Page 65 of The New Year's Party
“Wait! Let me get you a flashlight!” said Phelps. “There’s one in the Dog House. Wait, man—at least take your phone, I still have your phone—” But Bennett was already gone.
The corn rustled, then went still.
Phelps stood stock-still in the yard, looking toward the cornfield, Bennett’s phone dangling from his hand. Doug could see his shoulders rising and falling with his breathing.
Ted, from the height of the deck, was leaning on the rail and watching them. Smoke meandered from his joint into the dark sky like it had all the time in the world.
Phelps finally turned. For once in his life, he seemed lost for words.
“Sooooo...” Ted took a drag, held the smoke, then released it. His lip quirked in a half grin toward Phelps. “Allie. Let’s be real. Way too young and hot for you. Thoughts?”
Chapter 29
Hellie
Fifteen minutes earlier
“Ten... nine... eight...”
We all chant it together—or at least those of us present. Doug is still in the Dog House with Phelps and Bennett, and even though normally I’d at least be with my husband in spirit during a crisis of the magnitude of his injury, my focus isn’t there at all. It’s fully here as I stand next to Will, who’s just come inside from the deck.
Watching the liquid slosh around in my champagne flute is how I know my hand is shaking. Anger charges through my veins, begging me to let it out, to let Will have it. I’m fully aware I’m about to snap.
Ever since I put two and two together over dinner, I’ve been forcing myself to bide my time. I need to confront Will, but the moment hasn’t been right, and I haven’t thought out what to say, not to mention I don’t want to ruin Phelps’s party. It’s getting unbearable though. Standing so close to Will and pretending everything is fine. I imagine him in his smug little middle management office, feeding Doug’s background check into his fax machine, feeling righteous and superior as he toppled the first domino that would effectively end our future.
I’ve only snapped one other time in my life—when Dougwas in rehab the second time, a coworker stole my tips and I was late on rent already. I still have a scar from that one. Sometimes I touch it, to calm myself down. Not now.
“...three, two, one...”
“Happy New Year!” everyone explodes. I shout it too, as loud as I can. My voice sounds high, almost shrieky. Thin and breakable, just like the plate shards no one wanted to pick up. Just like me.
But no. That’s not true. I’m not as breakable as I seem, not as breakable as I feel. I’m going to survive tonight. And I’m going to survive tomorrow, when I pack up my stuff and leave Doug. Doug who I’ve loved since I was seventeen, when I looked into his blue eyes and he said, “Hello, princess. What’s your name?” I was his server, he was with friends—Phelps, actually, and Bennett—and Doug ordered two eggs over easy with toast and left me his number on a napkin and a twenty-dollar tip even though his part of the order was only five dollars. Doug who took me in when I had to leave home because Mom’s latest boyfriend was getting fresh. Doug who I fell for so fast it was like diving into a pool to escape the heat.
Now it’ll be me against the world. With no respite, no one to lean on... but no one to betray me.
I used to believe that if I made better choices, my life would turn out different than my mom’s. She’s a fifty-five-year-old bartender with at least two STDs at any given time who still shoplifts her cosmetics. I chose loyalty to one husband instead of an ever-rotating door of shitty boyfriends. I chose in sickness and in health even when Doug’s sickness turned out to be a drug addiction. I chose in riches and in poverty even when, while Doug was in jail for a week for getting caught with enough marijuana to be considered “intent to deal,” our landlord wanted sexual favors in return for not evicting me, a memory that still haunts me at two in the morning. And here I am now, thirty-four, bartending and waitressing, looking atleast ten years older than I am, just like my mom. The only difference between me and her is that I don’t have crabs or stolen L’Oréal lipstick in my purse.
Will extends his glass toward me, but I make a vicious turn away from him and clink with Olivia, Bunny, then Ted, finally Allie. Not Jenn—I pretend to be distracted as she lifts her glass to mine, and I pivot toward the TV. The giant screen is like a bursting piñata of fireworks and, for a second, it almost feels like we’re there, in the crowd. It’s 2020. People are going wild, I feel the hope in the air, and I envy all the people who expect 2020 to give them amazing things. New jobs... new relationships... new houses and babies and promotions...
I don’t know how long I watch the happy crowds in front of me. As Ted leads the group in a rowdy chorus of “Auld Lang Syne,” which no one appears to actually know the words to, I keep my eyes on the TV. The male and female announcers are jolly. A band is playing. There are shots of children sitting on the shoulders of their parents. Couples with their arms around each other. Glittering eyes and joyful faces. There’s a burning fist in my stomach.
I vaguely register that Ted is saying, “Hey, you don’t look so good, how about a breather,” and I’m about to say,Yes, please, when I realize he’s talking to Olivia. He ushers her toward the kitchen, I hear the whisper of the party streamers as they pass through them, and my stomach is suddenly on fire with envy, envy of that arm around Olivia’s shoulder, envy of that thing she has that makes men pay attention to her in all the best ways.
As for me? I know what they all think. Hellie is the reliable one. The steady one. The one who we can all take advantage of, because she’ll just keep going and going like the good little workhorse that she is.
The one whose babies are better offdead.
Strangely, of all the things that have happened tonight, theone that cuts me down the rest of the way is this: no one even notices that I’m about to break.
“Hey, we didn’t toast,” says Will, coming up behind me, and that is fuckingit. I spin, wielding my champagne flute high. Liquid flies as I swing wide. With a gut-wrenching shout that comes from the depths of my soul, I smash my glass against Will’s head. He stumbles back with a cry of surprise, all the way to the floor, his head and shoulders hitting the edge of the couch just as a violent sob shakes me.
“Hellie! Oh, myGod!” It’s Bunny, running up behind me, grabbing my shoulder, but I thrash away.
“Itrustedyou!” I shout, pointing the jagged remains of my champagne flute at Will. Blood is blooming on his temple and slipping down the side of his face. “Why? Why would you do that?”
Jenn is at Will’s side, a clump of napkins in her hand.
“What? What did I do?” gasps Will as he grabs the napkins and presses them into his head. “Hellie, what is going on?”
