Sway (5 page)

Chapter Nine

Mari insisted on coming with me to Kellynch. Charlie was busy with his beta testing, the nanny was watching the boys, and Mari had nothing else to do. No amount of begging on my part could convince her to stay home.

Climbing into the car, I could already imagine how many ways Mari might embarrass me in front of Eric’s sister. Meeting Sophia Croft for the first time was already going to be awkward. Adding my gabby sister into the mix? At least her endless chatter on the drive over was enough to keep my mind occupied.

“Welcome home!” Richard boomed and he laughed. Mari looked at him askance. “I’m Richard Croft, but then you probably guessed that already.”

“I’m Ava.” With a hesitant smile, I shook his hand, my eyes traveling over his faded jeans and Rolling Stones t-shirt. Black earrings pierced a wide hole in both of his ears and the edge of a tattoo peeked from one sleeve. My dad’s worst nightmare in the flesh. Then again, he had a handsome face and stylishly slicked dark hair that wouldn’t be out of place in a Givenchy ad.

“Yes, yes, I’ve heard all about you.” He gave me a wink, which I ignored.

“This is my sister, Marilyn.”

“Just Mari,” she said.

“Great to meet you. Come on in.” We followed him into the grand entrance, the sound of our shoes echoing off the floor. “The boxes are over here.” He pointed to a pile of six huge cardboard boxes sitting in the corner on the marble floors. I headed for them but he stopped me. “I’ll be happy to carry them out for you. They’re pretty heavy. Anyway, I want you to stay a bit, meet the wife. She’s dying to meet you.”

Mari and I exchanged a glance. Her lips tightened as if she was trying not to laugh, or tease.

“Actually, I needed to get something from my old room,” Mari said. Her eyes scanned every inch she could land on, even though nothing had changed about the foyer—yet.

I widened my eyes at Mari and mouthed the word ‘no’ but she ignored me.

“Sure, go ahead,” Richard said. “It’s your house after all.”

“Not anymore.” Mari’s hand toyed with the hydrangeas in the vase. She brushed a finger across the marble bust of Adonis in one corner, as if she was checking for dust. “I’m married. We live in Laguna Beach.”

Richard said something in reply but I didn’t hear it. A woman walking down the circular staircase had distracted me. Her hair and eyes were the exact same color as Eric’s. She smiled, and it was so familiar I felt an unexpected dart to my chest.

She walked to me, her hand extended. “I’m Sophia.”

“Ava,” I replied, a little breathlessly, shaking her hand. She studied me, taking in every inch. I felt like I was under a spotlight, the lone performer on stage.

“It must be strange to see someone else living in your house,” she said. No mention of Eric, no questions, no accusations. It surprised me.

“A little,” I said. “It’s only been a couple of days.”

She nodded. “It’ll take time to get used to it.”

“Come in, have a drink.” Richard motioned us into the kitchen. “What can I get you?”

I protested but Mari went very un-shyly to the fridge and peered over Richard’s shoulder.

“Ooh, that looks yummy,” she said. Richard handed her a bottle of some kind of fruit smoothie. I grimaced at her but she ignored it, taking a long swig.

Richard listed off every drink they had and I finally agreed on water. He handed me a bottle just as his phone started to buzz.

“Excuse me for a second,” he said, and left the room to take the call.

Sophia poured herself some iced tea and took a seat at the island. “So, Ava, what do you do for a living?”

I swallowed. Part of me felt like it was the start of an interrogation. “I play the piano.”

“Really?”

“I just graduated from Juilliard. I’m hoping to get a teaching position.”

She smiled and it seemed genuine. “That’s excellent.” Sophia turned to Mari. “What about you?”

“I’m a mom.” Mari took a seat on a tall leather barstool beside Sophia. “I stay home with my kids. Two boys.”

Sophia studied me over the rim of her teacup. “No marriage or kids for you, Ava?”

I shook my head.

“I was always sad that I never got to meet you,” Sophia said, “when you were engaged to Eric.”

