Page 14 of Middle Ground

“Care to share why you’re getting drunk in a storage room?” he asks.

“Because all my hopes and dreams have been shot to hell.”

“That’s a little dramatic for a Monday evening.”

I glare. “Do you want me to spill or not?”

He holds up his hands. “Sorry. Shutting up now.”

I sigh. “Apparently, my mother’s friend owned half of the inn. She has for the past fifteen years. Now that she’s gone, her shares have been left to her grandson.”

Declan’s brows raise in disbelief. “You’re shitting me.”

“’Fraid not, bud.” I take another mournful drink of wine. “She’s been coming around all my life, but to me, she was always just a guest.” I let out a bitter laugh. “And I thought I knew everything there was to know about this place.”

“Okay,” he says, rubbing his jaw in thought. “Superunexpected. But her grandson owning part of the inn, that’s a bad thing…why?”

I throw my hands in the air, nearly losing my hold on the wine. A few drops slosh out of the bottle, coating my hand. I lick the escaped alcohol from my skin before answering.

“Because I have to share, Declan!”

“Again, that’s a problem…why?”

I scowl. “My five-year plan centred around me showing the world what an accomplished businesswoman I can be. Look, world! Meyer Ellison didthat. Now I have tosharewith some business guy from Toronto who probably eats Rolexes for breakfast and doesn’t know a thing about physical labour. He’s probably going to want to sell and—Oh my God.”

“What?”

“He’s gonna want to sell!” I wail. “Theyalwayswant to sell!”

The night I learned that I am a weepy drunk was the night of my senior prom. I’d only had alcohol a handful of times before then, and it was never in excess. Prom night, however, my friends dragged me to a party.

Pippa didn’t get to town until the following year, so I had a different group of friends back then. Friends who left me and Fraisier Creek firmly in their rear view when they set out for university.

As I watched my friends having the time of their lives with our graduating class, I was hit with athis is the endkind of feeling. It was an odd melancholy that seeped into my bones and left me feeling exposed. So I did what any rational eighteen-year-old would do: I resolved to get blackout drunk.

I didn’t quite make it there because I can still vividly recall my friends finding me on my back in a hayfield, crying up at the stars. The pitying looks they shot me as they carried me home almost exactly match the look that Declan is giving me right now.

“It’ll be okay, Meyer,” he says, placing a comforting hand on my arm. “This isn’t goodbye.”

“Sure feels like it.”

That melancholy is back, and this time, she’s here to stay.

“Maybe we could take up a collection?” he suggests. “I know I haven’t been in Fraisier Creek long, but I get the feeling you folks protect your own. I’m sure everyone would be more than willing to help you buy him out.”

I smile at Declan’s naivety. He’s not stupid by any means, but at twenty-two, he somehow hasn’t been jaded enough by the world to see it the way I do. Even with shitty parents like his, he’s still good to his core.

I can’t resist telling him as much. “You’re one of the good ones, Declan Rhodes.”

He rolls his eyes, though he’s smiling, too. “I’m never going to escape that label, am I?”

I shake my head. “Probably not, but that’s okay. You just be you. A good man. A good friend.”

He slaps his thighs and then stands. “Well, as your friend, I think I should get you home.”

“I’m not ready to go home,” I admit.

The thought of going back to my dark, empty cottage makes the melancholy grow. Sure, my cat is there, but he definitely won’t have patience for my drunkenness.