I rubbed my hands along the stem of my glass. “Glad to provide you with a little escape.”
We went back to the kitchen for round two.
Wade came over and refilled Piper’s glass and she clinked it to mine. “The security line at the airport was where my two days of freedom began. I love them more than anything in the world, but sometimes they’re assholes.”
“The kids?”
She relaxed back in her seat. “Hell, throw Mark in there too. I love him to death, but this couldn’t have come at a better time. Right before all the holiday madness begins.”
Felicia stood on the rungs of her chair and grabbed the bottle before Wade got to it, refilling her own glass with a wink. “Eve told me yesterday she wanted to change her Halloween costume. She doesn’t want to be a Jack-in-the-box anymore, she wants to be an astronaut.”
Piper nodded. “I swear—you know what? Nope! We’re not doing this. Enough of us doing the mom complaining thing. How are you, Bay? Especially after what happened last week?”
“I want to hear, seriously. I love hearing about what’s going on with you guys.” And I did. I’d missed so much.
Piper folded one arm across her chest, holding out her glass like a prod. “You’re not weaseling out. Spill.”
I took a fortifying drink from my glass. “I’m good. Better. On my way to better. Keyton’s helped a lot with that.” I didn’t want to pull the day down and make it all about me.
Piper shot up with a look of knowing. “I can’t say I’m surprised. You two always had a connection.”
“Yeah, sure. For the 2.75 years before he finally noticed me, we were definitely connected.”
“You know what I mean. Once he saw you…he couldn’t unsee you. The way he looked at you—part of the reason I fell for Mark was when I saw him look at me like Keyton looked at you.”
“What?”
“All I’m saying is I’m glad you found your way back to each other.”
Felicia set her glass on a coaster on the table-tennis-sized coffee table in front of us. “When he showed up with your guitar…I swear I’ve never almost burst into tears looking at someone before. It could’ve also been postpartum hormone craziness, but holy shit.”
My stomach knotted with a yearning to reach out to him through time and tell him everything in person, not through a letter. I wished I could have figured out a way to have made it work without us both drowning.
Her hand covered mine. “I know you had your reasons for leaving. Given where you ended up, no one would begrudge you the hard choice you made. I’m happy he called me. I’m happy we get to be here with you.”
Piper covered my other hand. “Me too. Mark told me about you not being able to come to my party.”
I sucked in a sharp breath and stuttered trying to explain it all to her.
“I’m not upset. Of course I’m upset you won’t be there. But I’m not mad at you, Bay. Just like our lives are hectic and feel out of control, I know yours is too, even more so.”
Felicia poked me in the ribs like an older sister might. “It’s different with family.”
My chest tightened and tears burned in the backs of my eyes. I didn’t deserve their understanding after all the times I’d let them down over the past few years.
Piper squeezed my shoulder. “Family’s a lot more forgiving than hundreds of thousands, if not millions of fans demanding your attention.”
I looked back and forth between them. “I don’t want you two to ever think I’ve taken our friendships for granted or don’t care about you.”
Felicia patted my leg. “We know. And I think I speak for both of us here.” She looked to Piper, who nodded. “Anytime you have a day or something, let us know. We might not be able to make it every time. If you’re in Beijing or Melbourne, it’s probably a no, but let us know and we’ll come if we can. You’re not being a diva by calling your friends and asking them if they want to hang out.”
“Especially not if you’ve got top shelf booze.” Piper drained the last of her glass and waved it around.
The pounding drum in my chest signaling all my failings over the years changed its tune to one of celebration. My friends were here with me. They loved me and cared about me. They didn’t think I was the shittiest friend in existence and I hadn’t damaged our bond. A new song played, one filled with joy and friendship and love for the people I’d never take for granted, and who made my life fuller.
We moved down to the game room before lunch. After a skee-ball face-off where Felicia won, I took the basketball shoot-out while Piper wiped the floor with us during the Dance Dance Revolution dance-off.
The copious drinks might have been part of the reason she won. Laughter bounced off the vaulted ceilings and we rushed through the house like it was the world’s best amusement park.
After a lunch more delicious than it deserved to be and another food coma, we set off for the rock climbing wall treadmill (who knew that was a thing?), then a movie in the theater, complete with comfy theater seats, and we baked our own cookies before jumping into the hot tub before dinner.
Felicia topped up our glasses and leaned back. “Wade might kill me if dinner is as delicious as everything else we’ve had today.”
Piper dragged imaginary glasses down her nose. “Staring at him, I’m wondering why I didn’t decide to become a chef. Yum. Maybe he does virtual cooking lessons. If Mark learned to cook like that, I might never let him leave the bedroom, except to cook.”
Felicia handed out the still warm cookies. “You two met in college, right?”
“Their freshman year. They lived across the hall from each other.”
Felicia and I both awwed.
Piper rolled her eyes. “He was so cluelessly cute with his newly pink shirts after he’d mixed white and colors in the wash. Adorable and the sweetest thing ever. We’ve been together ever since.” She had a faraway, dreamy look on her face.
They’d been nearly inseparable since meeting. What would Keyton and I have been like if I hadn’t left him in LA? Or if I hadn’t left Greenwood right after graduation and we’d made up that summer? Would we have kids by now? A little girl and little boy who played with Violet and Parker?
A question rolled around my head. “If you hadn’t gotten married to Mark, what do you think you’d be doing now?”
She peered over her shoulder through the windows framing the kitchen where Wade showed off his knife skills making our meal.
We burst into laughter. “Other than serving yourself up to Wade on a silver platter.” I kicked her under the water.
“Ow!” She bent and rubbed her hand along her shin. “I don’t know. Maybe I’d still be in Japan? Or Austria?”
“Felicia, what about you?”
“Probably elbow deep in research, trying to wrangle research assistants and chase grants. Oh, right, that’s what I’m doing now, but with kids added to the mix. We met when we were both on this path, so things were already set. It’s nice having someone there who gets it. We’re tied to the same grant and funding deadlines. Parsing out similar cryptic comments on the papers we submit to journals.”