The Status of All Things (21 page)

“How about you, Jules?” I ask. “Is your life better the second time around?”

She pauses to refill her glass. “Hard to say,” she says. “You’re the only one who remembers living it the first time. You tell me.”

My mind wanders back to the month leading up to the wedding. Jules had seemed a little distracted, but I had chalked it up to stress. Between Ben, her kids, and her job, and being my matron of honor, her life was so busy that there was little room for error. But now I’m sure I must have missed something more serious. “You did seem”—I search for the right word—“distracted.”

A shadow passes over her face. “Interesting.” She glances at her watch. “Hey, we’ve got reservations at Sushi Samba soon—I’m going to jump in the shower.”

After the water is turned on, I glance over at Liam. “Do you think Jules has been acting weird lately? Is that why you asked her about why she
really
chose Vegas, because I agree with you, that’s not like her at all. . . .”

“Define
weird.
Because you’ve time traveled, wished her a kickass makeover, and me a famous girlfriend. So it seems like a sliding scale.”

“Touché.” I laugh. “But in all seriousness, she’s been different, right?”

“I don’t know—like you said, I’ve been MIA,” he says, and I can tell my comment bothers him.

“About that . . .”

“Forget it, let’s just have a good time and not worry about how any of us is acting. I think we can agree that we’re all doing the best we can under the circumstances.”

“You’re right, but what if this thing with Jules is more serious, like she might be having real problems, maybe even with Ben?” I start to tell him about what I overheard in Jules’ foyer when the buzzing of his phone interrupts us. I grab it before he can. “Can Nikki handle not receiving a text from you for five seconds? I’m trying to talk to you about something important here.”

I survey Liam as he searches for his answer. “Okay. She does seem slightly off. But if she has a problem, she’ll talk to us about it—I’m not going to force her.”

A dozen scenarios flare through my mind as I wonder what could be wrong between Jules and Ben—
if anything
. It was true that I could be reading too much into the fight I overheard. The reality was that couples argued, especially ones that had been together as long as they had. And it was possible I was being hypersensitive because of my own situation with Max. But the instinct in my gut told me something had happened to shift their dynamic dramatically. And I had wondered more than once, based on some of the cryptic comments Jules had made about her marriage, if Ben had cheated on her. It was possible—he traveled a lot and was a good-looking guy. But while there was a chance it had happened, I just couldn’t believe he had it in him. He used to brag that he didn’t need to look at other women after he met Jules—that she was the most beautiful person on the planet.

“I’m not saying we need to force her to tell us her secrets, I just want to make sure she knows she can confide in us. That we won’t judge her
or
Ben.” Max flashes through my mind, how I had ignored our problems until he’d been forced to look
other
places
for the answers he needed. I didn’t want Jules to make the same mistake. “After what happened to me, I just worry that if she’s wearing blinders, it could make whatever she’s going through worse.”

Liam motions for me to give him his phone. “Well, you might have been given a special gift, but most of us have no other choice but to get it right the first time,” he says, scrolling through his phone so his eyes don’t meet mine.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

“And you said we would
never
be able to finish it!” Liam raises his voice over the thumping sound of the music, pointing to the empty bottle of Ketel One vodka and mixers on the tray in front of us. He signals to the server who’s been assigned to our plush couch in the VIP area of TAO. “Another one, please.”

I try to shake my head, to tell Liam that I’ve already had too much, that I’m so buzzed I’m no longer embarrassed by the fluorescent penis beads I’m wearing around my neck. I had even let Jules talk me into participating in a ridiculous bachelorette scavenger hunt—I’d pinched some guy’s ass on the dance floor and done a blow-job shot at the bar. But despite Jules’ pleading, I had drawn the line at removing my bra and talking a man into wearing it.

But I was having a great time, the alcohol blunting any tension I’d felt among Liam, Jules, and me earlier.

“Having fun?” he yells into my ear, his breath hot.

“Of course!” I exclaim as that new will.i.am song starts playing, the one that Jules made us listen to on repeat so many times on the car ride here that Liam finally banned it.

“Oh my God—I
love
this song!” she screeches as she clum
sily grabs for our hands, yanking us through the bodies smashed together like sardines on the dance floor. Once there, I lose myself in the moment, forgetting to be worried about Jules’ marriage, about Liam’s relationship with a young starlet who’d been in rehab just months before, about my own future with Max. Instead I close my eyes, raise my hands above my head, and shake my hips to the beat. And for a moment, I wish we were back in college—things had seemed so much simpler then. Just the three of us against the world. When I open my eyes, I catch Liam watching me with an odd look on his face.

“What?” I mouth to him.

He nods in the direction of Jules, who has her hands on the chest of a man I had caught staring at her earlier. He has his hands on her hips, and every few seconds, one of them leans in to yell something in the other’s ear, but they never stop touching. When she finally glances over, I give her a questioning look, but she only throws her hands around his neck and grips him tighter. Concerned, I start to bob and weave my way over to her, but feel a strong hand on my shoulder. “Leave her be,” says Liam.

