One More For The Road Read online

  One More for the Road

  One More for the Road

  A novel by Rebecca Harris

  2020

  No part of this book may be used or reproduced or distributed in any form, electronic or mechanical, including information storage and retrieval, or photocopying without written permission by the author.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, and incidents are product of the author’s imagination. The author acknowledges the trademarked status of various products and places referenced in this novel. The use of these trademarks is not associated with or sponsored by the trademark owners.

  Kindle Edition

  Cover photo by Vera Arsic

  Cover design by Rebecca Harris

  Note from the author:

  Thank you for taking the time to read my novel, One More for the Road. Writing it has been a labor of love, and I am very proud to share this story with you. I feel a great sense of connection with my heroine and hope you enjoy reading her story as much as I enjoyed telling it.

  Please take the time to help independent authors such as myself by leaving a rating or review! And be on the lookout for more novels by Rebecca Harris, coming to Amazon Kindle soon!

  Contents

  Dedication

  1.

  2.

  3.

  4.

  5.

  6.

  7.

  8.

  9.

  10.

  11.

  12.

  13.

  14.

  15.

  16.

  17.

  18.

  19.

  20.

  21.

  Epilogue

  Playlist

  For the screw-ups

  1.

  “What the hell am I doing?”

  Heat slithers across my skin as I slink out the backdoor of the old river-rock church, the cracks between each stone filled by a makeshift mortar of a pale green moss that hold the weathered, ripened building together piece by piece. The granite steps are gray and slick, covered in dizzying patterns of sunlight.

  I balance on my toes, afraid someone might hear the staccato click-clack of my heels, designer monstrosities that have rubbed angry blisters into both of my heels. But I don’t stop. I can’t stop.

  Layers of silk and taffeta swish about my legs, twisting like vines around my knees. I stop for the briefest of seconds, grab handfuls of fluff and raise it well past my thighs.

  Much easier. I reach the bottom of the stairs and break into a dangerous sprint, down a long back alley running parallel with the church, and around the next corner to the nearest parking lot.

  A black stretch limousine idles across four parking spots, strangely intimidating in its polished perfection. I reach the car in a matter of seconds and throw myself across the back seat, my dress puffing up around my face like a deformed, vengeful marshmallow.

  “Is it over already?” The driver pops his head around from the front. He’s friendly looking, a sharp bristle brush mustache covering the top half of a genuine smile. He dabs at the sweat beading beneath his chauffeur’s cap with a tissue, leaving soft, white fibers behind.

  “Yeah. It’s over,” I answer quickly, the irony not slipping by unnoticed.

  “How was the ceremony?”

  “Lovely. Wonderful. The stuff dreams are made of.” I rip my veil off my head and throw it into the empty seat next to me. “Listen. There’s been a change of plans. You’re supposed to drive me here now.” I lean forward and hand him a torn scrap of paper.

  He stares down at the new address, pink brow furrowing in confusion. “Well, now, this isn’t the address I was given.”

  “That’s why I said there’s been a change of plans.” I can feel my pasted-on smile slipping with each wasted second.

  “I was given explicit instructions by the limo company,” he retorts, picking up and flipping through several pages on a standard issue company clipboard.

  “Listen…”

  “Randy.”

  “Listen, Randy,” I say slowly, as though speaking to a child. “We hired the limo company, right?” He nods. “So, that means you’re supposed to listen to me. And I need you to drive where I tell you.”

  “Where’s your husband?” Randy asks, lifting a lone eyebrow. “Shouldn’t we wait for him?” He glances at the rearview mirror as if he expects Andrew to be standing just outside, ironed tux, goofy smile fixed firmly in place.

  “No. He’s meeting me at the reception hall after we make this stop.”

  It isn’t even a good lie. He would have to be a complete moron to believe it.

  “Alright, alright.” The moron chuckles as though my rage simply amuses him. “I know better than to upset a bride on her wedding day.” He shifts the limo into drive, and long black car pulls out of the parking lot.

