Chapter 22

Chapter 22

Paisley

What a week. It shouldn’t have been legal for bad things to happen to me, not when I was such a benevolent, perfect force of good in this world.

I slumped back on the hospital bed when the door opened and Emberlynn came in, carrying a wrapped-up parcel. “Hey,” she said. “You’ve got a bit more color back.”

“What’d you get me?”

“Not even a hello?”

“You’ll get one if you got me something good.”

She handed it over. “Chicken sandwich from Brandy’s. With ranch dressing, extra pickles, and horseradish. Your favorite.”

That was my favorite. Still, it felt as appetizing as stale bread right now. I took it trying not to look like I was taking a dead mouse a cat was offering me. “It’s been a minute. Almost forgotten about these things.”

“Uh-huh. Loaded up with enough horseradish to kill a horse, because, I insist to you again, it is spicy.”

“Horseradish isn’t spicy, it’s just warm.” I paused. “Did you sneak a burger all contraband-style past the doctor?”

She strained a smile at me. Poor Emby looked tired, too. She’d gone through the wringer, between all the work that had swamped her ever since she finished that big gig and having been the one to find me passed out on the floor. She’d stayed the whole night here with me last night, even though I told her I was perfectly capable of sleeping by myself. “She said you could use a burger or two.”

“Damn, but that’s advice I’ve been waiting to hear.”

“Right. You can’t act like you’re an obsessed foodie without acknowledging the fact that you passed out from malnutrition.”

I slumped back against the headboard, rolling my head back against the wall. “Oh my god. I’m literally never living this down. I’m going to be a thousand years old hobbling along on my walking stick and you’ll be hobbling over to my house to knock on my door and remind me about the chicken burger incident. Might as well just strap me in fireworks and launch me into the sun.”

“I don’t think I’m living to be a thousand. Power to you if you want to set your sights high, though.”

I unwrapped the sandwich and took a bite, and it took about thirty seconds to actually swallow it. I felt full immediately, and I let my hands fall to my lap with the burger wrapper. “How have things been while I’ve been closed in here? Is Oliver still in one piece?”

She put a hand on my arm. “Please. Forget working for one second. Christ, I don’t know what to do with you as a workaholic.”

I wrinkled my nose. “I’m not a workaholic. I just wanna make sure my life doesn’t fall apart explosively around my ears and I end up disgraced, humiliated, lost to the eras in a—”

“Oliver’s just fine,” she said gently. “That bookstore was closed more often than not for the better part of its lifespan. Connor’s helping him out.”

“Ugh, that means they’re probably just making out in the store all the time.”

“Yeah, well, they’re both good-looking, so it’s just more sales from a bunch of girls hoping to catch the two of them going at it behind the register.”

“And Crystal Lights?”

She softened, smiling sweetly at me. Like she was patronizing me. Me! I fumed. “It can be closed for a bit.”

“Oh my god. The pull is going to be a nightmare when I get back there. The whole cycle is screwed. This is two days without croissants in production.”

“Paisley. Easy. You’re going to get yourself sicker. Eat.”

Dolefully, I took a second bite. It felt like climbing Everest. Nothing was ever supposed to be hard for me.

Emberlynn went on softly. “You know… this is what happens when you don’t look after yourself. If you burn yourself out keeping plates up, you’ll drop the plates, too.”

“Ugh, shove the plates up your butt.”

“I won’t, thanks.”

I muttered something to myself. She shook her head.

“Paisley… I’m going to say something you don’t like.”

“Thirty-three.”

“Ah-ah. Don’t bullshit your way out of this.” She folded her arms. “You can’t use work to fill the hole a person left.”

Oh, she wasn’t kidding with saying something I didn’t like. I felt something drop in my stomach, and I turned away, my head hurting. “Shut up. I know how to fill a hole.”

She cleared her throat. “Excuse me?”

I frowned. “I should have said that differently, but still. I’m good! I’ve been hollow all my life and it’s no different just because Harper went and ghosted the whole town of Bayview.”

