CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
The rest of the day moved in hazy, slow motion.
I operated dead on my feet, nodding at the right times, shoving cake and lobster into my mouth until Serena was satisfied, too zapped of energy to snap back at Minerva’s snide remarks.
Georgie sent me a series of questions about the bachelorette party that I promptly answered.
Teddy called and texted. I ignored each.
Later, Serena asked me if I felt alright as she drove us home. I mumbled something about being queasy—which, to be fair, wasn’t a complete lie. She apologized for using me as a taster and offered to make up for it in coffee.
I nodded in response and lowered the window. The fresh air froze my cheeks, but the whistling wind also kept her from asking more questions.
My phone rang again, Teddy’s name lighting up on the screen. I sent him to voicemail.
This town could be complicated; sometimes I hated it growing up—the rapid-fire gossip, the absence of a big city’s shine.
I applied to NYU and called it my dream because that’s what everyone expected.
In a small town, you were supposed to want out—to resent it, to run and never look back.
But I hadn’t fled Bluebell Cove. I’d fled my own embarrassment for wanting to stay when Teddy chose to go.
Maybe I never really knew him. Maybe, underneath it all, he’d always been the boy who resented his childhood and craved something bigger.
I should’ve seen the signs. None of his dreams ever included the Cove.
And he was allowed to seek out that adventure—just not at the expense of the place and the people I loved.
Serena parked the car in front of the Morning Bell. When she slid out, I did a quick scan of the sidewalk and through the cafe’s windows, breathing a sigh of relief. No sign of a yellow Jeep or a rugged mop of blonde hair.
“Where are you?” Georgie whispered through the phone a few minutes later. I sat at a tucked away table, eyeing Serena as she waited at the bar for our drinks.
“You don’t have to whisper,” I replied, “It’s a phone call.”
I could practically hear her roll her eyes.
“Can you bring her to the diner in ten minutes?”
“Ten minutes?” I echoed. “Pulling together an event in a handful of hours might be a record for you.”
“No, you can’t put that there—” Georgie’s voice went muffled as she directed someone about balloons. “I’m back. Is ten minutes okay?”
Serena smiled as she began walking toward me with two coffee mugs. “Yep,” I said, ending the call and shoving my phone back into my purse. Not exactly the most subtle I’d ever been, but, desperate times.
She set them down and draped one leg over the other as she sank into the chair across from me. “Who was that?” Her eyes twinkled.
“Georgie,” I replied, resenting the way Serena’s smile fell. “Asking about the rehearsal dinner.”
The next ten minutes moved like molasses.
Every time the bell on the door chimed, my gaze flitted across the cafe, pulse spiking as it did.
All I wanted was to find a corner of the party, a glass of wine, and do my best impression of a chameleon.
Preferably without going into cardiac arrest beforehand.
“I’m in the mood for a burger,” I said the moment my mental timer was up.
Her eyebrows rose. “Already? I thought you were sick from all the sampling.”
“What can I say?” I replied, standing abruptly with a scrape of my chair against the floor. “I have the appetite of a bear. Or is it a horse? I don’t know.” My heart sank to my stomach when my eyes caught on a passerby outside that almost looked like Teddy.
We left our half-drunk coffees at the table, Serena graciously following me out the door without further protest. Even as my knees wobbled, I distracted her while we moseyed down Main Street, pointing to my father’s obnoxious balloon bobbing over the rooftops, and Georgie’s Pottery Shop across the road.
She hummed and nodded in response, probably thinking I’d caught some sort of mind-controlling parasite from the final lobster tail.
Serena was decently preoccupied when I pushed open the door to Captain’s. A hand-written note—one of Georgie’s creations—hung on the glass, scrawled in colorful letters: Closed for a Private Event.
My best friend must’ve been a secret magician.
Inside, I could hardly tell it was Captain’s Table anymore, aside from the telltale blue seats and pink, checkerboard floor.
Every other inch sparkled in white and gold—balloons covered the ceiling, metallic tassels draped down every window, streamers hung above the bar and wrapped the legs of stools in stripes.
The juke box hummed with a Shania Twain song.
A veritable mountain of presents glistened on a nearby booth’s table.
When the door swung shut behind us, a crowd jumped up from behind the bar, cheering and blowing plastic horns. Serena gasped, hand flying to her mouth, taking it all in with glassy eyes.
“Happy bachelorette!” Georgie shouted, running around to us and enveloping her in a giant hug.
“I wasn’t expecting anything,” she whispered, glancing between us like we’d just gifted her a mansion on Bluebell Lane. “This is really too much.”
“This was all Georgie,” I replied.
She waved a hand at me. “Margot’s being modest. It was her idea.”
Against my will, Serena pulled me into a hug and sniffled in my ear. I frowned. Of course it was nice, but I didn’t think it was cry-worthy. She fanned her red, tear-streaked face when she released me. Georgie and I shared a concerned look.
A group of women soon consumed Serena. No one would’ve been able to tell they hadn’t seen or spoken to her in years—they squeezed her hands and crooned a series of genuine congratulations, just like they would treat anyone in town. My stomach knotted.
“Something’s wrong,” Georgie murmured from the side of her mouth as we looked on.
“I know,” I said. “My money’s on her fiancé.”
She sighed. “Still don’t want to do anything about it?”
I pinched the bridge of my nose, a headache beginning to swell. Georgie had been right all along. I was just too busy worrying about things that didn’t even matter.
Now, on top of everything else, I had to stop my friend’s wedding. How inconvenient.
???
“Who are you?” I asked my mother. “Shutting the diner down early in peak tourist season? I don’t think that’s ever been done.”
She smiled, running a rag across the bar. “Georgie said it was an emergency. And besides, Serena was my favorite of your friends.”
“Hey!” Georgie shouted from across the diner, stuffing crumpled wrapping paper into a trash bag. I fought a laugh as she slung it over her shoulder and stormed over, features pinched in mock-anger. “I thought I was your favorite, Ruth.”
“You were all my favorites, darlin’,” she replied with a wink.
I dropped my chin in my palm and traced a fingertip around the rim of the plastic wine glass. Half-eaten cake sat beside it—I’m only human, after all—a triple-tiered red velvet work of art Georgie must’ve procured from the bakery.
“What’s got you down in the dumps?” my mother asked. “This ain’t the Margaret from my breakfast table this mornin’.”
The stool beside me creaked as Georgie sat down. “It’s the guy Serena’s marrying.”
Right, that—not the guy that had somehow managed to sweep me off my feet and stomp on my heart in the span of twenty-four hours. I needed to stay on task.
“Do tell,” she replied, crossing her arms.
Georgie glanced at me before continuing. “It’s hard to explain. He seems nice, and clearly he takes care of Serena in his own way, but he… doesn’t appear to care about much other than himself.”
I swirled the dregs of my wine and cleared my throat. “Turns the charm on and off like a faucet,” I mumbled.
The remaining piece clicked into place. Snapping my attention up, my mother looked as if she’d come to the same conclusion. Her lips had pressed into a thin line, jaw tense, the color having drained ever so slightly from her cheeks. My stomach turned.
“What?” Georgie asked. “What am I missing?”
My mother wiped her hands on her apron and shook her head. “It’s not as confusing as it appears, Georgette. It seems Serena is marrying her very own Andrew Wade.”