  He shifts the car into drive, pulling out of the parking lot and onto the road. The engine purrs as we merge with the flow of traffic, leaving the quaint, carefully chosen location of my nuptials behind.

  I know I shouldn’t, but I can’t help but sneak a glance or two out the back window, half expecting an angry mob of church goers chasing our taillights. I peek again. Any minute now.

  But there’s no horde of pitchforks or torches. No screams or calls for my head. No stones being thrown. No riotous surge of two hundred of our closest friends and family uniformly attired in pastels.

  I hate pastels.

  To my left, settled in a bucket of rapidly melting ice, is an unopened bottle of champagne, tantalizing beads of moisture slipping down the rounded sides like the crook of a beckoning finger. I stare at the bottle in silence, daring it to judge me, before popping it open and raising it to my lips, trickles of cream-colored foam landing on the floorboard at my feet. It tastes unbelievably good.

  I lower the bottle from my mouth only to notice Randy staring at me in the rear-view mirror, eyes narrowed in what I can only assume is either puzzlement or disgust.

  “What?” I snap.

  He shakes his head and returns his focus to the road.

  I take a deep breath, and lean my head back against the soft, black leather seat. “I am so going to hell for this,” I mutter through pursed lips.

  I answer myself with a shrug and humbly help myself to another drink.

  We reach my apartment in ten minutes, the fierce July sun beaming through the windows showing. I unglue myself from the sticky, sweat coated backseat and grab the veil next to me. “Thanks,” I breathe as the car pulls to a stop.

  “I’ll just keep the motor running!” Randy calls as I grab my veil and unglue myself from the sweat-soaked backseat.

  My dress drifts across the sidewalk like a furious cloud as I run for my apartment complex, through the front door and up the six flights of stairs with the speed of a well-medicated Olympian, practically running over Mrs. Connor, my mildly senile, octogenarian neighbor, on the way up.

  “Congratulations, Frances!” She waves a wrinkled hand as I sprint past, her blue-gray hair bobbing up and down as she searches an enormous leather purse for her keys.

  “No time, Mrs. Connor!” I call, wrenching my door open.

  My apartment is small, a cramped utility space where kitchen, bedroom, and living space one and the same. The only separate rooms are the tiny closet to the right and the bathroom to the back left. A box springs and mattress rest on their sides, away from the kitchen sink and a pyramid of half-filled cardboard boxes that line walls painted a frightening, mental institution white. One sofa and a single shabby bookcase compile the rest of my rather pathetic collection of furniture.

  I lean my head back against the door, counting to ten, to twenty, to thirty, hoping the
repetition might work to pacify the cyclone of nerves swirling in the pit of my stomach. It doesn’t work. I reach one hundred and force myself to move through the nausea.

  I order an Uber and busy myself until its arrival. I could drive myself, I suppose, but my mother, the Grand Banshee herself, is currently holding my car keys hostage in the back of a church, and I can’t think of anything more frightening right at this moment than the prospect of slipping into the pew to ask for them.

  “Excuse me, Mother, but might I have my car keys for a moment? I need them for a quick get-away.”

  After rummaging through the poorly taped pile of boxes, boxes that should be on their way to Andrew’s condo first thing tomorrow morning, I manage to find my an old red messenger bag I’ve had since high school and cram it full of mismatched clothing and personal hygiene products.

  I kick off my heels and wiggle free of the billowing white atrocity strapped to me with an unbelievable number of buttons and hooks, leaving it a crumpled heap on the floor. I throw on the cleanest tank top and pair of jeans within arm’s reach and begin the tedious process of taking a thousand of tightly wound bobby pins out of my hair, letting the uneven brown waves fall free around my shoulders.

  My phone beeps with my ride’s arrival. I grab my bag and slip my sunglasses down over my eyes, feeling more like a member of the CIA than intended.

  “How was the wedding, dear?” Mrs. Connor asks, still digging around in her purse for her keys.