Emberlynn put her hands up. “Okay, you have even deeper issues, then. You can’t fill those with work, either.”

“I’m not! I’m filling it with… with…” I gestured vaguely at the air. “With intention. With purpose. With action. With chicken burgers.”

“You categorically haven’t been filling up on enough chicken burgers. That’s why you’re here,” she said, gesturing to the hospital room, which looked like a plant nursery now between the pastel green walls, the window letting in rich, full sunlight, and the bazillion flowers people had left me. Mrs. Park with the floristry shop was probably delighted I’d wound up here.

“Yeah, okay. I should have been eating more chicken burgers. That’s criticism I’ll happily take on board.”

“Kathleen says she hasn’t seen you in Hogshead in weeks. When was the last time you even stole my cheese?”

I scowled. “You’re always bitching about it, and when I stop doing it, you tell me to steal more cheese?”

She softened. “Just… I’ve been worrying about you. A lot. And it’s really hard because I know why you’re in this state, and it reminds me way, way too much of when Aria left. I didn’t let myself acknowledge how much of me… left with her. Didn’t let myself grieve it properly. And I don’t want you to do the same.”

I forced myself to take another bite of food, just because I didn’t want to respond. It tasted like I was chewing on cardboard. Did Brandy suddenly suck at making chicken burgers? Because I didn’t remember them tasting like this.

“You loved her,” Emberlynn said, and I shrugged.

“Eh.”

“You called her your wife. I don’t think that’s something you do with a little crush.”

I shrugged, a little less energy this time. “Eh.”

She sighed, hanging her head. “You’ve always been so stubborn… it was almost better when it was about lizard breeding.”

“You know how much longer they’re gonna keep me in here? I need to figure out the situation at the bakery.”

She put a hand up. “Fong’s been checking in on the bakery at least to make sure nothing’s going wrong. It’s closed, but it’s not, like… the food is all rotting or the ovens are running or anything.”

“Fong’s just been going in there for better acoustics. Answer the question or I’ll ritually disembowel myself in front of you right now.”

“Easy there. Honestly?” She shrugged. “Despite the name, Doctor Hardy is kind of a softy. She’d let you off now if you asked. Just… please don’t rush out of here. You’re going to get seriously sick.”

“I’m fine.” I looked away. “Going to be seriously sick if I have to sit here brooding forever.”

“Please. Listen to what the doctor says. At least one more night here. Promise.”

“Fine. I promise. But I’m gonna be miserable.”

She looked down. An uneasy silence settled over the both of us. After a minute sitting in the tension, I cleared my throat.

“Just spit it out.”

“It’s just…” She shook her head. “Nah. Forget it. No point.”

“It’s morally indefensible to leave me hanging like that.”

She looked out the window. “I’m sorry. Sorry she left like that. I never would have imagined…”

I rolled my eyes, sagging in the bed. “Guess I should have let you leave me hanging.”

“Sorry.”

I shifted uncomfortably. “Um… thanks. You know. For checking in. Hanging around to make sure I’m okay. Bringing me a chicken sandwich.”

She perked up a little, giving me a sweet little smile. “Anytime, Pais. Said it yourself. Ride or die. I’m with you to the bitter end, no matter what.”

I laughed. “Hardly. I’m out here living to a thousand, and you’ve given up.”

“All right, all right. Well, if you’re living to a thousand, then so am I.”

“That’s better. You’re marrying into my clan, so you’re not allowed to dishonor it.”

She smiled wryly. “Clan, huh. Hell of a word. And I see you’ve moved on from telling me not to date your sister to just straight-up telling me to marry her…”

“Might as well just get it over with and be sisters already. You want to marry her, don’t you?”

A light flush tinged her cheeks, and she looked away. “I think it’s a little early to say… I think we like taking our time.”

“Focusing on your careers. Yeah, yeah. And you give me shit for working all the time.”

“Hey. At least Aria and I eat.”

