In touch with my feelings? My feelings are a hot stove I want to test, even knowing the last time how it burned.
Chapter Thirty-One
Yasmen
It’s my favorite night of the year.
Or at least it used to be. On New Year’s Eve, you stand at the juncture of before and after. I know a new year doesn’t actually deliver a clean slate. That past-due rent? Still past-due at the stroke of midnight. That dead-end job? Still not going anywhere. The ailing marriage doesn’t heal itself by the end of “Auld Lang Syne.” This I know firsthand.
But the feeling of newness, the sense of possibility, can spur you to transform your circumstances in significant ways. Other than the last two years, I’ve planned every New Year’s Eve party Grits has ever had. Last year Josiah and I were barely speaking, and I left the planning of the party to Bayli and a few of the staff. Tonight we’re on better terms, though a different kind of tension has crept up between us. We may not have discussed our two-fuck, one-night stand, but too often I wake up sweating and panting and wet between my legs because Josiah roams around naked in my dreams.
“Party’s hype,” Hendrix says beside me. “Good job as usual.”
“Thank you. The whole staff did their part.”
Surrounded by partygoers halfway to their New Year’s buzz, we’re seated on Grits’s second floor at a huge table on the landing that leads out to the roof and overlooks the main dining room. Deja, along with Soledad, her three girls, and—for once—her husband, Edward, round out our group.
“I love the decorations,” Soledad says, peering over the side and scanning the Christmas lights and holly still suspended from the ceiling and hanging on the walls. “Everything looks fantastic.”
“That special bunting you made is chef’s kiss.” I grin at her and sip my French 75. “You really need to consider turning these talents to dollars, girl.”
“What’s that mean?” Edward asks, eyes lifting from his phone maybe for the first time tonight. “Dollars? What’s she talking about, Sol?”
Soledad clears her throat and rerolls her silverware in its linen napkin on the table. “Yas and Hen think I could turn some of my ideas into a business.”
“No doubt about it,” Hendrix chimes in. “Joanna Gaines got nothing on Sol.”
“Except a billion-dollar empire,” Edward scoffs, knocking back his scotch.
“Only a matter of time.” Hendrix’s smile is tight and her eyes are sharp. “Given the opportunity to focus her energies on it.”
Edward laughs. “You’ve got good friends, honey.”
“I really do,” Soledad replies, deliberately taking his sarcasm at face value. “Maybe I should listen to their advice.”
The glass on its way to Edward’s mouth freezes midair. “You can’t be serious. We’ve got the girls.”
“Joanna Gaines has five kids,” Deja interjects from across the table, chewing on an appetizer of fried green tomatoes.
“Doesn’t seem to have slowed her down,” Lupe adds, blinking long lashes innocently at her father. “I don’t want to be the reason Mom doesn’t do all she’s capable of.”
I glance between the two confident, composed thirteen-year-olds making more sense than the only grown man at our table. The next generation is scarily fierce if these girls are any indication.
“You aren’t,” Soledad tells Lupe firmly, taking time to look all three girls in their eyes. “None of you are. Raising you is exactly what I want to do. It always has been.”
“What about when we’re gone? I’m starting high school next year, and these rug rats”—Lupe grins, gesturing to her sisters—“aren’t far behind.”
“Yeah, Mom,” Inez adds. “We aren’t babies anymore.”
“Running our home, raising our kids,” Edward says, a frown puckering his brows. “That’s always been your dream.”
“One of them,” Soledad says, her words soft, but laced with a bit of steel I’m not used to from her. “Things change, right?”
A long look passes between husband and wife, and they are definitely holding a silent conversation the rest of us aren’t privy to. Hendrix kicks me under the table. I grunt and shoot her a glare.
“You guys want refills or more of anything before I go?” I smile like all is sunshine and lollipops. “I need to go make sure we’re ready for the midnight toast.”
“I’m good, but thanks,” Edward answers, lifting his phone to resume staring down at the screen.