“Are you sure?” I narrow my eyes. Jules has had a lot to drink.

“Come on.” Liam tugs on my arm and leads me back to our table. “She’s fine. We can keep an eye on her from here,” he says as he mixes us each a vodka and Red Bull.

“I really don’t need this—I’m already drunk,” I say, taking a deep sip anyway.

“Reminds me of old times,” Liam says wistfully. “When did we get old?”

I slap his shoulder. “We are not old! We’ve just grown up a bit. Or at least some of us have,” I say as I wink at him.

“At least I’m still having fun.”

“And I’m not?”

“I don’t know. Are you?”

“I just said I was having a great time!”

Liam’s eyes cut through mine, the speckles of brown in them disappearing as he squints, making his normal hazel hue appear dark green. “I’m not talking about tonight.”

We sit for a moment, me not sure I want to ask him what he means and him not sure he wants to tell me. Finally, I break eye contact and search the dance floor for Jules, spying her at a table across the room with the man she’d been dirty dancing with, sipping her drink, her knees touching his. “Are you sure we shouldn’t do something about that?” I set my drink down and nod in their direction. Something about the way he was looking at her didn’t feel right to me.

“Yes,” Liam says definitively.

“But don’t you see what’s going on over there?”

“I see it.”

“And?”

“And what?” He shrugs.

“You’re acting like they’re just over there chatting about the weather or trading recipes!” I start to stand up so I can intervene, but Liam pulls me back and I fall awkwardly into his lap. “Liam! Come on. Let me go!”

I feel his arms tighten around me. “When will you learn that sometimes you need to let people live their lives the way
they
want? To let people make mistakes? To let yourself make them? If she decides to cross a line, that’s her decision to make—not yours.”

“So I just need to sit here and let her possibly make a mistake that could cost her everything?” I turn toward Liam, his face just inches from mine. The stubble on his chin is so close that I almost reach out to touch it.

“Don’t you get it? This isn’t about Jules and what she may or
may not
do with that guy over there. This is about
you
!”

“Me?” I say. “How does this have anything to do with me?”

“Because you are so damn scared.” He rakes his hand through his hair, his face contorting as he strains for his next words. “Jesus, don’t you get it? You are so petrified to make a mistake, to not seem . . .” He pauses to make air quotes. “Perfect . . . that you’re putting that pressure on others too—that if you turn your back for a second Jules might willingly jump off the throne you’ve placed her on. It’s too much, Kate. We’re all fallible.”

“You think I care more about being perfect than being happy?” I challenge, my cheeks burning with anger and embarrassment. Liam had never talked to me this way before.

“Think about it. You’ve wished your life exactly how you want it. You didn’t like what happened with Max, so you’re back here fixing it so you can have things
your way
. And you’re still not happy—so maybe there’s something to be said for life just working out as it should. Maybe we should just let Jules make whatever choices she needs to make—right
or wrong
.”

Feeling as if the wind has been knocked out of me, I take a shallow breath, trying to decipher what Liam means. Is he saying I should have let Max leave me without trying to stop him? I stare at Jules, now flipping her hair over her shoulder and smiling the way she did back when she met Ben, and I try to remember the last time I have seen her flirt with her husband.

Liam’s voice jars me out of my thoughts. “What I’m trying to say is people lie, people cheat, people
leave people
.” His eyes lock with mine. “And sometimes you just have to accept that you can’t edit life the way you do online. This isn’t Facebook. It’s the real world, for Christ’s sake. Sometimes you just have to let your arm look fat in the picture.”

I swallow hard, letting his words sink in, remembering all the pictures I’d scrutinized, retaken, filtered. “Well, you certainly didn’t have a problem when I edited
your
life. When
I
made it possible for you to be with Nikki Day! Like she would have even looked at you twice in this
real world
we’re living in,” I shoot back, instantly wishing I could pull the words back after I see the hurt look on Liam’s face, his grip on my waist slacking slightly.

I start to apologize when I hear a voice behind me. “Liam?”

Liam stands so quickly that I fall off his lap to the floor, Nikki Day standing above me, her hands glued to her hips. “What exactly is going on here?”

“Nothing,” Liam and I say in unison.

“Didn’t look like nothing to me—you looked pretty cozy together.” Nikki pouts. “And here I thought I’d come out and surprise you guys. Looks like I’m the one getting the surprise. You were practically straddling my boyfriend!”

I clamber to my feet. “Nikki, it wasn’t what it looked like,” I say, still reeling from Liam’s words and trying to figure out how Nikki could think crashing my bachelorette party would be a welcome surprise
for me
. But as I watch Liam’s eyes light up, I decide that as uneasy as she made me, my desire for his happiness outweighs that, despite what I had just blurted out a moment ago. “I was going to go cock block Jules,” I say, nodding across the room, where she’s now sitting in the guy’s lap. “But Liam physically stopped me—pulled me down so I couldn’t walk away,” I say, baiting Nikki to see what she’ll say about it. Maybe she’ll agree that I shouldn’t sit here and let my best friend make a mistake just because it’s apparently her fate to be unfaithful to Ben while she’s drunk. What
were
the rules there?

