“Is it still illegal to murder people?”
“It depends on who you ask and how much money you have,” answers my best friend Nat, who’s also working the morning rush at The Grind coffee bar with me. “Why?”
“Look at him,” I say, gesturing to the man by the creamer—the man who is very obviously overfilling his to-go cup and spilling it everywhere. “I literally just asked him if he wanted me to leave room for creamer, and he said no.” I sigh, reaching for the rag we keep stashed under the counter for this very reason.
“I personally don’t think it should ever be illegal to murder a man who spills coffee,” Nat says quietly from her place beside the milk frother.
Ah yes, I knew there was a reason I asked her. It turns out, lesbians do tend to give the best life advice, something I learned a few years back as a baby gay, just figuring out how to handle life after realizing women were significantly hotter than dudes.
Nat took it upon herself to introduce me around, and explain the politics of living in a city with a small enough queer population that everyone is already someone else’s ex—she’s only four years older than me, twenty-eight to my twenty-four, but she’s been out since she could talk and loves to joke that queer years are like dog years and in that case, she’s old enough to be my cranky lesbian grandma . . . even though she’s really more of a big sister to me.
We met my freshman year of college, when she was auditing an acting class that I was forced to take as an elective, despite majoring in event and hospitality management. She was using it to fatten up her résumé and con the photography students into giving her free headshots.
We’re opposite in almost every way—sure, we’re both white and queer, but she has chestnut hair to my blond, her brown eyes could only be called striking and dark, while mine are a muddy hazel as if they couldn’t pick a color so decided to just be all of them. Nat’s also got a Hollywood body and teeth whiter than snow, while I’m a little softer, less flashy. “The perfect girl next door,” my mom always says, which always just feels like a nicer way to say “plain.”
But most importantly, Nat has her shit together, and I definitely don’t. She says it’s a confidence thing, but I don’t know.
Nat’s got the kind of attitude that makes you believe it when she says she’s going to be a film star someday, even if she does have to keep changing her date of birth on her acting résumés to make her perpetually twenty-three, while I’ve been telling everyone that I hope, maybe, sort of, if the stars align, to pursue my dream of running my own event planning company.
I’m lucky to have her holding my hand through this whole figuring myself out phase I’ve been in since I kissed a girl on my twentieth birthday . . . and through the multitude of moving-too-fast relationships and subsequent breakups that have ensued since. I can’t help it; I get excited.
Someone flashes me love eyes and I’m renting a U-Haul faster than Nat can hold me back . . . or remind me that while my taste in women is still developing, my taste in men is decidedly shitty.
That’s another big difference between us: I don’t fully rule out any other genders. I’m happily bi, no matter who I’m dating. A couple years ago, I had a lovely three-month relationship with a beekeeper with a talented tongue. When she said she wanted to spend our whole lives planting flowers and going down on each other, I believed her. Unfortunately, one expensive bee suit and three beekeeping classes later, I
discovered that just because I had assumed that meant we were exclusive didn’t mean that was actually the case.
After that, came Ashton, a motorcyclist who called me baby. Nat was convinced I was going to end up an organ donor the way Ashton rode, which didn’t help my nerves any. That one ended when they realized that I had, in fact, significantly oversold my interest and experience with motorcycles. It turns out they were looking for a “backpack” type of motorcycle girlfriend, and I was more of a shrieking, clawing, please-don’t-go-over-fifteen-mph kind of girlfriend.
Most recently—as in just a couple weeks ago—I got out of an eight-month live-in relationship with an unfortunate man named Blake who believed his fantasy football team was essentially a legitimate full-time job—like he would literally tweet the players feedback after their games and warn them he would bench them if they didn’t shape up. Yeah. Investment banker by day, NFL coach from the couch by night.
I cannot even begin to tell you how fully I tried to immerse myself into that sport. I could tell you the difference between PPR and standard scoring. I could talk about the pros and cons of draft leagues, deep leagues, and dynasty leagues. I could work the waiver wire like the best of them.
I thought Blake was really the one. I thought he was going to stick. He was even nice to my mother, agreeing to join me at her house for dinner a couple nights a week to ease her stress when I finally moved out to live with him.