  “No time, Mrs. Connor!” I jump the stairs two at a time until I reach the ground floor.

  “Have a great honeymoon, Frances!” I hear, heralded by the victorious jangle of keys.

  Oh Mrs. Connor. If only you knew.

  I wave to Randy, waiting patiently with the limousine, as I sprint past. “Your services are no longer required! Thank you!”

  I fling my bag into the backseat of the Uber and plunge in after it. “San Francisco!” I shout to my driver. “And step on it!”

  Instead of stepping on it as I have specifically instructed, my Uber driver turns from the front seat to glare at me. His skin reminds me vaguely of crumpled tissue paper “Are you crazy? There’s no way I’m driving you to California.”

  “How about the nearest bus station? Think you can go that far?”

  He slams on the gas without another word.

  We reach the downtown bus station in a matter of minutes. I crawl out of the back seat as the car pulls to the drop-off entrance, lungs bursting for want of air. I’d tried, and failed at, holding my breath the entire trip to block out the delightful smell of what I hoped wasn’t a dead body rotting in the trunk.

  The car pulls away in a cloud of exhaust fumes, and I head inside. The bus depot is busier than I expected. I’d anticipated only a few local transients, a few drunks, and the occasional escapee, who, like me, couldn’t afford plane fare. The station, however, is bustling with life, a spectrum of humanity milling about, buying tickets, carrying luggage, waiting for buses. I blow a limp strand of hair out of my eyes and join them, heading for the nearest ticket counter.

  “Hi,” I manage to choke out as I amble up to a friendly looking woman behind the counter. She wears the burgundy and gray jacket of a station employee, her black hair decorated with a sparkling red barrette. Are there any buses that travel to California?” I ask politely.

  She throws a manufactured smile in my direction. “I’m sure there are, darlin’. But none that come through this station.”

  I lift an eyebrow and focus on being pleasant. “Well, can you see if there is any possible way for me to get there? I don’t mind transferring buses.”

  “Hmm. Let me check on that.” She pounds away on the keyboard, manicured fingers flying across the keys. “Hmm,” she murmurs every so often with a thick southern drawl. “Hmm.” A minute of searching goes by before she stops typing and looks up at me. “There’s a bus to Kansas City, which connects to Colorado Springs. I’m fairly certain you can catch a bus to San Francisco from there.” She beams at me, pleased with herself.

  She wouldn’t be so jolly if she knew she had lipstick on her teeth.

  I sigh. “How much and when do I leave?”

  “The bus to Missouri leaves at 7:00 this evening. The fare is ninety-seven dollars and eighty-two cents.”

  “Ninety-seven dollars?” I exclaim.

  “And eighty-two cents,” she repeats, her smile slightly more forced than it was a moment ago. Apparently, I’m holding up the eve- growing line of customers waiting to be scammed by the transportation industry.

  “One-way to Kansas City,” I tell her, surrendering a wad of cash. I hadn’t figured on bus tickets costing quite this much, and a small pin prick of financial panic flashes to the forefront of my mind.

  “Bus 272 leaves from door 7 at 7:00. That should be easy to remember, shouldn’t it?” She gives a small chuckle as she slips my ticket across the counter. “There should be a fifteen-minute boarding call, so don’t worry. You won’t miss it.” And with a final, practiced grin, she’s on to the next person in line.

  I glance at the large clock on the depot wall, finding that it’s only ten after five, nearly two hours until I’m scheduled to leave. I peer around the station, hoping some form of ready entertainment will appear, anything to keep my thoughts occupied. A small gift shop resides in one corner, an even smaller coffee cart in another. A few vending machines are stationed chaotically around the station, surrounded by an army of uncomfortable looking plastic chairs, not one with an armrest. I drag my satchel of belongings over to the nearest row of seats, the bag somehow heavier than ever as I hurl it onto a chair and flop myself down in the one beside it.

