The Provence Cure for the Brokenhearted by Bridget Asher Read Free Book Online Page B

about her body—and who could blame her? Elysius was a workout freak who could live on her fridge contents of yogurt and baby carrots. And, if memory served me well, Charlotte’s mother was tall and thin. I’d met Charlotte’s mother only once, at one of Charlotte’s early birthday parties. Charlotte’s mother was not happy. That’s what I remembered. She didn’t want Charlotte to open the gifts in front of the other kids.“It’s too showy,” she said. “No one wants to sit through someone else’s happiness.”
    “Are you doing SAT prep now?” I asked. “You know, we’re supposed to be lining up in a few minutes.”
    “I’m trying to look like I’m studying,” she said. “It’s the one thing they can’t give me shit for.”
    “You look like you
are
studying,” I said, “except for staring out the window.”
    “I’ve gotten very convincing at looking like I’m studying. You just crack open a heavy book and uncap a highlighter. You have to make yourself look like you’re in charge.”
    “I’m in charge of making sure you’re ready.”
    “Am I ready?”
    “I think so.”
    She started stacking her books.
    “Are all those books just props?” I asked. “Do you set-design little fake study scenarios?”
    “Yep,” she said, and she stood up. “It looks very believable, though, doesn’t it? It’s very … rapacious.”
    “Rapacious?”
    “It’s, you know …” She looked at the palm of her hand where she had written some words in red ink. She was wearing black fingernail polish. “Um, it’s very redolent and recalcitrant.”
    “Do you know what those words mean?” I asked.
    “I’m supposed to use them in sentences so that I come to understand them. My father told me to.”
    “I think he meant that you’re supposed to use them in sentences, correctly, though—not just to use them.”
    “Right. That makes sense,” she said. “But it’s harder.” And I was pretty sure she knew that she was being funny, although she didn’t smile in the least.
    “You look beautiful,” I said.
    “I look like a dough-fart,” she said. Dough-fart? It seemed like the kind of expression that I, as a pastry chef, should know, but I’d never heard of it. “I hate this dress. I’m in the third ring of hell. Weddings are just reminders that love is so pathetic it needs a whole institution to hold it up.” Then she looked up at me, wide-eyed, like she’d said the wrong thing. Had bad-mouthing marriage made her think that she’d said something insensitive about my marriage and therefore my dead husband? “I’m sorry,” she said. “I forgot. I mean, I didn’t forget. It’s just that I wasn’t thinking.”
    “Your father’s getting married again. My sister’s getting married,” I said. “This might not be the easiest day for either of us.”
    “My father is already wrapped up in his own life. He’d marry his work if he could, you know. That’s the sad part. He can’t marry art.”
    I’d heard Charlotte make these kinds of comments before. She wanted more from her father, and he was capable of only so much. She seemed to accept it, but the acceptance didn’t take the sting out. “I think it’s good they’re making it official, Elysius and your dad.”
    “It’s a little bureaucratic, but I’m fine with it.” She shrugged. “I’m okay, in general, you know. I’m fine!” She seemed to want to get off the subject.
    “I’m okay, too, despite the fact that Elysius is trying to fix me up with a guy at the wedding.”
    “Really? Who?”
    “Jack Nixon.”
    “Huh,” Charlotte said. “He came for dinner once. He’s nice.”
    “Well, I’m not ready for that kind of thing. And setups are sneaky.”
    “True,” she said. “Veracity.”
    “We’re supposed to go down and meet people on the deck so we can line up like ducks,” I said, and then suddenly felt like I was underwater, sinking. We were going to line up. We were going to a wedding. We were all going to talk