It didn’t stick though—of course not. Worst of all, he was the one who dumped me—well, sort of. He told me he didn’t think it was fair to leave me a “football widow” for the several months of the year the games were played, to which I replied that I thought the fact that he was fucking his “work wife” was maybe the real problem here.
He was shocked. He had no idea I knew. It could have been a real boss babe moment. Except instead, like the mess I am, I promptly burst into tears and locked myself in the bedroom while he panicked on the other side of the door. Nat rushed right over, and before I knew it, we were gathering up
as much of my stuff as we could and heading back to my mom’s.
She says technically my retort—and the fact that I left that night—makes the breakup mutual, but it certainly didn’t feel mutual, not when he kept the condo and the cat, and I was back living in my childhood bedroom with garbage bags full of clothes. So yeah, lately I’ve been feeling like the antithesis of adulthood. Failure to launch, thy name is Molly.
My mom was thrilled to have me back. No surprise there. If breaking up with Blake didn’t already make me want to die, then moving back home definitely did.
Maybe I’m being mean. My mom is great. She wants me to be happy, of course she does. But also, she would love it if I lived at home forever. I can’t decide if she just doesn’t want to be alone—I’ve kind of been her de facto partner in life for the last decade plus—or if she’s still trying to make up for the fact that she had to liquidate my college savings account after she divorced my dad . . . who coincidentally was also fucking his work wife. That six-figure student loan hanging around my neck isn’t doing either one of us any favors.
It turns out entry level jobs in the wedding industry, even with a fancy degree and multiple unpaid internships, pay way worse than the tips I make at the coffee shop. Like can’t pay my student loans kind of low, and with my mom as a cosigner on them that couldn’t fly. The real secret to making it as a wedding planner in this city is money—a lot of it—and connections. I’m not saying all the big planners are nepo babies, but I’m not not saying it. They have trust funds and gala connections; I have Pinterest boards, and debt . . . and now a coffee-covered condiment station.
Nat pushes past me to hand a customer their vanilla latte (with nonfat milk and eleven Splendas) wearing the fakest smile I’ve ever seen. “Kill him or clean up his mess, I don’t care, but do something. It’s dripping all over the floor and we’re getting a line.”
I don’t miss the way she whispers, “kill kill kill” as I step out from behind the counter with my rag and head toward the tall red-haired man, who is still frantically trying to corral his epic coffee mistake—with his bare hands—before more of it falls on the floor. The napkins are right there, dude, what are you doing?
“I got it!” I say cheerfully, pushing him out of the way and catching the river of steaming hot liquid that has just soaked into our sugar. We’ve lost at least a dozen packets to this atrocity, and not even the generic ones either, the expensive brown ones. Randy, my boss, is going to scream at me when he does inventory. “Sugar doesn’t grow on trees,” he always grumbles. I wonder if he knows that it does basically grow on plants though.
“Thank you,” the man says, relieved, but I shoot him a glare anyway. His coffee says Erik in big, bold Sharpie letters and suddenly that is my least favorite name on earth.
“I did offer to leave you room for cream, Erik,” I remind him, the coffee scalding my palms as I finish cleaning up.
“I just wanted a splash! I didn’t need room!” He holds his chin up defiantly, even though his tone is somewhat apologetic.
“And how’d that work out for you?” I ask, tossing the damp sugar packets in
the trash and slinging the dish towel over my shoulder, remembering too late that it’s absolutely soaked. Shit. Erik raises his eyebrows at my now irrevocably stained white T-shirt before taking what’s left of his coffee and slinking away into a dark corner with his laptop.
I bet he thinks he’s going to write the next great American novel. I bet he thinks that even exists. He’s about as likely to get a publishing deal as I am to hit the lotto and become a wedding planner. He has his laptop. I have daydreams and too many bridal magazine subscriptions.
And a twenty-nine-point-five-hour-a-week barista job (carefully scheduled so that none of us qualify for health insurance).
And another twenty-plus-hour-a-week virtual job doing customer service calls for a local heating and cooling company.
When you subtract sleep and commute time, that leaves me about fifteen hours a week give or take to eat, shower, and live. I wonder how many hours Mr. I-didn’t-need-room gets.
“You’re aware your shift ended like twelve minutes ago, right?” Nat asks, wincing at the sight of my shirt when I walk over.
No! That means I’m already down to about fourteen hours and forty-eight minutes of free time this week, and it’s only Monday. “Going, going,” I call, even though we haven’t split our tips yet.
