Make sure you've read chapter 9 first.

ONE    AND    A    HALF    YEARS      EARLIER

A D D I E

December 2017

'I used to feel like I was on the top of the world. Then one day, I noticed that it felt like I was no longer on the top of the world. I was just floating around inside of it. And then eventually, it felt like the world was on top of me. . .'

"Addie!"

My head snapped up from a Christmas gift. A book to be exact. Without Merit by Colleen Hoover. Christmas was two days ago and I had finally found a moment to sit down and start on a new title. So far, this one had me all over the place. There was so much emotion. It was the sort of book that sucked me in and switched off my hearing until I was being shouted at.

"Yeah?"

Margo stood in front of the armchair while she slipped her hoop earrings in. Her dress was fitted, stretched down to her calf and paired with a little leather jacket, it was the perfect look for a date. I wasn't sure which number date this was but she'd been seeing this Jacob dude for about two months.

"Get up," she said, resting her hands on her hips. "You're coming with me. Jacob is bringing a friend and I swear, he's cute."

"How old is he?"

She shrugged. "No idea. Why?"

"Uh because Jacob is in his forties. So how old is his friend?"

"Oh," she laughed and gave me a slap on the leg. "Not as old as Jacob. They work together. But who cares. Older men are so much better. More mature. More experienced. You would suit an older man."

"If he's older than thirty five, I'm not interested."

"Bit snobbish. RDJ is fifty four."

I bit down on a guilt ridden grin.

"You would go there. You've said so."

"Yeah but that's different. He's gorgeous."

She rolled her eyes and even I knew that was a ridiculous argument. She lifted one foot at a time, balancing while she slid her platforms on. The heel was sharp and tall. The other end of the shoe was thick and gave her another three inches of height. As she walked into the kitchen, I watched the amount of grace that she carried herself with. There wasn't a tremor in her balance or the slightest hint at a rolled ankle. She didn't look like a deer on ice, but rather a swan on the water.

I could wear heels no problem. I was just certain that I didn't look as elegant as she did when I walked.

"Addie, we're going on a double date," she called over her shoulder. "You either get dolled up now or I'm dragging you out of the house in that flannel shirt. Which looks super cute but still. I'm pulling rank. Get up."

"It's just unfortunate that I'm in a long term relationship. Otherwise, I'd love to go on a double date."

"The couch doesn't count as a long term relationship."

I sighed and stood up, dragging my feet as I walked into the kitchen. Margo was strutting around the kitchen, watering the plants on the sills and side tables. "I'm doing your job," she said, pointing at fern in a white ceramic pot with geometric designs. "As a favour. Now you do one for me and come on this double date. You'll like Brad, I promise."

"His name is Brad? Nope. I'm already uninterested."

She inhaled a deep breath and pointed at the corridor. "Get dressed."

"Take Irie! She's always up for this sort of shit."

"Get dressed."

"Ugh," I stomped and felt like a teenager again. "Fine. I'd rather it was just us going out for dinner though."

She'd been spending quite a lot of time with her new man and I didn't have a problem with that, at all. But I hoped that we could have a girls night again soon.

She looked at me, her smile soft and understanding. "We'll go out, just the two of us, soon. Promise."

"New Years Eve? Or has Jacob claimed you for that too?"

She laughed and checked her phone. "No. He's got plans out of town. It'll just be us."

That improved my mood and I wandered off with a smile. It wasn't that I wanted to deprive Margo of her quest to find true love. I just couldn't stand seeing her upset whenever it didn't work out. Because so far, it had been disappointment after disappointment. It never failed to leave me confused whenever she was so optimistic about her potential love life.

She'd watched our dad cheat on her mom, leave his entire family, including her behind, her long term high school boyfriend cheated on her and her husband left her because she couldn't get pregnant.

I hadn't been dealt cards as shit as those and I was one hundred percent sure that relationships were a shit show and the ones that lasted with no cheating, were the exception. The rare case. It didn't happen a lot.

But no, she sat in the driver's seat of our shared Range Rover and gripped the steering wheel with excitement as we drove down Melrose Avenue toward the restaurant that had been chosen for the evening. Street and store lights illuminated the sidewalks and oncoming headlights came toward us, giving a brief view of each other's face every few seconds.

"He could be the one, Addie," Margo had a rich red lip tonight. It was incredible how a simple colour could serve to make her look so regal. "He could be it. The father. My future."

It was so hard not to tell her that she needed to get real. "You should bring it up with him sooner rather than later. It's kind of imp—"

"It's a super important conversation. I know. I just thought we should get to know each other a little bit before we jump right into the deep stuff. See if our interests mesh. I feel good about it though. He has two kids to a previous marriage. So it's like, he's already dad material."

