CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
I hadn’t stopped smiling in twelve hours.
Or at least, that’s how it felt, because my cheeks hurt and every time I glanced in a mirror I looked like a grinning idiot.
At a respectable hour, Teddy had deposited me back at my door, soaked with rain and shivering, and promised to meet me first thing in the morning.
I didn’t think my mother was awake. If I had, I wouldn’t have thrown myself into his arms like a lovestruck fool and demanded one more kiss before he drove away.
The concerning sparkle in my mother’s eyes at the breakfast table told me all I needed to know. She slid me a plate of pancakes and looked at me expectantly, as if the price for carbs was information.
I groaned and dropped my flaming face into my hands. “Just say it.”
She made a noise of glee and slipped into the seat across from me. “I know I’m not s’posed to say, ‘I told you so’.” A short pause, then: “But I told you so.”
“What exactly did you tell me?” I muttered, shoving a piece of pancake in my mouth.
“That you should’ve never let that boy go,” she replied matter-of-factly.
My fork clinked against the plate as I dropped it with a sigh. I’d forgotten about the certain false rumor I allowed to circulate to save my wounded ego.
“Well, that’s the thing,” I said slowly, already detesting the taste, “He broke up with me.”
Her mouth fell open and snapped shut like a fish out of water. I stabbed the rest of my flapjack and stared at it miserably. Maybe I could just tell the town’s biggest gossip, Dot, and stick my head in the sand until the embarrassment subsided.
“Then I can’t have you datin’ him,” she concluded with all manner of certainty. Tapping her pen against the table, she stared off into the distance as she added, “Seems he doesn’t have the good sense God gave a goose.”
I rolled my eyes. “I don’t even know if we’re dating. And besides, I’m twenty-five.”
The words sent a surge of acid through my stomach. I’d given him my heart, and I wasn’t even sure what that meant. Where did we stand? What could our future look like when I didn’t even know my own? My chest began to tighten and I reached for a long sip of water.
“That’s neither here nor there. I can’t abide my only child lovin’ a fool.”
“He’s not a fool, Mom,” I replied.
She scoffed. “He let you go, didn’t he?”
I couldn’t help the tiny grin that cracked across my face. “Don’t you have work? It’s eight o’clock.”
“I took a break,” she explained proudly. “So that I could cook my daughter breakfast.”
Hiding my growing smile with another bite of food, I swallowed and replied, “If this is going to become a regular thing, do you think you could learn to cook something other than pancakes?”
She swatted my hand and laughed.
When my mother returned to the diner downstairs, I spent five minutes pacing back and forth in my bedroom and staring at my phone screen.
My laptop sat open on the bed, staring at me—I resumed editing when I got home and barely got five hours of sleep.
The text cursor blinked in a particularly mocking fashion while I muttered unintelligibly.
I was ready for the day in a skirt, stockings, knee high boots and a sweater. Maybe I’d spent an embarrassing amount of time ripping apart my closet for the perfect outfit. Maybe most of my wardrobe now lay crumpled at the end of my bed in a wrinkled pile.
Of course, I didn’t even need to be dressed for a phone call. But clothes were armor, and I needed that more than ever.
The dial tone rang in my ear. My heart pulse fluctuated like a rollercoaster as the sound cut off and the voicemail message began.
At the beep, I said, “Hi, Priscilla.” I pulled the phone away and cleared my throat.
“This is Margot. Margot Wade, from Sterling Publications. I, uh—” Why was I blanking now?
I’d rehearsed this ten times over. Face flushing, I stammered some more until the long tone signaled the end of my recording time, and the call ended.
I screamed into my fist, gathered a steadying breath, and dialed again.
Repeating my greeting, I added, “Sorry for the repeat calls, I promise it’s not an emergency.
I just really enjoyed working with you on Celeste Fowler’s series.
You might’ve heard about my… career setback, but I wanted to reach out because I have a manuscript you might be interested in.
It’s my own. Give me a call back if that sounds like something you’d be interested in, okay? Thanks, Priscilla.”
Relief rushed through me as I hung up and threw it on the bed.
Saying it out loud to someone who could actually change my life felt as if I’d exchanged the giant question mark for a period.
The knowledge of possibly falling flat on my face didn’t scare me, either.
I’d done it before and survived the damage, so why couldn’t I do it again?
A knock sounded at the screen door in the alley. I could hear it through my cracked window.
An idiotic smile plastered back on my face, I snatched my phone, purse, and jacket, practically skipping across the apartment and down the stairs. When I swung the door open, my face fell.
“Well, I knew it would be a bit of a surprise, but I didn’t think it would be an unwelcome one,” Serena said incredulously. She hugged her camel coat to her thin frame, glancing up and down the alley, glossy hair flowing in the breeze as she did.
The pavement was still wet from the previous night’s storm.
Little puddles decorated the asphalt, glittering in the streaks of sun reaching through parted clouds.
A flock of gulls squawked overhead. Windchimes tinkled in the distance, harmonizing with the sway of branches and occasional flurries of leaves.
Oh no—I was beginning to sound like Georgie.
“Sorry,” I drawled as I resurfaced from my haze. “Did we have something scheduled?”
Serena sighed, looking uncharacteristically frustrated. “No, and I apologize for the inconvenience. There are so many things to get done over at the country club, and Jesse is with his groomsmen.” She hesitated before adding, “I really don’t want to go alone.”
I pressed my lips together. Trying to be a better, less selfish friend, meant showing up for Serena and cancelling my day with Teddy.
“Okay,” I replied. “Let’s do it.”
Her face lit up as she pulled me toward the rental car.
Inside, I sent an explanation to Teddy before shoving my phone in my purse and setting it at my feet.