“I’m eating!” I waved the sandwich at her before, my arm suddenly heavy, I let it drop by my side, sinking back against the headboard again. “I’m eating. Tastes like old socks, but I’m eating.”

She strained a smile, patting me on the arm. “It sucks. You remember I was like that after the label pulled the rug out from under me… you had to just about spoon-feed me soup.”

“Yeah, least I’m not that bad.”

“Um, you’re worse. You wouldn’t even take spoon-fed soup. So you passed out on the floor.”

I sighed. She squeezed my shoulder.

“Your appetite will come back. Just be gentle with yourself, okay? It’ll take time. Don’t force it, or you’ll just end up with eating disorders on top of no appetite.”

I squeezed the sandwich in my hands. “If I’m not forcing it, I don’t think I’ll finish this.”

She put her hand over it. “Then don’t finish it. Save it for later. No shame in that.”

I squeezed my eyes shut. I didn’t get it. Harper was just a friend. I liked kissing her—liked doing more than kissing her—but we were never really anything but friends. Emberlynn was a friend, too, and she was here when I was hurt, looking after me, telling me all the things I needed to hear. Shouldn’t that have been enough? Couldn’t that have been enough?

“Thanks, Emby.”

“If you’re going to thank me, say my damn name right.”

“Thanks, Emberlynn Morgan Isabella Wood.”

“You know, screw you too. I’ll marry Aria and tack her names in there too. I’ll be Emberlynn Morgan Isabella Ried Macleod Wood, and you’ll refer to me by the whole thing or I won’t acknowledge you.”

“What? Macleod has to go last, or you’re disrespecting the clan.”

“Not even giving you that.” She clapped a hand on my shoulder before she stood up, pushing the chair back. “I promised Annabel I’d see her in a bit, so I’d better go, but… text me if you need anything. Anything at all. I’m here. Okay?”

“Mm. Thanks, Emby.”

“Dammit,” she laughed, shaking her head as she headed for the door. There was a warmth that she had around her, just like… the ease of familiarity. And it left with her when she shut the door behind her, and it was suddenly a hospital room again—cold and sterile and unfamiliar.

Time went past, somehow or other. I watched a TikTok or two, picked at my sandwich, talked to the doctor when she swung by, checked my email compulsively, made empty talk with the friends who came to visit, played with the flowers closest to me, and through all of it, I was suffocating on emptiness. Something was missing. Something had always been missing. And Emberlynn was wrong—I could fill that void by working. It didn’t feel so rotten when I was busy.

Emberlynn sent me a text somewhere around nine, asking if I was still up, and when I sent her a selfie, she said she’d keep me company again tonight. I told her off, saying she needed a proper bed and I wasn’t going to be responsible for her falling apart too if she had to camp out next to me every night, and she told me she’d at least visit me again. It was barely five minutes later that a knock came from the door, and I set my phone down, looking up.

“Jesus, you’re fast. Come in, Quicksilver.”

The door unlatched and swung open, and I shoved the last bite of sandwich into my mouth, just hiding the evidence that it had taken me five hours to eat the thing, and I’d only just managed to get it down and the wrapper in the trash before she came around the corner and into the room, except it wasn’t Emberlynn.

And either I was high, or it was Harper.

I froze, my heart pounding wildly. There was no way. She’d cut off contact completely after leaving town—her number belonged to someone else now, and her work and personal email addresses both got an autoresponder saying the accounts were deactivated. Dropped off the face of the goddamn planet.

But I wasn’t forgetting Harper.

She carried herself differently, had an aura around her that I didn’t know how to describe, and she was wearing a black suit and a tie, looking so… different. And so much the same.

This girl could have traveled the world a hundred times over, changed her name a million times, gone to the ends of this earth and back, and I’d still know her eyes.

“Harper?” I said.

“Hey,” she said, and it was even her voice—I’d all but forgotten her voice. She was so guarded, her voice, her posture—scared. “Sorry to drop in without warning. I, um… heard you landed in the hospital. Thought I’d… check in.”