"So, he mentioned that he has kids, but you didn't bring up the fact that you want a baby?"

She shot me a side on glance and shrugged. "No one can just casually bring up the fact that they want a baby on the first date, Addie. I'm desperate but I'm not stupid."

"You don't have to be desperate either. I want to carry the baby!"

She mumbled under her breath as we pulled into the restaurant valet station. Flicking down her visor mirror, she checked her lip and hair and slammed it shut again. Before I could even get another word in, she told me to get out of the car.

"Come on," I pleaded, going around the tail end of the car to find her handing the keys to the valet. Now I felt like the desperate one. "You should be more grateful that I want to have your baby."

Margo stared at me with incredulity as the valet scurried off, his brows raised.

"How many people raise their hands to have kids for other women, huh?"

Margo linked her arm through mine and we walked through the revolving doors of the five star restaurant known as Osteria Mozza. Margo must have chosen where we ate tonight because it was our favourite Italian restaurant in California.

I also couldn't stand eating at new restaurants and having to choose something from the menu that I'd never had before. The disappointment if I didn't like the meal was too much for me. I ordered the same thing whenever we came here, grilled sonoma county lamb chops. The floors were light wood, the walls were dark wood. The table tops were covered in white table cloths and the lighting was low.

"A lot of people raise their hands to have kids for other people. That's why surrogacy agencies exist. Which is where I would be going if this thing with Jacob doesn't work out. Now, drop it."

"No. I never will."

"I haven't been this tempted to ground you since you were seventeen."

Before I could respond, we stopped at a table where Jacob and his friend were seated. There was a bottle of red, a bowl of bread and four menus at each place setting. Margo sat down beside Jacob who I had met once or twice, but didn't know that well and I took the seat beside his friend. Brad.

Brad gave me a slow once over, looking from the ankle booties on my feet to the sheer black play suit that was clinched at the waist and frilled at the bottom of the shorts.

He wasn't unattractive at all. Dark blonde curls licked at the base of his neck and he had a strong jaw, deep blue eyes and high cheekbones. Objectively, he was a good looking man. I wasn't sure that was my type though. More often than not, I was drawn to dark hair and a scruffier appearance. Brad was dressed in a sharp suit with a turtle neck. He gave me serious 'artistic' vibes.

"Pleasure," he extended a hand and when I took it, I couldn't help but notice how soft it was. "I'm Brad. You must be Addison."

"Addie."

"Beautiful name. I must admit that I was a little surprised to hear you're from Italian descent with the last name May."

I looked at Margo across the table but she was occupied with Jacob. The two of them were smiling at each other, heads together, menus open. Had Jacob filled Brad in on me or had he run some sort of background check before he came?

"Yeah we uh were born Bianchi. But we changed our name to May. For branding purposes. Addison and Margo May be the answer to your event planning needs. We thought it was sort of lame after a while but we kept the last name."

"I'm sorry about your parents," he said, his arm coming to rest on the back of my chair. I admired someone who paid attention and listened with focus but he was leaning in just a little too close. "That must have been hard."

"It wasn't great but I had Margo and she's—"

"Your best friend first, sister second and mother, third," she winked and rested her chin in her palm with a little grin. "Addie made it a breeze to raise her."

That was a lie and we both knew it but I appreciated the sentiment. Even if she was saying it for the purpose of being a wingman and talking me up to Brad.

"Yes Jacob mentioned that you don't have children and Addie is it. I can't imagine what a challenge it must have been to take on a teenager."

Jacob, who had a shaved head, sable skin and shoulders the size of a mountain, smiled at Margo with affection. I had to admit, the two painted a nice picture. If he was 'the one' the babies would be beautiful.

"It was. . . challenging," Margo chuckled, no doubt remembering a time when I didn't like to be cooped up at home but quite the opposite. Still, she regarded me with appreciation. "But it was worth it and I wouldn't be without her. I can't actually get pregnant so, she might be 'it' anyway."

I tried not to react to her subtle drop of information that would no doubt roll into a conversation about her hopes to have a child through IVF with a man. Jacob leaned back and laughed with a deep rumbling laughter that I should have expected from a man of his size but it still surprised me.

"Well that's good to know," he said it as if it were a joke. A light hearted one that some men might find amusing. The whole 'she can't get pregnant so I can hit it raw' gag. That didn't mean he'd be opposed to having more kids. But Margo seemed to see it like that. Her gaze fell to the table top and she picked at the corner of her menu.

It was all I had not to shout out for the check right then and there.

