Chapter 18
“I don’t want to give you every detail about yesterday, Quinn. I want you to use your special fashion magic to tell me what fucking shirt to wear.”
Zander slammed the drawer of the shaky dresser he’d taken over for the summer, waiting for it to finally fall apart.
“How am I supposed to tell you what shirt to wear when I have so little info?” Quinn asked through the phone wedged against Zander’s ear. “I don’t know what’s going on with you two!”
“I don’t know what’s going on either.” For all that Zander and Penny had managed to do with their few minutes the day before, talking about what they were doing, or if they were going to do it again, wasn’t one of them.
“Whatever we’re doing, it’s a terrible idea. I’ll be back in Boston in two months.”
“Maybe, but you’re here now. And so is she. And, Zander, I love you, but you can be very annoying in your mission to always be the best guy for the people around you. You deserve to do things sometimes because you want to.”
He yanked open another drawer. “Sure, but is that fair to her? To start something I can’t finish because I want to?”
“I think what’s fair to Penny is up to her, not you.”
Which was exactly what Penny had told him yesterday.
“Ah,” Quinn said. “Your silence means you know I’m right. Penny is acting on her own free will, but we still want to make you impossible to resist.”
Zander stared at the dresser, pushing a dime across decades of pale rings from sweating glasses. “What if I’m reading too much into it? What if it was just a hookup for her?”
Quinn’s voice gentled. “And it’s not just that for you?”
“No.” He didn’t know what it was, what it could be, but it was more than a hookup. Or he’d like it to be. But with each passing moment since he’d walked away from Penny’s front door, he wondered more if it was one-sided.
“I think the walls of this house actually suck out my self-esteem,” he told Quinn. “It’s like I hear his voice, asking me what I’m worth.”
Quinn sighed. “Paint the walls and tell that voice to fuck off. Did you bring that pink shirt you got in Provincetown when we went to the folk fest?”
“That barely fits me.”
“Exactly. Put it on. And call me later to tell me everything or suffer the consequences.”
Zander shoved his clothes around until he found the right shirt. “I will, I promise.”
“And, Zander. You’re worth a lot.”
He smiled big at the phone. “You’re being sappy.”
“Whatever. Call later.”
He was halfway down the stairs when a knock came at the door. He hollered to Winter that he’d get it, then took one slow breath before opening the door to the view of Penny framed in sunshine, biting her lower lip.
“Hi.” She was in snug jeans and a loose flannel shirt. Her hair fell in twin braids, and her thighs were streaked with dirt. One small dark smudge marked the curve of her cheek.
Zander pulled the door closed behind him as he stepped onto the porch, close to Penny. So close he could smell peppermint, basil, and fresh soil. So close he could wrap his fingers around one of her braids if he dared, which he didn’t.
But he did swipe at the dirt on her cheek with his thumb, wiping it clean. “Hi. Been gardening?”
Her cheeks pinkened as she touched where his thumb had been, and she tugged at her shirt and stared at her pants. “I’m a mess. I was helping my mom put in starts. I should have cleaned up.”
“No. You look…” Like he should slip his hands into her back pockets and see which parts of her skin smelled the most like peppermint. “Good. Fresh from the garden is a good look for you. I’m glad you could come early.”
Penny smiled as her eyes drew a path down his body, lingering on his chest and shoulders. Good call, Quinn.
When she looked at his face again, she shrugged. “I may have been looking for a way out of another circular argument with my mom.”
“Anything you want to talk about?”
She gave a full-body sigh. “I’ve just been thinking of patterns and potholes. You know, those same conversations and experiences that you have so many times—”
“They become potholes you might fall into. Believe me, I know all about them.”
“It was something Quinn said that day at the coffee shop.”
“Ah, yes.” Zander laughed. “When she accosted you and pleaded my case.”
Quinn was still waiting for a thank-you.
“Yep, that time,” Penny answered. “I keep thinking about this pothole thing. Like today my mom was talking about taking a vacation like she always does, and I responded like I always do, saying there was too much to do here. We’re like a broken record.”
“Do you want to go on a vacation?”
“I don’t know.” Penny turned, looking into the trees she’d walked through to come over. “I mean, sure? But she doesn’t get it that things aren’t that easy. Especially this year.”
“Why especially this year?”
