Page 82 of Love and Other Champagne Problems

“So, she’s leaving against medical advice?”

Nancy turned her head ever so slightly, threatening with her side eye, and Dr. Conan straightened his shoulders. “I can’t answer that.”

The bag of chips crumpled in my ruthless grip, but it was either the plastic or the doctor’sneck. He must’ve seen the dark look on my face, because he suddenly claimed he was being paged and bid us both a rushed farewell. He gave Ms. Jennings a look that saidI’ll call you.

“Where’d your other lover boy go?” Nancy asked, readjusting the bag in her lap. “Couldn’t bother to accompany a poor little old lady to the hospital?”

“Why would he?” I asked coldly. “If you were justa little tired?”

Nancy smacked her lips. “I don’t care for your tone.”

“Oh, you don’t care for it? I should change my tone, then, shouldn’t I? Because it only ever matters what you want.”

“Stop throwing a tantrum like a child.” Nancy stopped playing with the plastic of her bag and reached for the guards on her wheels. Her grouchy expression matched her voice. “It’s irritating.”

Before she had a chance to wheel more than an inch, my hand slammed down on the arm rest of her wheelchair, jolting her to a halt. “You’reirritating,” I said, repeating her insult like the child she accused me of being. “You’re acting like your blood pressure dropping that low isnormal. That it’snormalto just pass out at a dinner table. That it’snormalto have to be rushed to the hospital.”

“It’s a good thing they hadn’t served the food yet, or else I’d have fallen face-first into my baked potato.”

“You think all this isfunny?”

Nancy glared at me. “What, you think I actually dropped dead at the table?”

I didn’t reply. Instead, the image of her falling over inher wheelchair, as gray as a corpse, flashed through my mind. The words that’d been screaming on repeat followed.Not yet, not yet, not yet. My eyes burned.

Nancy smacked her lips again. “Margot,” she began, huffing at what she probably decided was an overreaction. “I’m old. I’m going to drop dead sometime. You’ll have to get over it.”

“At least have the decency not to do it while I’m watching.”

“If you’re going to act like a crybaby like this, I won’t.” Nancy swatted my hand off her wheelchair, but didn’t reach for the rails again. “If you were this invested in other people, they might like you more.”

Her words were a lash against my skin, biting and painful. It was hardly any different than the barking way we normally spoke to each other, but in that moment, I could’ve screamed. It built in my throat, the pressure about to explode.

Nancy turned up to look at Ms. Jennings. “Ally, drive me home, would you? At least I knowyouwon’t be sniveling the entire ride. Let’s stop by the gift shop first, hmm?”

Ms. Jennings was all too happy to oblige, stepping behind Nancy’s wheelchair and pushing her forward. When I turned around to watch them go, Sumner was there, a few feet away, awkwardly inching closer to the tense conversation. His expression oozed concern and worry and it made the compression in my throat worse.

Anger consumed me, so inexplicable buthot. Unthinkable around. I couldn’t remember the last time rage had consumed me so fully; not even myparents had elicited it in all their demands and patronizing. “And you wonder why I’m not a happy person,” I muttered, only half wanting him to hear. “Tell me, Sumner—what’s there to behappyabout?”

For once, I’d struck the ever-witty Sumner Pennington speechless. He pressed his lips together, at a loss.

As I stormed outside, my body trembled with the anger, and the hot summer air didn’t help. My car was waiting on the curb, and I had a brief, exhilarating thought of taking it. Of climbing into the driver’s seat and leaving Sumner behind. I’d top out the speedometer, race away as far and as fast as I could. It wouldn’t matter where I ended up; Bayview, New York, a ditch—as long as I got away from here.

Instead, I ripped open the passenger door and fell into the seat, slamming it shut with a force that shook the car.

I wiped my cheek, my fingers coming away wet, and it only incensed me further. Emotionswerestupid. Pointless. And I refused to give into them again.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

After word had spread that Nancy had taken a trip to the hospital, it seemed everyone was making their rounds to her house. Everyone but me, of course. I only knew the We Care About Nancy campaign when my mother had told me she was going to be taking over a fruit basket the next day, and had asked me if Nancy preferred strawberries or blueberries.

I’d told my mother blackberries. Nancy hated those.

The black cloud that’d fallen over me Sunday lingered beyond the walls of the hospital. Irritability had sunk its teeth into me, becoming hard to shake. My mother wanted me to go visit her, but she had others that could keep her company. I hope they all asked her if she’d finalized her will yet, just so it pissed her off.

Normally, when restlessness gripped me, I wandered around the grounds like a ghost. For the past two days, though, I didn’t leave my hotel room. I ordered room service and sat on the couch while housekeeping tidied up my room. And since I didn’t leave the hotel, I didn’t see Sumner.

Even though Sumner didn’t have any romanticfeelings toward me, I couldn’t keep myself from craving his company. In the past few weeks, when my days had been filled with his companionship, I didn’t realize how much I’d begun to lean on it. And even if he didn’t like me, I wanted to just ask him to dosomethingwith me—go for a drive, go to Gilfman’s, watch a movie. But I couldn’t. I would not cross the lines of professionalism again.

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