Page 59 of Always

“When did he find it, then?”

“Probably this morning,” Calvin said.

Anika stared at him, completely flummoxed.

“Explain yourself this instant,” Gwen demanded. “Clearly, and using sentences.”

Calvin sighed and put down his noodles.

“He didn’t find it the night of the dinner—I know because I was looking with him. We stayed at the banquet hall until midnight, until they kicked us out. We checked under every table, in the bathrooms, in the kitchens, everywhere. He talked to all the staff, he offered them this crazy reward if anyone had seen it—you know, also in case somebody maybe put it in their pocket, so it would make more sense for them just to give it back. But no luck.”

“I didn’t know you did that,” Anika said, deeply touched, “Thank you.”

“Well it didn’t work,” Calvin said. “We couldn’t find it anywhere. So the next day he went back again. He called me to get the number of the guy who runs the bookings, ‘cause he had the keys. James went first thing in the morning and looked everywhere again. He called me a couple times for ideas, I think he was going a bit insane about it.

“So anyway, he decided it had to be in the garbage somewhere. Like maybe it fell on your plate while you were eating and got dumped in the trash or something. So he told the guy he wanted all the garbage bags from that night. And the guy was like, dude, you’re crazy, we have like a hundred garbage bags back there, I dunno which ones are from the dinner. So James said I’m gonna take them all then. And the guy was like I don’t think so, that seems illegal. But probably he just didn’t wanna deal with it.

“So James paid him off, like a bribe, and he got this big truck and he took all the garbage. And then he went through it for like three days straight.”

“Did you help him with that?” Gwen demanded, both fascinated and repulsed.

“Well I helped him get the truck, but I didn’t touch the garbage,” Calvin said. “I mean, I like you, boss, but at that point I thought the earring was gone and also it was disgusting. And plus I was like, isn’t he rich? He should hire a team of people to do this. But like I said, I think he was a bit obsessed at that point.”

The girls just stared at him, dumbfounded. Anika couldn’t wrap her head around what she was hearing.

“So I guess he found it,” Calvin finished up. “Probably this morning, like I said, ‘cause I know he was still looking last night.”

“I can’t believe it,” Anika said.

“That’s insane,” Gwen said.

“Actually, it makes a lot of sense,” Hannah said, nodding. They all turned to stare at her instead of Calvin.

“Well, I knew he was still hung up on you Anika,” she said, as if it were the most natural thing in the world. “I mean, don’t get me wrong, I did my best, but I could tell his heart wasn’t in it. And now that I know that he’s still crazy about you, I don’t even feel bad about it. You can’t fight true love—who would even want to?”

Anika wanted to hug her. Bless Hannah and her boundless good spirits.

“Is that what it is?” Gwen asked Anika quietly. “Are you two still in love, after all this time?”

Slowly, Anika nodded her head.

“I think we are,” she said. “I think I never stopped.”

Locking herself in her office, she tried to call James three or four times, but nobody answered.

She typed a message to him:James, thank you. I know you know what that meant to me.

She wanted to write so much more, but it seemed impossible to do over text. She needed to speak with him face to face.

I need to see you,she wrote.

* * *

21

The rest of the afternoon Anika kept checking her phone to see if James had responded, but there was no answer. She tried calling him once more, but again it just rang and rang.

Now she had a dilemma. She knew she needed to meet with Marco to break things off with him. She would have to bring his ring, which was currently sitting in its box on her nightstand at home. But Marco had been texting her updates on Dominic throughout the afternoon, and things weren’t looking good. To dump him at this moment seemed incredibly callous. Yet to drag things out was also untenable. After all, at what point would this become easier?

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