CHAPTER NINETEEN
We talked for hours that morning.
She called her cook, then Janice, who surprisingly had some experience working the diner. I didn’t think she’d really do it, but then she turned off her phone, threw it in a drawer, and sat back at the table like it wasn’t the most monumental thing I’d witnessed in months.
We discussed everything from the high school years she missed, to my time at NYU, to the firm.
She got a kick out of hearing one of my favorite crazed author stories—a writer who was so passionate that he slept in our lobby for days until I grew annoyed enough to take a look at his manuscript. It ended up being a best-seller.
Admittedly, I might’ve been trying to procrastinate regaling her with the tale of my epic downfall.
She hardly blinked as I described writing about Bluebell Cove, being rejected, and self-destructing so completely that I practically forced them to fire me.
A long silence stretched before she took my hands in her own and whispered, “It’s okay to fail, darlin’. ”
On the surface, I cracked a smile and told her to take her own advice. Underneath, though, it felt like a pulsing wound was finally beginning to close.
She tried her best to wave me away when it was her turn, but I persisted. I would always win the battle of wills. After all, I inherited the genes of two exceptionally stubborn people.
The Cove didn’t change much over the years I was gone.
Janice had a health scare but came out the other side stronger.
Some of the Main Street shops struggled in between tourist seasons, a concern that might be in the past thanks to the recent uptick.
The years she didn’t stay late at the diner on a holiday, she spent it with Georgie and her grandmother, Marigold.
When Marigold’s health declined, it was rapid and sudden and threw the entire town for a loop.
My chest tightened as my mother described how Georgie struggled afterward.
She smiled and told everyone she was fine—true to form—but my mother could tell when she hadn’t been eating or sleeping well.
Even as I tried to think about anything else, that persistent guilt flared deep in my gut, rising with lapping acid at the back of my throat.
I was so consumed with doing everything right; never stepping out of line, surging ahead at every opportunity, forging my elusive dream with blood and sweat.
Yet, there I was, a veritable failure. Despite it all—the friendships forsaken, vacations ignored, and life I forgot to live, it all amounted to nothing.
Later that day, I found myself outside Georgie’s Pottery Shop.
She smiled—the kind that reached her eyes and made them sparkle—and animatedly discussed something as she wrapped a pumpkin mug for a girl at the register.
The hideous, bee pollen yellow sign that Rhett made creaked in the wind above me.
It would probably stay there until it fell and cracked on the cobblestones.
But knowing Rhett, the sign could most likely survive a hurricane.
I waited for the last customer to leave before pushing the door open.
“I brought caffeine and sustenance,” I called, lifting up the carrier laden with drinks and a small paper bag.
Georgie clapped and nearly skipped over to me. “It’s been so busy,” she replied gratefully. “Have you talked to Serena?”
I followed her to the register and watched as she hopped onto the counter and dug into the bag like a hungry racoon. “No—did something happen?”
She shrugged. “They’re getting married in a few days, and we’re her bridesmaids. It’s just a little strange.”
The unspoken truth hung between us. Exactly as I tried to tell her the day before, it didn’t make any sense for us to be in the bridal party.
Serena should have made more than enough friends in New York.
She had always been a social butterfly—or, more accurately, the light that attracted all sorts to her presence.
Something about it all didn’t sit right with me.
“I take it you haven’t talked to her about everything,” I muttered, sipping my cappuccino.
Georgie pursed her lips and picked her croissant apart over a napkin. “No, I guess you were right. It does feel… weird.”
“Too bad there’s no way out of it.”
“The dresses are paid for and everything,” she mumbled with a mouth full of pastry.
I sighed and pressed my eyelids, which were particularly swollen, and leaned my hip against the counter.
My pulse hammered against my neck as the words I came to say simmered on my tongue.
She was completely clueless, devouring the remains of her croissant and humming to herself, while I nearly had heart failure over the idea of a premeditated conversation about feelings.
“Hey,” I started, voice thin and wobbling. I cleared my throat and began again. “I just wanted to say that I’m sorry.”
Georgie paused and arched a comically high eyebrow at me over her shoulder. “For what?”
I gathered a breath. “For all those years. For the distance. You didn’t deserve that.”
Her legs ceased swinging, and she turned fully until she sat with crossed legs on the counter.
“It’s okay, Margot. We already had this conversation,” she said.
So, she was going to make me explain it in detail.
I groaned internally. “No, I mean—when Marigold got sick. I wasn’t there for you. And at the funeral, I was too consumed by my own stuff. I think I’ve been… selfish.”
Georgie sighed and tapped her leg, glancing up at the ceiling as if considering my words. I glared at the chipped corner of my fingernail. The blooming guilt in my stomach still hadn’t ebbed. Maybe it didn’t make anything better—maybe I only opened up an old wound and poured salt in.
“Thank you,” she finally replied. It was then that I saw the tears wobbling in her eyes.
Apparently I was quite good at making everyone cry.
“I…” I cleared my throat again and fiddled with my cup. “I’m not sure what to do now.”
Georgie smiled and dabbed her eyes. “This is typically when people hug, but I know you better than that.”
“Does this count?” I patted her knee.
“I’ll take it.”
The bell above the door jingled, and I almost didn’t look up. But then I heard his voice.
