Page 31 of Only and Forever
“Oh, hell no.” I throw up my hands. “I will not. Cannot. C’mon, Lu, would it kill you to give them an HEA?”
She frowns. “An HEA?”
“A happily ever after.”
Tallulah stares at me. “It’s... complicated.”
“Well, I’ve got another pound of lo mein to eat and a near-death ride home on a Vespa to delay, so I’ll be here a while. Give me a chance to understand. Explain it.”
Sighing, she leans in, elbows on the table. This position does great things for her very full, beautiful breasts, pushing them against the neckline of her black scoop-neck tee. I hold her eyes and tell my peripheral vision to stop working overtime.
“Listen,” she says. “I don’t... get the appeal of romance, this starry-eyed idea of love. I don’t think it’s real, though I understand it’s real to many. Given that, I don’t tend to write stories deviating from my mindset. But...”
“But?”
“But, I think, even with that, done right and with your help, you’d be okay with how this story ends.”
I fold my arms across my chest. “Let’s hear it, then.”
Those big brown eyes nearly bug out of her head. “I can’t tell you the ending! That spoils it!”
“I need to know what I’m getting myself into, Lulaloo.”
Tallulah shuts her eyes and starts to massage her temples. “They’re separated by the end, but... they’re friends. Good friends. In fact, they’re better friends than they were when they were married. Everything that unravels between them in the book, all that’s revealed, makes you root for their happiness, and they get that—a happily ever after—just... not the one your books always portray.”
I stare at her, sifting through what she’s saying. How quietly she’s said it, eyes shut, as if she’s been bracing herself for the same kind of swift put-down I was bracing myself for when I pushed her just now to open up to me.
“Well...” I shrug a shoulder, picking up my chopsticks again and digging around, just to give my antsy hands something to do. “I can work with that. Sometimes happy endings end sooner rather than later. Doesn’t mean they weren’t beautiful or happy while theyexisted. And it doesn’t mean there isn’t more beauty and happiness to come.”
Tallulah opens her eyes, and her gaze finds mine. “That’s what I was thinking.”
I smile. “Well then, Lu, I’d say we’re on the same page.”
She ducks her head, reaching for her lo mein with her chopsticks again, then plucks a carrot sliver from the noodles. “So,” she says. “We can sort out the details, how you’ll advise and help me, later on. For now, let’s talk about how I compensate you. Is—”
“I don’t want your money, Lula.”
She blinks at me, confused. “But I have to pay you back somehow. And clearly, you need the money.”
Sure, I could use the cash, but I’m too damn proud to take her money. This is part of what I’ve promised myself since I started planning for the store—this was going to bemysuccess, my independent accomplishment. No dropping the ball and scrambling for people to help me pick myself up, no mismanaging my resources and having to crawl to someone to bail me out.
“Want my help at your store instead?” she offers. “I could ‘pay’ you that way?”
I swallow nervously. “Well, I don’t think that’s exactly a fair trade. The kind of help I need, it’s more work than seems an even swap for a couple hours spent talking about the romantic nuts and bolts of your story.”
“You are grossly underestimating what bad shape this draft is in. Second-book syndrome is real. Trust me, it’s going to be an even swap.”
I bite my lip. “I don’t know. I have very specific ideas for how this place should operate, and I’m going to be a pain in the ass about it. I can be grating to spend extended periods of time around, especially when I’m fixated on a particular activity or outcome. I wouldn’t want you to feel cornered into something you’d regret.”
Tallulah frowns at me. “Says who?”
“Says who, what?”
“Who,” she says calmly, but there’s an edge to her voice, “says you’re ‘grating’ to spend a lot of time around?”
“Oh...” Heat creeps up my cheeks. I clear my throat. “Just... most of the people who’ve spent a lot of time around me.”
“Then fuck them,” she says icily. “Fuck anyone who makes you feel like you’re too much. If they feel that way,theyaren’t enough foryou.”