It’s midnight, sixteen hours before Portia is due to walk down the aisle. Fern is with Carolina and Andi in Emma’s living room; they’re staying the night to lend moral support.
The three of them were on setup duty at the wedding venue, a small former monastery turned winery a few miles from the house, while Emma attended the rehearsal dinner at a restaurant in town. They set hurricane candles on each of the tables, hung fairy lights from the roof of the veranda, and wove streams of jasmine and grapevine up and down the aisle.
Now Carolina and Andi are toasting the day’s success. Emma is in the kitchen reviewing her to-do list for the umpteenth time. Fern sits in the corner not having any fun.
“If I go to prison, I’m going to...” Andi raises her glass and a splosh of champagne lands on her pants. This is a game they created after watching Orange Is the New Black and declaring Natasha Lyonne Queen Goddess of the Universe. “I’m going to get a tattoo of a rose.”
“Boooringgg!” Carolina gives her a thumbs-down and a thbbft! “You have to get something more exciting than a rose.”
“Like?”
“Like a Buddha on your butt cheek. That makes you a Buddh-ass.” Carolina crumples in on herself with laughter.
“That doesn’t even make any sense.”
“Buddh-ass,” cackles Carolina.
Fern tries to resist snickering but fails. “It is kinda funny, actually.”
“I don’t get it!” Andi’s intelligence often impedes her ability to see the humor in things. “Seriously! Are you trying to say badass?”
Carolina slides to the floor, clutching her stomach while protecting her knee. “Don’t make me pee!”
Fern’s glad she’s not drunk enough to land on the floor beside her. “How does one get a tattoo in prison, anyway?” She can’t imagine the bureau of prisons allows for needles and tattoo guns.
“Ballpoint pens.” Andi, their resident prison expert, holds up her index finger and pretends to cut it off at the first knuckle. “They take out the ink cartridge, cut it into a sharp point, and drive it into the skin.” She shoves her nubby finger in Fern’s face.
“Easy there, cowgirl. Just curious, is all.”
Fern is staying sober tonight because she’s worried about what she might say under the influence of alcohol. Now that Smart Girls is in production, an even fatter check than the first has landed in her bank account. It’s enough to pay for Maisy’s first year at Amherst and the fact that she can’t share her good news with her best friends has her itching in all the worst places.
Even more, Dakota’s production company publicly released news of the deal on Tuesday. She doubts her friends read the industry rags, but they could have seen the news anywhere, heard it from anyone. Meaning, the truth is out there, floating about over her head like Pigpen’s dirt cloud.
She’s got to tell them first, to get ahead of it, before they find out on their own.
“Hey, you guys?” Like Mack told her months ago, she’s just going to have to rip off the Band-Aid. Take her bruises, make her apologies, and hope forgiveness comes swiftly.
At the moment, however, Andi and Carolina are engrossed in the idea of toilet wine and whether either of them would be desperate enough to make it.
“But if you’re using the toilet to ferment the fruit cocktail,” Carolina asks, “where do you go?”
“In the corner,” answers prison expert Andi. “In the showers. Over a drain in the floor. You can claim you’re having your period and wear a pad to pee in.”
“You guys!” What Fern has to say is far more important.
They turn to her.
“I need to tell you something.”
And that’s when Emma screams from the other room. “WHAT THE FU—”
Fern and Andi leap to their feet. “Help me up!” Carolina cries.
Emma comes in waving what looks like one of Portia’s wedding invitations. “What the hell is he trying to do?”
Fern, the most sober and therefore the quickest, grabs the paper from her hand. It is Portia’s invitation. At the bottom is a handwritten note.
Can’t wait! Carlton
Fern’s voice comes out sounding as incredulous as she feels. “You invited Carlton?”
“You did?” Andi and Carolina echo.
“Of course not!” Emma snatches the invitation back. “I don’t have any idea how he managed to get his hands on this.”
Andi blows out a deep breath, presumably trying to sober up quick. “It’s just a scare tactic. He’s snot—” She stops.
Carolina snort laughs.
Emma shoots her the look of death.
Andi starts again. “He’s not going to show up because he knows he’d be trespassing. You could have him thrown out in front of two hundred guests. The video would go viral in minutes.”
“He’d also ruin the wedding. Which is what he wants.” Emma clenches her fists and roars. “WHY THE HELL IS HE DOING THIS TO ME?”
“Because he’s an ass,” Fern answers. “And because he can. He knows a lot of your friends, knows your family. He probably paid some cousin a thousand bucks for their invitation and their silence.”
Andi steps forward and gently takes Emma’s arm. “It’s a million-to-one odds he’ll show up tomorrow. Carlton Willis is a bully who’s only gotten worse with age. You haven’t given him the assurance that he wants, so this is his response.”
“I have a thumb drive with a copy of the video in the safe-deposit box at my bank.” Carolina’s eyes light up, excited by the potential of sending Carlton to the bottom of the swamp from which he came. “Want Queenie to get it and bring it along tomorrow? Then if he shows up, we can play it on the big screen. Put an end to Carlton forever.”
Devin had done something sweet and put together a slide show of Portia from the day she was born to the day she and Lyle got engaged. The DJ was scheduled to play it during dinner.
“He can’t.” Emma’s face falls. “Tomorrow is Saturday. The bank will be closed.”
“No, I’m sure it’s open part of the day.” Carolina pulls out her phone and searches the location’s hours. “Crap. The drive-though is open until noon but the lobby is closed.”
Fern immediately hates herself for it, but she closes her eyes and allows a wave of relief to crash over her. With everyone on high alert for Carlton Willis tomorrow, she doesn’t have to say a word about what she’s done.