“Hey, KiKi and I were going to go check out that new brew pub up the street tonight for dinner. You wanna come?”
I blow out a breath because of course I want to come out with her and her ridiculously talented contractor girlfriend—they’re two of my favorite people in the world—but we both know I can’t. “I have to log in for the furnace place pretty soon,” I remind her, and she groans.
“What happened to all those ‘big city dreams’ we had when we were in college,” she teases, snapping her towel at me. “Would it kill you to come out once in a while? For old times? I’m starting to get a complex here.”
I melt a little at her puppy-dog eyes. “Yeah, well, it was easier to have those dreams when I was living off student loans instead of paying them,” I say, slipping my apron over my head and clocking out. “Next time I have a day I don’t have to work back-to-back, I promise I’ll come out and, hey, if you pick up the tab, I’ll even give KiKi a front row seat to how well I can drink you under the table.”
“As if,” she snorts. “Here, take this,” Nat says, handing me the paper cup labeled Dateline—today’s tip cup battle was Dateline vs 48 Hours, and Dateline was ahead by a mile. This isn’t fair to her.
“No, that’s . . . no. There was like one 48 Hours dollar for every ten Datelines. Come on, just split it even. I’ll grab my half tomorrow.”
“It’s fine, Molly,” she groans, already walking away. “KiKi moving in freed up a lot of cash. I can swing it this week. Plus, I have that callback. By this time next week, I might be filming in Outer Banks.”
“Nat.”
“This is where you say thank you, bitch,” she says, flipping her hair back
dramatically.
“Thank you, bitch,” I laugh, doing my best imitation of her.
“Now get out of here before I change my mind.”
* * *
“I got us a movie from Redbox for later,” my mother calls in a singsong voice before I’ve even gotten my shoes off. “And I’m making meat loaf.”
I’m in the front foyer, holding a coffee I brought home for her in one hand, and my Dateline tips in the other. I trip and almost drop them both, catching myself at the last minute. Even staring down the barrel of yet another “mother daughter date night,” the billionth since I’ve moved back in, I will not end up like tall cream splash man. I refuse.
“Great,” I say, mustering whatever cheer I can. I had been looking forward to a quiet night in my room after my customer service shift. I was going to chip away at my free WordPress website I’m building for Immaculate Events Inc. and study the latest in bridal gown trends, but it looks like my mom found a replacement Blu-ray player after all.
I do not understand that woman’s aversion to streaming.
“It’s a rom-com about a wedding planner who falls in love with a groom!” she chirps, sticking her head out of the kitchen. “It’s right up your alley. I thought we could watch with a late dinner. You’re done with the call center at eight, right?”
“Yep,” I say quietly, and then add a thumbs-up when she frowns. She’s trying, I know she is, but the last thing I want to do is watch a fictionalized version of the life I can’t have.
“Is something wrong?” she asks, her frown deepening.
“No, just a long day already,” I say. And now I have to spend the night feeling suffocated and guilty about wanting to move out after spending the next four hours asking homeowners how their recent furnace repair went.
“We can skip the movie,” Mom says, studying my face. “I’ll have dinner ready when you’re done and then you can just rest. You look tired, honey.”
“Okay, thanks,” I say. She looks a little crestfallen at how eagerly I agree, and the guilt rises up. “We’ll watch the movie another day, it sounds so good. Sorry, I just had a really annoying last customer and I need a minute to reset.”
Hey, at least it’s only half a lie. Mr. Coffee Spiller was annoying, and I do need a reset . . . just more like a total life one.
“Good thing I know just what will cheer you up.” Mom grins. “Go look at your bed. There’s a surprise for you.”
I raise my eyebrows and head down the hall, utterly confused until I push open my door and see my old American Girl doll sitting on the bed, complete with her fancy wedding dress
that my mom made for me herself. I had been so desperate to plan a wedding for her when I was nine, I never stopped to consider that I had just made poor little Kaia a child bride.
“Thanks, Mom. I love her!” I call out before I shut my door, because I know she’s waiting for me to say it and will be hurt if I don’t. She must have been digging around the old boxes upstairs again.
I shove Kaia to the side, throwing my arm over my eyes and pinching them shut as I settle onto my bed. As much as I wish I could sleep, I only have a half hour before I have to start my call center work.