  I didn’t anticipate having so much time to kill. Two hours gives my family and so-called friends more than enough time to find me. I take another frightened peek over my shoulder. No one.

  I rest my head in my hands and begin counting the colored tiles beneath my shoes, naming them, organizing them by size and amount of mildew, determined to think of anything except about how right this minute I’m supposed to be cutting a slice of my wedding cake and kissing gourmet icing off of Andrew’s nose.

  I bet it would have been delicious…

  “Frances Jane Renner!”

  I crack my eyelids against the bright, fluorescent lights to the figure of my sister looming over me like an irate bird of prey. She pokes me in the shoulder with one of her long, bony fingers.

  “Frances, what the hell do you think you’re doing?”

  I blink away a half-hearted sleep and take a good, long look up at her. Her auburn hair still curled and pinned in an elegant up-do, her cheeks contoured, eyelids dusted with a smoky shimmer. All that is missing is the beflowered bridesmaid’s dress I’d last seen this morning. Instead, she looks as if she dressed in a hurry, throwing on jeans and a wrinkled gray t-shirt.

  “Go away, Katie,” I groan.

  I stare up into a face that, despite a seven-year age gap, broadly resembles my own, the same wavy, chestnut hair of our mother, the pale skin that burns easily and high cheekbones dotted by the occasional freckle.

  She delivers a sharp, painful smack to the back of my head. “Have you lost your damn mind?”

  “Nice to see you too.” I rub at the spot where she hit me. “You look pretty today. Did you do something different with your hair?”

  “You don’t get to be a smart-ass,” she retorts with a grimace. “Not after what you’ve done.”

  “What I’ve done?”

  Her scowl would frighten most people. I, however, find it amusing. “You know exactly what I’m talking about, Frances. I’ve been rushing around town like a crazy person trying to find you.”

  I let the crazy person remark slide.

  “And come to think of it,” her voice rising with each word of reprimand, “so has everyone else! Do you realize that everyone you’ve ever met is out searching for you right now? Family. Friends. The caterers! It’s like you’re on the lam for fuck’s sake!”

&n
bsp; “Don’t be so melodramatic.”

  “This coming from a woman who just reenacted a Julia Roberts movie!”

  “Pretty Woman?”

  “Runaway Bride, idiot.”

  “Fuck off,” I say, stretching my arms out in front of me, feeling the pull and strain of the afternoon in every muscle. “I’ve had a rough day.”

  Her rose-tinted lips pinch together like a drawstring purse. “You’ve had a rough couple of hours? You’re the genius who ran out on her own wedding! Did it not occur to you to maybe tell someone your little plan?”

  “It was sort of a spur of the moment decision,” I offer. “Not to mention, if I told someone, then everyone would know where I am.”

  An unladylike snort escapes through her nose. “You know what? I don’t even know why I’m surprised. This is typical Frances, isn’t it? Just like when we were kids. You do something wrong and I cover for you. You flunk your history exam and I cover for you. You set our mailbox on fire; I cover for you.” She crosses her arms over her chest. “You’re lucky I got here before anyone else. Do you realize what would have happened if mom had found you first?”

  “She would kill me.”

  “Can I tell her?”

  “No!” I whirl around in my seat, half expecting an ambush. “Does anyone else know I’m here?”

  “No,” she says. “I didn’t tell anyone.”

  I let go of the breath I didn’t realize I was holding. “How did you find me?”

  She shrugs. “I went looking for you before you were supposed to walk down the aisle. Couldn’t find you, of course.” She slaps me with a particularly hostile bit of side-eye. “And then all hell broke loose once the music started and we all realized nobody knew where you were. Everyone was shouting. Andrew’s family was ready to tear the church apart, and Andrew…”

  “Don’t.” I stop her. “I don’t want to know.”

  “Fine,” she sighs, letting his name fade from her lips. “Well, I went back to your dressing room, because, knowing you, I figured it was possible you might just waltz back in like nothing was the matter. And then I found this.”