Chapter Eight
Graham
D o you want to tell me what we’re doing here?” I lower my voice.
Rafe is holding his guitar case in one hand. He flashes me a stupid grin as we approach the gazebo in the middle of town. “Oh, you know . . . we’re just two fairly young men who used to live in big cities but have now fallen in love with being part of a small town. Kind of like those Hallmark movies you’ve been told to star in.”
I give him an unamused stare.
“So, if we’re invited to an event here,” he continues, “we show up to that event, my friend.”
A chuckle escapes me. He is giddy with joy over the next few hours. I’m sure today will include something we’ll one day need pictures of to prove it happened. I look away, hiding the grin on my face as I focus on the glimpses of water visible between a few shops across the way.
Birch Borough is known for the sound of the rushing river that runs through town. It can be heard in the distance, carried across the slightly chilly air that reminds me of the new things starting to unfold all around us.
Breaking up the roar of the water are the squeals of children—at least a hundred—jumping up and down as they walk toward the trail to the pavilion that hovers at the end of the shops a few streets down. An Easter egg hunt is happening in less than an hour, and the town is literally hopping with excitement. I cringe that I thought of something so Easter-related.
“Now, dear . . .”
I turn toward the woman’s voice that suddenly speaks at our side, immediately recognizing Gladys, the town busybody and motherly figure who also “knows how to appreciate a fine-looking man” (not my words). My memory recalls quite a few instances of Lily mentioning the reels Gladys kept sending her featuring handsome chocolatiers around the world.
Thankfully, she’s looking at Rafe, a hint of mischief in her voice. “What do you think about putting on an Easter bunny costume?” Her voice is on the edge of elation.
I choke back a laugh and clear my throat. Her eyes break contact with Rafe’s long enough to give me a once-over and then return to see Rafe’s response. Sometimes, there are advantages in the delay of gaining the town’s favor, particularly during moments like this. Rafe is muttering in French, as he does when he’s overwhelmed or excited (in this case, he’s definitely overwhelmed).
“I already have your sweatshirt on under this, Gladys,” Rafe replies smoothly, opening a bit of his bomber jacket to reveal it, the image of Gladys and Rafe together staring back at us. He received the sweatshirt as his Christmas gift from her. Smart man to wear it today. At this, I can’t help but let out a laugh.
“Quiet, Wickham,” Gladys says to me, her eyes lighting up with a blaze I want to immediately quench.
“How did you . . .?” My thoughts race. It would be my guess that Gladys is trying to get a rise out of me. While it’s irritating that this is the nickname she’s given me, something straightens in my spine when I realize that Lily has been talking about me. Lily has mentioned me to her, huh?
She raises her pointer finger and brings it a little too close to my chest for my liking. “I have pictures of you around town, so don’t even think about crossing me.”
“Ma’am . . .” I begin.
“Gladys,” she corrects, and I feel like a schoolboy about to get . . . well, schooled. She elaborates without hesitation. “You were in the general store yesterday and had to bend over to grab something on the bottom shelf. I just couldn’t help myself. I mean, you could be studied for the way your pants are tailored. Have you ever considered modeling for one of the art classes at It’s Art, the shop just down the way?”
My mouth is hanging open, and my cheeks are burning.
“You were in public! If you didn’t want to be noticed, you shouldn’t have been bending over . . .” She trails off, pointing at Rafe. “I got photos of him unloading instruments last year and sent them to Rory, and we all see how she felt about those benefits.”
Rafe clears his throat and shakes out his hands in a French-turned-American way, as if he’s willing all of this to be a memory—quickly.
Gladys continues to protest. “I don’t post them. I just send them to people who may appreciate the views. I’m an artist myself, you know. And if you’re embarrassed about the human form, talk to God about it.” She quirks her eyebrows, and I’m beginning to wonder how much influence she’s had on Lily’s mannerisms.
This conversation is quickly moving in a direction I hadn’t anticipated. I choke on the air and start to pace, a hand moving through my hair.
“Gladys, let’s go get a coffee. Lord knows I could use it. C’est parti! ” Rafe mercifully interrupts and directs her toward Sparrow’s Beret just down the street.
I’m left standing on the sidewalk, mortified. Something in me hopes there will be a glitch, and the photo she captured will just happen to disappear from Gladys’ photo library. But I suspect the damage has already been done. I’ll probably see her collection pop up in a town calendar to raise money for some bridge repair or something soon. How did I end up here again?
All I know is that ever since Lily’s little dare at the diner the other night, my insides feel like they’re on fire. The way she challenged me and the memory of her nearness makes me think I’ll be lucky not to have permanent dark spots under my eyes. The fact that she would even dare try running me out of this town is so frustrating that I feel like my hair could stand up on its own without any product.
