Page 21 of Never the Best

I felt Alice stiffen beside me, and Maddie’s playful grin faded. I forced a smile, even as my chest tightened. “My so-called career pays my bills, Cash, since I gave you most of my inheritance, remember?”

I wasn't passive-aggressive; oh no, in the past decade, I'd become aggressive-aggressive. I refused to take any bullshit from anyone—at least on the surface. I was faking confidence andhutzpahuntil I actually had it.

Cash had called me in Los Angeles, saying that he needed me to reinvest my inheritance into the family business to save the Beaumont family name. He made it sound like it was my duty. Lucky for him, I didn't want to be burdened by thefamily legacy. The more I took from the Beaumont coffers, the more they'd try to control me.

I wished Cash had been honest with me and said that he'd overleveraged several properties, taken out massive loans, and made some terrible investments that hadn’t paid off. Real estate was a volatile game, and Cash had bet big—on luxury condos during a downturn, on high-risk commercial developments that went belly-up, and even on a golf resort in the middle of nowhere that no one wanted to visit. Instead, he'd all but demanded that Isavethe business. He couldn't sell his part of the company because he had children, while I, the loser, didn't have any offspring to worry about.

Then, I’d helped him out with an open heart. Now, as Iwatched Cash act like the king of the Beaumont empire, I wondered if I’d made a mistake by letting him throwmygood money after bad. He hadn’t saved the legacy. The quarterly reports told me the real story: unpaid debts, declining property values, shrinking margins. The empire was crumbling, and Cash had the nerve to sit here and act like I was the one who didn’t take things seriously.

“Don’t be defensive, Pearl,” Mama chimed in. “Your brother is only trying to help. You wouldn’t need to work at all if you’d simply made better choices. Now that you're not fat any longer, I thought you'd do the right thing and find yourself a beau, but?—”

I set my fork down, the sharp clink against my plate louder than I’d intended. “Mama, we've discussed this enough times now for you to know how this conversation ends. Do wereallyneed to do it all over again?"

Birdie Beaumont’s lips pursed, an unmistakable and familiar sign of her displeasure with me. “I don't understand why you're so stubborn. There’s nothing wrong with making a good match, Pearl. Josie has done quite well for herself, and she’ll make an excellent wife for Rhett. Not everyone is content to…what is it you do again?”

"Mama, I work in finance, and I'm good at it. My goal in life is not to marry some wealthy, vapid Savannah socialite and spend my days planning luncheons and charity events." I loosened my grip on the stem of my wine glass before I broke the damn thing.

“Oh, but you think working for Nina Davenport is agood thing?” Caroline now took over thelet's hammer on Pearlpart of the dinner.

This was the age-old battle that women participated in, weakening our gender’s ability to succeed. "I don’t know what your problem is with Nina having her own company—she's never insultedyourchoices or those of women who want to be homemakers."

"We're more than homemakers," Caroline ground out, her jaw tight. "We help the society at large."

"So does Nina. Savannah Lace employs a large number of people, and?—"

"Enough!" Mama banged a hand on the table. We all stared at my mother. She pursed her lips and cleared her throat. “Pearl, I know you think you’re being some fancy independent woman, but what you’re being is lonely.”

“I’m alone, Mama, not lonely.”

Cash sighed, shaking his head. "You know, Pearl, if you’d just listen to us, you’d actually get somewhere."

Before I could speak, quiet Maddy mused innocently, "What does getting somewhere mean, Daddy?"

"That means," Cash said, trying to sound superior, "Pearl would be married and have kids by now. Instead, she chose to run away to the West Coast and now works for a company that is not considered serious in the field—just Nina's minions playingDesigning Women."

The condescension was just too much. I knew I was about to lose my temper and say things I would regret, so I shut up. My stress levels were remarkably high right now, and I wanted to throw up the food I'd eaten.

“Daddy, I know Bianca Davenport, and she told me how her mother built that Savannah Lace from the ground up,” Alice remarked. “Miss Davenport is smart, successful, and honestly, pretty admirable. I want to be just like her when I grow up."

Caroline was about to scream the house down when Mama put herfootdown.

"Let’s eatonemeal in peace, shall we?" Mama's tone carried a familiar note of maternal disappointment. "I don't know, Pearl, we were doing fine before you came back to Savannah. Now, every time we meet as a family, it's like this,"

"Then, Mama, I, from now on, have a plausible reason to decline your future invitations to family dinners," I said without inflection, burying the hurt of my family’s not wanting me deep inside. I looked at my plate and knew I wouldn’t be able to eat another bite.

The table fell into an awkward silence, broken only by the clink of silverware. I glanced at Alice and Maddie, who both gave me supportive smiles.

“Anyway,” Birdie said after a moment, her voice taking on a lighter, more performative tone as she turned to Caroline. “Josie called me this afternoon. She and Rhett are thinking about having their wedding at the Historic Savannah Club. Such a lovely venue.”

“You know Josie, she has such an eye for these things. She was responsible for the last Garden Committeeevent, and it was beautiful,” Caroline agreed, her smile saccharine. “Rhett is lucky to have her.”

I felt a knot form in my stomach. It wasn’t jealousy—notof Josie, not of Rhett, not even of their engagement—it was exhaustion. I was tired of never measuring up to whatever impossible and unknown standard my family had set. I’d felt it my entire life, first in the way they talked about my weight and now in the way they dismissed my choices, my independence, my career.

"What do you think, Pearl?" Caroline persisted, and I saw malice in her eyes.Everyoneknew about what happened that summer between Rhett and me. This was her way of reminding me.

"About what?" I asked nonchalantly, not wanting to give Caroline the pleasure of seeing anything resembling my true feelings on my face and in my demeanor.

“You know about what," Caroline retorted. "Now, don’t be bitter, Pearl. You’ll find someone eventually, maybe once you adjust your attitude.”

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