“Check in?” I heard myself say. “On me?”

“Annabel… er…” She shifted uncomfortably. “I didn’t… hear what happened, exactly. Just that you were here. So I… came.”

“You came. Here.” Something felt like bubbling, boiling syrup in my chest. My arms burned, out to my fingertips, tingling with the sensation. “You just up and disappear, just—just cut us all off like none of it ever even meant anything—and then you just walk right back in through the door saying hey there like everything’s cool?”

She winced. “I’m… sorry. I can go. Christ, I don’t know what I’m doing, I should have called, texted, anything, just—”

“Should, if we’re talking should then maybe you should have just told me if you wanted me out of your life completely,” I shot, my face burning now as I swiveled out of the bed. “Could have gotten lost earlier if that’s what you wanted.”

“Paisley—that’s not what I—”

It felt like she’d just punched me in the face. Paisley. Hearing her say my name hurt. It hurt in a completely unhinged oh-my-god-make-it-stop-now kind of pain that drove me out of my mind, and I couldn’t even let her finish. “Just—just—just go if it’s what you want,” I blurted. “I get it. You thought you were obligated to come back here, see me. Well, thanks, turns out I’m just fine, now you can fuck off back to Never Never Land again and just disappear—”

My voice cracked. I winced. Harper shrank under the blows, her hands up, and she swallowed hard. “All right,” she said, her voice small, beaten, broken. That wasn’t fair. Now I just wanted to cry, hug her. “I’ll go. Sorry. I just… I’m sorry.”

She turned back to the door, and I wanted to scream and cry and grab her and keep her here and tell her she was never allowed to leave again, but I couldn’t find it in me to do anything other than watch numbly as she left the room, shutting the door behind her. The blood pounded in my ears, and I felt regret drip thick and noxious in my throat, staring at a closed door wondering if it was a metaphor. A door shut in front of me, something I couldn’t get through.

I hated metaphors.

I stood up at some point, and my heart was racing as I staggered over to the window, looking out at the quiet garden path a story below. Harper went by only a second later, and I clenched my hands on the windowsill, watching her go.

Dammit. It really was her.

I pushed the window open wider, stepped into my slippers, and I vaulted out, dropping deftly into the bushes. My heart raced for a lot more reasons than just the exertion, coming down into the cool, quiet night, crickets chirping around us, the air damp and tasting like mulch, and Harper stopped, turning back to me before she did a double take.

“I—Paisley?”

“Who else jumps out of windows around here?” I stood up, brushing the leaves off of myself.

“I swear to—you’re hospitalized, you can’t go jumping out of windows like that.”

I took a step forward, onto the paved path, and I just… stopped, looking at her. “Oh my god, it is you.”

She winced again. Here in the low light of a garden lamp casting her in stark contrast from one side, she was just so… I don’t know. Something about seeing every feature of her face in sharp clarity, like… like it was Harper. Harper.

I’d missed her.

“I told you, I’m sorry—”

“You fucking idiot,” I said, and apparently I’d started crying, because my voice came out rough between tears, and I stepped forward and hugged her. “It’s not that hard to remember my number. It ends in three-three-three. That’s easy stuff.”

She tensed up, holding her hands up, and I prayed silently just begging in my mind for her to hold me, for her not to pull away. “Am I supposed to be bringing you back to your—”

“Ugh, I’m fine. Honestly. Just a little malnourished. And Emberlynn would tell you overworked, but don’t listen to her.”

“Paisley…” She trailed off before, slowly, tenderly, she put her hands on my back, and it felt like pieces falling into place. Like everything was right and exactly where it was supposed to be.

Like I could breathe, dammit.

“I’m glad you’re all right,” she whispered. I sniffled, burying my face against her collar, and I stopped when I felt the solid shape of a pearl necklace underneath her shirt.

Dammit. This woman.

I gripped tighter at the sides of her jacket, and I managed to breathe out a sentence. “It’s… it’s nice to see you again.”