’s shop. Selena didn’t. The night felt like a time outside of time. Like the only things t
hat existed were them, the lamplight, the teacups, the photos, and Ruth’s memory.
Cade swept her hair off her face, revealing a sharp undercut. Selena longed to caress that flash of rebel beneath Cade’s buttoned-down look. Old Selena would have said, Come back to my place. But that was a mistake. Backslide now and she’d be back to picking up people at clubs and waking up hungover. And there was something about Cade that told her breaking her vow with Cade would be more dangerous than breaking it with one of Becket’s art scene friends. Cade was all alpha female on the outside, but beneath that exterior Selena sensed a shyness or a sadness that Selena wanted to coax and comfort. And yes, she wanted to have sticky, toy-filled sex with her, but for the first time in a long time that was a thought, not her only thought.
“Good night then, Cade Elgin,” Selena said. “If you change your mind about the shots, you know where to find me.”
Chapter 6
“I’m sleeping.” Selena answered Becket’s fourth knock and pulled the covers over her head.
“I have a key. I’m just being polite,” Becket said. To prove it, she let herself in and hopped onto the bed, her petite frame barely springing the mattress.
Selena pulled the covers down. Becket held her motorcycle helmet under one arm. She had stickers for all the flags in the LGBTQIA+ continuum on the helmet. The blue of the bisexuality flag complemented the blue of her hair, and as her hair dye faded, she’d match the lighter blue of the trans pride flag and eventually fade to the pale green of the agender flag. It was very egalitarian.
“You ready to go see the lawyer?” Becket asked.
Selena vaguely remembered Ruth’s lawyer making an appointment with her. At the time, she hadn’t been thinking about leaving her apartment and closing down the store. She’d thought maybe Ruth wanted to give her something special, an heirloom necklace or her snow globe collection. Maybe Ruth wanted it to be a surprise. Would she get to keep any of Ruth’s things now? Would they let her take Ruth’s portrait? She’d given it to Ruth; did that make it the Elgins’ property? She tightened her grip on the covers. Cade had been so sweet, and Roger and Pepper Elgin had seemed so fun and free-spirited—just like Ruth—and now they were all going back to New York and leaving Selena with eviction papers.
“Why do I need to?” Selena said. “They can just call and tell me to get out.”
Becket patted her shoulder.
“I’ll be there with you. You can ask for more time to move out. Maybe it’ll be okay. Closure.”
“I don’t want closure.”
“The lawyer says you need to be there.”
“What if he says I need to leave the apartment today?”
“You’ll crash with me,” Becket said. “It’ll be okay. When haven’t I had your back?”
Becket had had her back since they arrived at the McLaughlin Academy freshman orientation, the only two students who’d ridden in on junkyard motorcycles, the only two who weren’t eighteen.
“Never,” Selena said.
“Right. Now get dressed.”
Becket’s brow furrowed. Selena was still wearing Cade’s clothes.
“What’s this?” Becket tugged on the cuff of Cade’s sweatshirt.
“A sweatshirt.”
“When did you start wearing…is this Adidas fleece?”
“Cade loaned it to me.”
It occurred to Selena she needed to give the clothing back. It was just so cozy.
“You didn’t,” Becket said.
“We just talked.”
“And how do you define talked?”
“Like someone who would not sleep with Ruth’s niece the night of her funeral.”
Becket shook her head. “Let’s go see the lawyer.”
They rode together on Becket’s bike, as easy together as one body, like they’d been riding since college. The lawyer’s house was in a bungalow off busy Hawthorne Street, and Selena suggested they park on the sidewalk. Becket said something about ordinances and circled the block for ten minutes.
Inside, a secretary greeted them and indicated the double doors to the lawyer’s office. Selena pushed them open and stopped. Inside was a stately room, lined with bookshelves and dominated by a heavy conference table. But it wasn’t the conference table that dominated Selena’s vision. It was Cade, her parents, and Ruth’s attorney sitting at the table.
“They’re here?” she whispered to Becket.
You should be able to evict someone and take away their job—basically take away everything—without making a conference out of it. And she didn’t want to see Cade here. It ruined the whole time out of time feeling she’d had the night before. Couldn’t ruining her life be an anonymous transaction?
Cade sat with her hands folded, looking posh in a gray sweater and subtle tartan scarf, not one strand of silky blond hair out of place. She looked over when she heard Selena.
Hey, she mouthed.
The lawyer stood up and shook Selena’s hand and then Becket’s. “Delmar Thompson,” he said. “I was a friend of Ruth’s. She was an amazing woman. I’m so sorry for your loss.”
