Page 99 of Love and Other Champagne Problems

Again, I couldn’t imagine what she’d say to that. That was almost more painful, the silence of her voice. I hadn’t thought the absence of her would come so quickly, but it was like my brain couldn’t recall the timbre of her tone. Not yet. Not yet.

The choking band around my throat squeezed tighter, and I cleared my throat to speak around it. “You want to be spread around that pond?” I asked the urn. “I don’t know how bad your eyes were, but it’s not as pretty as it once was. I bet all the fish in it are dead. It’d be a drabby spot to be laid to rest, you know.”

There was a sound behind me, rustling, and I glanced over my shoulder. They started picking up the chairs. The remembrance of Nancy, rushed to a finish. It felt morbid, but I reached out and traced her name engraving with the tip of my finger, the scripted font elegant and wrong. Everything all felt wrong.

“Margot.”

I turned at the sound of my name being called from behind me, finding a lone girl standing at the entrance of the funeral hall.

Atfirst, I didn’t recognize her. Her brown hair was pulled back into a low bun, a few curls escaping to frame her face. Her features were sharper than I remembered them, as if she’d lost weight, or maybe it was just that she’d lost her baby fat that’d still lingered in high school. She looked older, as if in the year since we last saw each other, she’d grown five. She looked elegant in her black dress, resembling something like a full adult.

“This was supposed to be agoodsurprise,” Destelle Brighton said with her eyebrows scrunched together in the world’s saddest expression.

The ache in my chest returned in full force at the sight of my best friend. “I thought you weren’t flying in until tomorrow.”

“I wanted to surprise you by showing up at Annalise’s wedding.” She started toward me, her small heels muffled on the carpeted floors. “Mom onlyjusttold me about Nancy. You should’ve called me.”

I should’ve. She should’ve been the first person I called. While Destelle wasn’t close with Nancy much at all, not in the way I was, I still should’ve reached out. Thinking back now, I couldn’t believe I hadn’t. “These past few days have been a whirlwind.”

Destelle was the only one I could stand the pitying expression from, strangely enough. Maybe it was because we’d been so close, had seen each other at our worsts growing up, that it felt okay to let her see that side of me. To bear that burden of my sadness.

Destelle leaned her shoulder against mine and tilted her head close. I could smell her strawberry scentedshampoo, and the familiarity of it comforted me. “It doesn’t really look like her, does it?”

We peered at Nancy’s portrait for another long moment, but it didn’t grow any more similar to her. I half expected the funeral director to come up and shoo us out. I wondered what they would do with the portrait then. What they’d do with her ashes. Would they go to the country and spread the ashes themselves? Would they entrust someone else to do it? My stomach clenched at the idea of them reaching out to Yvette or Ms. Jennings, or even my mother.

I allowed myself to lean a bit firmer against Destelle’s side. “No one came.”

Destelle didn’t hesitate. “Bitches.”

A corner of my lips tilted up. “Bitches,” I agreed. Nancy would’ve said the same. I could finally, blessedly, hear her voice in my head.Bitches. “All of them.”

“Are you still going to the wedding?”

Sumner’s suggestion about skipping it echoed in my mind. The idea of going, facing everyone happy and laughing on such a miserable day, was exhausting. But then, the idea of facing my parents’ wrath for not showing up, for not properly introducing myself to Mr. Astor… it was equally exhausting. Breathing itself just felt so exhausting. I just wanted to close my eyes, to bask in that darkness.

“Of course,” I said to Destelle. “My chariot awaits outside. Do you need a ride?”

“Wait, thatwasyour car pulled out front? Was the guy insidehim?” Destelle’s expression lit up a little, and she bumped harder into myshoulder. “Theboy?”

She nudged me again until I smiled, tugging on the hem of my vest to straighten it out. “Yes, that’s him. Sumner. Nancy always talked about how he had a nice butt.”

Destelle nodded understandingly. “She liked Harry’s too. She liked her butts, that’s for sure.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Destelle loved Sumner, obviously. She rode in the backseat on our way to the country club, and she asked him many questions about himself, to which he answered good-naturedly. They both were good at that sort of thing, being genuinely curious about others, where I was more so used to sitting in the quiet while others asked the questions. It made me happy, though, that they seemed to immediately click, that the two important people left in my life weren’t uncomfortable around each other.

During the car ride, I crept my hand over to Sumner, and he didn’t hesitate. Sumner slid his hand into mine, wrapping his fingers around and giving a comforting squeeze. My heart mirrored the pulse, some of the ache from the day dissipating just a little. At least I’d thought so until we pulled up to the country club, and Sumner slid the car into the valet lane.

Both the wedding and the reception were being held at the country club, so no doubt everyone was already in the grand ballroom. It officially would’ve started ten minutes ago.

We all climbed out, and a valet I didn’t recognize slid into the driver’s seat. Sumner came to my side and looked into my eyes. “I’m not going to try to persuade you to just order room service and watch a movie in your room,” he said, threading his fingers through my hair to push it behind my ear. “But I want to. I really want to.”

“I want to, too. But I shouldn’t.”

Worry stirred in his eyes, increasing the longer he looked at me. I hated that I made that emotion surface. I wanted to be calm and put together, a person he only had to love, not be concerned about. Even if I were to lift my chin now, though, he’d see through the act. He always did. It wasn’t only worry in his gaze, the longer I looked. Nervousness twined in the blue depths.

“I’ll be on my best behavior,” I promised. “And as my reward, you’re spending the night with me tonight. And we’re not sleeping on the floor this time.”

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