Page 3 of Sunshine
Tess
“The conditions were met. Papers signed. It’s official—the condo is sold.” My real estate agent’s voice is cheery as if she’s informing me I’ve won the lottery. But I focus on one word.The.
Thecondo. Notyourcondo. I make some indistinguishable noise into the phone, and she continues.
“One more month, Tess, and you’ll no longer be living with the reminder of Gary on the floor with his whore.”
I wince at Donna’s words but only because I hate how women are always the whores in these situations. Gary’s the whore. He deserves one hundred percent of the blame here. He made promises, he was the one who signed the marriage contract. She didn’t owe me shit.
“Gary wasn’t on the floor,” I say, drily. “He was on Marie.”
Donna’s bark of laughter slices through the phone and cuts me. It’s not that funny.
“Oh, Tess, you do have a way with words.”
The other line on my cell cuts off her voice for a blip and offers me an escape from her chattering, so I sign off and tell the doorman to send Paige up.
I glance around the condo with a sigh, my heart in my gut. Losing my condo is way more difficult than losing Gary. And thanks to the asshole judge overseeing the divorce, I’m not only losing it, but being forced out of the city too.
“I come bearing tea and scones,” Paige says a few minutes later when she walks through the unlocked door. “When are the movers coming?” Her voice echoes in the empty-ish condo.
She hands me the tea and I take a sip before answering. “The movers will be here at two to take all this to storage.” I wave my hand around the room like a game show model. “Everything I’m taking fits into those two suitcases, my carry-on laptop bag and my purse.” Thumbing my bags at the door, I blow out a breath. “That’s what my life boils down to now.”
“Oh babe, I hate this, but maybe it’ll do you some good to get away. Maybe the idiotic judge appointing a financial guardian means you can forget all this for now. Go back home, rest, work through your grief. Enjoy the animals. Walk on the red sandy shores, take up fishing, or clam digging.”
“And write?” I ask, my eyebrow cocking.
She holds her hand up as if blocking my accusation. “I never said it, but…” He words trail off as she finds the label dangling from her teabag and fingers it. “I promised I’d only be best friend Paige today. Agent Paige is locked up.”
“Having no access to money without the guardian’s approval besides a monthly allowance is not exactly stressless or motivating. And I know nothing about animals, fishing or clam digging.” I pull a face. “We never had any animals when I lived there. Not even a cat, Paige. You know that. You were at my house all the time.”
“I went clam digging once.” She looks up, accessing her memory. “It was kind of fun. Learning new skills will be great for your writing.”This time both hands go up in surrender. “Bestie Paige talking here, I promise.”
I lower my face into my hands and groan. “Never mind writer’s block, Paige, how the hell am I going to milk a cow?”
“A cow? I thought you told me she only had chickens.” She rises, opens the paper bag she brought and pulls out a scone, handing it to me. I take it absently, noting the smell of fresh blueberries.
“I thought that too.A few chickens and thingswere her exact words.” I look my best friend in the eye. “Never trust an octogenarian. They lie like four-year-olds sneaking cookies.”
“Or in Gran’s case, whiskey.” We both smile fondly at that, then Paige continues. “You’re going to figure it out, Tess. That’s how. You’re the queen of research. And living out there, the allowance is plenty.”
I ignore her enthusiastic reply and bitch some more. “I’m faced with this horror simply because Gary’s lawyer accused me of plotting to hide money.” I look at Paige who’s planted her butt on a tote labelledEvil Bastard’s Stereo.“And the reason? Because I gave a decent donation to the hospice that cared for Gran, as well as paying the year upfront for feed, straw and wages, to care for Gran’s animals —which as I already mentioned were only supposed to bea few chickens and thingsbut are so much more.” I blow out a hard breath and take a too large bite of scone.
“Gary’s a pig.” Paige pauses looking thoughtful then sips her tea before asking, “Is there a pig?”
I groan through my bite of scone before swallowing enough of it to speak. “God, I hope not.”
Paige digs through her purse, pulling out a permanent marker and proceeds to draw a pig beside the words I scrawled onto the tote. She nods in approval when it’s done.
“When I asked her to move in with us, she’d said,Ah honey, I can’t leave my animals. And I’d replied,What animals, Gran?And she said,oh, it’s just a few chickens and things, nothing tofuss about.Gives me something to do. And little Jay from down the road gives me a hand.” I toss the scone down on top of the box closest to me. “I called Little Jay, Paige and wanna know what he told me?”
Paige smirks. “More than you know.”
“This isn’t funny!” I cry and my best friend rises to come closer. I think she’s going to give me a hug but instead she scoops my scone off the box.
“Mind?” she asks, holding it up. “You stop eating when you’re stressed, I eat more often, kind of like a grazing cow.” She giggles an apology when I groan again. And then she eats the rest of my scone and dusts her hands off on her yoga pants.
“It’s going to be an adventure, Tess.” She takes my shoulders in her hands and gives me a little shake. “Exactly what you need to get out of the rut you’ve been in. Now tell me about your new animals.” The mischievous sparkle in her eyes almost makes me laugh, but I frown instead because I’m nothing if not dramatic.
