Epilogue
INT. THE DUKE’S DRAWING ROOM—DAY
In the FOREGROUND, THE DUKE OF HARDING stands by the window. At the sound of footsteps, he turns around.
THE DUKE OF HARDING (smiling softly)
I’ve been waiting for you, darling. Have you come to
D: I made pancakes.
M: I love you.
D: Yes, that’s an extremely appropriate reaction to pancakes.
M: No, I mean. I love you.
D: By which you mean you want me to bring them to you in bed.
M: However did you guess? See, Dashwood, this is why you’re the perfect man for me. You always know what I’m
“The Slot Sluts are going to be here in three hours. We better hurry up and get to the laundromat if we’re going to be on time for lunch,” Dash said as he came into his room, bearing a plate of pancakes and two forks.
The buttery, syrupy smell reached me where I was still ensconced under his duvet, not ready yet to exchange its warmth for the chilly October air.
“Don’t even worry about it,” I told him as he claimed his spot on the mattress. “I only have a few loads to do. Plus, you’ll notice that I’m all packed up.”
He glanced at the corner of his bedroom where I had deposited my suitcases when I’d come over the day before. “You sure you’re only going to Los Angeles for a week? Because it looks like you packed for two months. At least.”
“Nah—one of those is for all the accessories I’ll be buying at estate sales. And books. Shy gave me a whole list of paperbacks I’m supposed to track down for them.”
Grace and I had been working on another project of our own that was similar in vibes—if not in content—to the Duke of Harding, and our agent had gotten us a meeting with a studio.
While I was gone, Dash was going to start on his next window for Second Chance.
I’d already seen the sketches—a big swath of canvas painted to look like the night sky, tiny pinpricks made in it to make the store’s lights look like stars shining through.
Two figures painted on the glass of the window itself would look like they were stargazing.
Dash was still trying to work out how to suspend books from the ceiling like he’d done the LED lights.
I held up a corner of the duvet so that Dash and the pancakes could join me under it. He pressed in close to me, handing me a fork.
It wasn’t that I wasn’t still scared of how full my ace of cups was. Here, though, in Dash’s bed, with the scent of pancakes in the air, I could almost believe that all the good things in it would never spill out.