Chapter 44 Poppy
POPPY
By the time Ethan has come to relieve me and take over for the closing shift, I’m bone tired and can barely drag my feet up the stairs to my apartment. I’m grateful he’s been feeling better, because I don’t think I could tolerate another full day, working from open to close.
My joints are screaming from being on my feet all day, my wrists and hands aching from carrying heavy milk jugs back and forth from the fridge.
Even though I should be elated that I’ve secured the deed, that the café is officially mine, there’s an undeniable weight on my shoulders, a black cloud looming over what should have been a perfect day. A bluebird day, as Jett would call it.
Any joy I should be soaking in after my meeting with the lawyer today is overshadowed by the fact that he’s probably busy drawing up divorce papers. My divorce papers, that will officially and irrevocably end my relationship with Jett.
When I enter my apartment, the quiet is almost deafening, and no one greets me at the door like I’ve become accustomed to. This last week there was almost always someone here when I finished work, either Jett or Cordelia giving me a warm welcome.
“Cordelia?” I call through the apartment. “Pss pss pss.”
I make the sound that almost guarantees she’ll come running, but there’s nothing. No response. I get the feeling she senses something is off since Jett left, and she’s been sulking. I wander around the apartment, checking each of the places she likes to hide.
I look behind and underneath the couch, in the hollow part of her cat tree, even behind the shower curtain around my clawfoot bathtub, but still, nothing. Finally, I go into the bedroom, and my eyes snag on a wrinkled section of my bed skirt.
Crouching down on the floor, I lift the fabric, and find her laying down, all four paws tucked under her. Her eyes glow from the light in my room, suddenly illuminating her hiding spot.
“Why are you hiding under here girl?” I coo at her, but she doesn’t move, just squeezes her eyes shut and turns her head away from me. “Come on out.” I try to encourage her. Now she curls herself around, forming a ball and tucking her head in tight. “Okay, suit yourself. I’ll be here.”
Brushing my pants off from being on the floor, I stand and leave Cordelia to pout under the bed. She’ll come out when she’s ready.
I peel off my work clothes, not bothering to put them away and leaving them in a pile on the floor instead. I pad into the bathroom and draw myself a hot bath, sinking down into the steaming water and letting the heat soak through to my bones.
I sit in the claw foot tub until my skin is wrinkled, and the water is just lukewarm. There’s still no sign that Cordelia has emerged from under the bed when I return to the bedroom, wrapped in a towel with one around my head.
Taking off the towels, I rummage around in my closet for some sweats, but my eyes snag on a familiar piece of clothing.
A t-shirt. When I pick it up, I recognize it instantly as the t-shirt Jett wore while he was here.
I lift it to my face and breathe in, taking in the soft, earthy scent of him that’s still on it.
My heart clenches thinking about him wearing it. Thinking about where he is and what he’s doing right now. I slip the t-shirt on and wrap my arms around myself for a moment.
Once I’m changed, I wander out into the living room. Behind me, I hear the soft pat pat pat of little paws on the floor behind me. I smile to myself, because I have a theory about why she’s suddenly decided to come out of hiding.
I cozy up on the couch under my favourite blanket—and the one Jett and I snuggled up under together more than once—and I open the letter from my aunt.
The last postcard I got from her was from Budapest, a picture of a large castle with tall spires on the front from when she started travelling more as I took over for her at the café.
I soaked up each word of her note on the back about her adventures before I tucked it in the shoe box along with the dozens of other postcards I’ve collected from her.
This letter, though, is written on thick paper, folded neatly in thirds in a long envelope. Emotion burns behind my eyes when I open it up and see how she’s addressed me.
My sweet Poppy girl,
A lump forms in my throat, a single tear rolling off my cheek and staining the cream paper.
If you’re reading this, it means I’m long gone. And although I have no plans of dying soon, I’m in the process of having my will done up and I wanted to write you this letter for when the day inevitably arrives that you must take over Thistle + Thorne.
This café is everything to me, and watching you take it over while I spend my last good years travelling has been the greatest joy of my life. You will do great things with the café, I know it. But please, don’t also forget to live.
I spent so many years working behind that counter, I forgot there was a whole world on the other side of it. I want you to experience all of it while you have your life ahead of you the way I never did.
You have one, beautiful, magical, extraordinary life to live, my girl.
Go live it.
XO
Dahlia
Another tear falls onto the page, smudging the ink.
My aunt’s words land somewhere deep within me, calling back all the moments I’ve said no to plans, made excuses, blamed it on my work at the café, all because I was afraid.
I’ve always been treated as fragile, needing to be coddled, held as if I could break at any moment.
Somewhere along the line I started to believe that about myself, too.
Until I married Jett and my world got turned upside down. I started experiencing things in a way that I never had before. Jett encouraged me, reminded me that I can do anything I set my mind to. And then he was there to support me when my body failed. All in a way that never made me feel broken.
Cordelia, as I predicted, hops up onto the couch next to me, and has started nuzzling her face into my side, rubbing it in Jett’s t-shirt.
“I know, I miss him, too.” I whisper, wiping away my tears with the back of my hand, as Cordelia blinks her big green eyes up at me.
Then, she gets up, turning away from me and jumping down off the couch as if it’s my fault that Jett’s gone. As if I’m keeping him away from her. She resumes her pacing around the living room, meowing loudly every so often, as if she’s crying about what an injustice this is.
I try to ignore her, to see if maybe she’ll just go back into hiding under the bed and settle down. But she doesn’t, and an hour later, I’m fed up with her nagging.
“Message received, girlie pop,” I say, getting up from where I am and scooping her up off the floor. She lets out a frustrated meow in protest but goes quiet when I stick her in her travel carrier.
I think I know the only thing that will get her to chill out.
Going to Jett’s.
It’s too late to text him. He might even be in the air, on the way to Switzerland. But I still have his key, and I doubt he’ll mind if we spend the night there. I peer at Cordelia through the mesh of the crate.
“Let’s go for a drive.”