I sigh again.
Looking at it from a different point of view, I can see how that would make me seem like a piece of shit.
Fuck.
“So what, I fucked up when I was 23 because I was young and stupid and some crazy shit had just gone down, and now there’s no chance?”
I don’t like the way my gut seizes at that thought. At the way I feel sick just thinking I ruined my shot with Zoe.
It’s Luna’s turn to sigh.
She looks around the room like she’s trying to figure something out, trying to find some kind of guidance or permission, before she finally nods.
“Look. I’m going to share something with you, but if you ever tell anyone, I can rightfully be flogged publicly.”
Tony’s eyes go wide, and a smile crosses his face, and my stomach churns for an entirely different reason. My sister, thankfully, throws another throw pillow at her husband.
“Anthony Garrison, stop it. You’re making Zander nauseous.”
Tony just smiles.
I hate this. Her being married to my best friend makes shit so uncomfortable.
“Do you agree to never, ever, in a million years, tell Zoe what I’m about to show you?” Her face is stoic and serious.
“Will it help me?”
She goes quiet for a split second before nodding.
“Then yeah,” I say, because this is not the time for egos.
“Okay,” she says, then she stands and walks out of the room.
Tony leans back in the couch, putting a foot on one knee before leaning back with a smile.
“So, Zoe?”
“Shut up, man.”
“It’s not like we didn’t all know.”
“Shut up, man.”
He laughs, but then Luna walks through the entryway holding a very familiar box. It’s worn with age but I could pinpoint it anywhere.
Their stupid wish box.
The box Luna hid terribly; the box Tony and I riffled through more times than I could count as kids just to fuck with my sister.
And now it might hold all of the answers.
She sits down with it in her lap and I grab for it. She moves it out of my reach, staring at me.
“Look. I’m not doing this for you. I’m doing it for Zoe.”
“Babe, you’re revealing your best friend’s hopes and dreams for her?” Tony says with a smile, and I want to punch him.
He’s supposed to be on my side, not Zoe’s.
“She’s having a midlife crisis.”
“She’s thirty.”
“Third-life crisis. Shit, I’ve already had this freaking conversation once with her. I don’t need to have it again.” Tony smiles, and I watch as nearly instantly, Luna’s frustration melts off.
Magic.
I hate that the first thing I think is that I fucking want that.
I’ve never wanted that.
I’ve watched my parents stay happily married for forty years.
I’ve watched my best friend fall for my sister.
I’ve watched all of the people I grew up with fall in love with their better halves.
I’ve never wanted it, not really.
At least not in a way I let myself grasp.
But now that it’s maybe a sort of, far-off possibility with Zoe?
Fuck. I want it.
I shake my head.
“Luna, what’s in the box that’s so Earth-shattering?” I feel like a 1990’s Brad Pit meme.
“All of my little girl hopes and dreams and more importantly, all of Zoe’s. Showing you this willingly is a huge break in the sisterhood of lifelong best friends. I could go to jail for this.”
“Pretty sure you couldn’t,” Tony says.
“Girl jail, which is a million times worse than real jail, trust me.”
Tony sits back with his hands in the air and smiles. Luna rolls her eyes and shakes her head.
“As I was saying—” She glares at her husband. “This holds everything Zoe wanted in life from age ten to like, twenty. And when she looked at it again, I think . . .” She sighs, trying to find the words. “I think she shocked herself. I think it shook her to the core knowing what she saw in here wasn’t even close to the life she was living.” My gut drops in concern for Zoe.
“I think . . .” Luna sighs again, leaning into a hand on her chin. “I think if she knew the life she was living was giving her all-consuming joy, that she was living a life even better than her ten-year-old brain could have thought up, she’d be fine. But she’s miserable. She’s not where she wants to be. I know because just days after our night together, she quit her job and dumped her boyfriend. I think . . . I think this was her wake-up call.” She lifts the box.
“Okay . . .”
“So I’m just saying, showing you this means something. It’s not just something funny to laugh about.”
“I wouldn’t—” Luna gives me a look because I totally would.
I totally would laugh at the girlish thoughts and memories and desires of my sister.
“It’s silly, but it means something. I’m only going to show you because I think it’s time you both stop playing this weird game, time you both admitted shit. It’s freaking time you gave me a sister-in-law because I need someone to gossip with.”
“You’re acting like you can’t gossip with Zoe on any other given day. Like you don’t gossip with her daily,” Tony says, and she glares at him before looking back at me.
“It’s not the same. But that doesn’t matter. All that matters is that you need to take this seriously. Do you understand?”
I look at her and see how earnest she is, then I nod.
Luna smiles then lifts the lid, handing it over to Tony.
“Oh, I guess I get a job too, cool.” She glares at him and fuck.
I want that too.
Who the fuck am I right now?
“This is my MASH card,” she says with a smile, cutting into my mental reverie. She hands it off to Tony.
“See, Luna. Four kids. The universe has spoken.” She shakes her head then moves to hand another piece of paper to me.
“This was Zoe’s. This was . . . This was what shook her up, Zee.”
And then I see it.
All laid out, Zoe’s childhood dreams are in the palms of my hands.
A cheat sheet, in a way.
A house.
An interior designer—I remember how much she loved to mess around with the furniture when she and Luna would have sleepovers, always talking about her visions and colors and vibes.
She’d be good at that.
Two kids. Makes sense, since she was an only child and basically lived in our chaotic house.
Live in Springbrook Hills.
Keep her here, Thomas’s voice says.
And married to . . . Zander Davidson.
To be fair, this is not the first time I’ve seen this paper.
I saw it and laughed at it when I was 15 and a douchey kid looking for dirt on his sister.
Back when this was some kind of fairy-tale daydream for Zoe.
But now . . . Now she looks at it and is reevaluating her life.
I look up from the paper, my finger touching where her girly handwriting wrote my name, and I ask the question I’m actually scared to ask.
“Do I have a shot?”
I’m terrified because by asking this, I’m admitting things I don’t want to put into the world unless it’s reciprocated.