Chapter 33
DESPERATE HOURS
I’d slept in the following morning, so the ringing phone jostled me out of a dead snooze. When I answered it, I wasn’t prepared to be met with a very loud Layla, yelling into my ear. “LisaismovingtoCaliforniawithPickford!”
Her voice was a barely intelligible blather, and I wasn’t sure I’d heard her correctly through her sniffling. “What?”
“Lisa. She’s not coming to New York with me! She’s going with Pickford to L.A.!”
“Wait. What? Are you kidding?” I was pretty shocked to hear the news, but Layla seemed completely annihilated. Her hyperventilating reverberated across our phone line as she tried to pull herself together.
I let out with a heavy breath myself. “Okay. Stay right where you are. I’m on my way over.”
Ten minutes later, I found Layla in her backyard, sitting like a lump on a lounge chair next to the pool, dressed in sweatpants and a ratty Duran Duran T-shirt. Mr. Warren was at the grill cooking up some lunch, but I suspected he was only using that as an excuse to keep an eye on his daughter. I nodded my head at him in greeting before planting myself on the end of Layla’s chair and placing a consoling hand on her shin. “Babe? You okay?”
She swiped her arm across her nose and sniveled, “No.”
I caught the raised eyebrows Mr. Warren aimed in my direction, a silent good luck for attempting to handle the situation. Something told me he’d been dealing with it all day. “What’s going on?”
“What’s going on? I’ll tell you what’s going on! My best friend is throwing me to the wolves, that’s what’s going on!” Her eyes were a puffy red mess as they met mine in desperation, before spilling the whole story in a frantic babble.
Apparently, all that fighting Pick and Lisa had indulged in during our beach weekend was because he’d been trying to convince her to move to California with him. He’d signed his commitment to UCLA months ago, and after much back and forth discussion, it would seem that Lisa had made the decision to commit to him. Bye bye, New York City. Hello, Los Angeles.
Layla was incredulous that her best friend would blow off F.I.T. in order to follow her boyfriend clear across the country. She sniffled through her tale, vacillating somewhere between devastated and pissed off, until ultimately, she threw her hands in the air and declared, “Perfect timing! She couldn’t even wait a full twenty-four hours after Cooper left to announce she’s abandoning me!”
Layla tended to play a little fast and loose with the word “abandonment,” but I guess I couldn’t blame her. Her piece of shit mother had given my girl one helluva complex.
“I’m sorry, Lay.” I gathered her in my arms for a hug, having no idea what I was supposed to say.
Mr. Warren saved me from coming up with the appropriate way to respond when he announced, “Hot dogs are almost ready. I’m thinking Irish stew for dinner. Sound good, guys?”
His pronouncement almost made me snicker. Here he was, cooking up some lunch, and his mind was already on what we’d be eating for dinner. Then again, Layla always said it was a total Italian thing to show concern through food. When in doubt, feed ‘em.
Layla crossed her arms over her chest again and went mute, so I answered for us both. “Yes. That sounds great, thanks.”
“Alright. I’ll have to go to the store and pick up some beef stock.”
“Beef stock?” I repeated. “Worst. Music festival. Ever.”
Lay didn’t bother to laugh at my awesome joke, so her father stepped up to take the reins. “Layla-Loo, are you feeling any better yet?”
Her lips twisted into a pout as she picked at a stray thread on her sweatpants. “No.”
Mr. Warren sighed in exasperation. Poor guy probably had no idea how to handle an irrationally emotional teenage girl. I knew the feeling.
He brushed down the grill, offering absently, “I’m sure if you talk to her, she’ll be able to explain.”
“Explain what?” Layla scathed. “That she’d rather move all the way across the country with her boyfriend than live in the most amazing city in the world with me?”
I pinched her toes and gave them a little wiggle. “It doesn’t need to be either-or, you know.”
“Sure it does. She already chose him!”
“But that doesn’t mean you can’t stay friends.”
