Chapter 26 Winnie
WINNIE
My phone won’t stop buzzing and it’s making me twitchy. Normally, I address everything as it comes because I am a doer. A fixer. A boss!
But as notification after notification lights up the screen with missed calls from Fabrizio, texts from Mom, more texts from Fab, I consider booking a cruise—never been on one and had little interest until now, but disembarking on a Caribbean Island and getting lost wouldn’t be so bad.
I could weave a dress out of palm fronds and live off coconut meat.
I don’t think there are bears or other deadly animals on tropical islands, but the guilt of abandoning my family would eat me alive.
I’m in my car, in the parking lot, unable to drive back to Grandma’s until I figure this out.
The voicemail icon appears and I listen to my brother’s voice, tight with panic. Call me back. It’s urgent.
Would Patton make an escape with me? I wonder what his desert island item would be. First, he’d need to reply to my text. I fear he’s avoiding me.
Yet, I’m still floating from last night—touching my lips every five minutes as if to confirm the kiss happened, still replaying the moments in his arms, still wondering what happens next. Like a skydiver, the ground rapidly gets closer as the minutes turn into hours and I don’t hear from him.
Reality is much like a slow-moving steamroller and I have to call my brother back.
“Finally!” He sounds breathless. “We got an eviction notice.”
The world tilts. “What?”
“Mom and Dad didn’t get the business loan. We’re three months behind on rent. The landlord is done waiting. We have thirty days or—”
I press my fingertips into my hairline. How did this happen?
“Can you send more money?”
Hand shaking, I pull up my banking app. The numbers staring back at me are depressingly small. I’ve been sending everything I can spare—and some I can’t—for months.
“Fab, I don’t have—”
“Please, Winnie. Mom and Dad don’t know how bad it is. I’ve been smoothing things over for them, but I’m out of options. If we lose the restaurant—” His voice cracks.
I finish, “It’ll destroy them.”
My chest tightens. The Sorrentino family restaurant has been open for thirty-five years. It’s Mom and Dad’s entire identity. Their legacy. The place where I learned to make meatballs and fold napkins and smile at difficult customers.
If it closes, they won’t survive it.
“How much?” I ask, willing my voice steady.
The number he gives me makes my stomach drop.
“I’ll figure it out. Give me a few days.”
But I already know that coming up with more money isn’t possible. I’ll have to think of another solution.
After we hang up, I sit in my car in the municipal complex parking lot and try to remember how to breathe when it has always come so naturally.
I can’t save my family and myself.
I can’t be perfect at work and help them financially.
I can’t fix Grandma’s house and have a full-time job.
I can’t be falling for Patton and dealing with this crisis.
The walls close in. My life is falling apart one sticky note at a time.
I’m late to work—unheard of for me—and can barely focus.
My phone must not have charged last night and died during my panic spiral, so I plug it in at my desk. When it turns on, there are three texts from Patton. My heart leaps and then crashes. How did I miss these? If it’s broken, I can’t afford a new one.
Patton: We should talk.
Patton: Where are you?
Patton: Call me when you get this.
He finally responded. Hours after I texted him. Hours after, I sat in my office wondering if the kiss was a mistake, if he regretted it, if I’d completely misread everything between us.
I look up at his office across the hall.
The chair sits empty.
He’s probably at the station or out on a call, living his straightforward, tidy life while mine implodes.
Once again, I touch my lips, recalling exactly how the kiss felt. The way his hands framed my face. The desperate, hungry sound he made. The way we fell asleep tangled together.
I was sure something had shifted between us, a page had turned, we were starting a new chapter. But what if I was wrong and we’re reading an entirely different book?
“Earth to Winnie!”
I startle, making my sticky notes flutter. Mindy stands in my doorway holding a box of doughnut holes.
All I want is a Crush Cake, or more accurately, a certain baking firefighter who makes them.
She sets the box on my desk and studies my face and slides into the chair facing me. “I’ve waited long enough for you to crack. Spill. What happened?”
“Nothing—”
“You were glowing and kept touching your mouth. Now you’re googly-eyed like you haven’t slept in a century.” She gasps. “You kissed him!”