Penny looked back to him, mouth slightly parted, like there was something just on the tip of her tongue. “Forget it.” She swept her braids to her back. “I didn’t mean to start complaining. We’ve got work to do.”
Something else was up, something that made Penny look a little desperate whenever she talked about the stakes of pulling off a great Honey Festival. Something he wanted to push but didn’t, because this was Penny’s life and he was only a blip in it, and he had no idea what they were to each other.
“Come on in.” He opened the door just as Winter yelled, “Aww shit!”
Penny covered a laugh with her fist.
“Dude.” Zander shook his head at his kid, leaning onto his elbows with his Switch in his hand.
They’d had a Mario Kart tournament earlier—Winter wiping the floor with Zander, as he always did—and his kid was playing some new game now that moved too quickly for Zander’s mid-thirties brain. “Language, please.”
“You and Mom use that word all the time.”
“Yeah, but we—”
“Have developed the self-control to know when to use it and when not to, and you don’t want me being in the habit,” he parroted, still not looking up from the game. “I know. Chill.”
Just don’t react, Mallory had taken to telling him. Winter’s hormones are a mess, and he’s going to push to see what we do.
Zander pushed some of his frustration out in a slow breath as Penny stepped into the house behind him. “Penny’s here. We’re going to work on the festival stuff a little. I was going to make some sandwiches. Will you come in and join us in the kitchen?”
The mention of Penny’s name pulled Winter’s eyes off the screen as a smile appeared on his face. “Dad’s actually helping you, huh?”
“He actually is.” Penny shot a dazzling smile to Zander before refocusing on Winter. “I’d love your input, too. A couple of years ago we started having a kids’ tent with activities and stuff, but you probably know better than me what kids actually like.”
Winter shrugged, but another smile was creeping its way up his face. “Yeah, I guess.”
Zander led Penny through the open doorway to the kitchen, flooded in midday sunlight. Like always, he did a double take when he entered the room, seeing it then and now.
Then it was drab and stuffy, with newspapers on the table and the ancient drip coffee machine gurgling on the yellowing linoleum counter.
His body had always tensed upon entering, crossing the room for cereal and milk and waiting for Papou to mumble something from his spot at the table.
One morning when he was seventeen, a classified ad had been cut out and stuck to the door of the ancient fridge: a job listing for a landscaper with a local company, entry level, shit for pay.
He’d wanted to swipe it from behind the magnet and toss it in the trash, but he also wanted money and a reason to be out of the house.
And there was a hope that if he saved money to bring back to his mom, she might see how he could be helpful in the summers and not just a burden.
He’d gotten in three good weeks of work, sweating his ass off in the humidity, before getting in a fight with his boss that resulted in a call to his grandfather to come pick him up from the jobsite.
“It’s nice in here.” Penny’s voice rolled over the rough edges of the memory. “Did you do all of this?”
He had. Bright yellow walls, green linen curtains from a thrift store two towns over, and an eclectic painting of a glimmering peacock that had made Winter laugh.
There was a floral fabric tablecloth, a small jar of wildflowers, and the detritus of Zander’s weeks in Sullivan’s Glen spread onto the counters—the electric kettle he’d brought from Boston along with the waffle iron and his set of kitchen knives, and a dish rack full of colorful Fiestaware that he’d splurged on when picking up basic cleaning supplies at the store.
More than he’d needed to do once he covered the basics by watching enough YouTube videos to fix the dripping kitchen pipes, cover the worst of the wear and tear on the walls with fresh paint, and replace the flickering bulbs with ones constructed in this century.
“Yeah.” He shrugged. “Thought it would be nice to make it a little homier for Winter. Even if it’s temporary.”
Penny’s smile wavered. “Right. Totally.”
“Anyway.” He motioned to the table, where he’d been looking at the maps from the festival setup the year before.
“I was starting to place vendors based on the applications we’ve gotten back.
I thought maybe you could look at what I have so far and see if it looks okay, and we can go from there.
Then I have some contracts for you to sign for the tent and table rental. ”
As Penny took a seat, Zander pulled out items from the fridge. “I was going to do turkey sandwiches, but we also have supplies for PB and J, or I have some hummus I made if you’d rather just that and veggies. I have stuff for a salad, too, and a tub of minestrone soup I picked up.”