A few weeks in, the two women sat working in the front office, still surrounded by dust and debris. Savannah was testing the new submission form on their website, wondering how many referrals they’d get from Kamile’s posts. Five? Ten? Fifty? Liv looked up from her ancient laptop. “Have you got a contract?”
“For what?”
“For Kamile. And all this”—Liv waved her 1:00 p.m. glass of white wine around—“exposure you think she’s going to get us. Me. Get me.”
Savannah gave the older woman an indulgent smile. “Kamile is my friend.”
Liv put her wine down with deliberate accuracy. “So, we’re working for free, for months, and if Kamile decides not to post about us, then legally we can do absolutely nothing. Correct?”
“Liv! Kamile is a sorority sister. If she says she’ll do it, she’ll do it.”
“If you’re not comfortable with sending her one, I’ll do it.”
“A contract will make it seem like I don’t trust her! Like I’m expecting her to screw me over! It’s like a prenup. Why would you get one unless you were expecting a marriage to fail?”
“Because so many do,” Liv said. “Even if you don’t expect it.”
Alarm spiked in Savannah’s chest, making her angrier. “I don’t need a contract. Kamile will post for us, on the Sunday morning after her wedding, just like she promised.”
“But what if she doesn’t? What if she forgets? What if she gets so used to having free wedding fairies at her disposal that she mistakes our hard work for her due in life and heads off on her honeymoon, totally oblivious?”
“I can guarantee that won’t happen.”
“No, you can’t,” said Liv, and Savannah wanted to scream. Liv didn’t get it at all. And she wasn’t much of a teacher, either.
As Savannah put it to Honey, later that night, over a plate of crunchy fried chicken, “It’s like she’s keeping me at arm’s length, and I only learn things if I squint real hard and happen to catch her doing it.”
Honey splashed more Pappy Van Winkle into Savannah’s glass. She’d heard the backstory of Liv and Eliot from Savannah’s regular appearances on a ’Shwick Chick barstool. “Be patient, darlin’,” said Honey. “You didn’t expect to be weaving friendship bracelets together from day one, did you?”
“No. We’re very different people.” Savannah chewed her drumstick thoughtfully. “I think she’s still trying to work out if she trusts me.”
“That takes time.” Honey folded her arms and cocked her head at Savannah.
“What?” Savannah asked, worried. “Don’t you think I’m trustworthy?”
Honey smiled, shaking her head like That’s not it, as she took a drinks order from another customer. With her tattoos and short hair, it was hard to picture her from small-town Alabama. Her lack of makeup had inspired Savannah to experiment with wearing less. Now, instead of primer, foundation, concealer, bronzer, blush, eyelid primer, eyeshadow, eyeliner, mascara, brow pencil, lip liner, lipstick, lip gloss, and a setting spray, she was only doing primer, foundation, blush, mascara, brow pencil, and lip gloss. It felt nice not to have on a full face. Liberating.
“When did it start feeling like home for you?” Savannah asked when Honey returned. “New York, I mean.”
Honey pulled beers for the couple next to Savannah, thinking. “That’s a good question. I’ll have to get back to you.”
Savannah sipped her bourbon. Still the taste of tailgating and bluegrass and long summer evenings on someone’s porch, listening to the screech owls. “Do you miss the South?”
“Nope.” Honey cleared Savannah’s empty plate and tossed the scraps in the trash. “I really don’t.” She didn’t meet Savannah’s eye when she said it.
8
Spring started as a timid, whiplashed affair. On the first day the mercury spiked over sixty, New Yorkers packed away their oppressive winter coats and flocked outside, only to unpack the coats the following week, scowling as the weather dipped back into the forties. Nevertheless, spring persisted. Day by day, buds emerged on the bare branches of the willow tree in the backyard. The farmers markets’ root vegetables and pickles were replaced with leafy greens and the daring hint of a tomato. Finally, the definitive sign that the seasons had changed: the city’s restaurants removed their cold-weather vestibules and set up outdoor seating. Spring had sprung.
And while time passing was meant to be a good thing, sometimes Liv wanted it to slow down, or stop altogether.
There was still a wedge of Eliot’s brie in the fridge. It stunk up the kitchen as it decomposed, day by day, but she couldn’t make herself toss it. To recycle the sports section stuffed next to the toilet. To empty the drawer of his mismatched socks. He called them misfit socks. That used to make her laugh.
Mornings were the hardest. Waking alone; no tuneless singing in the shower, no smell of burning toast. Just Liv, silently lying in bed, tears leaking down her temples, thinking about everything she’d lost.
But as Liv let herself be drawn into Dave and Kamile’s wedding planning, she discovered it was good to have a focus. It pulled her out of the muck of her own mind. She had to learn new parts of the process, the things Eliot usually did. The human side of negotiation, figuring out the rental toilets, exactly how much power a site needed. Sometimes an entire hour would pass and Liv was so involved in a task that Eliot didn’t enter her mind at all.
But Savannah was always there. Asking questions. Making suggestions. Cleaning things. She replaced the cigarette-singed couch with a pale pink sofa (sourced on Craigslist; Liv couldn’t afford a new one) and put Eliot’s things in the fourth-floor attic. She brightened the front room with a fresh coat of paint and inspirational posters (Liv vetoed CREATE YOUR OWN SUNSHINE and ALL WOMEN ARE QUEENS!, begrudgingly accepting DON’T DREAM ABOUT SUCCESS: WORK FOR IT). “But it’s not as if she’s actually helpful with anything to do with planning,” Liv complained to Henry and Gorman, in the back room of Flower Power, Honey!
“Because, you’re not actually letting her do any.” Henry added a few delicate white anemones to an airy table display. “Do you think Kamile would go for something like this? Very wabi-sabi, very chic.”
“She’ll approve anything I tell her is ‘extremely Instagrammable,’ ” Liv replied. “Which is rather a neat trick.”
Gorman looked up from his copy of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, which he was reading for his Monday-night playwriting class. “And who taught you that trick, darling?”
Liv huffed. The smartphone obsession was highly irritating, all these kids carrying phones around like miniature oxygen tanks. But it was true Savannah understood that inane world. “She’s very good at appearances,” Liv said. “How things look. How she looks.”
“But what’s going on on the inside?” Henry added another anemone to the display. “That’s what’s interesting.”
“Not much,” said Liv.
“Then what’d E see in her?” Gorman closed his book. “He was always a flirt, but I didn’t think he was the type to cheat.”