My palms started to sweat and I rubbed them off on my jeans, glad that the island was tall enough to cover it.

“It’s odd that I should meet you now,” she continued. “Years later and only because we’re living in your house.”

Odd and awkward and almost unbelievable. I pressed my lips together, remembering how it had been in this very kitchen where Eric and I shared our jalapeno-flavored kiss, just steps away from where I stood.

“I hope you don’t mind that Eric suggested we rent it.”

I plastered a smile on my face. “No, of course not. It’s a great house. Eric knew that.” It wouldn’t be awkward at all. Hopefully I could take my boxes and go, and this would be the last time I would ever have to see them.

“How’s Eric doing these days?” Mari asked. It was a weird question coming from her, as if she’d known him when in reality they hadn’t spent more than a holiday or two in each other’s company.

Richard returned to the kitchen. “Eric? He’s busy as usual. The band just finished their tour and he wants to get right back into the studio.”

“Doesn’t he want a break?” Mari asked.

“Eric never takes a break,” Sophia said.

That sounded just like him.

Richard stood beside his wife, cupping the back of her neck with his palm. “It’s true, no matter how much Soph begs him to slow down.”

When I knew Eric, his sister was never around. It was strange to hear how close they are now.

“His first album sold pretty well,” Richard continued. “His second better than the first. Good sales, but not quite on the Bublé scale. We’re hoping a third will really push The Eric Wentworth Band to another level. Get more radio play, reach out to more fans worldwide. He’s got some new songs in the works so I think he can do it.”

“You’re his producer?” I asked, hoping we could gradually steer the topic away from Eric.

He nodded. “I’m mostly retired, but I’ve kept Eric on because he’s family and all. These days, he does most of it on his own anyway, but I don’t like to be idle. Retirement is boring.”

“Oh.” I stared out the window.

We spent an hour in my former kitchen, telling them about Mari’s family, and talking more of Eric and the music business. Sophia’s eyes rarely left my face, her expression speculative, calculating. Part of me wanted to impress her, show her how great my life was so she could report back to Eric that I was a put-together, well-adjusted woman with no lingering Eric-hangups whatsoever. The other part of me realized that I was all of that anyway so it didn’t matter what she told him or how I acted.

I got up to throw my empty water bottle into our recycling bin under the sink. Richard and Sophia stood too, taking the hint. Mari, completely oblivious, didn’t get up until we’d left her alone in the kitchen.

“I’ll be sure to tell Eric you said hello,” Sophia said at the door. “He’ll be here in a couple of days.”

I almost stopped dead in my tracks. I glanced back at her, expecting a smirk or some sign of laughter on her face but there was none.

“He sold his old apartment. We begged him to stay with us until he buys a new place.”

I glanced at Mari. She didn’t look surprised at all by this news. I squeezed out an awkward smile. “How nice.”

I felt nothing but relief when Richard finally loaded the boxes into my car and we made our escape.

* * * * *

Ella Fitzgerald’s voice filled the car. I sang along in my mind, letting the music take away all thoughts of Eric. Mari stared out the window, abnormally quiet, especially after the excitement of the day.

“I hate it there,” Mari whispered, barely loud enough to hear over the music.

My hands gripped the steering wheel, I stared straight ahead. “Kellynch?”

“Yeah. Don’t you hate it there?”

Kellynch would always be home. I turned off the stereo and glanced at Mari. Her eyes were wet with unshed tears. “Then why did you want to go?” Why had we stayed so long?

“I wanted to see if it felt the same, with new people there.” Her hands clutched the purse on her lap. “Mom should still be here. When she died, it ruined my life. All our lives. That’s all I can think about when I’m there.”

I reached out and, taking Mari’s hand, I gave it a squeeze. “I just try and remember the good stuff.”

“That’s the problem. I can’t remember anything good.” She faced away from me and stared out the window.

Mari had been sent to boarding school so soon after Mom died. She was barely twelve at the time. Two years less of memories. I could remember for her.

