Page 102 of Don't Go Faking My Heart

I pull up social media and go to my dad's page. It's nothing but his golf scores, the deals he closed, and posts like, "My NEW family knows how to treat their 'old man'" with pictures of them showering him with presents on his birthday or Father's Day. It's funny that Rusty has an issue with men who get plastic surgery, because whatever work Mayor Teddy has gotten doesn't compare with how much my dad has.

The pictures on his page are all of them looking perfect. Everyone is the right shade of blond, his new wife's hair is flat-ironed without a single frizz. They wear rolled up jeans and white shirts on the beach and act so surprised when the waves hit their feet. They all know how to pose for pictures, and no one would ever stick their tongue out at the camera like my family did during our last family picture. While Greg stands behind my mom in pictures, Frank is front and center in every single one.

Millie has always said my dad has all the markers of actual narcissistic personality disorder, while Philip has more anti-social traits. I don't know what any of that means, but I know I'm tired of wanting crappy men to love me.

I want the best guy I've ever known to love me.

"Yeah, it's time to block him. I don't want his garbage cluttering up my feed anymore."

"Yes! That's my girl," Lou says, tackle-hugging me from her chair. She squeezes the breath out of me. "If Rusty can make you see yourself accurately in barely a week, imagine what a lifetime could do."

"Are we openly talking about this now?" Sonny asks. "Because I've been rooting for you two since the second I met Rusty."

"He really has," Parker says. "It's getting in the way of wedding planning at this point. You need to do something about it.”

I chuckle. "Good idea. I'm craving farm fresh produce. Anyone want to hit up a Farmer's Market in Orangeburg with me?"

Sonny raises his hand, Parker nods, and Lou puts down her guitar. "And watch you and the fake-fake boyfriend flirt? Yes, please."

As I drive my friends to Orangeburg, Sonny tells us about the last time he visited Rusty at the Farmer's Market, only a couple of weeks ago.

"You've visited Rusty at work?" I ask.

"Yeah, I go whenever he's doing a site visit. Y'all have Sugar Maple stuff at the house all the time. How do you get it?"

My cheeks get hot. "Rusty brings them over."

"Every week," Lou adds. "Don't feel bad about it."

"I should feel bad. I've taken advantage of him."

"He wishes," Sonny says, and everyone else laughs.

"I'm serious. He told me I'm the most important person in his life, but I didn't know that he was over a huge chunk of Tripp's business. I've swung by the farm plenty of times but I've never gone with him to sell at a fruit stand. I haven't stopped by the warehouse or even asked him about work. I thought he preferred our work. I've been a horrible friend."

"I'm pretty sure his only complaint with you is that you're not his wife," Lou says.

"I notice you're not contradicting me."

"Because I don't have anything to add. Beating yourself up about the past isn’t productive. You want to be more involved in his life, so you're taking steps to do it. Move forward, sugar."

"You are so practical, it hurts. How are you so good at lyricizing when you can do," I wiggle my fingers toward her in mild disgust, "this."

"Because I'm also a master of compartmentalizing, rationalizing, and intellectualizing. All the -izings, really."

"You're brilliant and I hate you."

"Love you, too," Lou says. We're coming up on Chick Hanks' house when suddenly, a bloom of yellow smoke appears in the air. I pull over and we all rush out to see Chick standing over the gopher holes with a gas mask on.

"What are you doing?" I ask.

He looks up at me with crazed eyes. "They keep coming back! No matter what I do, the varmints keep coming back. But I got 'em this time. I'm gonna smoke 'em out. And if they don't leave, I'll set the whole thing on fire!"

He lights another smoke bomb and throws it in the gopher hole. We watch him drop them into each of the holes. "Chick, those ain't the right smoke bombs!" Lou says, shaking her head.

But Chick is too busy laughing to overhear. He's also too busy laughing to notice that the gophers have popped out of a hole in the grass strip between the sidewalk and his fence line.

"Chick, have you checked for holes out here?" I gesture to where we're standing on the other side of his fence.

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