My hands are inching around the dresser, searching for something else to throw. Something of his that will crash and break into a million ugly little pieces. So far, I’m coming up empty.
I have words, though.
“Why the hell would I listen to anything you have to say? You’re a lying, cheating motherfu—”
“Oh, for God’s sake,” Susan interrupts, sitting up in my bed.
My bed!
She’s still naked and does nothing to cover herself. Just what I want to see under the circumstances: Her perfect, perky tits, bought and paid for during her second year of college.
“Shut up, Susan.” For once, I say what’s on my mind to my older, flawless, and totally bitchy sister.
“Jesus, Arden,” she sniffs. “Don’t be so dramatic.”
“Dramatic?” I repeat. “Dramatic? I find you in my bed fucking my boyfriend, and you think I’m being dramatic? I haven’t even started the drama.”
She tosses her head, and her hair flutters around her shoulders. It’s shorter than mine, something, she always points out, that makes my long, loose style completely out of date. It’s also lighter than mine, a bright golden color with rich highlights and lowlights, and that I could never hope to achieve.
Not that I want to! Especially now. More than that, I haven’t wanted to be like her in a long, long time. Her mean-spiritedness finally cured me after years of bullying, cruelty, and insults. Unfortunately, she still clings to the memories of our childhood when I followed her like a puppy.
So why did she decide to go after my bone? So to speak, and no pun intended.
I might laugh about the comparison some day, but right now I’m staring at Eddie’s withering dick, and it’s just gross.
“Well, for Christ’s sake, get over it,” she snaps with an impatient frown that I recognize from nearly every other conversation we’ve ever had. “It’s just fucking.”
“That’s what you think? Give me a break, Susan. There’s a little more to it than that. You’re my sister, and you’re fucking my boyfriend. Behind my back.”
“Come on, Arden.” Eddie finally grows big enough balls to take a step toward me. “Let’s go in the other room and we’ll talk. I’ll—”
“No!”
I step back, glancing between them as I do. At the messy room with the covers on my bed practically on the floor and their clothes wadded up in a pile. It turns my stomach—or is that because of the smell of sex?
It hits me then, like some semblance of good judgment snuck up behind me and smacked me on the back of the head, that I can’t stand another minute of this.
“You know what? I’ll tell you what we’ll do.”
They cannot stay, and I don’t want to listen.
“I don’t give a damn what you have to say. There’s no explanation that is going to make any difference. So, you two are going to get the fuck out of here, and you’re going to stay out!”
My voice and tone have grown until I’m shouting at the top of my lungs, and I don’t care. In fact, I like it.
Maybe love the hell out of it.
“Now, Arden. Let me—”
“No, Eddie,” I mimic. “Let me.”
I dart across the room, gather up the heap of clothes from the floor, shoes and all, and stalk out of the room. I hear shouting from behind me, but I don’t let that slow me. I don’t even listen.
At the front door, I fumble with the door knob, get it far enough open that I can kick it wide, and take the last couple of steps until I’m standing at the railing that looks down over the two flights below me.
“Fuck it.”
I open my arms and hurl their clothes downward, over the bannister.
One
Arden
The courtesy van pulls up in front of the main entrance of the large, tropical resort, and I heave a soft sigh of relief. It took nearly an hour from the Kahului Airport on Maui to get here, and I spent the entire ride crowded back into one corner of the bus to make enough room for the tourist group that’s going my way.
Finally—thank you, God!—we’re here.
It takes a little more of my patience as I wait for the other passengers to disembark. A tiny, white-haired lady of eighty or so stands just ahead of me. After a minute, looks up at me and says, “Hello.”
“Aloha.” I smile, and she smiles back.
“You aren’t with our tour group.”
“No, ma’am. I’m here for a wedding.”
Her somewhat cloudy eyes light up. “Yours?”
“No.” I don’t smile this time. “My cousin. I’m a bridesmaid.”
“How lovely.”
We take a few steps toward the front of the shuttle. “Yes, I suppose it is.”
She blinks, and her expression becomes shrewder than I would have expected. “You aren’t happy about it?”
“Oh, I’m very happy for my cousin. She and her fiancé love each other very much. They deserve to have their perfect day in this beautiful place.” I incline my head toward the resort.
“What about you?”
“I’m sorry?”
“Do you have a special man in your life?”
I do my best to maintain my smile. “No, ma’am. Not right now.”
Not since my selfish asshole of an ex-boyfriend decided to lie to me so he could cheat in my bed with my own damn sister.
I don’t say anything like that, of course. I wish I didn’t even think about it anymore, but I haven’t quite managed that yet. Life has had a way of keeping Eddie and Susan’s betrayal front and center—and, to be honest, I’m sick of it.
The line begins to move again, a little faster this time, and my elderly friend smiles at me over her shoulder. “You’re at a wedding in paradise, sweetie. Just the right recipe for love!”
I can’t help but return the smile. She’s so dang cheerful.
“Maybe you’re right,” I agree.
We’re nearly at the front when she stops and turns to face me full on. Her smile is surprisingly naughty.
She leans forward, like she wants to whisper, and so I bend down to hear her. “I’m Opal. I’m eighty-three, and I know a few things about life. One of them is, if you don’t find love, then find some handsome man and get yourself in his bed!”
The reception area of the hotel is packed. The tour group on my courtesy van has joined a large collection of other elderly tourists, and they’re milling around like a great herd of geese. Talking loudly, asking questions, bumping into each other, and generally taking up all the available space.
I swallow a weary sigh and sidle up against the wall. They must have a guide or hotel staff or someone to take charge of a group this large, I decide, so I’ll just stay out of the mix for now. Wait until that whole thing gets a little better organized.
I don’t have the energy to fight my way through the crowd, anyway. I was positive and, if not excited, at least encouraged when I left home. I had decided it: This trip would be both an ending and a beginning.
I was ready for it.
But that was more than eighteen hours ago, and now I’m exhausted. Chicago to Maui isn’t exactly a straight shot, even traveling by air.