“There was this one time, when I was nine, so you would have been seven and Beth was twelve. Anyway, Mom and Dad had gone on vacation and when they came back, they had presents for all of us.”

Mari stared out the window, but I knew she was listening.

“Beth got earrings. They were tiny crystal ballerinas.” Beth had been taking ballet at the time and thought she’d grow up to be a professional. Little did she know that ballet takes discipline, a quality she lacked. “She was so excited that she wouldn’t stop bragging about them.”

“I got piano music,” I continued. A big book of Russian composers—Stravinsky, Prokofiev, Shostakovich. I still had it, currently nestled in one of the boxes in the trunk. “And you got that huge doll, almost life-sized, with the long black hair that you used to braid or put into ponytails.”

“I remember that doll,” Mari said. “I named her Marisa. I took her with me everywhere.”

“You had a stroller for it and a bed and I can’t remember what else.” The corners of Mari’s mouth twitched. “Anyway, Beth couldn’t stop dancing around in her earrings and telling us how they were way better than our gifts and that Mom and Dad loved her the most. She made you so upset that you threw the doll out your window.”

“I did?”

“Yeah. The poor thing landed in the bushes and Reynaldo got all scratched up trying to get it out.” Mari covered up a chuckle. “You threw such a tantrum that I couldn’t practice my new pieces. So I went stomping up to your room to tell you to shut it.”

“Or to clobber me,” Mari interrupted.

“What? I never did that! That was all Beth.”

“Whatever.”

“Anyway, by the time I got up there, you were already quiet. I peeked into your room and you and Mom were snuggled in bed. She was telling you that she’d take the doll back if you really wanted her to, but that she bought it because she knew how much you’d love it. She was saying how from the moment she saw it, she knew the doll would be your best friend. How the doll asked her to take it home to you.”

I had watched my mother stroking Mari’s hair and I remembered thinking that only superpowers could make Mari stop yelling and screaming so easily. Superpowers only my mom had.

“You decided to keep it.”

Mari was quiet for a long time. Finally she said, “I don’t remember what happened to that doll.”

I brushed a hand over her hair. “I don’t either.”

Chapter Ten

Lacey and Mari danced around their patio to Usher, the music blaring from the outdoor speakers. Mari was barefoot, but Lacey managed to dance in her platforms without a single wobble. Her blonde hair flew around while her hips moved from side to side. Smoke and the smell of burnt steak trickled from the barbecue, where Charlie was attempting to cook.

“Crap!”

While trying to get one of the steaks off the grill, Charlie flipped it a bit too enthusiastically. It missed the plate and landed on the ground with a splat. “This barbecue is useless.”

Mari stopped dancing and put a hand to her head. “Charlie, you’re giving me a headache,” she groaned. She sank into one of the patio chairs. Lacey kept on dancing, swinging her arms from side to side in what was probably another Just Dance move.

“Should I do something?” I asked Mari. She cast a furtive look at her husband but didn’t reply.

I stood by the grill and tried to give Charlie instructions, but I was no better at steaks than he was. Lacey gently hip-bumped both of us out of the way and took over.

In no time, she had everything under control, and we were all sitting around the huge patio table, digging into our dinner.

“How was Kellynch?” Charlie asked around a bite of steak. “Are the Crofts decent?”

“They seem nice,” Mari replied. “Although Dad would have a heart attack if he saw Richard and all his piercings.”

“They keep up the house,” I said. “They haven’t made any changes that I could see, so that’s good.” Not that they had been there very long.

Charlie nodded. “I figured as much.” He passed the salad bowl to Lacey. “Eric said they’d take good care of it.”

Just like I thought, Charlie and Eric had worked the whole thing out. I swallowed a mouthful of bruschetta.

“Did Eric also tell you he’s coming back to LA, and that he’ll be staying at Kellynch too?” Though why Eric would want to set a toe inside my house was beyond me.

Lacey paused in the middle of piling her plate with salad. Charlie busied himself with his food.

“He might have mentioned it,” he mumbled.

