Midnight Valentine(84)

Suzanne is busily digging through her handbag. She produces a lipstick and compact, then proceeds to paint her lips a very unmummy shade of scarlet red. “Coop? I dunno. Maybe.”

“I mean…wouldn’t you like to see him there?”

She looks away from her compact and narrows her eyes at me. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Considering how peeved I was when she tried to set me up with Doug, the height-challenged building inspector, I have to tread carefully or risk being labeled a hypocrite. “Nothing. Only…”

Suzanne drops the compact and lipstick back into her bag, then turns to me with her arms folded. “Only what?”

She’s suspicious already. I might as well spit it out. “Only I’m sure he’d love to see you there.”

It takes a minute for her to process that, then she rears back like I’ve slapped her across the face. “Don’t be ridiculous!”

“Why is that ridiculous?”

“Preston Cooper is the last man on earth who’d be interested in a girl like me, that’s why! He likes sweet girls”—she simpers, batting her lashes—“homebodies who are duller than dirt who no one ever gossips about because they never do anything interesting! Girls like his wife!”

“Ex-wife.”

“Put on the damn wig.”

She’s annoyed by the turn in the conversation, so I let it go. “Who else will be at this shindig?”

“If you’re worried about the church ladies who’ve been talking about you, yes, most of them will be there. So will pretty much everyone else in this town. Booger’s annual Spooktacular is second only to the Christmas boat parade in popularity. Which is why you need a costume!”

I jam the wig on my head, make a few adjustments so all the purple strands are out of my eyes, and deadpan, “Ta-da. Costume.”

“You’re the worst.” She slings her handbag over her gauzy shoulder and heads for the door. “Let’s get outta here before the cats decide I’m a scratching post and shred me.”

Once in the car, Suzanne spends so much time staring at my profile, I start to get weirded out. “What’re you looking at?”

“I haven’t seen you since church. You’ve lost weight.”

“Maybe I should’ve gone as the mummy,” I mutter, taking a corner too fast.

“Have you been sick?”

“Jesus, do I look that bad?”

“No, you actually look great—bitch—just thinner. And sort of…haunted.”

I drag in a breath and grip the steering wheel harder. “I went on Lexapro for a few days, but it made me so sick, I stopped taking it. I couldn’t keep anything down.”

“Megan, I told you you’re not crazy.” Her tone is the same one my mother used right before I got a spanking as a kid.

“My shrink might disagree.”

“Fuck him!”

“He’s not my type.”

“Quit being sarcastic, this is serious! Just because you’re going through a rough patch doesn’t mean you need to take drugs!”

“Those drugs can save people’s lives, Suzanne.”

“They can also end them!” she shoots back hotly. “You ever see the list of horrible side effects for those antidepressants? Uncontrollable thoughts of suicide is right at the top!”

I assume this is her experience with her institutionalized Uncle Roy talking, but I’m too irritated to get into it. People who’ve never had depression don’t have a clue what it’s like. I can’t count how many times I’ve been told to “just get over it” or “focus on the positive” by well-meaning friends.

But then she says something that stops my irritation dead in its tracks.

“I mean, hell, if my boyfriend locked himself away in a psych ward, I’d be upset too, but you wouldn’t see me medicating my damn…self…” She trails off into silence, staring at me with wide eyes.

“How do you know Theo locked himself away in a psych ward?”

“Um…”

Realization punches me in the solar plexus. “Oh my God. Everyone in Seaside knows where Theo is, don’t they?”

She looks apologetic, scrunching up her shoulders. “Maybe?”

I shout, “How?”

“Well, honey—now don’t get upset—Leanne’s cousin’s hairdresser, Maxine, has a stepbrother who’s up at Acadia right now, having a little rest after his brain got knocked askew from spending one too many years balls-deep in cocaine. Maxine went to visit the stepbrother last week and saw Theo wandering around the grounds. Said he looked really out of it. So she told all her clients at the salon, one of whom was Leanne’s cousin, and the cousin told Leanne, and Leanne—who’s a major flaptrap, by the way, don’t ever trust that woman with a secret—told her book club and her knitting circle, and—”