“It’s a horse, dick-wad.” From his cross-legged position on the floor, Trevor casts an envious scowl at Scott’s surprisingly well-executed outline of Cinderella. The three of us are at Crystal and Scott’s, constructing life-size cardboard cutouts for Angie’s Disney party. Crystal is on party store duty, picking up plates, cups, balloons, and goody bag items.
Ever since my lunch with Angie four days ago, where I confirmed the vision and direction for her party in less than two weeks, I’ve been in full Disney planning mode. I even booked the lounge in the hospital to host the festivities. The lounge’s décor is a vague attempt at cheer with its canary-yellow walls, but a couple Disney-themed plates and hats won’t change the fact that she’s celebrating her birthday in a hospital. Life-size cutouts of her favorite Disney princesses may be extra, but I’m determined to give her an escape from reality, if only for an afternoon.
Scott squints at Trevor’s creation, tilting his head as if a different perspective will help its cause. “Looks like a sad, mangled giraffe, man.”
“It kind of does.” I nod in agreement. “Maybe next time, thicken the neck a bit?”
“I still don’t get why we got stuck with craft duty.” Disgruntled, Trevor tosses the cardboard figure into the growing trash pile.
“Because grown men who wear Crocs can’t be trusted to make good decisions at a party store,” I retort, shooting daggers at their feet. Ever since I called him out for the army-green atrocity, Trevor has been wearing them around the apartment and at work like a second, terror-inducing skin.
Turns out, Scott recently purchased his own pair. Wearing Crocs is this bizarre joke that all the crew at the firehouse have adopted like a badge of honor during their off time. I’m currently developing a plot to steal them in the cloak of darkness (Grinch-style) and burn them at the stake. I’ll drop them into the fire, one by one, using barbecue tongs to avoid direct contact. They’ll emit witchy squeals and maybe even refuse to burn as I douse the flames with gasoline.
Scott stretches his bright-blue Crocs toward me, giving me a gentle kick. He’s not even my official brother-in-law yet and he’s already finding ways to antagonize me. “I’ll never take them off. You’ll have to bury me in them.”
“Not in the Chen family plot.” I snort, my gaze falling over Trevor, who apparently can’t be bothered to take the task at hand seriously. He’s too distracted admiring his hideous footwear. I launch a pencil at his chest. “Stop wasting cardboard. You need to outline it before you start cutting at random.”
“Sorry. It’s this music. How am I supposed to work under these conditions?” Trevor casts a troubled look at my phone, which is blasting a bomb Disney playlist.
“Oh, come on, you’re practically itching to break out into song and dance,” I tease, nodding at Scott, who’s tapping his Croc merrily to Hercules’s “I Won’t Say (I’m in Love).”
Trevor rewards me with a dead-eyed stare. “Don’t compare me to that.”
“You can’t tell me you never watched these movies as a kid?” Scott chucks a balled-up wad of construction paper at his head.
Trevor catches the ball of paper before it hits him, like he’s some genetically modified super soldier. He tosses it into his personal trash pile, neatly stacked next to him. “Not by choice. The real question is, why did you?”
“I grew up with two sisters, man.”
I swing a warning glare at Trevor. “You better learn some of these tunes if you’re gonna be a half-decent prince at the party. All the good princes sing and dance.”
Trevor scoffs. “For the hundredth time, I’m not dressing up.”
“You are.”
“I’m not.”
Scott snickers. “I would pay money to see this. Good money.”
I scrutinize Scott up and down. “Oh, you’ll be there too. You’re going to be Prince Charming.”
Scott ponders that for a moment. “Works for me.”
“See? Scott’s gonna do it,” I goad.
Trevor glowers at him like he’s just broken sacred bro-code. “Because he’s a sucker. And he likes attention—”
“Hey, fuck off.” Scott chucks another wad of paper at him. This one hits him clean on the forehead, bouncing onto the floor.
Trevor continues on valiantly, like he didn’t just get smoked in the head. “And even if I were going to dress up, which I’m not—”
“You are—” I interject.
“Nope.”
I level him with a poisonous stare. “Do you realize how happy Angie would be if you dressed up? Besides, I already promised her you would. You can’t back out now. She’ll be heartbroken.” Truthfully, I never made such a promise to Angie. But he doesn’t need to know that.
