Flower arranging is the best problem-solving technique I know of. If I can put aside a problem long enough to make a big bouquet, it’s probably not a problem worth solving anyway. If it is something big enough to focus on, I usually have a solution by the time I put the last flower in its place.
But my Parker problem? That was two-fold: one, I was in love with him, and two, he was moving to Los Angeles. It took two big arrangements to figure out what to do, because it obviously wasn’t something that could be put aside. Unfortunately the solution I came up with didn’t really do anything to solve my Parker problem, but it did send me in the right direction.
Instead of replaying my conversation with Parker over and over a million times so I could figure out what I should have said to make him stay, I made an apology arrangement for Nancy. Lilies and roses. Basic, but I knew she loved them. I even happened to have a stuffed Scottie dog I added to it. As soon as my last customers picked up their orders, I closed up shop and drove to Nancy’s.
I heard laughing before I knocked on their door, and I was sure it came from their third-floor apartment. But seconds after I knocked everything went silent inside. I could have sworn I’d heard footsteps coming to the door, so I knocked again. And then I knocked a third time.
Martha finally answered, but she only opened the door wide enough to peek her head out and say, “Hello, Eliza.”
I’d worked at Daddy’s office with Martha one summer. I was seventeen, and she was . . . well, she was just old and cranky. Every time I’d made a mistake—which was often—she’d say my full name in the same tight voice she’d just used, emphasizing the “za” with the disappointment of someone who’d discovered they’d been served a steak with only a butter knife to cut it.
“Hello, Mrs. Bates.” I hadn’t called her that in years. I was an adult, after all. But she’d reduced me to that same seventeen-year-old girl who couldn’t understand why it was so important to file paperwork in cabinets when computers had been invented to save people from such a boring job.
“What can I do for you?” She still hadn’t opened the door all the way.
“I was wondering if I might come in and talk to Nancy for a minute. I brought her these.” I held up the flowers as proof I’d come in peace.
“She’s a little busy right now.” Martha glanced over her shoulder and let the door open a couple more inches. “We’ve got a wedding to plan for, you know.”
“I know, and I’m so excited for you both!” I smiled wide. I’d found something to say that might convince her to let me in. “And for Jami too. Blake is a great guy.”
The door opened a fraction of an inch more. “You didn’t seem very excited at the party. You seemed mad. Or disappointed.” She cocked her head to the side. “Maybe even jealous.”
Martha literally had not said more than five words to me in the past five years, and suddenly she had a lot to say that I didn’t want to hear. Did people really think I had been rejected by Blake? I thought back to my conversation with Parker. He’d said something about my being upset with Blake. Did he think it was because I had feelings for Blake and not because Blake had hijacked Taylor’s whole wedding party and made it his own? Because that would explain a lot about why things got so weird between us. It also might mean . . .
“Liza?” Martha’s voice brought me back to the present and the task at hand.
“Sorry. I got distracted.” I had to call Parker. The art of flower arranging had worked, and I’d found the solution to my problem when I wasn’t even looking for it. Except now I had a bigger problem: apologizing quickly enough I’d have time to call Parker but sincerely enough for Nancy to believe me.
“I understand if Nancy doesn’t want to see me.” I held the flowers toward Martha, who didn’t get the hint she should take them. “I really am sorry I was so rude. It didn’t have anything to do with her, I was just . . .” Just what? How could I explain the person I was mad at that night was Erica for implying I wanted to be in Jami’s place, when really, I wanted to be in Hailey’s place? Hailey was the one who’d sat next to Parker and who he held in his arms. And—
“I suppose I could ask her if she’d like to see you.” Martha opened the door wide, but I’d been knocked in the head by an epiphany, and I had to leave.
“Give her some more time.” I shoved the flowers into Martha’s chest. If Nancy did forgive me—which was likely, considering her kind nature—I’d be stuck there for hours talking to her. “I’ll come back in a few days and see if she’s ready to talk then,” I blurted then bolted for the metal stairs, taking them as slowly as my racing heart would let me until I got to the second floor, out of Martha’s sight. Then I ran down them because I had to see Parker.
I’d finally put everything together. Parker hadn’t been acting weird because he had feelings for Hailey. He’d been acting weird because he had feelings for me. But he thought I had feelings for Blake. An easy mistake to make considering how much time Blake and I had spent together. Erica’s stupid comments at Taylor’s reception hadn’t helped either, but then, neither had my stupid comment about being upset with Blake.
I had to let him know who I really wanted to surf and laugh and dance and . . . other stuff with. Not Blake. It had never been Blake. It had always been Parker. From the time I was a little girl who followed him around begging for piggy-back rides to the awkward tween who had a crush on the very grown-up college boy to now, when we were both grown-ups and he could love me as something other than an annoying faux sister. He could love me as me, faults and all.
And I suspected he did.
