Chapter 3 #2
“My father liked what you did,” Ivy remembered. “And he was never easy to please.”
“No, he wasn’t.” Elliot pressed his lips together. “I’m sorry for your loss, by the way. He was a pillar of this community. He was also maybe the scariest man I ever met. And that’s saying something, especially if you remember anything about my old man.”
Ivy remembered the rumors about Elliot’s father—how cruel he was to his contractors and how bitter he could be when one of his clients wronged him.
“That older generation,” Ivy said, shaking her head. “They were something else.”
“I think it’s part of the reason I had to leave Bluebell all those years ago,” Elliot admitted, referring back to when he’d left for Shelly.
“I needed to get out from under his shadow. And then, when it didn’t work?
I was right back under his shadow. Hate to admit how much I miss the old man these days.
He was a mystery to me. But I love him still. ”
Elliot sipped his beer and sidled closer to her.
Ivy could feel her sisters’ gaze on them, heavy with curiosity.
During the many weeks that Elliot had been working at the Bluebell Cove Eco-Lodge, Ivy had kept to herself, hardly allowing herself a glance.
Now, he was very much acting as though they’d known each other forever. They sort of had.
“I wasn’t sure if you recognized me,” he said then. “When I first started working back at the inn, I mean.”
Ivy took a breath and searched her mind for an excuse. “It’s been crazy. I have the flower shop to deal with, and my sisters are back, and… Yeah.” They were weak excuses.
Suddenly, Celia, Juliet, and Wren appeared on the little makeshift stage near the back porch of the eco-lodge.
Celia beckoned for Ivy to approach, while Wren wrangled the microphone from the DJ.
Ivy had forgotten about their grand welcome to everyone who’d come out.
“I’d better go,” she told Elliot, wincing at how much she didn’t want to go, how regretful she sounded.
“Let’s catch up another time,” Elliot said, his eyes urgent.
But as Ivy pulled away from him and headed to the stage, she reminded herself of how little she needed the stress of wanting something romantic to happen in her life.
Elliot was an outright catch: handsome, charming, thoughtful, and soft-spoken.
He’d approached her because of their shared past and nothing more.
If she started to make up stories about what they could be to one another, if she started to dream beyond the boundaries of what could happen, she’d set herself up for misery. She knew that better than anyone.
Up on stage, Celia took the mic first and welcomed everyone to the grand opening of the Bluebell Cove Eco-Lodge.
“For many years,” she began, “my father and mother worked tirelessly at the Bluebell Cove Inn. They joined our town’s thriving tourism industry and showed hundreds of thousands of guests what the magic of Bluebell Cove means.
Now that they’re gone, we honor their memory and look forward to a brighter and more environmentally friendly future—one of sustainability and cleaner oceans for our world and our children. ”
Celia handed the mic off to Juliet, who passed it to Wren like a hot potato.
It was clear that Juliet wanted as little to do with making a speech in front of the public as Ivy did.
Wren, who was meek but often chatty, took a moment to say what it meant to be back with her sisters for the first time in years.
“Many of you know that I’ve spent the better part of seventeen years traveling,” Wren said.
“I’ve been to countless countries. I’ve met people from all over the world.
But when I returned to Bluebell Cove for health reasons, I realized that I’m nothing without my sisters.
I’m nothing without all of you. Thank you. ”
Wren passed the microphone over to Ivy, who held it with both hands and scowled out across the crowd of people, all of whom shifted gently beneath the bright September sky.
The clouds had cleared, as though Celia had ordered them to.
What could Ivy say to any of them? How could she illustrate how complicated her emotions were?
She’d never felt understood by anyone. She’d always felt like she stuck out like a sore thumb.
Feeling out of sorts, she said, “I’d like to thank my daughter, Lily, for sticking around in Bluebell Cove for this difficult yet essential transition.
And I’d like to thank my son, Tyler, for his patience as we move through the world without his father and grandfather.
I look forward to a bright future with all of you in Bluebell Cove.
And I can only hope that my sisters will stick around a bit longer to see how everything transpires.
” She felt a crack at the edge of her heart.
After she handed the microphone back to the DJ, she felt her sisters’ angry and curious eyes upon her.
But when she blinked, they all dispersed, headed to different areas of the immaculate yard to talk to other Bluebell Covers and drink more wine and laugh.
They weren’t going to let Ivy’s fear that they were going to leave her behind darken a gorgeous day.
Maybe she’d imagined their anger, anyway.
Before she did any more harm, Ivy turned on her heel and went into her father’s old office, the office that now belonged to all four of them, and sat at his ornate desk.
With her eyes closed, all she could hear was a party out back, a party that could have been happening in any other year.
She could half imagine she was still a teenager, that Celia hadn’t abandoned the family yet, and that Juliet and Wren were scampering around outside.
She could half imagine that her life had only just begun and hadn’t fully devastated her yet.