His eyes meet mine, softening instantly. Bingo. I’ve pierced him straight through the heart with my arrow of guilt. He slumps his shoulders in grumpy resignation. “Okay. Fine. But no pictures. And why does Scotty get to be Prince Charming?”
“Because he’s charming,” I explain, to Scott’s delight. Normally, I have no interest in feeding my brother-in-law’s already inflated ego, but I’m willing to take one for the team if it means grinding Trevor’s gears.
Trevor places a hand over his chest, offended. “And I’m not?”
I try my best to keep a straight face while denying his natural charm. “You’re certainly not a wholesome type of charming.” I let my gaze flit over the intricate Celtic knot tattoo adorning his right arm.
Trevor mutters something unintelligible under his breath and starts slicing into the cardboard with his X-Acto knife as the soothing, instrumental melody from the lantern scene in Tangled fills the room.
Suddenly, I’m hit with a momentary stroke of genius. “You’re going to be Flynn Rider.”
“I don’t even know who that is. Why do I have to be some off-brand prince?”
Before I can explain that Flynn Rider is anything but off-brand and happens to be Angie’s favorite, Crystal bursts through the door with a hefty load of plastic bags on each arm.
“What took you so long?” I demand, popping up to inspect the bags.
“The roads are bad. I had to drive slow,” Crystal explains, kicking off her slushy leather booties in the entryway. She sets the bags on the floor and shuffles over to admire my Rapunzel tower, which will double as a photo shoot prop. “I was also busy with a little research.”
“What research?” I ask, smirking when Scott not-so-subtly checks out her backside.
“Found out where Daniel works,” she says nonchalantly, like it’s no big deal. Like he isn’t my very last hope.
I drop my Sharpie and lurch forward on my heels. “What? How did you find Daniel before me?” I ask, though it probably comes out more like HOWDIDYOUFINDDANIELBEFOREME? I wait with bated breath as the rush of adrenaline plunges my body into all-out chaos.
For dramatic effect, Crystal waits a few seconds before revealing her findings. “He works at that big tech company downtown. Flopify. That one that took over the old Macy’s building.”
“How did you find him? I’ve looked everywhere.”
“I have my ways,” she says, her eyes glinting, keeping the mystery alive. “Just kidding. I found him on LinkedIn. It really wasn’t that hard. I texted you the link to his profile.”
“I’m forever indebted. Seriously, though. I would lick your gym shoes if you asked me to.” I throw my arms around my sister’s shoulders, only narrowly avoiding stepping on the hot-glue gun.
She inches away from my smothering hug. “Really not necessary.”
“Are you gonna DM him?” Trevor asks, not looking up from his latest attempt at a horse cutout.
I shudder at the thought. “Oh, no. I can’t reunite with him via DM. I only have a week and a half before the gala. It’s not enough time to reestablish our rapport. I need to run into him naturally.”
Trevor sighs. “You’re going to stake out the front of his workplace, aren’t you?”
“Correction: we are.”
? chapter twenty
EVERY STATION IS running ads. Posturepedic mattresses. Car dealerships.
Trevor emits a tortured sigh as I fiddle with the radio dial, finally landing on an old Wilson Phillips song.
“I will turn this car around if you change the station one more time,” he warns, alarmed that I’m messing with his preset channels.
“Sheesh. You sound like my dad,” I say wryly. “It’s not my fault you don’t have Bluetooth. I’m just trying to enhance our experience. Now smile and wave to your fans,” I order, angling my phone to him.
When he sees it’s on Live video, he grumbles, promptly covering my phone with his free hand. “No. You’re distracting me while I’m driving.”
“Oh, come on. Give the people what they want. Just a quick hello,” I urge.
He rolls his eyes and gives a frosty hi before fixing his stare toward the slush-covered road. I take this as a sign to end the video.
Unsurprisingly, Trevor had to be bribed with Five Guys milkshakes to accompany me to Daniel’s workplace during a snowstorm. The windshield wipers are working overtime to clear the flurry of snow streaming off the SUV ahead. Trevor is aggrieved, muttering softly about the legalities of wiping the snow off one’s car. He’s driving turtle slow, simply to make the point.
He’s also taken to posing hypotheticals: