Count Your Lucky Stars: A Novel

Silence greeted Margot when she stepped inside the apartment. “Liv?”

She dropped her bag in the entry and briefly poked her head inside the kitchen before limping deeper into the apartment. She frowned. No answer. Except for the gentle hum of the refrigerator, it was quiet.

“Liv? Are you home?” she called out again, hobbling toward the hall. Her foot didn’t throb quite as badly as it had yesterday, and most of the swelling had gone down overnight. Luke’s advice about rest, ice, compression, and elevation had been spot-on, and the extra-strength Advil hadn’t hurt, either. “Liv?”

The door to Olivia’s room was left ajar, as always. Margot pressed her fingers to the door, pushing it open the rest of the way, poking her head inside to—

A shadowy blur shot past, darting down the hall. Margot gripped her chest, heart clawing its way up into her throat. A high-pitched yowl came from the living room and Margot sagged against the door frame. Cat. Phew. She chuckled and—

She stopped laughing because she was the only one laughing. Olivia wasn’t here. Margot reached inside her pocket for her phone. 10:58 a.m. She shot off a quick text.

She tucked her phone into her pocket so she wouldn’t be tempted to stare at it, waiting for a response, and ducked into her bedroom to change out of the yoga pants and sweatshirt she’d worn in the car.

The plan for the day was straightforward; the wedding party would meet up at the venue at one o’clock to run through the ceremony proceedings with the officiant to make sure everyone knew where they needed to be and when they needed to be there. From there, Annie and Brendon would head to the airport to pick up her parents. Setup for the pre–rehearsal dinner cocktail hour was scheduled to start at three, the cocktail hour itself was at five, and the dinner was scheduled for six thirty.

Bringing her phone with her, Margot wandered back out into the living room. Cat was curled up on the couch in a tight little ball that made it difficult to see where she started and ended. Two green eyes peeked out at Margot when she carefully—cautiously—sat. Her eyes shut, and she started up a low purr that made Margot smile.

11:12 a.m. She had over an hour to kill before she needed to leave, let alone before the rehearsal started. An hour to kill. That felt like an absurd amount of time to wait around, twiddling her thumbs, and yet . . . Olivia was cutting it close. Awfully close. Margot sighed, earning a serious side-eye from Cat. She reached for the remote.

The channel was still set to Turner Classic from the last time she and Olivia had curled up on the couch. Currently, the hosts of the cocktail hour–style intermission were sipping on flutes of champagne while discussing—Margot pressed the volume up button—Breakfast at Tiffany’s, the film du jour.

Olivia’s favorite.

The intermission ended, the movie picking up at the scene where Holly Golightly and Paul Varjak spend the day together. Margot glanced at the Kit-Cat Clock hanging on the wall, perpetually crooked no matter how many times she straightened it. 11:20.

Leaving the movie on in the background, Margot opened up her Chrome browser and selected one of the many open tabs at random. One hundred and thirteen thousand words of angsty fanfic tagged slow burn, hurt/comfort, and hate sex, sure to eat up the hour and twenty minutes before she had to leave.

Except she couldn’t get into the story no matter how hard she tried, couldn’t lose herself in the distraction the way she needed to. Her eyes kept flitting to the corner of her screen, desperate to see how much time had passed. She navigated over to her texts and reread the last message she’d sent to Olivia before hitting call.

Each ring ratcheted her nerves tighter, her heart rate higher, until she reached Olivia’s voicemail.

Hey, this is Olivia! I can’t come to the phone right now, but if you leave your name, number, and a brief message I’ll get back to you as soon as I can. Thanks!

The line beeped, but when Margot opened her mouth, nothing came out.

What was she supposed to say? Where are you? She’d already texted. Leaving a voicemail saying the same thing she’d already typed out was overkill. Needy. She ended the call, praying she hadn’t breathed too heavily during the brief three or four seconds before she’d hung up.

11:31. A pitiful little whimper escaped her lips as she let her head flop back against the couch. She couldn’t do this. Another hour of sitting around and doing nothing, waiting and worrying, was going to drive her up the wall.

She needed to do something. Go somewhere. She hit the power button on the remote and stood. Cat cracked open one eye.

“I’ll be back later, okay? Be good.”

Cat blinked at her and—she definitely needed to get out of here.

Hobbling down the hall, Margot snagged her purse off the bed and checked that she had her wallet and phone while she made her way to the door. She snagged her keys off the entry table and backtracked to the kitchen, stopping in front of the whiteboard on the fridge. Olivia had left a smiley face on the board days ago and Margot hadn’t erased it. She still couldn’t erase because—she didn’t even want to think that maybe this could be the last little message that Olivia left for her.

Rather than erase, she wrote beside it.

Went to Elle’s. Meet you at The Ruins at 1.

She clutched the dry-erase marker in her hand and added a heart beside her message. She cocked her head. It was a little lopsided, her hands unsteady, but it would do.

Seventeen minutes later, Margot knocked on Elle’s door. A shadow passed on the other side of the peephole right before the lock flipped and Elle opened the door. One eye was lined and the other wasn’t and she was wearing the polka-dotted silk robe Margot had given her for Christmas four years back.

“Hey, I thought we were meeting at . . .” Elle’s face fell. She reached out, dragging Margot inside. “What’s wrong?”

Nothing. Everything. Margot flicked her bangs out of her eyes. “I can’t get ahold of Liv. I called and texted and—nothing.” She cringed. “Sorry. I should’ve called before just showing up here and—”

Elle’s grip tightened around Margot’s wrist, cutting off her apology and her circulation. Damn.