She turned the radio on, humming to an impossibly cheery song by Carole King.
We rolled up Main Street, stopping intermittently for different crowds of tourists, before finally turning onto the little two-lane road out of town.
“So, what’s Jesse up to with his groomsmen?” I asked, suddenly realizing that I was alone with her for the first time since we were teenagers.
Serena’s jaw tensed for a split second before she responded. “Oh, I don’t know. They ‘kidnapped’ him last night.” She put up finger quotes. “Bachelor party secrets, I suppose.”
The color drained from my face. Where there were bachelor parties, there were typically bachelorette parties. I swallowed the lump of guilt in my throat and attempted subtlety as I murmured, “Did you ever tell us who your maid-of-honor is?”
“It was supposed to be Jesse’s older sister,” Serena replied. “But she just had a baby, so the timing wasn’t right.”
“Right,” I muttered.
Waiting a stifling five minutes to avoid suspicion, I ripped my purse open and tapped out an urgent message to Georgie: Bachelorette party.
Tonight. Stuck at the country club with Serena.
SOS. If anyone could pull together a spectacular last-minute event, it was Georgie.
I’d have to rush through with Serena as fast as I could.
My plans were foiled the minute we stepped into the glossy, marble-floored foyer.
Bellboys rushed by pulling gilded carts laden with suitcases, clusters of people milled through the lobby and waited in line at the front desk, and staff members carrying clipboards passed us without a second glance. Serena looked like a baby giraffe trying to balance on a rocking boat.
“Fallfest is the day after your wedding,” I explained. Georgie’s words rang in my ears—the country club was all booked up. The final wave of tourists had officially descended.
I followed Serena as she waded through the crowd and attempted to flag down her coordinator. The chatter, combined with ringing bells and rolling wheels, formed a low roar that drowned out her quiet voice. We’d never get home at that rate.
“What’s her name?” I asked, motioning to the woman with jet black hair and razor-sharp eyeliner.
“Minerva.”
“Seriously?”
Serena gave me a look.
Throwing up my hands, I shouted, “Minerva!”
The conversations rapidly fell to a hush. Several eyes caught on us, some whispering as they did. Serena, horrified, dipped her chin and blushed. I grimaced and shooed them away, pushing her by the back as we approached the woman studying me with obvious affront.
This was going to be a fun day.
???
I groaned and cradled my stomach. “I can’t fit anymore in here, S.”
Serena arched her brow as if to say, “You can stop when I tell you to stop.” Not that she’d ever say it out loud.
She slid the next plate to me, a slice with an ornate placard beside it that read “black forest gateau” in calligraphy.
Apparently, one of the many things she required another person for was to consume all the calories she refused.
I told her not indulging for her own wedding was ridiculous, but she excused it—something about couture—and shoved another piece of cake at me.
When my phone rang, I was sure it was Georgie.
“I need to get this,” I said, standing. “And possibly give my stomach some recovery time before it decides to implode in protest.”
As I left, she delved into another conversation about table settings with the coordinator, who’d been hovering behind me the entire time like some sort of Scooby-Doo villain.
I quickly found my way to the ocean view terrace, shrugging on my coat as I blindly answered the call. “Hey, Georgie—look, I’m in the middle of cake tastings, so I don’t have long. But—”
“Margot,” the voice cut in. Definitely not Georgie. “This is Priscilla, returning your earlier call.”
My pulse skyrocketed in record time. I paced away from the French doors, maneuvering through the half-set-up cocktail tables, and perched on the ledge. “I’m sorry, I didn’t look at my screen before I picked it up.”
She laughed. “Don’t apologize. Hey, did I hear something about cake tastings? Is the Margot Wade getting married?”
“No, no,” I snorted. “It’s my friend’s wedding in a couple days.”
There was a stretch of silence, then the sound of rustling papers. I spun away from the windows and wrapped one arm around my legs, conserving warmth.
“Did I hear your message right?” Priscilla said. “You have a manuscript for me?”
I swallowed. “Yes. My own novel, about growing up here in Bluebell Cove—fictionalized, of course.”
“Listen, I don’t even need to read it to know I want to represent you.”
“Well—” I paused to suck in a breath. “I’d love it if you read it before making any decisions. I don’t want it to be any sort of favor.”
A smile appeared in her voice as she replied, “Of course, I understand. But I doubt it’ll change my mind.”
I fought to keep from jumping up and throwing my arms in the air. I was doing it—finally, step by step, I inched toward that impossible dream. Only, it didn’t seem quite so impossible anymore.
“When can you be in New York next?”
“Next week,” I said. “I’ve got the wedding, and then an event called Fallfest this weekend.”
“Fallfest? That sounds familiar.”
My eyebrows drew together. “In Bluebell Cove? We’ve been getting more press coverage than usual.”
I heard her snap her fingers. “That’s it!
I think I saw the name in a Travel and Taste pitch deck—my friend works there.
They’re running a year-long series called ‘The Heart of America’, exploring small towns reinventing themselves after economic downturns.
Kind of a deep dive into small-town image versus reality—how nostalgia really sells, you know? What a coincidence.”
Whatever she said next fell on deaf ears. I managed to eke out a plausible excuse and a goodbye, ending the call as my hands began to shake.
Sepia-toned images flashed through my mind: cracked alleyways, hand-painted signs, and my mother, standing in her dated uniform, guarding the decades-old diner she loved.
I wrote an entire book about the magic of growing up in Bluebell Cove.
Teddy had come to shine a light on all our blemishes and flaws, for the entire world to see.
For the second time in my life, I realized the truth I kept trying to unlearn: Teddy Bowman would always chase the adventure, and I’d always be the one cleaning up the mess.