I’m not alone. My arm is slung over a thin set of shoulders—too thin—but I’m working on that by feeding her good food and keeping her well slept. Her chestnut hair tickles my neck as the wind blows and the scent of strawberry lip gloss and mint is like a drug hitting my system.
Inside the loft apartment sleeps a little girl who may not be mine by blood, but whom I love just as deeply.
“Pat? Come on, man. What do you think?” Collin asks.
“Yeah,” I say after a long pause, “I could see it.”
And it’s so close, so real, so powerful I can almost taste it.
Chapter Eight
Lindy
The library is usually one of my happy places. The building looks essentially like every historic library in a movie: high ceilings and tall shelves crammed with books, rich wood floors, and a curved staircase leading up to the second floor. For the Ladies Literary and Libation Society meetings, it’s lit solely by candles—electric, because libraries and real candles don’t mix.
Val has told me more than once she finds the library after-hours creepy, but I think it’s amazing. Jo and I discussed moving in after she read From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler. We won’t. Probably.
But tonight, not even the library’s ambiance can work a miracle on my mood. I feel like the heroine in an old cartoon, tied down to a set of tracks just waiting for the train to run me over.
“Are you okay, kiddo?” Val asks, giving my knee a squeeze.
My friends and I have our own corner, next to the glass case of historic photos, when our town was glorious and hopeful. It’s like the little kids’ table at a holiday meal. We don’t mind, since we can make snarky, whispered comments and the other ladies, most of whom predate us by at least a decade, can pretend they don’t hear.
“Fine,” I say, giving her the best version of a smile I can manage.
Val isn’t buying it but knows me well enough not to press me. Which is good. Because one good push is all it will take to have me spilling the news about Pat showing up today. And I am not ready to have this conversation, even if I promised Mari I’d tell my best friends.
I will. I will. But I can already guess how they’ll react—Val feeling like it’s fate, and Winnie wanting to know where Pat is now so she can give him several pieces of her mind. Before I can sort through their opinions, I need to know how I feel. And right now, that’s just overwhelmed and confused.
From my other side, Winnie eyes me, like her keen gaze has the power to see my thoughts. We not-so-jokingly call her the scalpel, both because of her keen insight and her aversion to anything but honesty. With Val’s soft questioning and Winnie’s sharp eyes, it’s hard to keep this secret. Especially when sandwiched between my two best friends.
I’m the perpetual middle of us, the medium setting in almost every way. My boring brown hair lands between Val’s black and Winnie’s golden; my olive skin is in the middle of Winnie’s pale cream and the rich sepia Val shares with Mari. Val runs full-tilt in terms of her words and her emotions, while Winnie is like a tight fist of control, wrapped up in snark. I am—you guessed it!—right in the middle.
I also fit somewhere between the two of them style-wise with what I call Texas casual chic. My usual uniform is cowboy boots paired with simple dresses or jeans. The forest-green Dickey’s coveralls Val has on tonight are one of her fashion staples, with multiple layers of paint across the knees and splatters on the chest. On most women, this utilitarian-artist look might not work, but not even coveralls can hide Val’s curves.
Meanwhile, Winnie dresses like she climbed right out of a 1950s pin-up calendar. The more covered-up variety of pin-up, to be clear. She is the epitome of sexy without showing a lot of skin. Tonight, she has on cropped, black pants and a soft cream button-down shirt, tied at the waist. She has the sleeves rolled up to her elbows, showing just a hint of her tattoos, which are real works of art covering her upper arms and shoulders. Val designed most of them. The high ponytail with a silky pink ribbon and her black-framed glasses complete Winnie’s look, which she’s been consistently rocking since eighth grade.