Fast & Loose by Elizabeth Bevarly (the giving tree read aloud .txt) 📕

“Oh, don’t you dare make it sound tawdry.”

“Bree, it is tawdry.”

“It’s not tawdry.”

“Then what do you call it?”

“Survival,” she said. “I call it survival.”

“And what have you been doing all these years?” he asked her. “You seem to have survived just fine on your own.” He spread his arms wide. “Look at this place. It’s beautiful.”

“It’s small.”

“It’s beautiful,” he repeated. “You have a nice place to live, Bree. You have a decent job. You have friends who care about you. Do you really need more than that?”

“Yes,” she told him without hesitation. “I do. Because I’m tired, Rufus. I’m tired of never having anything extra in the bank. I’m tired of dreaming about going places I can’t afford to go. Hell, I’m tired of months where I have to decide whether to pay the electric bill or the phone bill or buy groceries. And I’m tired, dammit, of worrying about the future and how I’m going to cope with everything that’s sure to come.”

She started to tell him about her mother. Wanted to tell him the real reason she was so obsessed with having—and hoarding—money. But maybe it would be better if he didn’t know. If he thought she was shallow enough to just want material possessions, then maybe his affection for her would wane. Maybe he’d begin to view her as just some whack chick he didn’t want to be around. Maybe he’d stop doing nice things for her, saying nice things to her, being so nice to her. And maybe he’d stop looking at her the way he did sometimes, a way that made her want to fall into his arms and cling to him.

He studied her hard for a moment, his mouth a thin line. “I still don’t get it, Bree. I still don’t see how you could sacrifice your dignity in exchange for letting someone else, someone who doesn’t even care about you on more than a superficial level, hold your future in his hands.”

She swallowed hard. “Yeah, well, the way it stands right now, I don’t have enough of a future for anyone’s hands, do I?”

Rufus shook his head. “You know, for a smart, articulate, interesting woman, you could use some serious education.”

She was about to challenge him on that, but the scrape of a key in the front door halted her. Before either she or Rufus could say a word, Lulu came in, chattering enough for both of them.

“I saw the light from the street, so I knew you were still up. Thank God, too, because you won’t believe what happened at the gallery tonight. You remember that girl from—” She halted abruptly when she saw Rufus, smiling until she evidently noticed how cool the temperature was in the room. Then, in a cautious voice, she said, “Hi, Rufus.” She looked at Bree. “Everything okay?”

Rufus replied before Bree had a chance to, and he spoke as he strode toward the front door that was still open behind Lulu. “Everything’s okay with me, Lulu,” he said as he brushed past her, giving her a quick buss on the cheek in both greeting and farewell as he went. “Your friend, though…” He shook his head again, but never finished his statement. Instead, he looked at Bree and said, “I hope you find what you’re looking for. But ya ask me, Bree, you don’t even know what the hell that is.”

And then he was gone, leaving Lulu to look at Bree, her face a silent question mark. And leaving Bree to look at Lulu without an answer to be had.

Eleven

IT WAS A RARE FRIDAY NIGHT WHEN BREE WAS OFF from work and Eddie wasn’t performing as Liza Minnelli. So Lulu and her friends took advantage of the anomaly by doing their most favorite thing in the world—congregating at Bree’s apartment to watch Orlando Bloom in high def. On this particular Friday night, it was Lulu’s turn to choose the movie, and she naturally selected Elizabethtown, because she’d seen part of it being filmed while the crew was on location in Louisville. In fact, she’d watched them set up for a scene that included Orlando Bloom. Unfortunately, she’d seen Orlando Bloom’s stand-in instead of Orlando himself, but by squinting her eyes just so, she had been able to pretend it was him and so had been content.

“I still think they should have filmed the hotel scenes at the Ambassador instead of the Brown,” Bree said as the credits scrolled past at movie’s end. But then, she always said that as the credits scrolled past at movie’s end. The only difference tonight was that she was wearing jeans and a T-shirt when she said it—much like Lulu and Eddie—instead of her Nick and Nora pajamas, which was what she and Lulu were usually wearing whenever they watched Orlando in high def.

“Of course you do, darling,” Eddie said absently. He had his blond head bent over the DVD case, reading over the liner notes. “The bonus features on this thing are appallingly bad,” he said. “There’s no photo gallery of Orlando at all. What’s up with that?”

“The hotel choice is a tough call if you ask me,” Lulu said, scraping the bottom of the popcorn bowl for old maids and coming up empty. So she swiped her finger through an especially buttery spot and licked it clean. “They’re both gorgeous and would set off Orlando nicely. He did look awfully dreamy in that Camberley robe, though, I must say.”

“Ah, well,” Bree said as she reached for the remote control. “Time to go back to the real world.” She pushed the button to return to regular TV, just in time for the eleven o’clock news. Inevitably, though, midway through the program there was an interview with Cole Early, and his face was splashed across the screen in all its ruggedly handsome glory. Again.

Lulu’s first thought upon seeing him