Tell Me It’s Right (Sweetspire #1)

Chapter 46

Chapter Forty-Six

GRACIE

Liam: I’m so sorry. Something came up with Casey. I won’t make it for 7. Can we try closer to 9?

I hesitate at the outskirts of the park with my store-bought sandwich. So much for hurrying home. Not that I would’ve stayed longer otherwise. Less than an hour there and I still left the bar feeling like I needed a nap. I backtrack through the path until I come across an empty bench, sit, and tear open my clearance bin dinner.

We’re still hanging on to those long days of summer, so the sun hasn’t quite set yet, casting a golden tint to the surrounding park. The paths are full of people heading home from work, jogging, or walking their dogs. I close my eyes for a moment and breathe in the fresh air. It’s not quite as peaceful as I’d been hoping for with cars honking and music from the surrounding bars in the background.

I wanted this. More than anything, I wanted this , I remind myself.

I worked so hard to be here. I spent nights crying into my pillow when I thought this day wouldn’t come.

Across the street, I catch sight of a man rolling by on a skateboard.

My stomach twists.

All I can think about is the summer. Sitting in coffee shops, on the beach, the skatepark, the shop. Laughing with Carson or Liam or Leo, working day and night because I so badly wanted to see the shop improve. Because it felt like that mattered. Like everything I was doing had the potential to make a difference.

I glance around the park, at all the strangers passing by, people I’ll probably never see again and whose names I’ll never know. And I desperately try to remember when it was that I decided I wanted this. And why.

When nine o’clock rolls around and I still haven’t heard from Liam, I FaceTime Marti instead. The odds of her being available on a Friday night are slim, but at least since she’s on the West Coast, it’s only six o’clock for her.

“Gracieee!” Marti squeals as her face blurs across the screen. She sets the phone up in what seems to be her bathroom, her hair half pinned up like she was in the middle of straightening it. Rap music blares somewhere in the background, and she shouts over it for her speaker to pause. “I’m so glad you called! I was wondering how your first week in the big city went.” She fishes around in a makeup bag on the counter until she finds a brush, then disappears from view as she leans closer to the mirror.

“Oh, you’re busy. This can wait.”

“No—no!” She snatches the phone off the counter, a close-up of her face abruptly coming into view. “I wanted to talk to you anyway! I have newsss .”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yes!” she squeals and sets the phone down, leaving me to stare at her ceiling. She snatches me up again just as quickly, and I have to look away from the screen for a moment, starting to get motion sick. “Gracie, I got the part!”

“I— what ?”

“Yes!” she screams. “I just got the call from my agent like thirty minutes ago. I. Got. The. Part! I’m screaming. I’m dying. I’m levitating. I’m dreaming, right? This isn’t real.”

“Oh my God, Marti, that’s amazing! I’m so happy for you!”

“I really thought I didn’t stand a chance,” she gushes, props the phone up, and goes to town blending the blush on her cheeks. “So I wasn’t getting my hopes up. My agent was a little more optimistic since they got the big name for the male lead, so they had a little more leeway with my part, but I didn’t think they’d cast a nobody .”

I roll my eyes. “You’re not a nobody.”

“You know what I mean.” She drops the brush onto the counter and leans her face close with a goofy smile. “I don’t know, Gracie, I just really feel like this is going to be my big break, you know? If this goes well, this could open so many doors for me. I’m just—I’m so—” Tears fill her eyes. “Ugh.” She looks up and fans her face with both hands. “I’m going to ruin my makeup!”

“So are you going out tonight to celebrate?”

“You bet your ass I am! I want to stay out until the sun comes up. Ugh, I wish you and the girls were here too. You’d love LA…” She grimaces. “Okay, you’d hate it. But I would love having you here.”

“So what’s next? What happens now?”

“I don’t have all the details yet, but it sounds like it’s going to be a lot. Rehearsals, trainings, choreographing, table reads. It sounds like we’ll be jumping right into prep here pretty soon.”

“God, Marti, I’m, like, in shock. This is so amazing.”

“I know, me too!” She does a little dance as she sifts through her lip gloss options, then pauses. “Wait, you called me. What’s up? Tell me alllll about the new job!”

“Oh. Um. Great. Everything’s great. I actually just went out with some coworkers for drinks.”

“Oh my God, that’s great. I’m so happy for you. So you guys get along well?”

“I—yeah, yeah.” I cringe at the way my voice shoots up an octave. “They’re very…passionate, but nice. More welcoming than I was expecting.”

“And how’s the new apartment? It must be so nice being out of the basement, right?”

A weird longing settles into the pit of my stomach, but I clear any trace of it from my face by the time Marti looks back at the screen.

“Yeah. The building is nice. It feels really safe, and it’s close to work, so I’ve been walking there every day.”

“Ugh. A dream. LA is so not walkable.”

A dream .

“Wow, I love this for us.” Marti beams. “Everything’s working out for all of us right now, isn’t it?”

I don’t correct her. How can I? Especially not today, the day she got the most amazing news of her life. She doesn’t need my pity party energy right now.

“Well, have fun tonight!”

“Tell Liam I said hi!” She air kisses the camera and waves before hanging up.

The following silence rings in my ears.

I didn’t lie to Marti. I am happy for her. Of course I am.

But that conversation did the opposite of make me feel better.

Another text from Liam waits in my notifications, apologizing that he’s still too busy and he’ll call me tomorrow instead.

I change into one of his T-shirts that still smells like him and shuffle my way to the bed. Hugging a pillow to my chest, I curl into a ball on my side and look out at the city below. As the tears roll down my face, I don’t bother trying to stop them. I just let them flow on and on.

It’ll get better. Eventually, it will.

It has to.