Mary sighed. “Elly, it might take me a few days to….”
“We don’t have a few days. We have about two hours to get this figured out. Make it happen, Mary. I need a full refund in my account within an hour.”
There was silence on the other end. “I’ll get that processed this morning.”
“Thank you. I’ll be in touch.” Elly hung up the phone, panic buzzing in her ears. Kim shuffled Hadley to her other shoulder, his sweet baby face totally unaware of the travesty happening around him. The cameras turned to catch Elly and Kim’s conversation. A boom mic hovered above Elly’s head. “The flowers are dead. Frozen.”
“WHAT?”
“I know. I have to make some calls.”
Kim turned her head. “Can I lay him down upstairs in the apartment? He’ll be out for a few more hours, and I can help you.”
“Sure.” Elly motioned to the staff to follow her. The cameramen followed. She needed to talk to the staff. Alone. But the only place without cameras was…. “I have to go to the bathroom,” she snapped at the operators.
“Oh.” They backed off a bit, but kept their cameras trained on Anthony and Snarky Teenager, who were standing beside the boxes.
Elly opened the door to the bathroom and began gesturing to Anthony silently. His eyes met hers and he gave a silent nod. “I have to go to the restroom, too.” Snarky Teenager joined them.
The inside of the bathroom was cramped. Usually there was only enough room for one person. Snarky Teenager wedged herself into an ant-sized pocket behind the door, and Anthony stood unsteadily on the toilet lid. Elly looked around. “We are definitely going to update the bathroom after this wedding.”
“Word.”
Elly saw shadows underneath the door. “Flush the toilet!” Anthony pushed down on the handle and a roaring filled the room. “Okay. Mary can’t get the flowers here in time.”
They both gasped. “But how …? We can’t….”
“I know.” Elly rubbed her temples. “The only answer is that we are going to have to buy all the flowers here, in St. Louis. The flower markets are open. It will just be a situation where we are just going to have to buy what they have on the shelf.”
They both paled. “What about the rare garden roses?”
“We won’t have those.”
“The nerine lilies?”
“Nope.”
“Orchids?”
“Only what we can buy.” The toilet gave a gurgle as the Posies staff considered what that meant. Snarky Teenager looked at her fingernails. “This sucks. I mean, this is like going to be on TV, and we don’t have the flowers we need and the flower market won’t have the same type….”
“Yeah.” Elly ran her fingers through her damp curls. “I know. It’s the worst. But I think if we spend all day freaking out, then we will just be in the same boat that we are now. We can’t panic, we have to act. If we freak out, we will miss this tiny window where we can come up with a solution.” Elly saw the waves again, threatening to pull her under. The only way to stay above the rising tide of total devastation was to kick. There would be no drowning of Elly Jordan today. “Here’s what we are going to do….”
There was a sharp knock at the bathroom door.
“We’re busy!” Elly yelled. “Doing lady things!”
“Elly?” It was Kim’s voice coming through the door.
“Hold on!”
“Elly, I need to talk to you.” Kim was mumbling, and Elly could tell that she was trying not to be heard by the cameras.
“I’ll be out in a minute, just hold on.”
“Elly. I need to talk to you right now.” The door jerked open, and Kim was standing in front of it, bathed in the light from the studio, Hadley on her hip. “Elly. Dennis is gone.”
Elly looked up in confusion. “What?”
Kim handed her a note. “The door was open upstairs, just totally open. This was on the kitchen table.”
Elly’s hands began shaking as she unfolded the note.
I’m sorry for what I said about your mom.
Things are just better without me.
Goodbye,
Dennis
Chapter Twenty-Two