I glared at him. “You might have told me, you know. Given me a little heads up.”

Charlie let out an exasperated sigh. “What does it matter? It’s been eight years. You’re both over it by now. That’s what you keep saying, anyway.”

Yes, I was over it. Whining about it only made it look like I wasn’t. I went back to my food.

“You’re going to invite him over though, right?” Lacey asked Charlie. “I’d love to meet him.”

I froze mid-chew. Seeing Eric again was not something I was looking forward to. Maybe coming to stay with Mari and Charlie had been a mistake.

Charlie shrugged.

“You’ve already met him, Lace,” Mari said.

“I was just a kid,” Lacey said. “All I remember is some guy who used to wear that weird hat all the time.”

Eric’s fedora. Despite myself, I smiled at the memory. He was obsessed with the thing our entire sophomore year. Charlie used to tease that he only wore it so he wouldn’t have to wash his hair.

“Yeah, I don’t remember him much either,” Mari said.

“He sings those old Frank Sinatra songs, right?” Lacey asked.

“He writes his own songs too,” I said. “He does a mix of both.” My face heated under their stares. “What? Just because I broke up with him means I can’t listen to his music?”

Mari shot me a knowing grin. She raised her eyebrows up and down. “Of course you can.”

Honestly. They would never leave me alone.

“He’s like that other guy,” Charlie said, ignoring us. “Michael Bublé. This article I read called him the next Michael Bublé.”

Eric probably didn’t like that any more than being called the next Frank Sinatra.

“I’ve heard him on the radio,” Mari said, shooing away a fly. “What’s that song he’s got out now?”

No one answered. “‘Miss Me,’” I replied with a sigh.

Mari pointed at me and said, “Ha!”

“Wait, he did that song… What was it called?” Lacey looked around for help. “I absolutely loved it when it came out, and then it was in that cellphone commercial.” She frowned, thinking hard, then snapped her fingers. “‘No Two Hearts.’”

I stared at the table, trying to keep my face smooth. “No Two Hearts” had been Eric’s first single. The song made him famous. And it was about us.

“I love that song!” Lacey went on. “And that guy is
hot
. Did you read the article about him in GQ?”

“What article? All I saw were the pictures,” said Mari. “Yowsa!”

“Nice,” Charlie said.

I picked at my broccoli with my fork. I had no idea Mari was keeping up with Eric’s career or reading articles about him. Well, looking at the pictures anyway.

Mari and Lacey continued to talk about Eric but “No Two Hearts” had started in my head, drowning them out. His song, his sweet voice singing those painful words played through my mind and I couldn’t shake them loose.

Once there were no two hearts so open

Once there were no two minds so alike

No feelings so in harmony

Now we’re strangers and it’s killing me

Once there were no feelings so in unison

Once there were no faces so adored

No tastes so much the same

Now we’re strangers and it’s killing me

Once there were no two souls so happy

Once there were no lovers so close as one

No perfection so complete

Now we’re strangers and it’s killing me

Once there were no two hearts so open

Now we’re strangers and it’s killing me

No two hearts so open

Now we’re strangers and it’s killing me

They talked about Eric the entire night. Lacey and Mari made plans to buy his CDs so they’d know his songs by the time he got to Kellynch. At first, they were just going to download everything, but then Lacey pointed out that they wouldn’t have anything for him to autograph.

I eventually retreated to my room, unable to listen any longer. I knew I was supposed to be over him, and I was. But for some reason, the more they talked about him, the worse I felt. In rare moments, I still got aches over Eric, but mostly I kept him out of my mind. He was the past, why dwell on it? But they kept repeating it,
Eric Eric Eric
over and over, like an annoying techno dance beat. I just wanted to run from the room.

Grabbing a book from my luggage, I snuggled into my borrowed bed. Mari and Lacey could spend all the time with Eric they wanted. I would stay away. Nothing good was going to come from seeing my ex-fiancé.