She’s the woman who told me everything we used to have was one-sided. The sound of her voice still keeps me up at night. Her eyes have branded me. I’m undone in her presence, and I wonder if she realizes the effect she continues to exert over me. Lily has “bewitched me, body and soul,” and I know there’s nothing I can do about it .
She’s also the woman currently walking across the street with a basket full of chocolate bunnies (handmade by her, no doubt) like she’s an Easter fairy and not the woman who shattered my heart and let the pieces blow away in the wind. I still haven’t found all of them.
The moment she spots me—looking like a crazed man as I stare at her, I’m sure—feels like a punch in the ribs. She pauses then closes her eyes. The sharp rise and fall of her chest is obvious as she takes a deep breath. When she opens her eyes again, a newfound determination is in her step.
I rise a little taller and wait for the impact when she’s within a few feet of me. There’s an otherworldly pull between us, and the closer she gets, the more I feel my temperature rising—once caused by love, now by the devastation of what I lost.
“George,” she says crisply.
“Lily.”
She’s wearing a black boatneck striped shirt beneath a charcoal cardigan, the tops of her shoulders peeking out and tormenting me as her creamy skin begs to be touched, the spot where her neck and shoulder meet taunting me thoroughly. A frigid breeze moves around us, and for the first time in my life, as I watch it circle through the ends of her hair, shifting it to the front and then to the sides, I’m jealous of the wind.
“Gladys was here,” I say. She tenses, and I know she’s already heard all about it.
“Yes, she was . . . that is, I saw her. I think you should expect to be asked to feature in her town calendar for the new year.”
Ah, so there is a calendar. I’m satisfied that I was right. The delicate shade of pink on Lily’s cheeks is also very satisfying.
“If I’m here in the new year, of course,” I add. I have no intention of losing Lily’s challenges, but the reality is that it’s too much fun not to give her back a bit of fire for all the sparks she sends me.
“Be lucky you dodged a bullet, then. Edgar still hasn’t recovered from Gladys trying to make him take his shirt off for last year’s calendar. Raising money for charity never looked so good—or scared.” She grins.
Everything in me is begging me not to ask, but I know we can’t move on from this without clarification. “Edgar?” I ask, but her pleased squint into the air tells me I didn’t keep it as cool as I had hoped.
“He owns the boxing studio, In the Ring, down the way.”
I nod and look away casually, determined not to look at her, even though I want to analyze every aspect of this conversation into next week. Something in her tone tells me there’s more to their story, and it may fuel a future bout of insomnia. But I can’t help turning back to her a moment later, mouth already open for a follow-up question.
Lily must sense this as she tilts her chin up, a look I don’t like in her eyes. “I challenge you not to ask me about him.”
She’s keeping me from information, and as someone with an investigative personality, she knows I’ll press for the details. Not willing to give in to my curiosity no matter how much it’s grating on me, I decide to stick with a potentially safer question. “You . . . box?”
Lily turns toward me, a hand on her hip. A chocolate bunny almost catapults from the basket with the force of her pivot. Whispers of a conversation we once had invade my brain, but with her so near, I can’t recall the details. Somehow, it feels important that she started boxing.
“Yes, I box. I could take you, that’s for sure.”
I scoff a bit, more to irritate her, but I’m also instantly frustrated by what the image of her and me in a boxing ring is doing to my insides. Another thing to haunt me. “We’ll see.”
“We’ll see? I’ll take you here and now if you want me to prove it.”
“Is this one of your challenges?” I counter.
Her chest is rising and falling in such a quick rhythm that I almost want to check her pulse, but I know if I touch her right now, it will hurt me more than it would ever hurt her.
“Bunnies!”
A squeal from across the street causes both of us to turn our heads. We catch sight of a little girl with a white dress, face paint of a nose and whiskers swept across her face. She is nothing less than adorable. Her hair is blonde, almost the color of Lily’s, and something in my heart tugs at me.
Lily shakes her head slowly. She softens, bending to eye level with the little girl, who nearly collides with her, a big smile on her face.
“Hey, darlin’!” Lily says. I’m caught off guard by the easy way she seems to soften.
“Bunny!” the child declares again.
Lily laughs and waves at someone who must be the girl’s mother. The woman is slowly walking toward us with one hand on her growing stomach and another little boy holding tightly to her other hand.
“As a vegetarian, chocolate bunnies feel as though they should be against my moral code, but I can’t deny the people what they want. I think we’ve got some bunnies that need a good home, Leisel,” Lily says to her as she closes the distance.
