The Best of Fools (Jane Austen Book 2) (8 page)

I brushed by them again and an odd image of Alistair's face inching toward me took over my mind.
I should've kissed him.

"But then it would've been more complicated," I said to myself.

Autumn said something.

I stared at the corner where the ceiling met the walls. "And I don't need complications."

"Are you talking to yourself again?"

I tuned back to her. "What?"

"So weird."

So my original plans never work out. I was beginning to think maybe I should stop planning anything at all. Not that I'd be able to resist the beauty of my calendar, but still. The plan was to go to Ikea. Alone. Then to come back and put furniture together. Alone. Like a total single woman who enjoyed being a single woman and using single woman screwdrivers while screaming at the Ikea instruction manuals and wondering why, why, why they made everything so complicated.

But here I was. Standing in the middle of an array of Ikea couches. With Donovan and Zoe making out on the one I liked. The one I wanted to sit on until now. Okay, so they weren't making out, but man ... couldn't they go one-point-seven seconds without running their hands through each other's hair?

Sheesh.

I penciled in the number of the couch and walked away, like a third wheel who wanted to be a unicycle. Completely content in my unicycledom. But they realized I left and came after me.

They whispered and laughed behind me as I searched for a bed, wondering why I agreed to let them come with me.

Donovan sat on a bed and pulled Zoe onto his lap.

"Guys, seriously?" I looked around me. "There are people here. People who don't want to see a make out fest during their Saturday shopping sprees."

Oblivious. Completely oblivious.
That's it
, I thought as I scurried away to the tent in the bedroom section for kids and hid inside. I figured they'd pass me and I could wait until all was clear, then go back to the bedroom section in peace. Good thing we drove separately. They could actually leave if they wanted to. I hoped they'd want to.

I pulled my knees to my chest and peeked out of the tent again as a mother and her two kids came toward me. Oh, great. The woman squeezed her eyebrows together and snatched her kids away, enveloping them in her arms as she moved them to the next section while glaring over her shoulder at me.

"What?" I whispered. "Not that big of a deal."

I heard Zoe's giggle coming around the corner, so I waited a few seconds and checked.

"Hey." Zoe pointed. "There she is."

Donovan linked his hand with hers and walked toward me. I closed my eyes.

Only me.

"What are you doing?" Donovan tapped the top of the tent and leaned down to look inside. "This is the kids section."

"I know," I grumbled. "Was thinking of getting this for when you stay over."

He smiled. "No, really, what are you doing?"

I stood up and walked away. "I'm just looking around. Shopping, you know, because that's what you do in stores. What are
you
doing? That's the real question."

He laughed. Zoe didn't.

She pulled his hand back and they stayed behind, surely about to kiss each other's lips until they turned blue. And I would be alone, wheeling away on my beloved, comforting, very nice unicycle, thank you very much.

I finished my shopping in peace and asked an Ikea employee if he could help me load the truck I bought.

"Sorry," he said. "There are people outside that do that. Not me."

"Kay." I maneuvered my cart thingies to the side of the exit and pushed one outside. Don't know what he was talking about because there were no Ikea employees anywhere to be found, so I wheeled the cart to the yellow poles and went to get the moving truck, then parked it and stared at the stuff.

Kay....

I brought the other three carts out.

Stared at them.

Kay.

Okay.

Okay!

I could do this.

Oh, wait! Out of thin air, he appeared! The blue shirt I so wanted to see. I walked up to him and smiled. "Hey, um, the guy in there told me that you help load?"

He didn't speak. But he moved toward the truck and began throwing—yes, throwing—my new stuff into the car.

"Um, I can do it. Don't worry about it."

The lips on his face seemed real, but they didn't move at all. He threw another box in. The wood inside banged against the truck and probably shattered into a million pieces.

"Right," I said. "So, I can take care of it, but thanks."

He didn't make eye contact with me, just stood there reaching his hand out. I looked at his sweaty palm.

"Yes?" I stepped back.

He picked up another box.

"Do you speak English?"

He tipped it on to the back of the truck so that half of it was hanging toward me, then reached out his palm again. "Tip."

"Hark, he speaks!"

He narrowed his eyes and chewed his gum. "Tip."

"Isn't this your job?"

He extended his hand closer to me.

I shoved a five into his hand just to get him the hell away.

I swear, only me.

He disappeared into a secret door and I turned back to grab the box, but it fell on my foot. I seized up and grabbed the edge of the truck, leaning over as stars danced inside my head.

"That hurt," I said, looking down at my toe. It felt broken. Thankfully it only looked a little red, but as I loaded the rest of the enormous heavy boxes into the truck without the slightest bit of ease, the pain turned into hot prickly needles stabbing my toe from the inside out.

I worked fast, shoving the damn things into the truck and contemplating suing Ikea. When I got everything settled I closed the truck and wobbled inside, careful to put pressure on the side of my foot to relieve the pressure from my big toe. I went to the customer service desk and told them my story. They shrugged. More gum chewing.

"Is there a manager here?" I said.

"That would be me." Ryan pointed to his name tag.

"Right. Thanks. Okay." I turned and walked back to the truck, sat down in the driver's seat, and held my toe which was now turning black.

Great.

This unicycle didn't have medical insurance now that she was supposed to be eighteen and responsible with her own money.

So, I took myself home, driving with the outer edge of my foot pressing on the pedal and even then it hurt like, oh, about nine thousand wasps stinging me at once while setting my foot on fire for kicks.

I breathed in and out, cringing with each throb, until finally parking behind my lovely new apartment. There was no way I could move the rest of the boxes in myself. Not now. Not when I needed to figure out how to deal with a possibly broken and definitely excruciating toe.

