I didn’t like it.
When I pulled into the driveway outside Mason and Fenn’s place up in the Heights, I was in a full-on mope, which was totally unlike me. I sat in the Jeep in the driveway, staring up at the house for a long minute.
Outside, the house looked the same as it had a couple weeks ago when they bought it—two stories of buttery stucco with a tower in front that glowed in the moonlight like an Italian building that had survived a renaissance or two.
Rafe and our dad, Big Rafe, had given Fenn a generous helping of shit over the giant fountain burbling in the center of the semicircular driveway, since Fenn was not generally a fountain-owning sort of person. But Mason’s entire being had been so purely happy, I was pretty sure even Fenn had felt it, and he hadn’t found one single fuck to give over their teasing.
Honestly, I wouldn’t have either. From the second floor of the tower, you could see east, past the waters of the intracoastal waterway to the mainland, and west over the Gulf to the horizon. Around back, a bougainvillea arbor led to a giant pool and guesthouse. Let people tease if they wanted to, but Mason and Fenn had invested part of their treasure windfall into buying themselves a castle. They were living the dream here.
Or they would be, once the inside of the house was as beautiful as the outside.
I took a quick peek in the windows from the porch and verified that the contractors had left everything in good shape for the weekend, and then I wandered under the bougainvillea to their huge backyard. I threw myself down on a lounge chair near the pool and stared at the underwater lights, thinking.
Earlier, when I’d gotten the house keys from Mason, he’d been stressed out about the renovations—understandable, since every floor in his precious house had been stripped down to the subfloor, with the remains thrown in a dumpster in the side yard—stressed about leaving his practice so soon after moving the clinic to a new building, and stressed about having Fenn meet his family.
I’d tried to talk him down, but it was like he couldn’t hear a word I said. I’d told him, “I’ve got the house under control. Taffy’s running the clinic. Everything’s gonna be fine!” But he’d paced up and down the echoing, empty front hall and stared at me like I was speaking Klingon. I could almost see the intensity of his brain waves spiraling up a notch.
Then Fenn had come downstairs with their suitcase, dressed nicer than I’d ever seen him. He’d taken one look at Mason’s anxious face, grabbed him around the waist with no preamble, and twirled him in a half circle, ignoring Mason’s protests.
“Remind me, Loafers. Is tonight the night we visit your old high school and recreate your swan dive into history, or is that tomorrow?”
I’d had no clue what he was talking about, but it was clear Mason did, because he’d gotten that super-severe look he got when he was trying not to laugh at Fenn’s bullshit. He’d pushed half-heartedly at Fenn’s chest. “That’s never. Tonight we meet my sisters. And my nephew.” He blew out a nervous breath. “You have the things for the girls, right?”
“Packed in the suitcase,” he’d confirmed. “It’s like a unicorn threw up in there. Competition for best bonus uncle will be fierce, but Constantine’s no match for my shock-and-awe campaign. He’s going down.”
Mason had burst out laughing, burying his face in Fenn’s collarbone, and when he’d emerged a minute later, he’d looked more like his usual calm, level self.
“Love you,” Mason had said looking Fenn dead in the eyes, casual but not.
“Love you,” Fenn had replied, and if you’d known the man even half as long as I had, you’d understand why I almost felt like I wanted to cry, I was so genuinely happy for him. Fenn and Mason were halves of a single unit, consciously vibrating at the same frequency. No one, except maybe Rafe, could look at them and not believe that a benevolent Universe had meant for them to be together. No one could believe there wasn’t a soul mate, a perfect complement, out there for each of us.
Even if sometimes we got impatient, waiting for it.
Even if sometimes we sort of worried that the Universe had forgotten us.
I clasped my hand over my wrist where my bracelet used to rest and felt that pang of emptiness I’d felt earlier at the bar. “Please make it soon,” I whispered.
The only reply was the gurgle of the water in the pool and the chattering of the night insects in the trees, so I sighed and made my way to my temporary home for the next week.
I’d accidentally left the kitchen light on earlier, but the living room was cool and tidy, apart from a couple of boxes tucked in the corner. It even smelled like expensive air freshener I didn’t recall smelling earlier, and just inhaling that sweet, spicy fragrance, I felt my whole mood shift back into the right alignment.
How fucking lucky was I? To be here on this island, the most beautiful place in the world, with a roof over my head?
Somewhere in this room or in the little bedroom beyond, the only female in my life was hiding—probably under the sofa or under the bed, or maybe directly on top of the pillows and blankets I’d left stacked on the bed—ready to pee and hiss and claw the world to shit if I turned on the light, ’cause Marjorie was amusingly vampirish like that. Tomorrow, I’d get to wake up and do the volunteer work I loved—work that was important, and at some point I’d see my brothers or my dad, since it was impossible not to when you all lived on an island as small as Whispering Key.
The truth was, there were a billion people in the world who’d trade places with me right now. I was young and healthy, and my bank balance was a beautiful thing. I had important volunteer work I was doing at the Nature Center, even if Rafe believed that wasn’t real or important. I was grateful. And I believed the rest would come in time.
I made my way into the bedroom, stripped out of my boots and clothes in the darkness, and ran my hand over the bed before I lay on it to be sure I wasn’t squashing Marjorie. I left the rest of my bedding in the center of the mattress and curled up with just a pillow and blanket on top of the covers, and then I let myself drift.
In the perfect future I visualized, I walked along the beach with the wind whipping around me, hand in hand with the man I loved. I couldn’t see his face, but I didn’t need to, because I knew everything about him that I needed to know. He was incredibly kind. He loved me unreservedly. He adored animals, peace and quiet, and simplicity. He never pushed me to talk. He never rushed me. He was patient when it came to sex and let things develop really slowly.
And he was out there waiting for me, I thought as my brain finally wound down and I fell asleep, somewhere just beyond my reach.
3
Toby
Help Me Hagatha (Issue #2399)
Dear Aunt Hagatha:
My sweet little girl is a senior in high school, and she insists on applying to colleges that are way above her league academically. She’s done pretty well in our small-town school, but maybe my wife and I have expressed our pride a little too strongly. Sending her off to the Ivy League would be like sending a Chihuahua to live with wolves. How can we rein in her ambition just enough to prevent her from getting hurt?
Protective in Palmyra