“Don’t even, Mar. It’s fine.” Elle tugged her over to the couch. “Olivia’s probably just driving. Or maybe her phone died and she doesn’t have her charger?”

Olivia had Bluetooth in her car, and she was far too organized to lose her charger. Even as rattled as she was yesterday, there was no way she’d have left it behind. Besides, Margot had done a quick sweep of Olivia’s room this morning before checkout, just to make sure nothing got left behind. “Maybe.”

Margot’s chin wobbled and Elle frowned.

“Hey, no.” Elle reached out and grabbed her hand. “You’re not okay. What is it?”

Margot dragged in a breath, air stuttering between her lips. She held it until her lungs burned, then let it out slowly. “Liv and I, we had a fight last night. Before she left. Before I came down to dinner. It was . . .” She scoffed out a laugh, brows rising and falling. “Not fun.”

Elle squeezed her fingers and offered up a small, crooked smile. “Fighting with you never is. You always make good points, and it sucks when you’re right. And outside of the fight itself, the not-talking part is awful and—”

Margot threw herself across the cushion and flung her arms around Elle, burying her face against Elle’s shoulder, scrunching her eyes shut. Elle’s hair tickled her nose, adding to the burn inside her sinuses. She sniffed hard and tried to lean back, but Elle wouldn’t let her, only squeezing harder.

“How come you didn’t say anything?” Elle asked, leaning but not letting go, fingers wrapped around Margot’s upper arms. “Last night or this morning in the car? You just told us all Olivia had to leave. You didn’t say anything about a fight.”

She scratched the tip of her nose and shrugged. “I didn’t want to put a damper on the trip. Today. The weekend. I didn’t want to talk about it.”

Elle rubbed her arm. “Would it help to talk about it?”

Hell if she knew. She’d rather there not be something to talk about in the first place, something she felt like she needed to get off her chest, this weight, this—this fist wrapped around her heart.

“Come on,” Elle cajoled. “Talk to me.”

Margot took a deep breath. “Olivia, she’s generous, you know? She’s always putting everyone else first and—and I love that about her. But there has to be a point where she puts herself first, otherwise she’s going to give and give until she’s got nothing left. I basically told her that. Only, I also said she was overreacting. As soon as I said it, I realized it was a shitty thing to say, and now I’m worried that might’ve overshadowed my point. I don’t know. I just didn’t understand why she had to leave then, and she told me I have a fear of abandonment, which—”

“Why would she say that?”

Margot gave an awkward laugh. “Because I kind of do?”

Elle continued to look confused, the furrow between her brows deepening. “You? Afraid of something? I’m sorry. I’m just . . . having a little difficulty processing that. You’re the bravest person I know. In my experience, nothing scares you. You’re the one who charges in headfirst.” Elle smiled, lopsided. “You always killed the spiders when I was too chicken.”

Spiders weren’t shit compared to opening up, making herself vulnerable.

Margot laughed. “Things scare me. I just don’t love talking about them, especially not this. And I haven’t exactly had a reason or a need to talk about it. But I guess a lot of old feelings and fears I didn’t realize I was still holding on to have sort of . . . floated to the surface. Fears about how I spent the last eleven years believing Olivia chose Brad over me and abandoned all of our plans when, apparently, there was more to it I didn’t know about.” Margot ducked her head and sniffled. “It’s just . . . everything is changing. Brendon and Annie are getting married tomorrow and you and Darcy are engaged and everyone is going to couples’ yoga and—I’m so happy for you guys. You have no idea how happy. But there’s a part of me that’s worried you all have each other and you won’t need me.” Like how Olivia hadn’t needed her because she’d had Brad. “That, slowly, you’re going to forget about me and move on with your lives because I’m just me and—”

“What did you tell me once? Just Elle is pretty great?” Elle gathered both of Margot’s hands in hers. “Well, just Margot is amazing. You’re my favorite person.”

Margot bit down on the tip of her tongue so she wouldn’t cry. “Darcy’s your favorite person. She’s your person. Your perfect person.”

“You also told me we can have lots of perfect people. You told me I was one of your perfect people and you’re one of mine, Mar. I mean, look.” Elle scooted closer until their knees bumped. “You care about me and you care about Olivia, and I’d never ask you who you care about more because you care about us differently and I believe love is one of those things that doesn’t run out.”

One of her favorite things about Olivia was her endless capacity to care.

“I’m not going anywhere, Margot. None of us are, okay? Change is inevitable, you know that, but that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Okay, so we might not see each other every day, but I feel confident speaking for everyone when I say we wouldn’t know what to do without you. You’re Margot. You could never be a fifth wheel. If you’re worried we’re going to stop wanting to spend time with you, don’t. We don’t need you to change who you are or be sunshine and roses for us. You are the glue.”

Margot sputtered out a weak laugh. “Glue?”

“Gorilla Glue.” Elle pinched her lips together, the very picture of sincerity save for the twinkle in her eyes. “And don’t forget it.”

Being called glue wasn’t something she’d soon forget, and neither was the sentiment behind it. The next time she worked herself up with irrational worries about her friends ditching her as they entered a new chapter in their lives, she’d remind herself that they were just that—irrational. She was Margot Cooper, damn it, one of a kind. The glue. “Thanks, Elle.”

She nudged Margot with a knee. “You’re still worried about Olivia, aren’t you?”

Margot sucked in a shuddering breath and dipped her chin. “What if what I said went too far? I said what I did because I care and because I didn’t want to lose her and—what if I pushed her away?”

“If she said she’s going to be here, I think you have to trust her. Do you think you can do that?”

What other choice did she have?