One Last Time (Loveless Brothers 5)

“Thanks,” I say as she stands on her toes and presses a quick kiss to my temple.

“Don’t be late tomorrow!” Vera calls after me as I open the heavy front door of her house, then let it fall shut behind me.

I exhale, my breath fogging in front of me like I’m a dragon with its light extinguished, and I head down the front stairs of my parents’ mansion and onto the curved, paved driveway, the fountain in the center shut off for the winter and oddly quiet.

Everything is quiet, stark, dead. It’s not even five o’clock yet, but the sun is a faded memory in the western sky, the moon and stars hard and bright above. The trees that line the long driveway to the house are bare, branches stabbing at the sky like skeletal hands.

Virginia is far enough north that it gets cold but too far south to get much snow, so for four months every year the world is dead and brown and gray. The little we do get sends everyone into a panic for forty-eight hours before melting into dirty scraps at the side of the road, so it’s not much help.

I head for my car. I breathe the cold air deep, then exhale hard. It’s cold and gray and shitty, the time of year when it feels like spring will never come, and I had to think about Seth again today.

I don’t want to think about Seth. I don’t want to think about our shared past, and I particularly don’t want to think about it this close to Ava’s wedding, but here I am.

As I’m driving down the tree-lined lane, away from my parents’ house, I wonder how much longer it’s going to take to get over him.I tap my pen against the paper as Vera slows to a careful stop. In the backseat there’s the swish of drycleaning in garment bags swinging together.

“Is there anything else we need on the absolutely do not play list?” I ask, trying to think.

“You’ve got Lay Lady Lay on there?”

“There’s a zero percent chance that the band is going to play a weird Dylan song at Ava’s wedding,” I point out as she eases the car forward.

“There’s a zero percent chance if you put it on the no list,” she says.

I write Lay Lady Lay on the list, just to humor her.

“Every Rose Has Its Thorn,” she goes on. “Pour Some Sugar On Me. They’re stripper songs.”

“Sure, that’s why,” I tease, writing them both down.

“They are.”

“You’re just afraid that you won’t be able to hold back your true inner self if they come on,” I say. “I’ve seen pictures of you from the eighties.”

“Delilah, are you calling my true inner self a stripper?”

“I’m calling your true inner self an Axl Rose fangirl who might not be able to resist an air guitar solo,” I say, grinning. “Nonna told me all about your bedroom walls in high school.”

There’s a secret, sneaky smile on Vera’s face, and she glances at me quickly while she drives.

“I’ve still got some of the pictures,” she says, raising an eyebrow like she’s being really bad. “Don’t tell your father.”

I make a lip-zipping motion, then throw away a pretend key.

“And Don’t Stop Believing,” she says. “You young people have ruined that song for me.”

I sigh and write it down, even though I kind of like it.

It’s Friday, the day before Ava’s wedding, and I’ve been out with Vera since nine this morning running wedding-related errands. In the back we’ve got bridesmaids’ dresses, cummerbunds, the flowers girls’ and ring bearers’ outfits, plus all the outfit-related odds and ends anyone could possibly want. There’s a roll of duct tape back there, next to a small sewing kit. I don’t know what it’s for. I’m afraid to ask.

Officially, she wanted me to come along because she also dropped in to see how the flowers and cake were coming, and I’ve got an “artist’s eye,” but really, I think having someone along on these errands soothes her anxious, micromanaging psyche.

If Vera were acting this way about a Saturday afternoon barbecue, I’d push back. But it’s Ava’s wedding, which is a very big deal. I’m pretty sure she’ll be back to normal some time next week. At least, that was the case with the other three weddings she’s planned — mine, Winona’s, and Olivia’s — so I just need to smile and nod until it all blows over.

“Any other beloved anthems you want to make sure people don’t hear?” I tease, looking down the list of songs that includes all of the above, as well as The Chicken Dance, The YMCA, and Friends in Low Places.

That last one was Ava’s addition. She hates that song.

“Paradise by the Dashboard Lights.”

“I’m not writing that down, there’s absolutely no way that —"

I glance out the front window as I’m talking and realize we’re not in town anymore, nor are we on the road back to my parents’ house.