I hobbled to the back door and did what I always do when life sucks. I popped my earphones in and played my favorite music. From my favorite movie. From my favorite hero ever.

Batman.

Batman Begins. The Dark Knight. The Dark Knight Rises
. I played the
Batman Begins
soundtrack by the incredible Hans Zimmerman and James Newton Howard. Some girls fangirl over Chris Pinetree or whatever and I obsess over film composers. Or any composer really. If I were ever to fall in love it would definitely be possible for me to fall in love with a composer before even meeting him. Okay, I take that back, but I guess what I'm trying to say is I adore classical music and film scores get me a little too excited. Hence the reason I play them when I feel like burying my face in my pillow and screaming my head off.

Donovan's car wasn't parked anywhere around yet. Whew. Some peace and quiet for a bit would be nice, especially while I researched how to heal a crushed toe without the hospital.

I opened the back door and hummed along with the music, using my hands like a composer. For a second, I forgot about my toe, closed my eyes, and let the music fill me as I stepped inside and pretended I was standing in front of an orchestra with welcoming ears behind me.

I got pretty into it, if I do say so myself. Someone tapped me. I opened my eyes, hands still hanging in mid air, and saw dozens of eyes staring back at me with a "SURPRISE!" banner hanging over their heads. Donovan laughed as I took the headphones out of my ears, my other hand still hanging in the air to complete the song.

"Surprise," Mom said, walking toward me with open arms and glassy eyes perched right above her red nose. "I'm sorry I couldn't help you move. We were planning this and I wanted to make sure everything was prepared in time." She hugged me and sniffed. "I'm so proud of you, Janie."

"I ... I don't know what to say." I squeezed her back. "Thank you."

She let go, then Granny wrapped her arms around me and stepped on my toe.

"Ahhhh!!!!" I howled into the air and hopped on one foot.

Granny stepped back, shaking.

"Oh, shi—I mean, shoot. Shoot." I strained my neck while my friends and family looked at me like I was as nuts as I apparently was.

Granny trembled and looked back and forth. "I ... I ...."

"No, Granny," I said. "You're fine. I just hurt my toe. I'm sorry I scared you." I breathed in and out as the pain shot up to my thigh.

"Are you okay?" Donovan teetered between a laugh and genuine concern.

"My toe," I said between clenched teeth, pretending to smile for the others still staring at me. "Make them eat. Make them do something."

"All right everyone." Donovan clapped. "Let's go ahead and eat. Mrs. Austen created some fantastic food you're all gonna love." He gestured toward the dining room, my dining room, which now had a table sitting in the middle of it where I planned to put the table I just bought. And the couch. The couch I just bought was sitting in the living room along with a coffee table. The entire place was now filled with my favorite furniture.

Dad and Mom lingered near me. I exhaled. Dad glanced at my foot. I shook my head as though it were nothing. Mom knelt down and peered up at me with those motherly eyes. I waved my hands.

"It's nothing," I said. "Just a little bruise."

"When did this happen?" Dad said. "It looks brutal."

"It's okay. Really." I nodded toward the living room. "You guys did this? The furniture?"

Mom blushed as she stood up.

"How did you remember which furniture I liked?" I couldn't tell them I just bought every last one of those things. Man ... could've saved myself a toe.

"I just know you," Mom said.

"She pays attention." Dad pulled her into him and kissed the top of her head. "She's always paying attention to you guys."

My. Freaking. Toe. Was. Now. Radiating. Extreme. Pain. To. My. Brain.

"Excuse me," I said, trying not to limp away. "I just need to use the bathroom real quick."

Away I went. Pretending as though everything was normal as best as I could. All of these sweet people here to see me, to welcome me into my new place. I didn't want to let them down.

Autumn crossed her arms and stood in my path. "Care to explain?"

I shook my head and bit my lip. "Toe. Smashed it."

"Why didn't you go to the ER?"

"Shhhhh..."

"What if it's broken?"

"It's not. It's just smashed."

"Smashed? Into a billion broken pieces? It looks really bad."

I brushed by hair. "Bathroom. I need a pillow to scream into."

"Afraid you won't find that on the toilet."

"Right." I cringed. "What should I do then?"

"Um, seek medical attention?"

"No insurance."

"I have some arnica."

"Quack sugar pills?"

"If you say so."

I brushed by her. "Ibuprofen."

"If you say so."

I sat in the bathroom only to realize that I was sitting, fully clothed, on an open toilet seat that gladly soaked my tunic as it draped down into the water. I took a deep breath and whispered to myself, "This is seriously the worst best day ever."

The ibuprofen helped me get through the party, but by the time everyone left I was about to fall on the floor and cry myself to sleep. Thing is ... I didn't sleep. Couldn't sleep. I took as much as ibuprofen as I could and still couldn't close my eyes without seeing bright dots flashing in my eyelids. The sound of Zoe giggling woke me up in the morning. Not that I had been sleeping. Just rolling around on my bed, twisting the covers around my face, and contorting my body into all sorts of strange positions that somehow eased the pain for a millisecond.

So, I guess what I mean is her giggle made me realize that I made it to another dawn. And if I didn't get my toe checked out soon, I'd never make it to another.

Mom texted me.
Everything okay? You seemed unusual last night.

I decided to be honest.
Think I broke my toe or at least smashed it into pieces.

Well, go to the ER then. Can you drive?

I think I can. But I don't have insurance.

You're still on our insurance. We aren't canceling it until you set up your own plan.

I shoved my phone in my purse and limped as I ran to the door, then limped back to get my flip flops on. And back to the door while yelling, "The night is darkest just before the dawn. And I promise you, the dawn is coming.”