* * * * *

I pushed Aiden on the swing while Mari pushed Landon. The sun covered me from head to toe like a warm blanket, brushing over my skin. Sweat pooled underneath my floppy hat, but I closed my eyes and reveled in the fresh clean heat, different from the muggy thickness that was summer in New York.

“Push me, push me!” Aiden yelled. I gave Aiden a harder push on the back and he squealed.

“It’s too hot out here,” Mari complained, wiping the back of her neck with one hand. “I can feel my scalp burning.”

“I told you to wear a hat.”

She groaned. “I didn’t want to ruin my hair.”

Mari had big plans that night. Eric had finally made it to LA and Charlie had called him up, eager to see his old bestie again. They made plans for dinner at STK, a restaurant so posh that vowels were beneath them. Mari and Lacey were going, as well as the Crofts. I made plans with Lexi to get out of going, not that anyone expected me to. Lexi had argued with me—she wanted me to go just so she could tag along and meet the infamous Eric Wentworth—but I finally convinced her that it was a bad idea to the power of ten.

“You’re going to want to shower anyway,” I said to Mari. A thin sheen of sweat glistened down her arms and her neck.

“We should never have come to the park,” Mari grumbled. She stopped pushing Landon and the swing slowed. Landon and Aiden both hopped off and ran to the playground. They grappled with each other, trying to be first up the steps.

“I still can’t believe you’re not coming,” Mari said, sitting down on a park bench and stretching her white legs in front of her. Mari was unnaturally pale for a Californian. Not that I thought she needed a tan, but some vitamin D would be good for her. “It’s STK! I’ve wanted to go there for so long but Charlie would never make reservations.”

I sat beside her, crossing one leg over the other. Dad would tell me not to because I’d give myself varicose veins but I was more concerned with flashing a kid in my mini skirt. My eyes followed the boys down the slide. Their giggles floated through the air.

“You know why.”

She sighed. “Yeah, I guess. Although I don’t know what the big deal is. You’re going to have to see him eventually.”

Not if I could help it. He had to go back on tour someday.

“Lacey bought me a new outfit for tonight, did I tell you?”

Only a few hundred times. “I bet it will look amazing.”

“I should’ve told her to get something for Charlie too,” she said. “He’s got nothing but t-shirts and jeans. And sweats.”

A smile quirked my lips. I didn’t think I’d ever seen Charlie in anything but what Mari just described. For senior prom, the dressiest he’d gotten was a blazer over a Star Wars tee.

“He’s got to have a nice shirt somewhere in his closet,” I said.

“I should text Lacey and tell her to bring him something, just in case.” She pulled out her phone.

I watched Landon scramble down the stairs of the playground. My eyes scanned, searching for Aiden. I found him at the top, reaching for the fire pole.

“Um, Mar,” I started. Landon stood at the bottom of the pole, looking up at his brother. I stood. “Can Aiden climb down that thing?”

“What?” Mari asked absently. She looked up, and gasped. “Aiden, no!”

Aiden reached his arms out, grasping the pole. From our vantage, he seemed almost horizontal.

We ran for him. “Aiden, stop!” Mari yelled. Aiden stepped off the platform. He managed to get one small leg wrapped around the pole but not the other. For one long second, he hung suspended. Then his grip loosened and he fell to the ground.

Aiden lay on his back. He didn’t move. His eyes were open, but his face was paler than the sand underneath him. Landon began to cry.

“Are you okay?” Mari asked, crouching beside her son. “Does it hurt?”

Aiden stared at his mom. His lower lip quivered but he didn’t cry. He didn’t make a sound at all.

“Mari.” I stared at Aiden. Below his neck, a bone was pushing against his skin “I think he broke his collarbone.”

Her eyes went to the protruding bone and she began to scream. A small crowd of parents and kids gathered around us. “My baby! Oh no! What do we do?” Landon cried even harder.

“I don’t think we should move him, in case we make it worse.” I reached into my pocket for my phone and dialed 911. I wrapped Landon in my arms and attempted to settle him and his mother down while we waited for the ambulance.