Page 1 of The Road to Finding Us

1

Lily

Present

“I want a divorce.” The words fly out of my mouth as I come to a stop in the middle of the busy downtown Dallas sidewalk. An old lady walking her two-pound dog says some words I didn’t think precious old ladies would still use when she dodges me.

“You can’t divorce me, Lily,” Veronica says from the other end of the phone call. “We aren’t even married.”

“Yeah, well, you’ll probably end up marrying my brother which means you’ll also be marrying me. Except I’m divorcing you before this marriage because, Veronica Cunningham, you’ve betrayed me.”

Veronica—my ex-best friend—laughs from the other line and I want to punch her right in her perfectly perky boob…hard.

“There are some last-minute things I have to do for the grand opening, Lil. I have to stay here in Beaufort to make sure everything goes according to plan. I’m sure you understand.” She says the last sentence in a tone I think is supposed to make me feel guilty, except she’s as blunt as a dull kitchen knife. Sneaky guilt tripping is not something she’s good at.

“I understand we’re no longer friends.” I pull my keys out of my clutch and hold the fob in the air, repeatedly pressing the lock button as I try to find my car on the busy street. My twin brother, Maverick, is always telling me I should be more aware of my surroundings, but I live in Texas. Nothing bad happens here. Well, you think nothing bad happens if you ignore the nightly news.

“Being a bit dramatic today, aren’t we?” Veronica says in her typical snarky voice.

Don’t get me wrong, I love the girl. When she first moved into my brother’s apartment when he was dating my other best friend—Selma—I had my doubts about her. She tried very hard to come off as a bitch. Lucky for her, nothing deters me. Even if it comes in a bitchy package. But sometimes I feel like she’s still trying to show the world she isn’t deserving of good things, even though she deserves anything she could possibly want.

“Okay, for starters, you are probably the most dramatic person ever,” I tell her, and finally, I hear the beeping of my car. I start to walk toward it while I continue to have a meltdown over my current situation. “And second, we were supposed to road trip together. Super fun bonding experience. Best friends. Remember?” The tone of my voice gets pitchier and pitchier as I talk because I’m internally panicking at the fact that she’s ditching me.

“I know, and I feel so bad about it. I didn’t expect for our caterer to pull out last minute.”

Letting out a long sigh, I step into my car. I know how much this grand opening means to her, and I want it to be perfect. When Veronica and Maverick moved to South Carolina to work for the same nonprofit, I was so proud of them.

Connor’s Ocean, the nonprofit, was started by Veronica’s late boyfriend’s family after he passed away. He and Veronica were both still in high school at the time.

Maverick joined the team to run the legal side of things, and Veronica handles the marketing. They’ve been wanting to open an office for a year. Now, they’re getting ready to open a physical headquarters for the charity. It’s amazing, and I’m so proud of both of them.

But it doesn’t mean I’m not hurt that she isn’t making the road trip to South Carolina with me like we’d planned.

When she called me four months ago, saying it was finally happening, we’d already had this whole road trip planned out. But it looks like I’ll just be stuck alone in my tiny car for days. Ugh.

I roughly push the button to turn on my car. “We planned this months ago. You were supposed to come spend a couple of days with me in Dallas and then we’d have this amazing bonding experience of a fun girls’ trip to South Carolina. I even went and got an oil change for it!” My Corolla makes a loud beeping noise when a man steps behind it just as I’m backing out of my parking spot. “Shit!”

Andddd I almost committed vehicular manslaughter.

There’s a rustling sound as she says, “I’m aware of that, but I don’t know what else to do, Lil. Maverick and I can book a flight for you right now if you’d rather that.”

Merging onto the highway, I gasp. She knows how I feel about airplanes. “You know I am not stepping foot on an airplane.” I can hear Maverick laugh in the background. That bitch has me on speaker phone!

The two of them share a few words before she responds to me. “You know Snakes on a Plane is a fictional movie. Fiction as in fake—not real. No snakes involved.”

My body shutters at the mental picture I have from the movie. Samuel L. Jackson was so convincing I made a pact with myself that I would never get on an airplane, ever again.

Even the thought of being stuck thirty thousand feet in the air with a buttload of snakes…no can do. “I’m not risking it. You can use your frequent-flyer miles for something else. I’ll drive all by my lonesome. Might get stolen by a trucker on the way, but I guess that’s the risk you two are making me take.”

Just as I finish talking, a huge red truck cuts me off. I honk my horn as the wannabe cowboy purposely slows down in front of me. All these Dallas men pretend they’re cowboys when in reality, they live in a city loft. But god forbid they ditch the trucks that make it appear as if they’re actually doing work on a ranch.

“You know,” Maverick starts, pausing for a moment.

I imagine him looking at Veronica for confirmation on what he’s about to say. The two of them are inseparable. So in love and borderline disgusting with the way they communicate.

“Aspen is in Dallas for the summer. You could always see if he’s driving down. You could catch a ride together,” he offers, dragging the last part out, as if it’s something I might actually consider.

My foot slams on the brakes. Aspen’s stupidly-chiseled face pops into my mind. “Hell to the no, brother!” I shout toward the speaker above my head, which allows me to talk hands-free. “I can’t believe you’d even suggest that.”

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