“That’s exactly what it means.”
Mr. Warren and I shared a knowing look as he placed a dish of food on the side table next to me. “Trip, I tried to tell her the same thing. I didn’t get very far either.”
* * *
Layla was a zombie over the following days. I kept trying to get her to call Lisa, or at the very least, talk it over with me, but she refused to discuss it any further than she had on that very first day. Which wasn’t that much to begin with.
She was more intent on pouting her way through the news rather than trying to figure out a way to deal with it. I had no idea what to do and I felt awful for her. She was really down about the whole thing.
In an attempt to cheer her up, I arranged for a little delivery, just a little something that would hopefully put a smile on her face.
I called her exactly thirty minutes later. I was too excited to wait. “Did it get there yet?”
“Did what get here yet?”
“I’ll take that as a no,” I chuckled. “Just make sure you stay home for like the next half hour. You’ve got a delivery coming. They told me it would be there by twelve.”
“Trip?” she asked, intrigued. “Did you send me flowers or something? You know you didn’t have to do that.”
“I know I didn’t have to,” I said. “But I wanted to.”
Am I romantic bastard or what?
It was only about ten minutes later when she called me back. “So. Umm. The delivery guy just left.”
I could barely contain my smile. “Yeah? And?”
“And... you are seriously the cutest thing ever! Truly, Trip. A pepperoni pie from The Westlake Pub? Only my favorite pizza in the whole world! Thank you!”
“You’re welcome.”
“The mozzarella sticks were a nice touch.”
I grinned like a madman. “I thought so. And the zeppole?”
“Divine,” she giggled out. It was the first time I heard her laugh in days. Worth it. “Only you, Chester. I swear. Most guys would’ve sent flowers.”
“Most girls would have wanted them. But I knew you’d appreciate this more.”
I was pretty sure she was smiling as she asked, “So, are you planning to come over and help me eat all this food?”
“I’d love to, but I’ve got somewhere to be in a few minutes. I’m sure Bruce will be more than happy to help you out. But I’ll call you later, okay?”
The thing was, I was meeting Pickford for a racquetball game over at the Shermer Heights Training Facility. I’d decided to come at The Layla-Lisa Predicament from a different angle, and figured maybe Pick and I would be able to come up with a way for our girls to sort out their shit.
We spent the next half hour mostly concentrating on the game, but we both knew why we were there.
“So, we gonna talk about this or what?” I asked. “I don’t know how much more I can take. Layla’s losing her mind over this California thing.”
“Yeah, no shit,” he said. “You think it’s been a cakewalk on my end? Lisa’s been a mess for days. She’s getting crap from all angles. Her parents, her best friend... You need to tell your girl to chill out.”
I swung my racquet and whiffed the shot. “Easy there, pal. My girl is only worked up because your girl is leaving her flat.”
Pick was gearing up for a serve when he dropped his arms and looked at me. “Is that what she thinks?”
I shrugged. “Look, Pick, it’s easy for me to see why you’re doing what you’re doing, but just try and see it from Layla’s point of view. She’s stressed out about moving away as it is. She thought she’d have her best friend by her side to help her through it, but now she has to say goodbye instead.”
“Yeah, because her best friend is choosing to try and make a go of it with her boyfriend.”
Pick offered the rebuttal as if it were a perfectly reasonable explanation. And it was, no doubt about it. But he obviously wasn’t seeing the other side to it.
I gave my racquet a spin, arched my eyebrow at him, and said, “Exactly.”
Pick let out a heavy breath as he bounced the ball a few times off the floor. “Wait. Layla doesn’t think Lisa’s choosing me over her, does she?”
I gave him a shrug and asked him to take his serve.
He did it, distractedly, letting out with a, “Well, fuck!”
I bent over laughing too hard to hit the damn ball. It bounced off the wall and I caught it before noticing Pick’s expression. The gears were turning so fast in his brain, I thought smoke was going to come out of his ears. On the plus side, he was finally grasping the full extent of what we were dealing with here at least.