What I need right now isn’t an old childhood doll or to be reminded that I used to have big dreams. It’s not even extra tips or to revise my business plan for the fiftieth time. No, what I need right now is a fucking miracle.
“Oh good, you’re up. Your aunt Christina died. Sounds like she left you something in the will.”
“Good morning to you too, Mom, Jesus.” And okay, when I prayed for a miracle, I didn’t mean, like, kill off my mother’s estranged sister so I could finally afford first, last, and security with the inheritance. I meant like . . . you know, let Randy give me overtime or health insurance or sublet the empty apartment over the coffee bar for a reasonable non-price-gouging amount. Something along those lines.
My mother probably feels like Aunt Christina’s death was a miracle—other than the occasional passive-aggressive postcard, they haven’t spoken in well over a decade since they had a falling-out over something I was too young to really understand. Their last meeting is mostly a blur in my head, an epic argument which somehow devolved into a shouting match. But no matter how blurry the rest of it is, I’ll never forget how fierce my tiny mother looked as she accused Aunt Christina of sleeping with half the cowboys in the country instead of dealing with her Daddy issues, or how fast she wilted when Aunt Christina replied “At least I can keep a man interested.”
I didn’t understand half of what they were screaming about, but I understood pain and recognized it on both their faces as they fell silent. When my mom told her to get out, Aunt Christina did. For good.
“Sorry,” my mom says, loading some French toast onto a plate for me. “Good morning, sweetie. Your aunt Christina died. Was that better?”
“What? No, not really. Just, what happened?” I mumble out, because while I’m still half-asleep, I’m also extremely curious why someone I haven’t seen since I was a kid would apparently put me in her will.
“I don’t know,” she says, and waves me off. I look for signs she’s secretly upset but don’t see any. Then again, Mom always does keep her cards close to her vest when it comes to Aunt Christina. “She probably just left you some old boots or something, don’t get too excited.”
“I guess,” I say, digging into my food.
“Anyway, the executor of her estate wants you to call her back. Apparently, Christina passed a week ago and they’re just now getting around to letting us know because they legally have to! Typical. She probably told them not to even tell me,” Mom stage-whispers, but I can’t help but think this outrage is just an act to cover for any hurt she might be feeling. “I’ll grab you the number after we eat, but they’re doing a remembrance and reading of the will at the barn this weekend, if you want to go. I think I still have that address if you need it.”
“Do you want to go?”
Mom looks thoughtful for a moment. “I don’t think so, hon. I made my peace that I didn’t have a sister anymore a long time ago. You should though; find out what this is all about. Meet her friends and tell me about them.”
I study her face. That’s an interesting request for someone who isn’t sad about her sister.
* * *
The drive to the barn
isn’t horrendously long, just over two hours or so, but still, I’m happy to have Nat with me for company. Randy was nice enough to give me the day off, and I called out from the call center. It was just luck that Nat was already scheduled off . . . and that she dodged Randy’s call asking her to cover for me.
“This isn’t one of those Hills Have Eyes things, is it?” Nat asks as we pull back on the road after our first Starbucks stop of the day. “Luring us out into some kind of trap with the promise of vintage cowboy boots?”
“I don’t think that’s what that movie was about. Plus, we don’t know for sure that it’s boots,” I say, greedily gulping down my caramel frappe. I know, I know, we’re both baristas. Shouldn’t we avoid the corporate overlords threatening constantly to put Randy out of business? Yes. Do we care in the face of this caramelly goodness? Not one single bit.
“Okay but either way, have you actually seen this hillbilly horse Holiday Inn? Like do we know for a fact that it even exists?”
I smile. “I spent a summer here when I was nine, it definitely exists.”
“Mm-hmm, but that was a long time ago,” she says, putting on some music. Unfortunately, this also turns off my GPS, and I almost miss the turnoff—if not for the giant rickety sign that says Christina’s Corrals, this way. It hangs at the end of a dusty, unpaved dirt driveway, and I nearly knock it over as I bank hard to make up for overshooting the drive.
“Holy shit,” Nat says, holding the lids on both our coffees.
“Well, if somebody wasn’t pulling up the latest Justin Bieber instead of letting me look at the map then—”
“No, I meant that.” She points out the window.