"Good evening, I'm Han," the waiter came and saved the table from the awkward lull it had fallen into. "Do you have any new drink order? Or would you like to hear specials for tonight?"

The waiter, a tall Asian man with the most jovial smile and infectious bounce in his step, looked at us for an answer. His English wasn't perfect but it didn't warrant the response that Brad gave.

"I can't understand him," he chuckled and twisted in his seat, facing Jacob who furrowed his brows at him. "Let him know that we'll have another bottle of this," he tapped the wine bottle, which was down to its last quarter. "Unless you're all ready to order."

Margo twisted her lips into disgust and turned to face the waiter. "We're still deciding. But we'd love to hear the specials."

Han proceeded to let us know what the specials for the evening were, smiling and stuttering his way through it while he read from a notepad. Whenever I heard Brad snigger beside me, my heart sped up and I had to resist the urge to throttle him in front of this entire restaurant. Was he being racist right now? Really?! I met Margo's stare across the table and knew that she was thinking the same thing.

After he left, letting us know that he'd bring back the new bottle of wine, Brad leaned back in the seat and clacked his tongue. "I don't get why they don't hire people that can speak decent English when it comes to jobs that require communicating with a lot of English speaking people."

Margo looked at me and shook her head, never one for confrontation, I knew that she didn't want me to snap at him and ruin the evening. So I inhaled a deep breath and went with an educated response.

"Because, Brad, even people that don't speak fluent English need to earn a living."

Alright, so it wasn't so much educational as it was sarcastic. But it wasn't 'shut the fuck up you racist pig' and I figured that was the main thing. He lifted his lips into an uncertain smile and nodded.

"Yeah. I mean, I just think sometimes they should learn the language before they move here. Or just stay in their own country. I mean, you should be able to—"

"What the fuck," I stared at him. He stammered and looked between the three of us, as if he was hoping that someone would come to his rescue.

"I'm not racist," he gestured at Jacob. "Look, Jacob is one of my best friends. But he can speak English. It's not about their race. It's about— um—"

"Just say you're racist and go," I snapped. "No, wait, I'll go."

My chair legs scraped against the wooden floor as I slid backwards and stood up, looking at Margo and Jacob who were shell shocked. Well Jacob was shocked. Margo was a dark red with a hint of frustration. "I'm sorry, Margo. I can't. I just— can't. I'll get an Uber home. Have a great night."

I was in bed when I heard Margo come home. I was so familiar with her patterns that I could visualise her actions as she walked through the house. Shoes off at the door. The next light thud was her purse hitting the side table. I heard the rustle of her coat being thrown across the sofa and a few moments later, she pushed my bedroom door open and leaned on the frame.

"You finished the other book?"

"Without Merit? Yeah it was so good that I sped through it."

"What's this new one about?"

I closed Chasing Red and ran a hand across the cover, which was made up of oranges, reds, yellows and pinks, swirling like a colourful smoke bomb. "It's about a girl who's had it rough. She meets a boy, who on the surface, has it all. It's a romance. It's a hot romance."

"Oh?" Margo raised a brow and wandered in, sitting on the edge of the bed. She picked up the book and started reading the blurb. "Caleb and Veronica also known as Red. Oh I get it. Chasing Red. That's cute."

"You should read it."

"I will then," she put it down and looked at me. "I ended things with Jacob."

"What?"

"Yeah, after you left, he went off at Brad for being insensitive. Which I loved—"

"Oh, so it's fine when he does it, but not me?"

She tilted her head with confusion. "I wasn't mad when you told him off. I was proud."

"You looked pissed."

"Well, I was. At him. Your confidence isn't something that I have. I just. . . don't seem to have the guts to do stuff like that. Ya know, put people in their place. I wish I did. But I'm glad that you were there to do it for me."

"Oh," I felt stupid for thinking that she would come in here and give me a lecture. "So what happened with Jacob."

"Well we had an awkward dinner and then we went back to his place where we talked for a bit and I decided to just bring up the baby thing and he said that he most definitely did not want more children."

My chest tightened and I ran my hands through my hair with frustration.

"Don't be upset."

"Well I am," I said, voice breathless. "I hate it when this happens."

"I'm getting used to it. You tried to warn me and I never listen," she pursed her lips and shrugged but I could see the glisten in her gaze. "I think it's time to just do it alone."

"Margo," I scooted forward in the bed, the comforter bunching on my lap. "Please let me help. Please. What do I have to do to convince you that I can do this? That it won't be triggering or upsetting for me."

"Addie, how can you be sure that it won't?"

"Because it won't be like the first time."