Page 78 of Betting on the Brainiac

Ruby is waiting for me at the bottom of the stairs. “Outside, please.”

When the front door closes behind us, she crosses her arms and hisses, “Why are you so dumb?”

“It’s a pretty smart plan.”

“You know what I mean, Oliver. Is this your strategy to win Madison?”

I sigh. “No. I agree this would be the dumbest possible way to do that. I’m not going to say a word, and I’m going to keep my distance.”

She studies me with tight-pressed lips. “That’s why you haven’t told her it was you who kissed her?”

“Yeah. It complicates everything. She’s not into the Oliver she knows. She’s into a character I accidentally played one night. Sucks, but that’s how it is.” I scrub my hand through my hair. “I’m going to quit working at the club. I can afford to lease asmall office space on another floor in the building now because of the dowry.”

She can’t hide a smile. “The dowry.”

“Yes. I must marry to preserve my company’s fortunes.”

She shakes her head. “I don’t even know what to say to you right now.”

“Congratulations on your upcoming nuptials.”

“No congratulations. I trust that you and Madison are both honest people and will do right by each other with the money. But this is going to be messy.”

“It won’t. I’ll keep my distance. I’ve kept myself up several nights imagining how wrong this would go if I forget that. I practiced feeling that kind of pain. I didn’t love it. I’m putting in giant emotional buffer zones, and I’m enforcing them. Now can we get your blessing?”

“You donotget my blessing,” Ruby says. “But you will get my help. Let’s go see what your unhinged future wife is hatching, because I’m warning you, Oliver, it will be nuts. That’s her MO.”

“Thank you, Ruby.”

She puts her hand on the doorknob but pauses to fix me with one last searching look. “What you need here is good luck.”

She disappears into the condo, and I sigh at how true her words are: next up, I have to call my mom.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Madison

We went with 7-Elevenas our theme, of course. What else would you do for a marriage ofconvenience?

Looking at our setup around the pool, I’m not sure I’ll ever go to a wedding that will top this. It starts in fifteen minutes, and we’re ready to go. We’ve invited everyone in the Grove for the price of a convenience store snack to supplement our grazing table. Ruby has arranged it with crackers—packages of the fluorescent orange cracker sandwiches with gluey peanut butter filling, and cheese—string cheese. She’s got bags of Skittles for fruit and bags of single serving Planter’s peanuts. It’s a magnificent crime against nature. Or at least nutrition.

“Girls,” Mrs. Lipsky calls as she walks out of her front door, “you look stunning.”

No one believed me when I told them that the 7-Eleven website sells branded clothes, but Ruby and Ava are now wearing shockingly cute retro 7-Eleven raglan sleeve T-shirts.

“I’m almost jealous,” Sami says.

Lies. Sami, as befitting the seriousness of her role as officiant via an internet certification it took her five minutes to get, is wearing a pajama set with 7-Eleven foods and signs printed all over it “because it’s more like a suit.”

“Don’t be,” Mrs. Lipsky says. “You’re pretty fabulous yourself. But isn’t it warm for that beanie?”

Sami also got herself a beanie in a neon pattern called “Slurpee Swirls,” complete with a pompom, which she pats. “No way. Everyone knows the biggest-deal priest has the fanciest hat. Nice to see you, Migos.”

Mrs. Lipsky’s chonky Yorkie is nestled in her arms, glaring at us. Ava defended him once by saying it was his wild eyebrows that make him look grouchy, but Mrs. Lipsky had set her straight. “His eyebrows are only like that because he’s too mean to let the groomer do a proper job.”

Other neighbors drift out, depositing their offerings of Doritos or Muddy Buddies on the table and exclaiming over our wedding fashion.

The couple on the other side of Josh, Hugo and Jasmine, unload cardboard trays of nachos with the gross round corn chips and plastic cups of fake cheese sauce. It’s perfect.

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