Page 30 of Love, Morgan

“Would that I could…”

She laughed and draped herself into the lounger next to where I’d been sitting. I got the feeling she didn’t need permission to exist in other people’s spaces.

“I stepped out of my bungalow earlier,” she said, leaning back and holding the mango in front of her face, “and found this. Well, actually, I found a gift bag with green tissue paper, and this.”

“Someone left you a mango as a gift?” That was what she’d been saying. I had been so distracted by her sudden appearance, and the fact that she was climbing from her deck to my own, that I hadn’t really taken it in, but that’s what it had been. She’d been talking about a mango being left as a gift.

“You did,” she said, looking up at me with one eye, the other scrunched closed.

“No, I didn’t.”

“You did, though. Apparently.”

“I’m fairly sure I would remember that.”

She laughed. “I’m fairly sure you wouldn’t have dropped it in a gift bag.”

I watched her as I considered that. She was right, of course. There was nothing wrong with a gift bag in the right circumstance, but I’d never put a mango in one. A mango was an unusual enough gift to send in the first place that the wrapping would have to be immaculate. It would either have to be a very special mango, or the recipient would have to have an intense love of them. Either way, immaculate wrapping would be required.

As for whether I’d sent it at all, I had neither very special mangoes, nor any inclination of how Morgan felt about them.

If I had, though—and regardless of the reason for gifting a mango—it belonged in a gift box. Not one it rolled around in like it did in a gift bag. One where it nestled into a bed of carefully chosen packaging that caressed and complimented it. One that held it in the center of the box and revealed it perfectly when the lid was lifted. A bow wrapped around the outside. A little notecard slipped between the bow and the box as it waited to be discovered…

“What’s that expression?” Morgan asked, lighting up. “Are you plotting how to wrap a mango?”

“What? No. Of course not.”

“You totally are.” She looked like all of her Christmases were coming at once.

“I am not.”

“You are too.”

I walked into my bungalow, not sure what I was looking for, just looking to get away from being seen through so transparently. Morgan followed after me like she belonged there, like she’d always belonged there. As if this wasn’t the first time she’d crossed the barrier into my private space. As if we were friends or something.

It was like a more intense version of Thalia taking pineapple from my plate. I wasn’t used to people crossing the careful walls I kept around myself, but suddenly, I wondered whether this was what living really was and I’d just been doing it wrong the whole time.

“Tell me how you’d wrap it,” Morgan said, dropping onto my couch as I poured myself a drink.

“I wouldn’t.” I chanced a glance over my shoulder at her. “And, please, make yourself at home.”

She laughed and my momentary flash of dismay at being so snarky with someone abated. I didn’t know what had possessed me.

“Hey, you’re the one who invited me over,” she said, crossing her legs.

“I am certain I’d remember doing that.”

“You sent me a gift-bagged mango.”

“I did not. And I wouldn’t put a mango in a gift bag. You said as much.”

Her grin widened. “So you do know how you’d wrap it. Tell me.”

There was something in her voice that I just wanted to obey, some confidence, the fear of failure so completely absent that even I didn’t think I’d refuse her. I wondered what she did for a living. She seemed too chaotic to be a lawyer, but the way she spoke, the confidence… I didn’t think I’d want to go up against her in court.

I sighed, working hard to keep my hand from shaking as I crossed to the couch she was sitting on and perched carefully on the opposite edge. “Gift box. Complementary packaging to nestle it in—possibly straw or shredded paper. A bow. Notecard under the bow until it’s received.”

“I knew it. I’m always right.” She looked away from me, seeming so satisfied with herself that I wasn’t sure what to do.

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