Chapter 11 #2
Poppy stepped inside after him and looked around.
It was a big, homey space set with communal-style benches, already half-full with families and other couples.
There were photos of sailboats, and old anchors hung up on the walls, and the windows on the far wall looked out over the twinkling lights of the bay.
Poppy’s mouth watered as she watched a waitress pass by with a massive platter of fresh-baked rolls and butter.
“To tell the truth, I prefer this kind of place over fancy restaurants,” she confided, as they waited for the hostess.
“My friend Summer works at a really high-end place in the city, but every time I go there, I start worrying about using the wrong fork, or annoying the snooty ma?tre d’. ”
Cooper chuckled. “Let me guess, they serve everything with weird foam and freeze-dried shavings.”
“Yes!” Poppy exclaimed. “Half the time, I don’t even know what I’m eating. Summer isn’t like that,” she added quickly. “She’s the most amazing chef, and her pastries . . .” She trailed off with a lustful sigh. “One day, she wants to open a bakery, but I guess she’s still paying her dues.”
“I get that.” Cooper nodded. “I didn’t go out on my own until just a few years ago. They don’t tell you how running your own business isn’t just about the fun stuff, it’s all the extra work as well—keeping the books, and dealing with suppliers, and marketing.”
“And you can’t play hooky, either, when you’re boss,” Poppy agreed, laughing.
“See, I told you.” Cooper grinned. “Work ethic.”
The hostess showed them to a table by the windows, and they got settled, the salty sea air mingling with all the delicious food smells wafting from the kitchen.
“Can I bring you some menus?” the girl asked, and Cooper looked to Poppy.
“Usually, I just get the platter, but if you want . . . ?”
“No, it sounds good to me,” she agreed quickly. “And can you please bring some of those rolls? Lots of those rolls. And butter,” she added, before the waitress departed. She caught his smile from across the table. “It’s hungry work!” she protested. “All that sitting around, typing.”
“Working up a sweat.” Cooper gave her a wink, and Poppy cringed again.
“I said we were forgetting about that.”
“We were,” he replied, looking amused. “But now you’re blushing so hard, it makes me wonder what I missed.”
“That’s for me to know, and you to find out,” Poppy said, realizing too late how flirtatious the challenge sounded. But thankfully, the waitress returned with their beers, so Cooper just quirked a knowing eyebrow and let that one slide.
Poppy sat back, trying to relax. “I still can’t believe you’re here in town. You were always so . . . restless,” she smiled, remembering him when he was younger. “I figured you’d be on the other side of the country by now.”
Cooper gave a knowing smile. “Is that a polite way of saying I was a loud-ass brat?”
“Hey, take the pass,” she said, and he laughed.
“You’re right, I couldn’t wait to get the hell out.
I left for college, but then my dad got sick, and, well .
. .” He shrugged. “It turned out Sweetbriar had something going for it, after all.” He toyed with his beer bottle.
“They really pulled together for us, and after a while, I guess it just feels like home.”
Poppy felt a pang. She couldn’t imagine losing a parent, especially like that. “I bet he’d be proud of you,” she said softly, thinking of everything he’d achieved.
Cooper looked bashful. “I don’t know about that. What about you?” he changed the subject. “Where’s home to you these days?”
Poppy hesitated. “New York, I guess. Brooklyn. At least, that was the plan. I was going to move into Owen’s apartment,” she admitted. “And then we’d start looking for a place outside the city, maybe upstate.”
“Ah yes, the famous fiancé.” Cooper tilted his head, fixing her with an unreadable look. “So what happened there?”
Poppy let out a sigh.
He chuckled. “That bad?”
“No,” Poppy quickly defended him. “He wasn’t bad at all. He was great. I just… didn’t love him,” she said sadly. “Not the way I should.”
She couldn’t even explain why. Owen was a good guy: thoughtful and serious, kind of obsessive when it came to Star Wars movies and all the comic books he had stacked neatly in their basement, but Poppy figured she was the same with her romance book collection.
Sure, he could get stressed and distant when he had a big project at work, and forget to call her when he travelled every other month, so sometimes they would spend a week barely exchanging a text, but not every couple had to coo sweet nothings over the phone every night.
They were independent adults, with their own lives to lead.
At least, that’s what Poppy told herself.
“The truth is, I wanted it to be right,” she admitted, meeting Cooper’s steady gaze.
“I wanted it to be him, so badly. I’d been on my own for so long before I met him, I thought, finally, this is it.
Someone to be with, to share my life with.
We would get married and start a family, and everything would work out.
I could see it all, you know? The life I wanted more than anything.
I knew deep down, he wasn’t the one for me, but I ignored it for too long.
” She looked away, feeling foolish. “You probably don’t understand. ”
“I do.” Cooper’s reply was quiet. “You thought that if you just pushed through, ignored all the warning signs, you could make him the one.”
Poppy nodded. “Until the wedding was right around the corner, and those little whispers in my head started screaming at me, and I couldn’t ignore it any more. So, I called it all off.”
She sighed. She wasn’t proud of what she’d done, but there hadn’t been any other way.
“Now I just have to hope I was right, and I didn’t throw away something good and solid, for .
. . what was it you said?” she asked, remembering his scornful words when they first met.
“A fairy-tale fantasy that’s only going to leave me disappointed in the end. ”
Cooper grimaced. “I’m sorry, I should never have said that.”
“But it’s what you believe, isn’t it?” Poppy found herself hanging on his answer, hoping he wasn’t as downbeat on love as he seemed. It shouldn’t matter to her, but somehow, it did.
Cooper paused and looked down. “I don’t know. Not like that. But either way, I had no right to be such an ass to you.” He glanced back up and met her eyes with a rueful, sincere smile. “I’m sorry.”
“Apology accepted,” Poppy said slowly. She wanted to ask him more, about his past, too, and those glimpses of bitterness she saw still lingering at the edges, but the waitress suddenly returned, depositing two massive platters on the table.
“Alright you guys, I have two mixed, extra rolls, extra butter.”
Poppy took in the spread, and laughed. “Wow.”
“Need anything else?” the girl asked.
“A bib?” she joked, but the waitress just nodded.
“On the table. Enjoy.”
She dashed away, leaving Poppy to survey the feast in front of them. “There’s no elegant way to do this, is there?” she said, her mouth already watering. There were whole crabs, clams, and even lobster tail, so fresh she could smell the ocean.
“Go crazy, I won’t judge.” Cooper grinned, handing her a plastic bib. Poppy laughed and fastened it around her neck, and he did the same.
Cooper held up his beer in a toast. “Here’s to starting over.”
She smiled and clinked the glass to his. “To starting over.”
Their eyes caught, and Poppy felt a slow shiver of anticipation bubbling through her veins, the champagne promise of something sweet, just on the horizon.
She’d spent all year questioning her choices, wondering if she could trust her instincts—or if they were sending her spinning off track, away from the truth.
But as Poppy took a sip, she felt perfectly content.
She was starting a new chapter in her life, and it was scary, but exhilarating, too, to leave her past behind and strike out in search of something more.
Maybe there was hope for her, after all.