Page 13 of The Yes Factor

LIV

I wake up to a kaleidoscope of bright LA sunshine streaming in through Bex’s guest bedroom window. In my jet-lagged stupor, I’d forgotten to close the lace curtains, not that they’d have done much to stop this solar-powered spotlight. Leafy branches of an avocado tree sweep across the windowpanes. God, this view, it’s a tonic after the gray skies and dingy brick flats that I wake up to in London. I yawn and prop myself up on a few pillows to get a better look out the window. Grapefruit hangs from a tree that is polka dotted with globes of the yellow fruit, too many to pick before they start to rot and fall to the ground, making a blanket of mushy bittersweet in the shade below. In comparison to the plastic-wrapped fruit in London grocery stores, Bex’s backyard is a cornucopia of citrus, vibrant flavors and color. It’s the picture-perfect California dream. And about a million pounds’ worth of produce. I laugh to myself, thinking of the puny, green-gray avocados at the market near my flat that go for £3 a piece. It costs more than a bottle of wine just to make a decent bowl of guacamole. My parents would probably stop talking to me if they knew how much I spent on guac.

Feeling groggy and dazed, I wonder what time it is. Jet lag is a bitch. Was I dreaming that Bex told me the bartender started to weep? I’m all for men in tune with their emotional selves, but it seems like a major red flag to have an intense crying jag on the first date, regardless of gender. Bex definitely needs something more light-hearted, and what I have lined up for tonight will be perfect.

Lazily, I stretch and enjoy the luxurious comfort of the queen-sized mattress and starfish my arms and legs to all four corners of the bed. I can’t help but enjoy this feeling of being alone in bed. No snoring Ethan, whenever he makes it to bed, and no half asleep wrestling to get more of the blanket. I used to laugh at the old black-and-white TV shows that had the husband and wife sleeping in separate beds. Maybe they were on to something after all.

Reaching up with another yawn, my hands bump into the polished oak headboard. Bex is a genius with rehabbing old furniture. I’ve told her a million times she should open her own shop, not just her online Etsy thing but an actual store. Her eye for unearthed treasures is better than those experts on Antiques Roadshow. I trace my fingers along the beautifully carved inlay of the headboard and smile, remembering the look on Bex’s face when she first laid eyes on it.

We were grappling with vicious hangovers in the early stretch of a six-hour drive back to Atlanta in muggy August weather after a crazy weekend in New Orleans. Back then, in our college youth, a twelve-hour round trip drive for a Saturday night to meet up with cute Cajun guys and down some Hurricanes was no big deal. We’d made it past Slidell when Bex veered the car off the I-10, almost missing the exit.

“Did you see that sign?” She half turned to me under the weight of her hangover, then started saying repeatedly as if possessed, “Po’boys. Po’boys.”

To this day, whenever we say “Po’boys,” we both start to giggle.

It was a two stoplight town in Mississippi; I don’t remember the name. I do remember those shrimp po’boys and sweet tea being the best damn hangover cure ever. As we were heading back to the car, Bex made a beeline across the street, having spotted an Antiques sign in the corner of a darkened storefront window. Before I knew it, she was inside. I followed just in time to see her stop in her tracks, a rapturous glow breaking the zombie look of her hangover.

“Amazing, it’s perfect,” she said.

I followed her gaze to see a beat-up, dusty piece of wood leaning against the wall that definitely did not look perfect to me. Bex sweet-talked the woman at the counter into letting her take it off her hands for fifteen dollars. We tied it to the roof of the car with some rope. It was heavy as hell, but the po’boys had given us strength. The following weekend Bex worked on it both days, resurrecting it from that cobwebbed corner of a forgotten store in Mississippi into a piece worthy of the Smithsonian. I love that she’s kept it with her all these years. I wonder what this chunk of wood has witnessed in its lifetime. From forest roots to a carpenter’s hand. Tender embraces, mean silences, arguments, and fights. How many cycles of a relationship has it been at the mast of.

“Wake up!” Bex hollers from downstairs. “I don’t know what time it is in London, but it’s too late for you to still be in bed. We need to at least do brunch before it’s happy hour.”

I grab my phone, 10:18 a.m. It’s not that late. Bex is clearly still on Mom time, even with Maddie away at camp.

And no messages from Ethan. What did I expect? I hadn’t even told him that I was here. He probably thinks that I’m with Clarissa, happily discussing the subtle nuances between French and English lavender.

“Okay, Mom!” I shout back. “I’m up! It’s not even eleven!” Yelling from the bed like this makes me feel like a teenager again, but a happy one. I always loved spending the night at Bex’s house when we were kids. Her mom would give me the fluffiest pink towels with satin trim and a matching robe. Those towels felt like pure silk compared to the nubby, sand paper thin ones we had at home.

Bex knocks on the door and peers in.

“Doesn’t look like you’re up to me.” She dive bombs onto the bed, making the headboard rattle.

“Careful, this thing’s old.” I yawn. “Remember when we found it?”

“How could I forget? That was an insane weekend. And you know what the craziest thing about it is? We were only five years older than Maddie is now. I do not even want to think about her on a weekend trip to New Orleans! Let alone one with a fake ID!”

“Do as you say, not as you do?” I give her a wry look. “Why did you never open your own store? I swear you could have sold this headboard for six hundred dollars, even back then.”

Bex leans back on the headboard beside me.

“I don’t know. Well, I do know. It’s called motherhood and divorce. I’m doing good just to make ends meet sometimes. God bless whichever millennial founded Etsy. Now I don’t even need to open my own store, plus I can work in my pajamas.”

“Speaking of.” I give Bex a once-over. “That getup is not going to be getting you any. I think my grandmother had that exact same one.”

“What?” Bex looks down at the nightgown. “It’s comfortable.”

“Exactly.”

* * *

I was worried about it being too late for brunch, but this is America. Home of the all-day breakfast. And this is LA on a weekend, so basically the Disneyland of brunching. Pushing my sunglasses up like a headband, I soak in the relaxed atmosphere of the outdoor patio and warm sun that’s melting away the London cold inside me.

“I’m so happy to be here,” I say to Bex. “Thank you for letting me be your Fairy Godmother Wingwoman.”

Bex clinks my mimosa glass with her own. “I still can’t believe you came all the way from London to do this. And by the way, I changed all the passwords on my profiles. Enjoys arthouse films, jazz, and cultivating heirloom tomatoes. You do know me, don’t you? That makes me sound like some twenty-three-year-old hipster growing his first beard!”

“Well, I had to put something! You’d hardly even filled them out. Anyway, forget about all that. Tonight is something different. Tonight is gonna be fun and upbeat. A party!” I say in a Valley girl accent.

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