Page 14 of Might as Well

Violet eyes me as if I’ve been up to something in a back room rather than standing near the bar in plain sight. I’ll take a wild guess and say she was told exactly who I was talking to.

“Everything okay?” she asks.

“Yeah, sorry about that.” I hand her the drink and she takes a good gulp. “Let me introduce you to some of my other teammates. Excuse us, guys.”

As we step away, Violet asks, “Going to introduce me to Deanna?”

I laugh. “If you want me to, I can, but I wasn’t planning on it.”

Violet comments on how Sydney and Ian seem nice, and I introduce her to EJ, the Kessy twins, and a few others. Everyone seems to welcome her with open arms. We mingle, dance, and go through the haunted banquet hall Brayden managed to put together. Violet jumps at every little thing, clutching me tighter each time.

There’s a pumpkin carving contest, too, where the pumpkin with the most votes wins a thousand dollars to a charity of their choice. I lead Violet that way after we finish the haunted hall.

“Want to?” I ask.

She stiffens next to me as she admires the pumpkins already carved. I tuck her into my side in an effort to remind her that I’m here and she has my support, though I’m unsure for what.

“The last time I carved pumpkins was the Halloween before my grandma died,” she says softly. “We used to carve them everyyear as kids and my grandma kept up the tradition, even with us being teenagers.” Violet takes a deep breath as if to steady herself and then looks up at me. “I’d love to.”

We walk around the table and then take a seat in front of waiting pumpkins and next to Cal.

“Didn’t think you’d want to carve a pumpkin,” I say.

“Got a side bet going with Collin that I can get more votes than him,” he explains.

“This is stupid,” his girlfriend, Tori, complains. “What are we, nine?”

Cal completely ignores her and peers over at Violet. “You actually like him?” He scrutinizes her as if he can detect if she’s a bad apple or something.

“Enough to marry him while intoxicated, apparently.”

Cal laughs at her answer. He carries on easy conversation with her while we carve, but we both finish long before Violet. She takes her pumpkin carving seriously. We easily spend an hour and a half waiting on her to finish.

The fact that she free-hands a design instead of picking one of the various designs offered impresses me. Afterward, we grab a little something to eat as the night begins to wind down.

Brayden stands at the front of the room on a small stage. He clears his throat into a microphone and gathers everyone’s attention as the music pauses.

“Okay, everyone, it’s time to announce a couple of winners. The pumpkin carving contest is up first. The pumpkin with the most votes by a landslide is…” He peers at a piece of paper. “Violet’s pumpkin?” Violet squeezes my hand and when I look down at her, she actually seems a little horrified. His gaze scans the room. “Where’s Violet?” he asks over the applause. “Come on up.”

Violet, though, seems frozen in place.

“Babe, that’s you.”

“Right.” She stiffly walks to the front of the room where Deanna meets her to jot down the name of whatever charity she chooses. They converse for a moment before Violet hurries back to me.

“Now for the best costume,” Brayden continues. “I’ll be donating five thousand dollars to a charity of your choice.” Brayden looks at a second piece of paper and groans. “Marco,” he starts, a hoot immediately coming from Marc, “and Lizzy,” he finishes.

The crowd rustles as they make their way to the mini stage.

“What are they?” Violet whispers.

I shrug. “Couple from a TV show, I think.” Marc told me, but I can’t remember. He thought I was living under a rock because I never heard of the show, let alone the couple.

“They are very elaborate,” Violet says.

Marc begins a speech as if he just won a huge, important prize and I tune out, though he gets a few laughs. As soon as that’s over, we make our rounds to say goodbye, and head out.

“Did you have fun?” I ask as I drive her home twenty minutes later.

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