Page 9 of Somebody to Save
Hope bloomed in my chest, and I warred with what to say. I’d practiced so many times, yet I didn’t believe this moment would ever come. Everything I’d planned to say vanished, every conceivable thought with it.
And all I could choke out was, “Bubbles.”
FIVE
LIFESTYLE COORDINATOR
Addison
I slammedmy car door shut and cringed as it creaked and made another sound that I couldn’t begin to describe. Fumbling with my bag, water bottle, and phone, I finally balanced everything and strode into work.
“Addie? Addie!” My best friend’s voice chirped from my phone as I put it against my ear.
“Yes, Bri. I’m still here.”
“Oh, okay, good. I heard a horrible metallic-like clanging sound and got worried.”
“That was just my car door,” I sighed as I passed through the lobby and into my office.
She choked out a laugh, and I knew exactly what she was about to say. “You’ve gotta buy something new, Addie.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” I muttered as I dropped my belongings on my desk, hoping for a quiet, calm day. “Anyway, we were talking about you. What are you going to do?”
She sighed, groaned, and then I heard a squeak, which I assumed was her bed as she plopped down onto it. I knew Bri better than anyone. We’d been best friends since elementaryschool when she moved in next door, but she’d relocated across the country for her dream job in the tech industry a few months ago. Don’t ask me exactly what she was doing—I barely remembered her job title most of the time.
When she’d left, there was a Bri-sized hole in my heart that no amount of phone or video calls would ever begin to fill.
But I’d take what I could get.
“I don’t know,” she groaned. “That’s why I called you.”
I tossed my lunch into the mini-fridge in the office I shared with our property manager and flipped on the lamps I’d strategically placed around the room. Whoever invented the fluorescent light and installed it in all offices throughout the country was diabolical.
“Do you want advice or for me to just commiserate with you?”
She was silent for a beat as I dropped into my desk chair and smoothed out the skirt of my pink dress. A color that perfectly matched my freshly dyed, cotton candy hair.
“Advice, I guess.”
My smile was slow. I put her on speakerphone and logged into my computer to get started on my morning tasks—posting the lunch and dinner menus for the day on our resident portal and printing them out to post in the main lobby. As a lifestyle coordinator, which was a fancy title for event planner, at a luxury senior living facility, my job duties were vast, but I loved it. I loved the residents, and I loved that the job kept me on my toes.
But that was never really a problem for me. Not only did I work at Lake Hills Luxury Senior Living, I was also an assistant coordinator at Grant Events. Caroline Grant was the best boss, and I pretty much made my own hours, making it possible to do both. Not easy by any means, but manageable. Most of the time.
Bri cleared her throat as I read the menu from the chef and got lost in my thoughts. “Addie? Hello?”
“Sorry, sorry,” I muttered, hitting print and copy and pastingthe menu onto our site. “My advice is…well, relationships with coworkers are exceptionally complicated. Does your company have a fraternization policy?”
“Only for managers and subordinates. We’re both developers, so no, no issues there. Trust me, I checked the first time we talked.”
I pressed my lips into a line and shook my head. Leave it to my best friend to fall in love with her gorgeous coworker. Bri always seemed to get herself into messy situations.
“You’ve got it bad, Bri. Is it even possible that you can let it go? That you could maybe keep your relationship with her strictly professional?”
“Probably not,” she said honestly. “This is a pointless conversation because I’m going to do what I want anyway.”
“Yes, I know.” I hopped up and grabbed the menu from the printer. Jogging out into the lobby, it was early, so it was still quiet, and I was able to pin it to the bulletin board without running into anyone. “You always do what you want no matter my advice.”
Back in my office, I continued down my mental checklist. All other emails were next.
