Not even a third as nice as the mini mansion where his parents lived in Georgia. “Thanks.”
She led him through the small but cozy family room, down the hall and to her bedroom. It was the way she’d left it five years ago, its old familiar self every Christmas and summer when she’d come home. Mint green walls, sunny yellow comforter and white pillows. Her bedframe was a rich dark hardwood, an old family heirloom that squeaked – she’d had it tested in that department. Matching dressing table and dresser framed one corner, the closet door the other. Above her bed, a watercolor painting of a blooming spring meadow had always soothed her to sleep. The nightstand bore a lamp with beaded shade, a clock radio, and a small ceramic jewelry box she’d made in the eleventh grade.
Ronnie stopped at the end of the bed, hands going in his pockets. He opened his mouth to speak, and Ava beat him to the punch.
“You don’t have to say it’s nice. It’s just my room, and it’s nothing special.”
He sighed. “Shit, Ava, what–”
“Nothing.” She pushed down the handle of her rolling suitcase and went to her closet, pushing the accordion door back harder than she needed to.
She heard him step up behind her, his loafers making soft noises against the carpet. “Look–”
A knock at the back door, rapid-fire and insistent.
Ronnie stayed behind as she walked to answer it, for which she was thankful. Out of usual caution, she peeked through the kitchen window to see who was standing on the patio. Her father had raised no dummy when it came to being careful.
For the first time since hearing that New Orleans was in town, she grinned and meant it. Ava flipped the locks and pulled the door wide, just in time to catch Leah Cook’s crushing hug.
“Aavvaaaaa!” Leah shrieked, bouncing on her toes.
Ava laughed. “I take it Mom called you.”
“Yes!” As quickly as she’d attacked, Leah retreated, pushing back, and smacked Ava lightly across the arm. “Which you were supposed to do the second you rolled across the city limit line.”
“I was distracted,” she defended, and laughed again at her friend’s mock outrage.
Leah, very tiny and South Korean, looked like a little anime doll on almost every occasion. She favored bright colors and flamboyant hairstyles. The adopted daughter of a local coffee shop owner, she almost smelled like Arabica beans and bounced off the walls like she was made from them.
Today, she was in a hot pink miniskirt, black tights, chunky heeled sandals, and a white t-shirt with WTF stamped across the chest. Her hair was full of bright blue streaks and was pulled into two high pigtails, the ends hanging down past her shoulders.
Leah’s eyes flipped wide; her mouth formed a little O. “Distracted…as in…” She leaned in close and dropped her voice, “Lord haveMercy, you were distracted?”
“No.” When would people stop saying his name out loud? Each time was a tiny gunshot through her heart. “There’s just a lot going on. The party and everything.”
Leah rolled her eyes, stepped the rest of the way into the house and heeled the door shut. “God, this party. Everyone in the city knows the Lean Dogs prez is stepping down at this point. I don’t know how it didn’t make the papers.”
“Everyone knows?” Ava bit her lip. “That could be bad…”
“Oh, don’t be paranoid.” Leah dragged out a stool at the breakfast bar and climbed onto it. “Nothing’s going to happen.”
“Um…just you saying thatguaranteessomething will happen.”
“So?” Leah shrugged her narrow shoulders. “I thought you were all Writer Girl now.”
“Yeah, but this is my family.”
Leah ignored her, was instead wrestling something from her bag. “Here. I printed it out; I want you to sign it for me, in case it’s worth something one of these days.”
It was a printed copy of the online mag that had run her short story. Leah set it on the counter and smoothed it with one magenta-nailed hand. On the crinkled cover, Ava spotted her name in tiny black typeface: A.R. Teague, under the title of her piece, “Falling.”
“No one would give you a nickel for my signature,” she said.
Leah, rummaging through her purse for a pen, glanced up with a vicious scowl. “Yes they would.Iwould.”
“You and my mother.” Ava sighed and leaned forward to prop her elbows on the counter.
“Hey.” The pen – a purple Sharpie – landed on the counter with aclickand Leah put on her best bossy pose, hands on her slender hips. “You’ve wanted to get published since we were four, Ava, and now you are, and you’re acting like it’s not a big deal.”
