Olivia’s favorite.
The intermission ended, the movie picking up at the scene where Holly Golightly and Paul Varjak spend the day together. Margot glanced at the Kit-Cat Clock hanging on the wall, perpetually crooked no matter how many times she straightened it. 11:20.
Leaving the movie on in the background, Margot opened up her Chrome browser and selected one of the many open tabs at random. One hundred and thirteen thousand words of angsty fanfic tagged slow burn, hurt/comfort, and hate sex, sure to eat up the hour and twenty minutes before she had to leave.
Except she couldn’t get into the story no matter how hard she tried, couldn’t lose herself in the distraction the way she needed to. Her eyes kept flitting to the corner of her screen, desperate to see how much time had passed. She navigated over to her texts and reread the last message she’d sent to Olivia before hitting call.
Each ring ratcheted her nerves tighter, her heart rate higher, until she reached Olivia’s voicemail.
Hey, this is Olivia! I can’t come to the phone right now, but if you leave your name, number, and a brief message I’ll get back to you as soon as I can. Thanks!
The line beeped, but when Margot opened her mouth, nothing came out.
What was she supposed to say? Where are you? She’d already texted. Leaving a voicemail saying the same thing she’d already typed out was overkill. Needy. She ended the call, praying she hadn’t breathed too heavily during the brief three or four seconds before she’d hung up.
11:31. A pitiful little whimper escaped her lips as she let her head flop back against the couch. She couldn’t do this. Another hour of sitting around and doing nothing, waiting and worrying, was going to drive her up the wall.
She needed to do something. Go somewhere. She hit the power button on the remote and stood. Cat cracked open one eye.
“I’ll be back later, okay? Be good.”
Cat blinked at her and—she definitely needed to get out of here.
Hobbling down the hall, Margot snagged her purse off the bed and checked that she had her wallet and phone while she made her way to the door. She snagged her keys off the entry table and backtracked to the kitchen, stopping in front of the whiteboard on the fridge. Olivia had left a smiley face on the board days ago and Margot hadn’t erased it. She still couldn’t erase because—she didn’t even want to think that maybe this could be the last little message that Olivia left for her.
Rather than erase, she wrote beside it.
Went to Elle’s. Meet you at The Ruins at 1.
She clutched the dry-erase marker in her hand and added a heart beside her message. She cocked her head. It was a little lopsided, her hands unsteady, but it would do.
Seventeen minutes later, Margot knocked on Elle’s door. A shadow passed on the other side of the peephole right before the lock flipped and Elle opened the door. One eye was lined and the other wasn’t and she was wearing the polka-dotted silk robe Margot had given her for Christmas four years back.
“Hey, I thought we were meeting at . . .” Elle’s face fell. She reached out, dragging Margot inside. “What’s wrong?”
Nothing. Everything. Margot flicked her bangs out of her eyes. “I can’t get ahold of Liv. I called and texted and—nothing.” She cringed. “Sorry. I should’ve called before just showing up here and—”
Elle’s grip tightened around Margot’s wrist, cutting off her apology and her circulation. Damn.
“Don’t even, Mar. It’s fine.” Elle tugged her over to the couch. “Olivia’s probably just driving. Or maybe her phone died and she doesn’t have her charger?”
Olivia had Bluetooth in her car, and she was far too organized to lose her charger. Even as rattled as she was yesterday, there was no way she’d have left it behind. Besides, Margot had done a quick sweep of Olivia’s room this morning before checkout, just to make sure nothing got left behind. “Maybe.”
Margot’s chin wobbled and Elle frowned.
“Hey, no.” Elle reached out and grabbed her hand. “You’re not okay. What is it?”
Margot dragged in a breath, air stuttering between her lips. She held it until her lungs burned, then let it out slowly. “Liv and I, we had a fight last night. Before she left. Before I came down to dinner. It was . . .” She scoffed out a laugh, brows rising and falling. “Not fun.”
Elle squeezed her fingers and offered up a small, crooked smile. “Fighting with you never is. You always make good points, and it sucks when you’re right. And outside of the fight itself, the not-talking part is awful and—”