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“No, Liv,” Delia wailed. “Scientists don’t sing. I can’t take it!”
Olivia got to her feet and put her fists to her hips, taking a break from the song to announce, “Scientist singer.”
“Of course. Well, if you’re going to singFrozentunes, you need to go join your sister or I might have to use my freezing fingers on you.” Delia waggled her fingers at the little girl and made a crazy face.
Olivia hesitated, and then gathered her rocks into the front of her yellow T-shirt and picked up her microscope, trudging off to the back of the house, strains of “Let It Go”wafting down the hall after her. My heart squeezed as I exchanged a smile with Delia. She had everything, and it amplified the pain in my chest to realize how far from her life my own still was.
My wine tasted strangely sour, and instead of making me feel better, it was turning my stomach, so I put it down. “Oliver and I broke up.”
Delia’s face immediately turned sad, as she pressed her lips together and furrowed her own eyebrows. “Oh, honey.” She reached to lay a hand on mine and then crossed to me and pulled me into a hug. “What was his reason? What did he say?”
I pushed her away. “Why do you assume hebroke up with me?”
She shook her head, the tight braids shining in the glow coming from the tall windows behind her as she sat back down. “Sorry. I don’t know. It was you?”
I nodded.
“Why?” Her voice was a whisper.
“It just wasn’t right, Deel. I was sleeping with my boss!”
“That again? Seriously?”
“It’s not ethical,” I told her, annoyed that I’d have to explain it. “I got a raise, pulled in the MLB deal, took a promotion . . . and I don’t get to be happy about it because it feels like maybe none of it would have happened without Oliver.”
“So shouldn’t you be thanking him instead of saying ‘Get out’?”
“No!” Anger flared in my head, making the lingering headache I’d had all day throb in my temples. “No, Deel. Don’t you see how it looks? Even if I did all that myself, all anyone will think is that I got it by sleeping with the CEO.”
She shrugged. “You know that’s not true, though,” she said. “You earned all of it.”
“But it’s how it looks.”
“Right, I see that. But I’m not sure how much that matters. What if he’s the guy? What if you’re perfect together? Will you let the way things look keep you from being happy?”
I narrowed my eyes at her. “You’re supposed to be on my side.”
We sat in silence for a moment, across from each other in the armchairs in front of Delia’s living room windows, ourwine on the small table between us, and Delia looked like she was thinking about something. “Honey, I’m always on your side. That’s why I have to tell you when I think you’re wrong. Oliver was good for you. He’s a good guy, and you two fit together. I could see it. Even Carl could see it, and he doesn’t exactly notice subtleties.”
Delia had always had a way of cutting to the basic elements of a situation while I had to think through every detail and often got lost in the weeds. I tried to weigh whether she was right in this case, but still felt the sting of not owning my accomplishments entirely. I knew I’d done the right thing breaking up with him. It was right, at least on paper, but God, I missed him. I picked up my wine, but the first sip made me put it back down on the table.
“You don’t like it?” Delia asked, nodding to the wineglass. Her own glass was almost empty. “It’s the Vermentino you told Carl was the best thing you’d ever tasted. We bought a half-case just for you!”
“Maybe this bottle is corked?” I asked, picking up the wine and sniffing it. Even the smell made me flinch.
Delia sniffed hers and then swallowed the rest with a smile. “Something’s wrong with you, girl.” She grinned at me.
I shrugged and put the wine back down. Nothing had tasted right since I’d broken up with Oliver. “I think my heart is making my food taste funny.”
“I don’t think it works like that.”
The doorbell rang and Delia jumped up to answer it. “Pizza!” she called to the back of the house.The faint sounds of the movie stopped and small feet pounded down the hallway as Delia paid the pizza guy and handed me the boxes. “Can you get some plates out?”
We ate with the little girls, listening to their analysis of whether Sven was a reindeer or—Olivia’s opinion—a moose, and whether Olaf would really enjoy a beach vacation or if that was just something he threw in the song to make it rhyme. It felt good to distract myself for a while with their happy chatter, but I couldn’t eat much and Delia was watching me through the whole meal with a strange look on her face.
As we cleared dishes, she cornered me in the kitchen. “When was your last period, Holl?”
Not the kind of question I was used to from a dinner companion. I raised an eyebrow and frowned at her. “When’s the last time you and Carl had sex?” I shot back.
