Page 15 of Fighting

His expression is distant, his smile half-hearted. “Whatever you say. How about I take you to dinner one night this week? To discuss the festival.”

My stomach sinks. Dammit. We really do have to plan. “How about I come to you? Although, I’m thinking it would be better tojust ‘break up’”—with a grin, I throw back his air quotes—“with you publicly and be done with both of you.”

“Sorry, babe. You’re going to have to stick this festival thing out.” With a smirk, he places a hand on my lower back and steers me toward home.

“Cordelia Danielle Shane,get your ass out here. Right. Now. DEFCON, um, five? The worst one,” I shout, sounding more like my mother than I’d like to admit. But the next words come out as a high-pitched whine. “I need you.”

Delia is the only person I trust to play therapist for me. Except, of course, my actual therapist.

Emerging slowly from her bedroom, she rubs her eyes, then takes in my disastrous state—hair up in a messy pile on my head, bra strap slipping below one sleeve.

“Were you mentally at town hall tonight?” I whine, pulling out one of the island stools.

Delia opens the fridge and then faces me, holding a bottle of white wine.

I give a soft nod, accepting the gesture.

She pours two glasses and slides one across the island, lips twitching. “Maybe? I was physically there for a while, but I snuck out to go to bed early since it’s my night off. That plan was foiled when you came in screeching my full name,Mom.”

I drop my head to the island and groan. “I suck. Sorry. Do you want to go back to bed?”

She lifts a shoulder. “You’ve got me here. Hit me with it. It’s not like you to cry wolf.”

“Caleb and Mateo are competing to buy Grant Morgan’s properties and the undeveloped farmland on the north side of town.”

“See?” She points a finger at me, eyes wide. “Actual. Serious. Shit.”

For a long moment, we sit in the silence, sipping our drinks. Delia knows by now that I plan my words carefully.

“The good news is that the dick confetti was the final straw,” I say.

Dick confetti, as in the package we sent to Lily’s ex-husband and his wife, making sure they understood what a bag of dicks they were for hurting Lily.

Our mutual acceptance that some stories aren’t shared bonded us. Sure, it means she has no context for why Mateo has been on my shit list since I was fourteen but it also means I accept that her middle school falling out with Landan Sherman is good enough. Tack on that Landan dated Grant but waited to sleep with him after he married Lily, she’s the living embodiment of a pick-me girl.

I’d love to pry—again—but I have to let Delia come to me in her own time if I want the same courtesy. So instead, I quickly add, “I only wish I could have hit her in the face with a vibrator the way Seth got walloped at the bridal shower.”

Silently, she holds out her glass, and we clink and sip quietly.

“Satan’s set his target on our town for his next gentrification project. Now Mateo is my only hope to prevent personality-free houses with overpriced amenities from destroying our culture. Plus, they’ll decimate anything nature-related.”

“Didn’t realize you were so passionately against housing expansion.” Delia cocks an eyebrow.

“No, this is Satan’s way of trying to get close to me. And now Mateo has swooped in, claiming he’s my boyfriend, yammeringabout how he doesn’t want to hear Caleb talking about my pubic hair styling ever again?—”

“Your what?” She throws her head back and cackles.

“Yeah, um. That’s where the moniker came from. You know? Satan’s Bikini Waxer? He was so obsessed with ‘aesthetics,’ and I was young and dumb, so I let him talk me into trying it, but it hurt.” I avert my gaze, cheeks heating. Why am I suddenly the one spilling my guts?

“But I’ve seen you in a bikini. It’s not like…” Delia huffs.

“Correct,” I say. “I’m not rocking the ’70s bush, but… I feel better when I look like an adult, which means I don’t remove all my body hair.”

“That makes sense. What the fuck is wrong with men? You’re allowed to—wait, hold on. Don’t distract me with beauty things. Didn’t Mateo just show up? He’s been here a matter of hours, and he’s already telling people you’re an item?”

“Yep.” I sag against the cool countertop. “He thinks that by claiming me, Satan will back off. Like if he pisses around me, marking his territory, the asshole will respect it.”

“Hey, even stupid gets it right sometimes.” She chuckles at her own joke.

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