Page 7 of The Girl and the Lies

“I know you two have something going on,” I say as I rejoin them in the living room.

“What do you mean?” Sam asks, herding me toward the door.

“I can’t just pick up dinner for you?” Eric asks innocently.

“You can’t drive a couple of hours and happen to get to the restaurant on time and get dinner for someone who doesn’t live with me?” I ask. “Whyever would I think that?”

We walk out into the mercifully cooling evening and start our walk over to Dean and Xavier’s house—the house that we lived in until only a very short time ago. It’s just a couple of blocks, and the walk is so familiar my feet could do it without me even thinking about it. This is the same walk I used to do when I visited Sam when I was younger and with my grandparents. I walked, jogged, and rode my bike along these roads more times than I could possibly count. Every time I do it, I’m grateful the houses are still with us and I still have the opportunity to walk between them to see people I love.

We get to the house, and I notice an extra car in the driveway. It’s unmistakably Cupcake’s, with its pink custom paint and vanity tags proclaiming her name. There’s nothing subtle about her arrival anywhere, one of the things I’ve come to adore about her. The small, bubbly confection of a woman knows full well that she’s not everyone’s cup of tea, but she’s not going to back down or try to minimize herself to make them more comfortable. She’s herself unapologetically and without reservation.

“Oh, look, Cupcake is here,” Eric says, his voice still stilted like he’s trying far too hard to sound surprised by the circumstances. “I guess that’s why there’s so much food.”

I climb up onto the front porch and knock.

“Come in,” Dean calls from inside.

I use my key to open the door and step into an explosion of primary colors and helium balloons.

“Surprise!” several voices shout out at me as people burst out from various makeshift hiding places throughout the living room.

I turn around to look at Sam and Eric, who are coming in behind me.

“What’s all this?” I ask.

Suddenly a puff of confetti flutters around my head.

“Happy birthday!”

I turn around and see Xavier wearing a red cone hat strapped around his chin with a strand of elastic and carrying a party horn. He blows the horn at me.

“Um, my birthday isn’t for a few more weeks,” I point out.

“That’s what makes it a surprise,” he says, tossing another handful of confetti at me.

“We know you don’t like to make a big deal out of your birthday and figured you would find some way to be busy that day so we couldn’t celebrate you,” Bellamy says as she and Bebe step out from behind the wall between the living room and dining room. “So we thought we would give you a surprise early.”

“Well, I’m definitely surprised,” I say. I look at Vance Armand, a friend of Dean’s, who emerged from behind the curtains when I came into the house. “Where did you even park?”

“Down the street,” he says. “I got some looks from the neighbors as I walked here with the balloons.”

“I’m sure you did,” I say.

I look around at the copious twisted crepe paper and floating balloons. It looks like a party from when I was a child, and I can’t help but laugh and shake my head.

“This looks great.” I realize it’s the same thing I said about the party at the hospital, and I look at Sam. “You let me talk about going to the birthday party at the children’s hospital when you knew this was going on, and you didn’t say anything?”

“I know. For once, I managed to keep a secret,” he says. “I couldn’t believe it when you said they wanted you to stay for a birthday party for the kids. We were already setting everything up.”

“Thank you for this,” I tell him. “You’re right, I don’t usually want to celebrate my birthday, but this is perfect.”

“I’m glad you said that, because I would have felt really dumb wearing this thing if you didn’t like it,” Dean’s son, Owen, says, coming out of the kitchen wearing a blue cone hat and carrying a vegetable tray.

He sets it down as I cross the room to hug him.

“Owen,” I say. “It’s so good to see you. How is your sister?”

“She’s good,” he says. “Getting better every day, I think.”

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