Chapter 5
HOLLY
I’ve been doing my best to stay busy lately, especially this past week. Work centers me. It keeps my hands moving and my thoughts from spiraling.
Today’s no different.
Thankfully, I’m neck-deep in a big project: a full nursery redesign for a wealthy couple expecting their second little boy in just under three months.
It’s not the exact distraction I was hoping for, but it helps.
I dive into the fabrics, the layouts, the lighting, pouring everything I have into it, like I always do.
Most of my clients own the kind of New York real estate that people dream about, and they don’t blink when I suggest vintage wallpaper flown in from Europe.
They’re polite, professional, and we usually keep things at arm’s length.
Which is fine. I love what I do, and I’m good at it.
I get to create beautiful spaces for people who can afford to let me run with big ideas.
It pays the bills, keeps my fridge full, and gives me something solid to stand on.
But Mrs. Barlowe, the mom-to-be, is a surprise.
Kind, hands-on, oddly grounded for someone whose closet probably costs more than everything I own put together.
Turns out, she sews. Not just as a hobby.
She made the curtains, the crib canopy, even a set of throw pillows from the fabric we picked out together.
She’s glowing in that effortless way pregnant women sometimes do, and every time I look at her, one word screams in my chest: soon.
“No, no, Bill, please, the changing table goes by the window,” I tell the mover as he tries to set it down somewhere else.
“You’re the boss, Ms. Bishop,” Bill says, adjusting his grip with a grunt.
Most of the furniture is nearly in place, and I’m doing one last walk-through, eyeing curtain lengths and testing the glide of the vintage rocking horse I found at a flea market, when I hear it.
A screech.
A door slam.
“Mooom!”
And the rapid-fire thud of angry feet on hardwood.
“Mooooom! This house is a nightmare!”
A tiny blur barrels past the nursery door. I turn just in time to see Nolan, age six, wearing a white shirt and a yellow tie, fists clenched and face red as a tomato.
Right behind him: a very calm Mrs. Barlowe, mug in hand, cushion in the other, wearing that serene third-trimester glow that somehow makes it look like having a six-year-old in full meltdown mode is perfectly normal.
“I swear he was sweet before he turned five,” she murmurs.
“You don’t have to convince me. My sister once threatened to run away because our mom switched our Honey Nut Cheerios for oatmeal.”
“Oh, the betrayal.”
“The trauma,” I say solemnly, and we both laugh.
She snorts, gives me a grateful look, puts the cushion down, and continues after him.
I exhale and turn back to the room. It’s coming together, slowly. The soft blues and creams. The antique wooden propeller I mounted above the window after a full afternoon of sanding and sealing. Restoring old pieces has always been a hobby of mine. The quiet atmos—
My phone vibrates in my pocket, and when I check the screen, my breath catches.
Dexter.
Dexter:
Plane just landed.
My place tonight?
Me:
Sure. You ready to talk more baby stuff?
Dexter:
Yeah. Let’s figure it all out. I’ll cook. See you at 7.
My stomach twists at his last text. Not full-on nerves, because this is Dexter, after all. We’ve known each other too long for me to be nervous around him.
Still, I feel a trace of unease I can’t quite explain.
What if he suddenly has ridiculous conditions?
Or worse, what if he says he’s not ready? He better not.
Ding. I glance back down.
Dexter:
And be on time.
Holly:
I am perfectly capable of being on time.
Dexter:
And I mean 7. Not 7-ish.
Me:
See you at 7. On. The. Dot.
I’m grinning, and I’d bet anything he is too. Probably doing that slow head-shake of his and smiling like an idiot.
Dexter has been my partner in crime since we were kids. He was the guy I could always count on. But we’ve never been anything more than friends. Because, back then, my heart belonged to someone else.
Christian Darrow.
A full-blown bad boy. Hockey star. Straight-up trouble in all the best, worst ways.
And yes, ridiculously cute.
I can still remember standing at his locker with that folded note in my hand.
It had taken everything I had just to be there. To even think about asking him if he would go to prom with me. Dexter had encouraged me. I was seventeen. He was nineteen at the time, already finished with high school.
“Do it,” he said. “What’s the worst that could happen? You came with nothing, you’ve got nothing to lose.”
I almost backed out.
But then he looked me dead in the eye and said, “You’ve got better odds than anyone. You’re not like the other girls. You’re brave. No one else would dare ask him.”
So I slid the note into Christian Darrow’s locker... and tried not to pass out.
Hey Christian,
This might be a little forward, but I’d love to go to prom with you.
I think we’d have a blast.
Pick me up at seven?
XOXO Holly
Turns out, Dexter was right.
An agonizing day later, I found a note in my locker. With shaky hands and my heart pounding somewhere up in my throat, I unfolded it.
