Page 55 of Love Hollow at Last
“How does Twyla know all this?”grumbled Aya, digging through her vanity for a bobby pin.
“She would say she has her sources.”Emi let another little smile flit across her face.
Aya glanced up at the mirror, shooting Emi a look.“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you.”
Emi grinned.“I have to admit I really am.Though I’m sad my parents are on vacation.They could have been my spies at this shindig.”
“Oh, what do you need spies for?”Aya went over to her closet to find some suitable shoes.If she could just find some ballet-style black shoes, that was as fancy as she was going to be able to get.Wearing heels would bring her slightly closer to Noah’s height but at the rather steep cost of rendering her unable to walk.
“What do you think of these?”she asked Emi, waving around some maroon flats that had seen better days.
Emi wrinkled her nose.“Might as well go in your tennis shoes.”
Aya knew she would be expected to ditch her shoes at the door in the Kato house, as she had always done at her own house.They weren’t a critical part of the outfit.
“Oh, hush,” she said, slipping her foot into one of the shoes.At least they still fit.“I won’t even have to wear them for very long.”
“Wear what?”Twyla asked, poking her head in the door just as she had always done when Aya was younger and no less annoying.“Your clothes?”
Aya held the shoe up, ready to throw it, but Twyla had already flounced off.
“Seriously, though,” said Emi.“What’s up with you guys?”
“Well, he’s a celebrity.I’m not.He’s rich.I’m not.”
“But?”
“I mean, we had a chance in high school.But I feel like now, he doesn’t really understand much about what’s important to me.He basically told me not to finish my doctorate!And for all his talk about how important the museum is, he hasn’t actually wanted to donate.”
Emi was silent for a minute.“Did he actually tell you not to finish your degree?And what was the rationale?”
Aya thought back to it.The conversation had been overshadowed by the events in the reading room but not quite obliterated.“I don’t know.There were lots of reasons.But I think it says something that you came out here specifically to tell me to finish my degree, and he tried to convince me not to listen to you.”
Emi smiled.“So you saw through my excuses, huh?”
Aya rolled her eyes.“You came back home for a visit when your parents weren’t even here?Um, yes, Dr.Obvious.Safe to say I saw through that one.”
Emi pulled herself up, wiggled down from the bed, and hugged her.“So that’s it?You’re just going to give him up?”
Aya frowned, straightening the pearl necklace she had borrowed from her mom.“Of course not.I’m going to try to make it work.”
“Because…”
“Because I’ve never felt this way about anyone else,” Aya answered.“And that has to mean something.”
“Okay,” said Emi cautiously.“If you’ve never felt this way before, do you think Noah knows that?”
Aya scoffed.“Probably.I mean, my love life this past decade has been pretty pathetic.You’ve seen it.”
“But he hasn’t.He might imagine you don’t really feel that much for him these days.”
Aya laughed.“Oh, okay.He’s a celebrity, Emi.He thinks everyone is madly in love with him.”
“Does he, though?”
Aya rolled her eyes.“The annoying thing is that he’s right.”
47