And yeah. That. Holy shit.
We crest the hill of the long driveway to see sprawling acres of grass; there are even a few horses dotted throughout. A large barn that looks like it’s seen better days is plopped straight in the center, surrounded by various paddocks and mini pastures. Behind it looks to be an auxiliary barn, maybe for storage? Finally, off to the left, is a farmhouse that looks like it’s held together solely by some duct tape and a prayer. Half of the siding has blown off, exposing angry, weathered plywood, and the roof curves in a way that looks unnatural.
What. The. Hell.
There are people everywhere and a lot of cars parked all over, so I have to pull onto the grass in front of the house just to find a spot. A few people look at me from the barn, their expressions a mixture of curiosity and disappointment as I put the car in park. I realize belatedly that I have stopped on what looks to be a garden of some sort, and I unintentionally whack a ceramic gnome over with my car door as I open it. Things are off to a great start, as usual.
I also begin to realize that the ultra-high heels I have selected for this occasion—a gift from my mother that she’s still paying off from when I graduated and accepted an internship with the hottest wedding planner in the city—were a massive mistake. They sink deeply into the soft ground, forcing
me to hobble on my tiptoes until I reach the rickety steps of the porch. Nat, in her much more sensible Nike Blazers, tries and fails to stifle a laugh as she follows behind me.
I freeze in front of the door. I don’t know what to do in this situation. Do I knock? Do I walk right in? I’m supposed to find someone named Shani first, according to the half-hearted message my mom took, but I have no idea if they’re inside or out in the barn with the others. I wish she had written down that number.
I take a deep breath and decide to head inside, only to be instantly met with a half-dozen curious faces staring at me.
“Just walk right in and make yourself at home,” a woman says, and I can’t tell if she’s joking or not.
I snap my eyes to her, but my apology dies on my lips. She’s hot. And not just kind of hot. Like really, really, fucking hot. Her piercing green eyes are framed by dark, shaggy, brown hair sliced over the perfect undercut. Her skin is peppered with just a hint of freckles and enough of a tan to let me know she probably spends some time outside. She has this kind of sun-kissed KStew vibe that’s definitely working for her.
And for me.
The woman, who still hasn’t introduced herself, is dressed in black, which I guess I should have anticipated. She’s paired a mens dress shirt and fitted slacks with honest-to-god midnight-black cowboy boots. It’s a look I immediately want to pin to my “western wedding” Pinterest board, and a body that I want to pin other places.
My mouth snaps shut, more to prevent drool than anything else, but she seems to take it as a challenge, her eyes flashing as she crosses her arms.
“Hi, this is Molly,” Nat says helpfully, putting her arm on my shoulder, taking control like the best pseudo–big sister, always. “This was her aunt’s farm.”
“Oh, Molly!” an older Black woman says, standing up from her place on the well-worn sofa. She’s maybe in her fifties, plump, with
beautiful brown eyes and a kind face that instantly puts me at ease. She pushes past everyone to wrap me in a hug. “I’m Lita, one of the people who board their horse here. Your aunt Christina and I were great friends. She told me so much about you! She always said how much you loved this place.”
“Yeah, nice of you to finally visit,” the still nameless woman grumbles behind her.
“Oh hush, Shani,” Lita says.
And this is Shani? This KStew wannabe is the maybe-executor of my aunt’s estate? Wonderful. I’m sure she’s downgrading my inheritance from vintage boots to dirty hay as we speak.
I sigh and take in the rest of the people. Everyone around me is dressed either in smart black clothes, or some variation of flannel and jeans. I feel overdressed in my dark green cocktail dress—the nicest thing I own, in an attempt to pay respect—which I just had to top off with the aforementioned Louboutin heels that I should have sold off long ago.
No wonder Shani isn’t my biggest fan. Not only did I walk right in, but I’m also dressed for drinks at an upscale restaurant instead of a memorial followed by a probable barn tour. I’d hate me too.
“Come on, hon, let’s get you a drink,” Lita says, leading me into the kitchen.
“What’s that woman’s problem?” Nat whispers, following closely behind us.
“Oh don’t worry about Shani,” Lita says. “She’s just a little stressed sorting so much of the business side. Losing your aunt was very hard for her and I think she’s trying to stay busy.”
“Were they close? ...
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