My face must betray me. I’ve never been good at lying. Keeping secrets, namely from my parents, is another story.
Just like that, their situation keeps intruding into what should be a cloud nine kind of day, week. Instead, it’s gloomy outside … and inside.
Thomas and Pauline appear behind Mindy like a pair of gossip-seeking missiles. “Who kissed who?”
“Winnie kissed Patton!” Mindy announces.
“I didn’t—we—it was mutual.”
Pauline clasps her hands under her chin, a sucker for romance.
Thomas does a weird jump-jog in place motion. “You’re totally winning the bet!”
The bet.
A bitter wind freezes me all over.
Make Patton smile at the Fireman’s Ball. Prove he’s not as grouchy as everyone thinks. Win bragging rights and avoid doing the mascot dance at the Parks and Recreation Regional Convention.
It feels dirty. Wrong. Manipulative.
“Maybe we should cancel the bet,” I say quickly.
Mindy holds up her arm like a crossing guard flashing a stop sign. “No way! Do you want to dance in a mascot suit in front of two hundred professionals? Sleep in the same room as Thomas?”
I shudder.
He adds, “Besides, you’ve clearly already won.”
“Anyway, if I win, how does that benefit you?”
He waves his hand dismissively.
Pauline nods in agreement. “You’re smitten and—”
Thomas cuts in, “With a fireside flush after coming in from the slopes.”
“That is very specific, but I’m not—”
“All you have to do is make sure he has a good time at the Fireman’s Ball,” Mindy says firmly. “Which, given the way he looks at you, won’t be hard.”
They’re not wrong. Patton is already smiling around me and opening up. The bet feels like a sneaky matchmaking scenario at this point. But it still sits wrong in my chest. Forms a lump in my throat. Causes a pit in my stomach. Because I agreed to it.
“I should get back to work,” I mutter, opening the Dot’s Dots doughnut holes box to avoid their knowing looks.
“You mean daydreaming about a certain fireman.” Mindy winks as they go back to their desks.
An hour later, I pass the storage closet on my way to the copier. The door hangs open. The squirrel mascot head sits on the shelf, staring at me with its maniacal smile.
I glare at it. “I’m never wearing you again.”
“I don’t know,” a deep voice says behind me. “You were the cutest chickaree squirrel I’ve ever seen.”
I whirl around.
Patton stands there in his firefighter uniform, hair slightly damp like he just showered after a call. He’s smiling a small, corner-of-mouth smile that makes my knees weak.
And yes, my fingers drift to my lips.
“You’re here,” I say stupidly.
He rolls his eyes. “Just got back from a false alarm on Cedar Street. Thought I’d—” He stops when he sees my face. “Are you okay?”
No. My family’s restaurant is going to have to close. I’m broke. I’m exhausted. I’m terrified of losing everything I’ve worked for. But he’s here and not ignoring me.
I clear my throat, feeling like I’m telling half a lie. “I’m fine.”
So tall and broad, he steps closer, crowding into my space in a way that should feel overwhelming but somehow feels safe. A protective wall between me and the world—when it used to stand between us. “Winnie—”
Then Pauline’s orthopedic shoes squeak around the corner, and we jump apart.
“I was heading to the copying machine!” I announce too loudly.
Pauline gives us a look that says she knows exactly what we were doing—or about to do—and disappears into the breakroom.
And what might that be? If it weren’t for the squirrel costume, I’d drag this man into the closet and see what it’s like to kiss in the light of day, er, small, dark space. But why? Because of a bet? Because he’s a distraction from my problems, or do I really like him?
Patton and I stare at each other as if each of our minds are filled with questions we’re afraid to answer.
“Want to grab lunch?” he pauses, then adds, “We should talk.”
“I have a meeting—” with my bank account, my brother, with God. How am I going to fix this? “It’ll probably run long.”
“After?”
“I’ll text you.”
He nods, but his eyes linger on my face like he’s trying to read everything I’m not saying.
Then his radio crackles, and he’s gone.