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None of them were looking for happily-ever-after yet it had fallen in each one of their laps.
And then there was me. The lone female Comfort sibling. All I’d ever wanted was to be in love. I wanted the sort of love that Billy, Hank, and Jimmy had all found.
Cash’s face popped into my head. I guess what I really wanted was for that love to be reciprocated.
“Get a room!” Jimmy, who was already inside the bar called out.
The three of us walked in and I saw that Reagan and I were the last two to arrive. The gang was all here.
Hank and his fiancée Skylar were seated at a two-top. Isabella and Jimmy were cuddled up in a corner booth with a large pizza that I assumed Hank had brought since he called the meeting and that was the rule. Reagan and Billy walked behind the bar and then there was me. I wasn’t the third wheel I was the seventh.
Growing up, I’d always felt like an outsider. I never fit into my grandparents’ life, not that they noticed. As long as I got the grades they wanted, played the instruments they deemed worthy of my learning, and didn’t speak they seemed happy. But we were never a family.
I hated complaining about my upbringing. I’d been raised in luxury. But I’d never felt loved, or even liked. They had each other and their social circle.
At school, I got along with people, but I’d never really had a best friend. I never asked if I could have people over because I didn’t really have time to entertain anyone. On the weekends I got ‘free time’ and I’d hang out at the mall or go to the movies. But my grandparents didn’t think it was appropriate for me to spend the night at other people’s houses, so I never got to go to sleepovers.
I think the parameters they placed on me and my hectic schedule were put in place because they hadn’t wanted me to turn out like my mom. They rarely spoke about her, but Milly—who had been the family house manager from the time my mom was a little girl—told me once after she’d had a few glasses of wine, that my grandparents had spoiled my mom. They’d never given her rules or made her do anything. She said that I was their redemption child.
I guess with me they wanted to right the mistakes they’d made with my mom by giving her too much freedom. Milly told me they were practicing tough love. I remember thinking at the time, does that mean they love me? Because in all the years I’d lived with them, they’d never spoken those words to me.
To this day, I had no clue if they actually loved me or if they’d just wanted a do-over. Actually, I was pretty sure they couldn’t love me considering they didn’t know me.
To be honest, I wasn’t even sure I knew myself.
I heard a snort and looked down to find Kevin Bacon, the bar pig. Or should I say bar mascot. Over the past couple of years he’d become Instafamous. Some people came to Firefly just to take a picture with him.
I bent down and gave him a scratch behind the ears. Currently Kevin Bacon and Skittles the parrot were the only two mascots. Although Ray, who had worked at the bar even before my parents bought it, had rescued a lot of animals over the years. There’s been Axl Rose the goat, Minnie Mouse the bearded dragon, and Cleopatra the python, to name a few.
“I called the family meeting because I wanted to apologize for my timing of the last one.” Hank didn’t waste time with pleasantries and got right to the point. “It was shitty.”
“No, it wasn’t. I’m glad you didn’t wait to tell us until after the honeymoon.” Billy said sincerely. “We’ve all had time to digest it. And act on it.”
Reagan pulled a pile of paperwork out of her bag. “This morning I reached out to an old colleague of mine in New York who specializes in probate law and he’s going to look into the trust and what needs to happen to get the funds released. I submitted the report from the private investigator and also included Wayne’s written statement and his copy of the unredacted police report which backs up everything Wayne said in his letter and his statement.” She removed the report from a white envelope and started to hand it to Jimmy, who had walked up to the bar with his hand out, but Hank grabbed it first. Reagan didn’t bat an eye and continued, “If the trust is no longer being protested then the funds should be released in the next thirty days.”
“What if it is protested?” Hank asked as he looked over the report.
“Then we’ll most likely have to go to arbitration which could end up taking months, maybe years.”
A silence fell on the group and one by one everyone’s eyes turned to me.
“Have you heard anything from them?” Billy asked.
If anyone would know what my grandparents’ plans were, it should be me. But I had no clue. “They haven’t spoken to me since I told them I was moving here. But if I had to guess, I would say that they will exhaust every avenue available to them to keep the trust frozen.”
“That’s what I thought.” Billy sighed.
A quiet fell on the group before Reagan said, “If that’s the case we’ll be ready and prepared. We can regroup when I’ve heard back from Justin and discuss a strategy.”
I loved Reagan. I wished that I had more of her take charge, type-A personality. As it was, I overthought everything and was somewhat of a procrastinator. Reagan made things happen. She never let anything get in her way or stop her.
Before moving here, she’d caught her fiancé having an affair with his secretary. It was complicated because she not only lived with him, she also worked for his family’s law firm. Instead of feeling sorry for herself she’d quit her job and moved thousands of miles away to a town where she only knew one person, Nadia, her college roommate.
She’d been proactive in circumstances that were out of her control and look where she was now. She had a job she loved and a husband who worshipped the ground she walked on.
The alarm sounded on my phone. I checked it and saw that it was a reminder that I had an appointment at Pretty in Peach so Miss Shaw could do a trial run on my hairstyle for the show. I started to say my goodbyes when I noticed that the envelope the police report had been in from Wayne, the man that my mother was pregnant by when she died, was lying on the bar top.
It had his home address on it.
On an impulse, I slid it off the counter and into my purse then said my goodbyes.
As I made the short walk down to the beauty salon, my heart was beating rapidly in my chest.
My life had felt so out of control for the past year. And before I came to live here, my entire life was controlled by my grandparents. I was tired of both of those extremes, and I thought I needed to take a page out of Reagan’s book.
From now on, I was going to ask myself What Would Reagan Do? And I think I knew the answer. I might not have any control over my situation with Cash, but there was a huge piece of my life that was missing and I had a lead in my purse that might help me find answers.
It was time for a road trip.