At the bottom of my note, in messy, half-assed handwriting, he’d scribbled:
Why not? Chris.
I was ecstatic.
I really was.
Dexter was genuinely happy for me, though he grumbled something like, “What kind of damn answer is that?”
When 7 p.m. rolled around on prom night, my whole body was shaking.
I’d spent hours getting ready. New hair.
New makeup. Burt’s Bees caramel-scented lip shimmer.
Too much time stressing over a spritz of perfume I wasn’t even sure I liked yet, but hoping he would.
The highlight was my coral dress. The capped sleeves and a subtle cutout at the waist lined with tiny pearl buttons made me feel like the prettiest girl in school.
I’d even settled on cream ankle-strap heels with a small silver buckle, willing to risk the likelihood that they’d go from pinching to blistering long before the night was over.
In my imagination, Chris would show up early. He’d tell me I looked beautiful. We’d dance all night. He’d call me princess. And by the end of the night, he’d sweep me off my feet (the aching, blistered ones I definitely didn’t mention to him) in front of my house and kiss me until I saw stars.
I even told Dexter that whole fantasy. He just stared at me and muttered something about it being “absurd” and “girly” and that seeing stars from kissing didn’t sound pleasant at all.
When I asked for an explanation, Dexter said something along the lines of:
“Stars? Yeah, that’s just asking for a headache.
You should focus on the kiss, not on trying to get a concussion.
People only see stars when they sneeze, or cough, or have some kind of retinal or brain disturbance, which, by the way, are not ideal kissing scenarios…
unless you happen to sneeze or cough or have a minor brain episode mid-kiss, which doesn’t sound preferable either.
” He shook his head, slow and calm as ever, and shrugged.
“The only option is if you intend to see actual stars up in the night sky, but without that guy dipping you backward at a ninety-degree angle, I don’t see that happening either…
unless you roll your eyes up so far that you get dizzy and think he’d kissed you senseless.
And if that’s the case, you’ve got vertigo, not chemistry. And probably a medical emergency.”
I didn’t care.
I was ready to be star-kissed. I even made sure to put some Burt’s Bees in my purse.
By 8 p.m., I was a mess. I called Dexter sobbing so hard I could barely talk. Half my pillow was soaked, my makeup was ruined, and I’d never felt so awful or embarrassed in my life.
Twenty minutes later, I heard someone at the door.
For a second, I let myself hope that Chris had changed his mind. He came to pick me up after all! I needed to hurry. Mom wasn’t home to open the door. She’d taken my sister to the dentist because of an unexpected toothache (too much Honey Nut Cheerios for breakfast).
In record time, I fixed my hair, dabbed at my face, and rushed downstairs, wiping tears off my cheeks.
But it wasn’t Chris.
It was Dexter.
Back then, he hadn’t grown into his frame yet. Still a little scrawny. Nothing like the six foot three broad-shouldered heartbreaker he is now.
But there he was, standing on my porch in a suit, hair styled, cuter than I’d ever seen him, his dimple grinning at me, holding a bouquet of coral and white flowers that matched my dress.
“Ready for prom, princess?”
Yeah. My heart did melt a little back then.
“You came.”
“You called.”
When I told my sister Shelby the story years later, going on and on about how much fun Dexter and I had that night, how he opened every door, how he brought backup snacks in his jacket pocket just in case I got hungry (a cherry Pop-Tart, my favorite, slightly crushed), how he didn’t even complain when I dragged him into a slow dance, and how he was way better on the dance floor than he gave himself credit for, she just rolled her eyes.
“You should’ve let him pop your cherry that very evening,” she said, full Brit mode.
My sister never lost her UK accent, even after Mom moved back to the States with us.
She called it her “silent protest.” Which is hilarious, because Shelby has never been silent a day in her life.
She says exactly what she thinks, unfiltered, and never holds back.
And the moment she had the chance, she went straight back to London where she swears she belongs.
“Or the next day,” she added. “Or even the day after that. Missed opportunity, darling.”
“Impossible,” I told her. He and I, we just weren’t like that.
“He didn’t even try to grab your boob?”
“No!”
“Or rub his dick up against you?”
“No! Hello?”
Dexter had been a perfect gentleman. None of those “choices” would have ever crossed his mind. We’re strictly platonic, always have been.
There’s no romantic love from his side. That much is clear.
And there’s no romantic love from my side either.
Fine. It’s not as if I’ve never wondered what he looked like without his shirt on. Or his jeans. Or… Okay, I wasn’t blind. But Dexter hadn’t even tried to kiss me that night, not even when he walked me to my door.
He just said, “Okay, see ya,”
And I said, “Okay, see ya.”
I’m not his type.
Simple as that.
“Ms. Bishop?” Bill’s voice cuts through my thoughts.
I blink, snapping back to the room. “Yeah, sorry, right here.”