Selena and Becket took the remaining seats. Selena got the one next to Cade.
“I don’t know what this is about,” Cade said.
Becket snorted.
Selena wished it were true.
“Cadence, Selena, I know you’re wondering why you’re here.” Delmar sat down at the head of the table. “I’ll get right to it. Ruth changed her will.”
“She was always so spontaneous,” Roger Elgin said.
“Roger and Pepper and I have talked about this,” Delmar said, “but Ruth wanted Cadence and Selena to hear the details of the will together. And she wanted it to be after her death. She didn’t tell you herself—especially you, Selena—because it’s bad news.”
Becket would help her pack. The Elgins would sell the house. Someone would cut down the wisteria. Selena began to tear up.
“Ruth left a letter and instructions to be read today,” Delmar said. “Are you ready?”
No.
“A missive from the beyond,” Roger Elgin said. “Read on!”
Delmar put on reading glasses, took a sheet of pink paper out of an envelope, and unfolded it.
“Dear ones, this is my final will and testament or whatever they say in the movies. Cadence, I know we haven’t seen each other much these last years, but you’re still my girl. And Selena, you’re the daughter I never had. Working at Satisfaction Guaranteed and having you in the guest house: those were some of the happiest times of my life.
But Satisfaction Guaranteed isn’t doing well. I’m an Elgin. I’ve done business like an Elgin. We’re not good at business, except Cade. Delmar will fill you in on the details. But the store isn’t doing too well.”
“Satisfaction Guaranteed is fine.” Selena leaned forward. “It’s beautiful. People love it.”
“It’s not doing well,” Delmar said apologetically.
“How bad is it?” Cade tapped a tablet in front of her and poised the stylus over the screen.
“Here’s the deal,” Delmar said. “Ruth bought her stock from three distributors.” He checked his notes. “Adult Playground, Palace Perfect, and Swing Set. They’re big distributors. It’s a small store. So she flew under the radar for a long time, but they finally noticed that she hadn’t made the minimum payments on her accounts for…years. I think. Her records aren’t the best. It looks like she owes close to a hundred thousand.”
A hundred thousand dollars in debt? Ruth had said everything was fine. They were doing better than ever.
“Swing Set is willing to work with you, but the other two aren’t,” Delmar went on. “They know Ruth passed away, and they are collecting on their debts. The house is also double mortgaged, so you can’t take out a home equity loan.”
“When are they collecting?” Cade asked.
“Probate gives you about a month. But there’s more.” Delmar adjusted his reading glasses. “Ruth writes, But that’s just an old w
oman letting things slide. Cadence, you’ve always been good at business. Don’t roll your eyes, sweetie. I remember how you used to do that when you were a girl. So serious. None of us know where you came from, our little accountant, but if anyone can save Satisfaction Guaranteed, it’s you. Take care of my Selena. She needs an accountant in her life.”
“Everyone does,” Cade said wearily.
“It’s on you two,” Delmar read on. “I know death is the next great journey, but even if it’s just lights-out, I know my love is going to float around in the universe forever. I’m sure there’s some law of physics that explains it. Or God. Or maybe we’re all just part of the same beautiful dream. I’ll be looking down on you in one way or another. I know you can do this. Your loving friend and aunt, Ruth.”
The letter sounded so like Ruth. Selena held her breath to hold back her tears. Becket squeezed her hand.
“What does it mean?” Cade twirled her stylus around in her long fingers.
“She’s splitting her property between you,” Delmar said. “Her shop, her house, and her little cabin in the woods. The conditions are that you have to live in the house. Selena stays in the in-law apartment. You both have to work at the shop, and if you can get it back in the black everything is yours. Fifty-fifty.”
Ruth had left everything to her and Cade? Everything?
“We get the house?” Selena couldn’t believe it. “And the store?”
Ruth loved surprises, but this? It was like one of the movies Ruth watched where a sad, lonely woman inherited money or won the lottery or got sent to Italy for work and she blossomed. (That was the word Ruth used.) She kissed a sexy lifeguard, and became a novelist, and when she went back to Ohio she was a new woman. Ruth was giving that to Selena. Not an apartment she lived in rent-free, her own home. Not a job, a business.
“Why didn’t she tell us?” Selena’s mind reeled. “I could have thanked her. I could have told her…this is…it’s everything. Cade, can you believe it?”
“Yes, why didn’t she tell us?” Cade asked Delmar.
Delmar shrugged. “She said she was ashamed she’d let it all slide. She got sick and she didn’t want Selena to worry.”
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