A smile spreads across her face. “She’s the boring married one, right?”

Ignoring Nikki, I shoot Liam a sharp look and he looks down. “Married, but never boring,” he says quickly.

“Whatever,” she says. “Marriage is overrated. I’m with Liam on this one. Leave her alone,” she says, and she leans into Liam and kisses him, pushing him down on the couch hard as if I’m not even standing there. He pulls her in by her waist, his hand on the back of her sequined tank top, acting as if this isn’t my party that she’s inserted herself into. I pound the rest of my drink and slam the glass down. My deepest fear had come true—Liam’s new girlfriend has finally infiltrated the inner sanctum of our friendship. I give them one last glance before striding away, Liam’s words from earlier still ringing in my ears. My mind might be blurry with alcohol, but they had still stung sharply.

And another unsettling thought was also gnawing at me. Last time, Jules hadn’t acted like this at my bachelorette party—causing me to think that even though she may have had the same problems with Ben last time, it was the makeover
I’d
wished for her that had set all this in motion.

I shuffle across the bar and order a glass of water, keeping a close eye on Jules the entire time and glancing occasionally at the crowd that has now gathered around Nikki and Liam. Finally, I make my way to where Jules is sitting, her face dangerously close to that of the man she’s been flirting with, his hand now resting comfortably on her upper thigh, as he rubs it back and forth with the rhythm of the music. I cringe as I get up close—his eyes are glassy and squinting, his brow is covered with a sheen of perspiration, and there are sweat rings around the armpits of his T-shirt. Suddenly, I feel completely sober. “Hey,” I say casually, forcing myself not to rip his hand off her leg and yank her away from him and into my arms.

“Hey!” she exclaims, and engulfs me in a tight hug, swaying
so hard that we both almost topple over. “This is my best friend!” she slurs to the man she introduces as Kevin. “She’s getting married!”

I give a nod to Kevin, who holds up his drink while never letting his eyes leave Jules. “Yep, I’m getting married!” I say through the smile I’ve plastered on my face. “Now I’ll be just like you, Jules.
Married!
”

Snapping her head up, she gives me a look I can’t identify—a cross of anger, sadness, and something else. “Kate,” she says, my name sounding garbled as it comes out of her mouth.

“Jules,” I respond. “I think it’s time to go.”

She falls back onto the couch, Kevin’s hand instantly draping around her shoulder possessively. “I don’t want to go. Join us,” she says, her glassy eyes pleading with me. Hoping I’ll reserve judgment, that I’ll pretend she doesn’t have a husband and two children at home, that I’ll say this is okay. But I can’t. Even after what Liam said to me, I can’t stand by idly and watch her make this mistake. Maybe it’s because of the way Max left me for Courtney or because I’ve had to fight like hell to get him back. Or maybe it’s just the simple fact that I really love Ben and Jules together and could never imagine them apart. No matter what my reason, I know I can’t let her throw everything away on my watch—even if she thinks it’s not a life worth coveting anymore. It’s still a life she’s spent years building.

“I’m sorry,” I say as I perch on the edge of the table in front of them. “Kevin, right?” He nods. “Here’s the thing: Jules is
married
. She has been for a long time. And as nice as you seem, I can’t let her do this.”

Kevin smiles. “I don’t think that’s your choice to make,” he says, and tightens his grip, and I remember Liam’s words from earlier.

“I couldn’t disagree more,” I say as I look at Jules watching our exchange with a faraway look in her eyes—she was even more wasted than I thought. “Listen, asshole,” I say evenly. “I’ve just told you my friend is
married.
It’s time for you to get lost. Because, honestly, the only reason she’s even sitting here right now flirting with you is because of the half dozen drinks she’s had tonight.” I pause, daring him to challenge me, hoping I’m right. Praying that she wouldn’t be acting this way if she were sober. But Kevin only winks at me. “I’m not leaving here without her,” I demand, putting my hand on Jules’.

“Well, why don’t
you
stay then?” he says, letting his eyes drop to my chest. “I’ve always wanted to have a threesome.” He grabs my arm, digging his hand in as I attempt to pull away, the loud music pulsating in my brain as I try to wriggle from his grasp, his other arm still enveloping Jules’ waist.

Kevin’s grip loosens only when he’s lifted off the couch a moment later, Liam’s fist connecting with his nose swiftly, hurling him into a ball on the floor as he holds his face, screaming.

“Let’s go,” Liam orders, scooping Jules off the couch and leading us toward the exit as security quickly moves in. “Don’t look back,” he warns when I start to turn my head, Liam grabbing my hand as he holds Jules up like a puppet, placing her gently in the backseat of a waiting taxi as soon as we step out of the casino doors, the cab line miraculously empty. We crawl in behind her and sit in silence as the driver navigates the traffic, still heavy at 1 a.m., the honking and buzz from the streets drowning out the booming from the music in the club still pulsating in my ears. Jules passes out almost immediately, her breath heavy.