Chapter 7

Once all the neighbours had left, Gabe sat around the deck with his Chuck, Teri and Tom. Tom's wife had gone to bed, as had Trey and Nick. They talked about the business. They caught up with one another. Gabe had been gone from the show for a little over two years. He was one of the more popular supporting characters and the producers had tried everything they could think of to bring him back.

His heart just wasn't in it, though. Not with his mother's failing health. Even though she scolded him for dropping everything to care for her, he stayed by her side. And after her death, he coasted on for another year.

"You've got to strike while the iron is hot," Tom had told him when he was back in New York.

"Get off your ass, stop feeling sorry for yourself and get the fuck back to work," was Chuck's way of saying the same thing.

After the publicity surrounding his prom date, it didn't take much coaxing to get back into the swing of things. His encounter with the girls and fresh exposure in the press seemed to put that spring back in his step.

The citronella torches were flickering with their last light. Tom and Chuck went inside. The catering crew had long since departed. The leftovers were packed in foil containers and deposited in the fridge. Empty beer bottles and the disposable paper plates were stuffed into trash cans.

Gabe and Teri sat underneath the stars for a few more minutes. The neighbourhood was quiet.

"Your mom would have had a great time tonight," his friend said.

He smiled ruefully. "Yeah ... she would have."

"She always loved having people around," Teri divided the last bit of wine between their two glasses. "Do you remember the time we took her to that party out in the Hamptons?"

"You mean the time we crashed the wedding?"

Both of them laughed at the memory.

"Hey, we had an invitation," she replied, feigning defensiveness.

"That you stole!"

"It was sent to me. Well ... to my house, anyway." They laughed again. "Your mom was a firecracker, Gabe."

He smiled wistfully. Libby had always like Teri. The two were like sisters.

"She would have liked Bailey, too," Teri said quietly.

"Mom liked everybody," Gabe replied absently. That wasn't quite true. His mom never liked his ex-wife, even before the divorce.

"Not like that, Lo. Libby would have liked Bailey because you like Bailey," she continued. "Don't give me that look, mister. You two were making puppy dog eyes at each other all night long."

"She's young enough—"

"Oh, horseshit," Teri snorted. "You're what? ... Thirty-five? You're not an old man, Lo. She's hot for you, too ... and not just because you're a looker who's on TV. She really likes you."