I see that Lily’s eyes are unnaturally bright. And maybe she’s great at faking with everyone else, but I notice the way her expression, while friendly, is tight. It’s as if her own mask of face paint has been applied, pretending her smile is her real one and not her polite one.
Because Lily has at least eight different smiles. One for when she’s embarrassed. One for when she’s amused by something. One for when she’s holding back a laugh. One for when something is actually funny to her. One for her friends. One for when she’s playing. One for when she’s polite. And one for when she used to look at me.
The woman I now know is Leisel raises her free arm and gives a huge sigh. Her eyes widen as she looks between Lily and me, another grin tipping her mouth up.
“Oh, Leisel, this is . . .”
I know it’s killing her to have to say my name. To be honest, I don’t think I could handle hearing it on her tongue, so I rush in, stretching out my hand. “Graham. I’m Graham.”
“Leisel,” she says, a brightness in her tired eyes despite clearly being dragged around town by small, enthusiastic feet for today’s event. “And, yes, as in The Sound of Music .”
“Ah, I always did like that one.” I give her a wink and get some satisfaction as Lily starts chucking bunnies at kids who are starting to gather all around her. I’d help her pass out the candy, but I know she wouldn’t accept my offer if it meant her having to admit she couldn’t keep up on her own .
Leisel and I take a step back. Her children are now tucked behind her like little ducks. We stand and enjoy watching the chocolate bunny massacre of the year. Ears are bitten off, eyes are gone, feet are missing, and melted chocolate covers the mouths of many delighted faces.
Lily hovers in the middle of it all, looking like an angel and not like the woman who just told me she could take me in a boxing match.
“She’s all bark and no bite,” Leisel says with amusement. I let out a scoff. Her eyes widen. “Okay, so a bit of a bite.”
“How long have you known her?” I question without taking my eyes off the woman before us.
“Oh, ages. My husband went to school with the four of them—Sparrow, Lily, Ivy, and Grey.”
It’s not the first time I’ve heard about the four friends of Birch Borough, although it does strike me that I have yet to see many sightings of Ivy and Grey.
Leisel continues, “The four used to be inseparable, and you’ll still see them around each other quite a bit. But circumstances and life kind of paired them off. With Sparrow—or Rory, as Lily calls her—and Lily working together at the bakery so much, their families became more intertwined.”
I nod as if all this information is common to me, mainly to see if she’ll keep giving me the insider scoop.
“It was hard on Lily, you know, when her parents left. They’re such great people, but I think she’s felt the pressure to be perfect or to find her own adventure in life.”
While I know her parents now do humanitarian work overseas, I didn’t know their absence had been tough on Lily. Now, her past comments about needing to make her mark on the world make a bit more sense.
“Do you know anything about Edgar?” I barely manage to get out the words before we’re interrupted by the arrival of more screaming children.
Lily tenses as she registers more children approaching and turns to us. “George! Let’s go!”
With a quick apology as I wish Leisel and her kids a nice day, I jog to keep up with Lily’s retreating form.
“More bunnies,” she gasps into the fresh air.
“I don’t think this is part of my wedding duties,” I rebut.
Lily grunts. “Your wedding duties include easing the burden off Rory and Rafe. Right now, with Rory trying to hold down the café and me redirecting these young little heathens to eat their chocolates outside rather than inside our place, I’m doing us all a favor.”
She pauses briefly to look over her shoulder. Her eyes focus on my throat and not my eyes. I’ve noticed that’s been her thing since I moved to Birch Borough—she barely makes eye contact with me. It drives me mad. I feel as though she doesn’t see me anymore because she never really looks at me. But I also know that to have any hope of getting over her, I need to learn how to avoid letting her actions affect me.
“Oh, by the way, are you bringing a plus-one?” she asks casually.
That stops me in my tracks.
“What?” I sputter. Amidst all the wedding thoughts and plans, I didn’t even think or ask whether I should find a date. “Are you?” is my brilliant response back. It feels like the outdoor thermostat just got kicked up one hundred degrees.
“I was . . . thinking about it,” she replies, acting as though her words didn’t just punch me in the gut. It hurts because this is all we are to each other now: slightly hostile, barely speaking, not friends, and two people who could’ve been in love. Instead, it feels like we have both been thrown into an arena, trying to see who will survive.
“Who are you bringing?” I ask as casually as I can, as if the mere idea of Lily with someone else isn’t causing a train wreck of emotions in my mind.
“I might ask Edgar . . . We used to . . . He kind of . . . The person who—” She stops and starts a few times.
“Owns the boxing place, yes,” I finish for her, my heart humming to a different beat than usual. My worst fears are confirmed. The only reason I don’t start dry heaving is the words used to .