“Tell me there’s still something left for the under-caffeinated photographer,” Teddy said, leaning in the doorway, wind-tousled and smirking like he hadn’t been the shoulder I cried into nearly twenty-four hours ago.
My heart fluttered. It fluttered.
I tore my eyes away and pretended the lid of my coffee was incredibly interesting. The movement, unfortunately, did not go unnoticed by my copper-haired, meddlesome best friend.
“No, but I’ll go get you something!” she replied, jumping from the counter with a startling amount of coordination. It seemed scheming made her rather graceful. “You two can hold down the fort, right?” Georgie didn’t wait for us to reply, rushing past Teddy with an elated grin and a wave.
I watched, scowling, as she took her time crossing the street.
“Georgie asked me for some professional photos of her pottery,” he explained, languidly approaching as his gaze flitted across the display tables and half-empty shelves. “How are you feeling?”
“I’m fine,” I replied instinctively. Then, I shut my eyes for a second and added, “Better. Thank you.”
Teddy set his camera bag on the counter, the smile having vanished from his face. “I’m here if you want to talk. About… anything. Do you know that?”
I peered at him through my peripheral vision and tapped my fingernails against the tile. “I have Georgie for talking,” I murmured.
“Yeah,” he replied, looking lost.
“That’s good, right?” I said. “You’ll be gone soon on your next big adventure, I’ll be doing…
whatever I’m doing. Life will return to normal.
” I emptied my cappuccino and leaned back against the register with crossed arms, pretending to watch the passersby like my pulse was completely normal and I couldn’t smell his cologne all around me.
“About that. I—” Teddy paused and rubbed the back of his neck. “I wasn’t completely honest when I came to town.”
That had my attention.
“I pitched the idea to Travel and Taste.”
I sent him an expectant look. “So?”
“It’s… er— it’s a year-long assignment. Someone would be staying in Bluebell Cove year-round to document all the festivals and traditions.” He wrung his hands together, squinting as if hoping I’d connect the dots.
“Someone being you,” I finished.
Teddy nodded.
“Why?”
I fought to keep my expression impassive.
Inside, that nasty, hopeful spark began to glow again.
The one that had me watching ridiculous rom-coms with Georgie all through high school.
The one that kept me wildly, desperately in love with Teddy for most of my life.
I’d thought I stamped it out, but there it was, burning and crackling and whispering romantic impossibilities into my ears—further confirmation that the old Margot was alive and well.
We were a stubborn pair.
“Because,” Teddy finally breathed, “I missed it—everything.”
The pain was familiar. All at once, I was seven years younger and seven times more naive, standing in the freezing winds on Bluebell Point as Teddy Bowman shattered my dreams. He must’ve seen the light die in my eyes because I took a step back just as he shifted forward, arms reaching—I didn’t know for what. They dropped to his sides.
“I’m happy for you,” I muttered.
The feelings that had been steadily mounting in my throat, forming words ready to spew from my lips, were resolutely tamped back down. I heard his scruff as he rubbed his jaw.
“Margot, you might be—”
A bell chimed, rescuing me from any further humiliation. Georgie’s eyes danced between us as she hurried inside with a cup of coffee for Teddy. Her nose tinged pink, she seemed to be shivering in her dress and sweater.
“Sorry,” she said with a grimace. “I would’ve waited outside, but it’s insanely cold today—”
“No need,” I interrupted.
Teddy accepted his coffee with a small smile. “Your stuff is beautiful, Georgie. I can get to work right away.”
She stared at my profile as he unpacked his camera bag and began drifting through the shop.
He looked stiff and mechanical, jaw tense while he moved a few items to better light and snapped a few photos.
I tried not to watch him too long, focused on the edge of my lid that I’d unconsciously mangled instead of the strange mood that passed over him.
Georgie, never known for her patience, grabbed my wrist and hauled me into the back room. It was tiny—it used to be a storage closet before Rhett converted it to a mini pottery room—and there was hardly any space between her wheel and the precariously stacked ceramics two inches from my backside.
I wrenched my arm away with a glare.
“What happened?” she yell-whispered.
“Nothing,” I said with an attempt at a casual shrug. “What did you expect to happen? That we’d get eloped and have babies in the five minutes you were gone?”
“Well, I wouldn’t have been mad!” She threw her arms up as best she could with another shelf right overhead. It ended up looking more like both of them had been broken and put in casts.
I pinched the bridge of my nose. “It’s been seven years. He’s over it, and—and so am I.”
“You sound so convincing,” Georgie replied with a snort.
“He said—verbatim—that he isn’t here for me.” A pathetic wobble stretched through my words.
“Really?”
“Yes,” I muttered. It wasn’t technically true, but I knew it to be true in my heart.
Her eyebrows drew together and her lips pressed into a thin line, her shoulders slumping like a deflating balloon. She looked as if someone told her that Easton had died.
“It’ll be okay,” I said, not really believing it. “I’ve survived worse.” That was true. “We have Serena’s rehearsal dinner, the wedding, and Fallfest. Let’s focus on that, okay?” The words tilted awkwardly on my tongue, an unnatural distraction from the thing I really didn’t want to discuss.
Teddy was gone when we resurfaced.
It stung a little. The air still smelled faintly like his cologne—proof he’d been here, proof he was gone.