We packed it in and headed to the juice bar, then spent the next hour coming up with a plan to get the girls back on track. We didn’t really land on anything more original than locking them into a room together, but our plotting was an easy excuse to spend a few final minutes with each other. I was glad we were given the chance to say our goodbyes.
Afterward, I went straight to Layla’s with all intentions of forcing her to end this ridiculous feud with Lisa once and for all.
We ended up fighting instead.
She was pacing around her backyard in nothing but a bikini, ranting and snippy. If she wasn’t in such a belligerent mood, I may have been turned on instead. She looked pretty freaking hot when she was angry.
And half-naked.
I ran a hand over my hair in frustration. “Just do me a favor and talk to her already. You better do it soon, though. Before you leave. That’s only two days away, as if you didn’t already know.”
Hell, I’d drag her over there myself if that’s what it came to. Those two had been best friends their whole lives. They had to understand how rare that was. It frustrated me that they couldn’t see it.
“I don’t see how this situation concerns you, Trip. It’s really none of your business.”
“None of my business?” I asked, incredulously. “Are you kidding? Lay, we’ve only got so much time together, here. I don’t want to spend our last hours miserable.”
She threw her hands out to her side and scathed, “Well, if I’m making you so miserable, why don’t we just break up now, then? Why wait two days?”
I sighed as I crossed my arms over my chest, attempting to calm down. I knew she didn’t mean what she just said. I knew she was simply upset. “Why are you doing this?”
“Doing what?”
“Trying to cut everyone out of your life. What, do you think it’s going to be easier to leave if you’re mad at everyone?”
“No!”
“Then what is this? You won’t talk to Lisa, you’re picking a fight with me... It’s not going to change anything, you know. Your friends are leaving. You’re leaving, too. I know that’s hard for you, but it’s going to hurt no matter what, Lay.”
She pushed the hair out of her face, gripping it in a fist on top of her head as she raised her teary eyes to mine. She looked positively broken as she took a huge shaky breath and said, “It already does.”
My lips pursed in understanding. The poor girl had been under too much pressure for too many weeks. Of course she was losing it over all the new changes. Of course it was going to come to a head. “I know. I know it does. C’mere.” I gathered her trembling form to my chest as I wrapped my arms around her for a hug. “Okay. It’s okay, babe.”
I smoothed her hair as she offered in an uneven voice, “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry...”
“I know.”
“No,” she sighed. “I’ve been a stubborn unruly bitch for days.” She pulled back to meet my eyes and swipe the tears from her cheeks. “I don’t want to fixate on this any longer. All it does is make me miss everybody.”
I tightened my arms around her and kissed the top of her head. “I’m still here for you, Lay. Even if I’m a million miles away, I’ll always be here.”
* * *
I wasn’t surprised to hear Layla’s voice when I answered the phone the following afternoon. I was surprised when I heard her say, “I talked to Lisa.”
Finally. Relief pooled through me as I said, “About damn time.”
“Yeah. I made myself go over to her house and apologize. She was pretty terrific about it. I’m glad we got a chance to say a proper goodbye.” She gave me a quick rundown of how things went down between the two of them. A little bit of reminiscing; a whole lot of tears. Lay said their big farewell scene wasn’t the complete devastation she’d been expecting. It was more like “see you later.”
“How about that,” I said. “I’m proud of you both.”
“Thanks.”
As much as she tried to convince me she was at peace about the whole thing, I could still hear the waver in her voice.
“You okay?”
“Yeah. I mean, I’m still sad that she’s leaving, but at least we made up before she took off.” I started to commend her when she cut me off to ask, “Hey, we’re still on for tonight, right? I really need to see you.”
Well, duh. It was her last night in town. She’d be leaving for New York in the morning. I didn’t know what we’d be doing, but I knew damn well we’d be doing it together.
“I’m all yours.”