I’ve seen Edgar around town. I knew who he was when Lily mentioned him. Tall with dark hair and eyes and a strength that is clear in every step he takes. He has tattoos on his forearms and a necklace that I haven't seen a man brave enough to wear since the early 2000s. I may hate the choice, but I respect it. At least I know he'll get some of Lily's random pop culture references.
When we reach the café, I break my stride, pausing to hover outside of the door.
“What are you doing?” Lily hisses.
“I’m not allowed in here.” It feels ridiculous to say, but she knows I’ve always respected the boundaries she put in place.
“Oh.” She peeks up at the sign and then at the door, seeming to come quickly to a resolution. “I need help. You can help. It’s fine.”
“So, does that mean I can get coffee here now?” A grin escapes me because I know that as we’re figuring out how to be near each other again, this is her safe space. And her letting me in—and thus, letting me back in, in a way—is a big deal.
“Don’t push it.” Lily throws the door open, and I catch it before it shuts in my face.
As we enter the bakery, Lily rushes to the back counter, opens a cabinet, chucks her basket at me, and hastily begins to throw more chocolate bunnies toward it. By the time I reach her side, I immediately recognize the mayhem. Inside the cabinet are beautiful, handcrafted chocolates thrown over, under, and tossed aside haphazardly.
Lightly, I laugh as Lily tosses them over her shoulders, clearly expecting me to catch them without even making eye contact. I’m in the zone of catching them and storing them safely in the basket, so it takes me a minute to realize that the atmosphere in the bakery has shifted and what must be the normal hustle and bustle has quieted.
I look around while Lily mumbles under her breath and the espresso machine hums. I catch Sparrow’s wide eyes staring in our direction. I think I detect a bit of hope in her gaze, but it must be because she still doesn’t know what Lily and I once had is now only a relic of heartache. I scratch the back of my neck and meet the eyes of several customers. Everyone has stopped enjoying their croissants and coffees to take in the sight of Lily and me, as if the sight of us together is something to get used to.
While my fragile hope feels foolish now, I once wished this was a sight Birch Borough would see all the time. And the reality that she’s been seen with another man, even for a short time, hits me in my gut. We’ve both tried to move on. However, I never lasted more than a few dates, while Lily may have had a whole other fulfilling relationship between now and the last time I saw her. Even if she isn’t with someone presently, I realize I’m standing in the space where she has, no doubt, had crushes throughout the years. Other guys have taken her on dates on these very streets. Birch Borough is the very place where she has been hurt by immature boys, but it’s also where she has dreamed of settling down.
I knew I wasn’t the first guy in her life, but I wanted to be the last. The thought of letting that dream go again is harder to fathom now that I’m in her hometown.
Embarrassment creeps in at the idea that people may think I’m the one to blame for this scenario. All at once, I know what I have to do. I don’t know if it’s her challenge to me or the feeling of knowing I’m finally standing in the place that Lily calls her second home, but I’m done.
In the middle of the café, with townspeople listening all around, I do something that is the painful equivalent of kicking myself where it hurts. “Lily, it’s a challenge,” I say, determination in my voice.
“What?” she says over her shoulder in an exasperated tone. She turns to face me, suddenly recognizing how quiet the shop has become.
I do not doubt that my jaw is set like iron. “I’m adding another challenge. You seem to like those.”
Her eyes, once disarmed, now flash. She is annoyed, and I’m the cause. Again.
“You can’t do that. But if you’re going to insist, George, just spit it out. Or let’s go because I don’t have time for this. I have bunnies to throw at kids, for crying out loud. Easter is upon us!” She motions impatiently for me to continue.
“Bring a plus-one.”
Her hands grip the counter behind her tightly. She narrows her eyes and takes a deep breath. “Fine.”
“Fine,” I reply.
“All of this is fine!” Sparrow says lightly. We turn toward her, the sounds of a café coming back to life reverberating around us as if all is normal with the world. To be honest, her tone sounds terrified, but I’m trying to be positive.
It’s clear to me now that Lily has the right idea in trying to drive me out of this town for her own self-preservation. And I was right to tell her we can’t do this again. One of us is staying in this town, and one of us is leaving. But if I play my cards right, in an alternate twist of fate, maybe we can both stay here together. I want the last version so much I can feel it humming between my ribs.
At that moment, in Sparrow’s Beret, the place I was once banned from and now find myself standing in, I decide to show Lily that I’ll always be the man she found in the movie theater. This stubborn, gorgeous woman needs to know that while I didn’t go after her the first time, if she lashes out again, I’m responding in kindness. If she’s out for blood, I’ll bring the bandages. She might want to fight, but I will come in peace. I’m rewriting the narrative. And I know where to start.