Page 39 of The Dead Romantics

12

Emotional Support

THE PHONE RANGfour and a half times before Rose picked up.

“Oh thankgodyou called. I was beginning to worry the town swallowed you up,” she said. In the background, I could hear bathroom noises, and realized that she must’ve been... atwork?

I checked my watch. “What’re you still doing at the office? Isn’t this your lunch?”

“AndSaturday,” she said with a tragic sigh. “But ohmygod, I have some news—but first, I want to ask how you’re doing. How’s the family? Is everything... well, notfinebecause of course not, but is everything fine?”

“As fine as it can be.” I flopped onto the bed in the Violet Suite. It creaked loudly. I would’ve hated to be in one of the neighboring rooms if any honeymooners ever got this suite. The hinges needed some WD-40 and duct tape. “Alice is rearing for a fight, but I figured she would be. We haven’t really seen eye to eye in a few years.”

“Yeah, my money’s on Alice—no offense.”

“You haven’t even met her! And I’m your best friend!”

“Yes, and I love you, but you’re about as threatening as a chipmunk.”

“Rude,” I said, but I didn’t say she was wrong. Because she wasn’t. Of all the fights Alice and I had had over the course of our contentious relationship, Alice had won the majority of them. “Though she probably could murder me and never get caught. She did go to Duke for forensic chemistry.”

“Wow, so badass. And your brother’s a swanky tech bro—what happened to you?”

“Unequivocal failure,” I replied bluntly. “And apparently the only one who’s willing to prepare Dad’s funeral as he planned out in his will.”

“That issometal.”

“It’s exhausting.” I recounted to Rose what I needed to do, and she listened sagely as I ranted about the wildflowers, and Elvis, and murders of crows, and the party supplies. I told her about the Waffle House conversation this morning, and how I was saddled with doing all of it by myself. “I mean, they have stuff to do, too, but—so do I!”

“Maybe it’s too hard for them.”

“It’s hard for me, too.”

Rose gave a hard sigh. “Yeah, I know, but you’re the big sister, right? You’ve always been really good at pushing through whatever feelings you have and getting things done. I mean, remember when that guy—Quinn—stood you up on a date and you had to finish edits forMidnight Matineein like twelve hours?”

“Quinn sucked.”

On a long laundry list of guys that I fell for that sucked.

“You pushed through andacedthose edits. And the time our toilet literally exploded and you fixed it with the power of YouTubeand sheer determinationwhile on deadline. And the time I got that horrendous stomach bug and you ended up making ends meet by writing all those terrible self-help articles and paying all the bills forthree months. You just do things. You finish them. You pull through.”

“Tell that to Ann’s book I didn’t finish.”

“One thing in averyshitty year.”

“Wish I could tell Ann’s agent that. I’m just waiting for Molly to call me again once Ann finds out to tell me all the things I already know—how I’m a failure, how Ann should never have put her trust me, how theone jobI had was the one I failed at and I know I failed and—”

“Andas I said, you’ve had a very shitty year. You’regood, Florence! You’re reliable. Most of the time. Maybe your family doesn’t realize you want help with your dad’s funeral.”

At the mention of help, I bristled. “Who said help? I don’t needhelp. And anyway, what are you doing in the offices on a Saturday?” I wanted to change the subject, to get away from the things that I might’ve once been good at but wasn’t anymore. Which, as it turned out, happened to be everything. “And are you—are you in a stall?”

“Absolutely. You know how my boss hates me talking on the phone in the office,” she added in a hushed tone. “And everything issupernuts today over here. Jessica Stone’s freaking out over her clothing line launch, so my boss called us all here to work, on our Saturday, because apparently she’s auditioning for a role in the remake ofThe Devil Wears Prada.”

“Yikes.”

“But that’s not theohmygodpart. You would not believe what happened yesterday.”

I rolled over on the bed, and the springs creaked. I stared up at the speckled ceiling. “You... got a promotion?”

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