Total pages in book: 82
Estimated words: 81584 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 408(@200wpm)___ 326(@250wpm)___ 272(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 81584 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 408(@200wpm)___ 326(@250wpm)___ 272(@300wpm)
I let her walk away, and I made my way more slowly back to Otto.
“Good?” he asked.
“She’s fine,” I replied, watching Frankie as she crossed the room and stepped onto the sun porch. Myla was there, sitting on Cian’s lap, and both of them were watching Frankie closely. She waved her arms around dramatically, laughed, and reached for a beer in the cooler.
“Thought he was just boring,” Bas said flatly. “But I don’t know. Somethin’ about that guy is off. I just can’t put my finger on it.”
“He’s too nice,” Esther said simply. We both looked at her in surprise. “No one is that nice. Not all the time.”
“Lou is,” Bas muttered.
“I’ve heard Lou tell Myla that a lady who cut her off at the grocery store was a heinous bitch who she hoped got both gonorrhea and dysentery so she’d uncontrollably shit her pants,” Esther replied, her lips twitching. “So.”
Bas laughed loudly. I grinned.
“No one that tries so hard to seem nice actually is nice,” Esther said quietly, watching as Scott came out of the hallway. “It’s a scam.”
Otto leaned down and kissed the top of her head.
I refused to look over my shoulder as Scott walked behind me to the sun porch.
“Gettin’ sick of this shit,” Bas mumbled, walking away.
“I think Frankie could take him,” Otto mused, watching the two of them. “Guy’s kind of scrawny.”
Esther huffed out a laugh and leaned against her much larger husband. “You want to make the rounds and head out soon? Bryony’s going to wake up in about an hour.”
Otto looked at me. “It’s like fuckin’ clockwork. Beginnin’ to think we’ll never get a full night of sleep.”
“You love it,” Esther teased.
Otto shot me a look that indicated he did not love it.
As they went off to say their goodbyes, I took time to say hello to the Aces around the room. None of the older generation were there, but considering the way they’d procreated like rabbits, there were a lot of the younger generation at the party. I ended up sitting with Harper and our cousins Olive and Meg for most of the night. The sisters were only about a year apart, and they bickered constantly, which meant that no one really noticed that I was saying even less than usual.
I was too busy keeping an eye on Frankie, who’d steadily gotten wasted as the hours passed. She was loud and bouncing around the party like she was having a great time, but something about the way she was laughing seemed brittle. No one else seemed to notice that the life of the party was trying a little too hard.
Eventually the crowd thinned to mostly family. Myla and Cian, Lou, Brody and Bas, Meg and Olive, Harper and me. We migrated to the sun porch with the rest of the group, and I took it in as I sat down in a lawn chair next to the cooler. None of the furniture out there matched, but it somehow seemed to all flow together well. An old wicker love seat with a floral cushion sat next to a bright yellow metal bench. In the corner was a neon green metal table and chairs. An old white daybed ran along the outer half wall beneath the windows, covered with throw pillows.
“You came,” Lou said, plopping down on the cooler.
“Couldn’t deprive you of Harper,” I replied, glancing at her. Did she notice that something was going on with Frankie? She didn’t seem concerned.
“Well, good,” Lou said with a drunken nod. “Frankie was really excited to see her.”
“Yeah?”
“Yep.” She hiccupped and leaned toward me. “I think it was a good party. You know, other than Slimy Scott.”
“You don’t like Scott, huh?”
Lou wrinkled her nose in disgust.
“What’d he do to piss you off?” I asked lightly.
“He’s pushy,” Lou said, her eyes on Brody as he burst to his feet and pounded his chest, making the women around him laugh hysterically. “He’s always here.”
“Frankie must be into it.”
“I don’t think so.” She burped and covered her mouth quickly. “Sorry.”
“She’s pretty hammered,” I commented as Frankie swayed from side to side next to the table. Her boyfriend sat in the chair next to her, talking to Olive and paying zero attention to his woman. I caught my cousin’s eye. Her face was emotionless. She wasn’t amused by whatever the guy was saying.
“I’ll take care of her,” Lou informed me. It didn’t fill me with comfort considering the hundred-pound pixie next to me looked like she was about to topple over. “And Bas is staying. Probably Brody, too. They usually crash out on the couch and the floor.”
I felt marginally better, knowing that the boys were staying, but I still hesitated when Harper told me an hour later that she was ready to leave. Meg had already dragged Olive away. Myla and Cian just had to walk across the street, but even they looked like they were ready to get going. If I insisted on staying longer it would look weird as fuck.