Page 7 of One Last Time
I laugh at the sight of this superstar carrying boxes for his girlfriend’s best friend. Sometimes, this feels like a cosmic joke the world is playing onme.
Heather heads over and removes a few boxes from his stack. “Babe, it usually helps to see where you’re going,” shechides.
He looks at the rest of us all sitting or standing around, and he smirks. “I see how it is...the men do all the work and you guyssupervise?”
It sounds aboutright.
“At least you’re learning, big guy.” Nicole lays her head back and closes hereyes.
“Why do you guys like her again?” heasks.
“We’re not sure.” I shrug. “We’ve tried to get rid of her, but she’s like a bad case of chickenpox. For each one you scratch, another one pops up and is even itchier. We stopped scratchingfinally.”
We’re the four most unlikely friends, but we work. Our group is unique, in that while we are all close, we’re also close in different ways. Heather is who I call when I need someone to cry to. She’s the most sympathetic person out of the three of them. Danielle is who I call for relationship or parenting advice, and Nicole is who I call when I want to forget the night before. She’s anut.
I always thought Danni was my person, but when I told her about the separation, she pulled back a little. At first, I thought it was because we would both commiserate over our shitty marriages and now hers is better, but then she offered to watch the kids for me when I have to work, so maybe I’m imaginingit.
“Watch it, Eli,” Nicole warns. “You’re not officially a member of this tribe. We can still vote your ass off theisland.”
Eli grins and pulls Heather’s back to his chest. His arms wrap around her middle, and I fight the pang of jealousy that arises. “Is that right,baby?”
Heather rolls her eyes and looks over her shoulder. “I’m pretty sure you’re staying. It’s still debatable,though.”
“Can you at least wait a fewweeks?”
She shrugs. “I guessso.”
He laughs and kisses her. I turn away, wishing it didn’thurt.
Scott used to look at me that way. We were playful, loving, and he made my heart skip a beat. He was my knight in shining armor, and I was the princess he rescued, but the fairy tale is over. There is no happily everafter.
We finish getting everything unloaded, and with as much shit as I give Nicole, the girl is busting her ass to get this place decorated. I now understand why she’s one of the top interior designers in Tampa. The house actually looks like ahome.
In a few hours, we are able to get the main living areas pretty much done. Nicole directs where the guys should move the furniture, and she manages to mesh what I was able to take from my old house with what shebrought.
Scott refused to let me take anything except the bedroom furniture. He said he didn’t want to be reminded of what we once shared. I don’t even know what he means, but it was one less thing I had tobuy.
“I’m beat,” I say as I collapse onto the couch. Nicole is the only one stillhere.
“Me,too.”
I rest my hand on her leg and wait for her to look at me. “Thank you. I couldn’t have done this withoutyou.”
Nicole covers my hand with hers. “It’s what wedo.”
It really is. Whenever disaster strikes in any of our lives, we don’t hesitate to jump to aid whoever is introuble.
“I’d like it if we didn’t have to do this again,” Iremark.
“If you’d all just stay single like me, you wouldn’t have to worry aboutit.”
I just laugh. There aren’t many people I know who are built like she is. She lives by her own set of rules, which is something I’ve always admired. No matter what people think about her, she does what she wants. I’m theopposite.
I was expected to get married by twenty-five, so I did. My mother believed you spent the first three years of your marriage building a strong foundation, so we waited to have kids. Then, a mother stays home and raises herbabies.
Someone left out the part about what I am expected to do when the foundation has cracks and ends upcrumbling.
“I liked being married. I can remember waiting for him to come home because I missed him all day,” I tellher.
