Perfect Fifths_ A Jessica Darling Novel - Megan McCafferty [92]
Jessica fumbles the note in shock. “What?!” The paper wafts gently to the floor.
“Woo! You did! You saw Marcus! That’s the secret! Woo! Where did you see him? When? Does he look the same? Did he ask about me? Wooooo!” Marin has run out of breath and inhales long and loud before finishing up with the kicker. “Are you still in looooooooooove?”
Usually, Marin’s uncensored inquisitions are attributed to the guilelessness of youth. But in this case, she’s just asking the questions—the question—that anyone who knows Jessica and Marcus would have asked, which is exactly why Jessica kept the news to herself all afternoon. Until now.
“Say something!!!” Marin begs.
Jessica replies to the questions in the order in which they were asked.
“Yes, I saw Marcus. I ran over him at the airport, then we spent the whole afternoon talking to each other over coffee. He looks the same but even better than the same. He did ask about you.”
Jessica stops here, squats down, and looks for the dropped slip of paper.
“Aunt J.?! You haven’t answered the most important question of all!!!”
“I haven’t,” Jessica says, crawling on her hands and knees. “Have I?”
“I’ll answer it for you,” Marin announces in the same all-business tone that declared she couldn’t wear the fugly tracksuits.
“Oh, really?” Jessica spots the paper underneath the desk, reaches for it.
“And the answer is …” Marin takes a dramatic breath and delivers a speech that draws upon everything she has ever learned about love from watching too much reality television with her nanny. “YES! You and Marcus still LOVE LOVE LOVE each other because you and Marcus are TRUE SOUL MATES even though you haven’t seen each other in, like, FOREVER, but it’s just like MOM and E-CAR JERRY, who didn’t see each other after, like, FOREVER, and it was, like, WHAMMO! BLAMMO! Cupid’s ARROW with, like, MANY INTIMATE MOMENTS, and they knew it was FATE and DESTINY that had brought them back together …” Marin pauses just long enough to suck in a lungful of air.
“YES! You and Marcus are still in LOVE and you’re totally going to get MARRIED and have ME as a FLOWER GIRL in the ceremony and MAYBE you’ll even get married at twenty-seven like my mom did the first time which is ONLY A YEAR AWAY only YOU AND MARCUS won’t ever ever ever split up because you are SOUL MATES with MANY INTIMATE MOMENTS you are DESTINED to live HAPPLILY HAPPILY HAPPILY ever AFTER …”
Marin is hyperventilating. Jessica, too, is having trouble breathing. She shakily stands up, then backs herself onto Marcus’s untouched bed.
“So?” Marin asks.
Jessica squints, trying to focus on the shaking paper.
Gone for a while
Hoping, always, to return
If you will let me
“Aunt J.! Helllloooooooo? Are you there?”
Am I here? Jessica asks herself. Am I really here? Is any of this really happening? Or is this really a long, vivid-coma dream?
Jessica clears her throat. “I gotta go, Marin,” she says, trying to steady her voice. “I’ll talk to you soon.”
“But you didn’t answer the most important question of all!!!”
“I didn’t need to,” Jessica replies matter-of-factly. “You answered it for me.”
She shuts off the phone. Sloppily folds the note and stores it in her back pocket. She calls out to him.
“Marcus Flutie.”
fifteen
Marcus doesn’t know how long he’s been leaning against this wall with his eyes closed, recuperating from the strange encounter with the salesclerk. It’s been long enough to get noticed.
“Aren’t you a tall drink of water.”
Marcus opens his eyes and looks down to see a woman whose complicated yellow feathered hat is half as tall as she is. From her vantage point, even Natty would qualify as a tall drink of water.
“My name is Lola.”
“Er, hi, Lola.”
“I am a showgirl.”
“A showgirl?”
She flounces her wrists. “With painted feathers in my hair.” Then risks another hip replacement surgery with a shimmy. “And a dress cut down to there …”
“Oh,” Marcus says, slow on the uptake. “I get it. ‘Copacabana.’”
“I knew you were good people!” She tries to punch him in the arm but doesn’t come close