At least, I really, really hoped he did. Otherwise I was about to make the biggest fool of myself possible. But I had to do it.
I pulled into my driveway twenty minutes later. Traffic, red lights, and a charger-less phone with a dead battery had all conspired against me. What should have been a ten-minute drive took double that, and I had no way to call Parker.
I shouldn’t have been surprised when I went around back and found his apartment dark. I knocked on the door anyway. No one answered. Then I rang the doorbell and peeked in every window I could. They all reconfirmed what I already knew—he wasn’t there.
I walked the short distance back to my house and went inside. I still had options. Or option, anyway. I’d have to call him. For some reason the thought of telling him face to face how I felt was less scary than doing it over the phone. Maybe because face to face I could gauge his body language and abort the whole mission if it looked like it was headed off course. I couldn’t do that over the phone.
“Eliza, is that you?” Daddy called from upstairs like he always did when I came in. As though it would be anybody else.
“Hi, Daddy!” I climbed the stairs quickly. I needed to call Parker before I lost my nerve, but I couldn’t run to my room like I wanted to without hugging my dad first.
“I put dinner in the oven a few minutes ago,” he said as I kissed his cheek. “It will be ready in fifteen minutes.” He motioned for me to sit next to him. “Tell me about your day.”
Fifteen minutes? I couldn’t wait that long plus the time it would take for us to eat. I had about fifteen seconds before my adrenaline rush wore off and my brain took back over in time to talk me out of calling Parker.
“I will in a minute. I have to do something first—” I started to say.
“Parker left for L.A. Did you know he’s moving there?” Daddy glanced from me to the couch, looking as confused about why I still wasn’t sitting by him as he was about why Parker would ever want to live anywhere besides right behind us.
But if I sat down, my legs wouldn’t want to get back up to carry me somewhere for the private conversation I needed to have. “He told me, but I thought he wasn’t moving until this weekend.”
“He’ll be back in a couple days to get his stuff,” he answered. “I don’t understand this sudden decision. He came over half an hour ago, thanked me for everything, and said he’d be back Friday to pack up.”
“I’ll be right back, Daddy.” I ran to my room, with Daddy calling after me wondering what was going on. I ignored him. If Parker had left thirty minutes before, I’d beg him to come back so we could talk, and I’d explain to Daddy later.
I dialed Parker’s number, my heartbeat increasing each time I pushed a digit. He didn’t answer, so I hung up and dialed again. And again. And three more times without an answer. He had to be driving and he had Bluetooth, so there was no way he wasn’t hearing his phone.
Which could only mean one thing: he didn’t want to talk to me.
But I wasn’t ready to give up. I thought about it, but the stakes were too high. I’d spent half a lifetime afraid of falling in love. Now that I was in it, I was going to fight for it.
Please pick up. I texted him just in case he was stopped in traffic and would glance at his phone then waited thirty seconds to call again.
It rang and rang with no answer.
I’d imagined a romantic scene where I’d knock on his door, he’d open it, I’d tell him I loved him, and he wouldn’t say anything—just take me in his arms, lifting me off the ground, and finally, finally, his lips would be on mine.
None of that was happening now.
The ringing changed to a beep, and his voice came on asking me to leave a message. I almost pressed end, but I knew if I hung up again, I’d never be able to say what I wanted to say. And I had to say it, even if it meant spilling my emotions all over like a first-time skater on an ice rink carrying one of those giant mugs full of Coke. Or Mountain Dew. Or whatever it was people who carried sixty-four-ounce mugs of soda drank.
“Don’t move to L.A., Parker,” I blurted. “I know it would make your life about a thousand times easier, but don’t do it. I should have told you that when you said goodbye today. I should have told you a lot of things. I don’t know why I didn’t.” I blathered, saying anything that made it from my brain to my mouth out of the million reasons he should stay that were darting through my head. I paused long enough to grab one of them. The best one of them.
“Here’s the thing. I love you.” My brain slowed down, and so did my heart. I’d said it. I’d said it, and nothing had exploded or imploded or . . . ploded in any way. I could say more. I could say everything. He might not want to hear it, but I had to do it.
“And I think you may love me too,” I went on. “At least, I hope you do. Because I really can’t imagine my life without you. I think I’ve known that for a long time, but it wasn’t until I had to think about that possibility that I realized I didn’t want to think about it. Ever.
“Please come home. Please.” I didn’t know what else to say. I’d said everything I had to, and even if it turned out he didn’t love me back, I felt lighter. I didn’t know how I’d bear it if he didn’t love me, but at least I could stop pretending I didn’t love him.
“Okay. I think that’s all. Except, please call me.” I pressed the phone to my ear like I might be able to hear into the future and skip right to the part where he was supposed to tell me he loved me too.
I couldn’t hear anything. Obvs, as Hailey would say. All I could do was wait.