I got lucky that one of the bathrooms was free and went in, purse under my arm, to brush my teeth and do my makeup and hair which was a somewhat frizzy corona around my head this morning.
It took me longer than I would have liked to tame it and just as I was getting half of it up in a pewter hair clip, a knock fell at the door.
“Just one more minute!” I called out and fastened the clip. I swept everything into my purse and unlocked and opened the door. Sunshine beaming up at me.
“Hi!” I cried and wrapped the small woman in a hug.
“Hey, you!” she cried back and hugged me back tight.
“Sorry I took so long.”
“Not at all! I’ll see you back in the common room.” She smiled and laugh lines fanned out from her golden eyes. She was getting older, yes, but she was aging with grace and beauty. I wished I were half so lucky when I started pushing fifty.
I went to head toward the common room when I heard my best friend’s voice rise in distress from the library. I diverted and made a beeline for it. It was originally a member’s club room, but he had died when I was little. To remember him and honor him and his ol’ lady who loved to read, it’d been converted into a library with all of his ol’ lady’s books. I’d spent a lot of time here and it was where I’d found my love of romance novels.
Right now, though, it was occupied by Ghost, Shelly, and my best friend Harmony who was sitting in the old wingback chair in front of her parents in absolute tears.
“I’m so fucking pissed at you!” Ghost hissed and the set of his shoulders beneath his cut was tense, his hands on his hips as Shelly sighed in exasperation beside her husband.
“Maybe you should let me handle this,” she said to her man. Ghost turned his attention to scowl at her and caught sight of me in the doorway, his expression softening.
“Hey, Eedee, can you give us a minute?” he asked.
“No, it’s fine, Eedee, why don’t you come here?” Shelly asked.
“Mom!” Harmony cried slightly horrified, and I felt my shoulders drop and the smile on my lips fall away before even I knew that was the reaction I was going to have.
I stepped into the room. Ghost threw up his hands and with a noise of disgust, left. I went over to Harmony and hugged her. She buried her makeup-free face in my stomach and sobbed.
I rubbed her back and her mom and I exchanged a look, our hearts kind of breaking for my best friend.
“This is so embarrassing!” Harmony cried, muffled against me. “Does everybody know?”
“That’s club life,” her mother said dryly. “These fuckers gossip worse than little old blue hairs in the beauty parlor.”
Harmony and I both choked on a laugh and I sat down next to her on the arm of the chair. She looked up at me and asked meekly, “You’re not mad?”
I shook my head and said, “What’s there to be mad about? He’s my brother,” I said with a shrug. “Honestly, you’re punishing yourself,” I cracked, and she laughed. Shelly, too.
“I love you, Eedee,” she said and squeezed me tight.
“I love you, too, girl.” I squeezed her back.
It took twenty minutes or more to get Harmony back to smiling, her face washed and her makeup on. She was still really embarrassed and I couldn’t blame her. And oh, it was her first time; her’s and Dante’s both.
What a mess and what a night of firsts, I thought to myself. It’d been my first kiss and definitely my first time sleeping next to a man. I couldn’t tell you how elated I was that man was Sage. I caught a glimpse of him talking with Slice, Noah, and Chandler over in the corner. He gave me an imperceptible chin lift, his brown eyes holding some curious emotion I couldn’t discern from here, but I was quickly distracted by my auntie Everett coming out from behind the bar and squeezing me in a tight hug.
“Glad you’re up. Why don’t you come on back here and help me get the hot chocolate, coffee, cider, and mulled wine dispensers ready for when we all get back here?”
“Absolutely, come on Harmony.” I pulled her along with me into the kitchen.
Once breakfast was done and the hot drinks were all made and set up on the bar for our return, we donned our winter coats, scarves, hats, and gloves, traipsing outside to the trucks and SUV’s to head to the U-Cut Christmas tree farms out past town. Sage was riding with Reaver, Slice, and Hayden.
“Eden, what are you waiting for?” my dad demanded.
“Sorry, Dad!” I got in the back seat of his SUV, my mom settling in the passenger seat in front of me. Dante was sitting behind Dad, forehead pressed to the glass and staring out of it miserably. I winced a little and felt bad for him, wondering how hard my dad had been on him. Sometimes, he didn’t know when to quit.
“You and lover boy riding together or with us, Puddin’?” I smiled and shook my head as my dad called out the window at Disney and his husband, Aaron.
We had another row of seating, and Disney and Aaron exchanged a look.
“We’re comin’.”
“Kids, get in the back,” my dad ordered and Dante just went up and over the back seat like he was body surfing in a concert. I got out and put the seat forward and did things properly. My dad rolled up his window as Disney and Aaron got in behind him and mom.
“Hey, Eedee. Hi, Dante.” Aaron smiled over the back seat. He’d taken to dying over his natural hair with red, the silver threading through it, naturally turning to red highlights and sparking fire in the light. It looked good on him, and I happened to know Disney did it for him.
Disney was as skinny as ever, his hair shorter now, the long hair too hard to take care of, he claimed. He wore glasses and they suited him – a new addition when he turned forty.
He and Aaron were just as in love as the day they met, pulling off their gloves on their one hand to twine fingers on the seat between them.
“How’s the tattoo life?” I asked, and Disney grinned.
“Same shit, different day,” he said with a wink and Aaron smiled too. He didn’t play as much anymore, preferring to stay home and travel less. He still did orchestra work in the nearest city, a solid hour commute away, but that was about it. They lived modestly in a little two-bedroom house they’d fixed up to look like a freaking magazine spread. Their second bedroom was Aaron’s music room while Disney had a drafting desk in the front corner of the living room to draw up his tattoos on the days he didn’t have clients and didn’t feel like going into the shop.
They had a cozy, peace-filled existence that I envied.
I didn’t know if I ever wanted kids of my own. I certainly didn’t want any this young. I wanted to wait, which is why, even though I hadn’t had sex yet, my mom had helped me get an IUD so I didn’t have to worry about it. What I did know for sure, is that I wanted the kind of life with the kind of house that Disney and Aaron had. Clean, with lots of air and light, the ceilings high and with plenty of windows.
Maybe a book nook, where I could read in peace and drink my pretentious teas. I smiled at the thought, and of course, I couldn’t forget the most important piece… Sage.
After last night, anything seemed possible, but I definitely wanted to temper my enthusiasm. While things had felt very different, it was the light of day and in the light of day things were starker. He could change his mind, I thought, and I wasn’t sure that his mind had really been changed in the first place.