Chapter 5
VIVIAN
The air still holds the heat of the day, even as the sun dips lower over the Potomac River. Summer does that. The days linger for an infinite number of hours, or so it seems. And I’m right here ready to soak up each and every summery second I can.
I sit back in the porch chair, the wood warm beneath me, and take a slow sip of my iced tea.
The glass is sweating in my hand, condensation slipping over my fingers as a faint breeze moves through the street.
Not enough to cool anything, just enough to carry the smells with it—cut grass, warm pavement, something sweet from a nearby garden.
Someone down the block is grilling. Again.
A car rolls past, slow over cobblestones, and somewhere a screen door slams. Voices drift from a neighboring porch, easy, unhurried.
I glance down at my watch. An hour. My grandmother should have been home an hour ago.
I tip the glass back, finishing the last of the tea, and set it down beside me. The porch light flickers on overhead as the sky starts to fade into dusk.
Okay. Think. She was going to see Larry today, but then she mentioned bingo. Or maybe it was garden club.
Actually—no. I press my lips together. I’m fairly certain she said it was book club this week. Erotic book club, which is still something I have not recovered from.
I exhale slowly. No one ever tells you that having a grandmother is basically the same thing as having a child, but now that I know that, I feel very confident in my current decision not to have an actual child of my own. This woman keeps me busy enough.
I reach for my phone, turning it over in my hand, already debating whether I should call Larry when a low rumble hits the end of the street before I can decide. I pause. That sound is like a…No. Surely not.
The engine gets louder, rolling up the street with a deep, unmistakable growl that doesn’t belong anywhere near our quiet little block.
I sit up a little straighter as a Harley pulls into view and slows in front of the house. I shouldn’t be shocked as my grandmother swings off the back like this is the most normal thing in the world.
Helmet comes off. Hair slightly askew. Her laugh is bright and unbothered as she pats the driver on the shoulder, says something I can’t hear, then reaches for her bag.
I just sit and watch. Processing as she turns and spots me on the porch, and beams like she hasn’t just arrived on the back of a motorcycle.
“Hello!” she calls, already heading up the steps. “I’m so sorry I’m late. I lost my phone!”
“Why am I not surprised to hear that?” I shake my head, pushing up out of the chair. “Is that anyone I know?”
She waves a free hand in the air, completely unapologetic, as she makes her way up the steps. “It’s Millie’s son. He was on his way home and said he’d give me a lift so I didn’t have to grab a cab. Couldn’t use Uber without a phone, right?”
“No, I guess you can’t,” I say, like this is all perfectly reasonable.
She drops her bag by the door and collapses into the chair beside mine with a satisfied sigh, like she’s just had the most normal taxi ride in the world.
“I am sorry I’m late,” she says, glancing over at me. “Did I ruin dinner?”
I reach for my glass again before remembering it’s empty. “Nope. We’re ordering in tonight, so you’re right on time.”
“Perfect,” she says, settling back, completely at ease now that she’s home.
I glance at her, still a little in disbelief, but it fades quickly. It always does.
I’ve been here a few years now. Long enough that this—motorcycles, missing phones, unexpected detours—has somehow become part of my everyday.
Part of me still can’t fathom that when she got hurt, when I called my mother and told her what happened, she didn’t come back to help her own mother. She’s too busy for that. Too important, at least in her own mind.
So I stayed. Someone had to. People can slip away, so it felt easier than wondering what would happen if I didn’t.
And now, I’m the one who sits on the porch in the middle of June, waiting for my grandmother to come home from erotic book club on the back of a Harley like this is just another Thursday.
Which, for her, apparently, it is.
She fans herself beside me before glancing over. “So,” she says, like she hasn’t just arrived via motorcycle, “how have things been at the store this week?”
I shrug a shoulder, stretching my legs out in front of me. “Pretty good. Busy.”
“That’s my girl.”
“I’m finishing up the McAllister brooch,” I add. “And I’ve got the design to do for the Williamses’ fiftieth anniversary. That one needs to be done by Friday.”
“Oooh,” she says, pleased. “Fifty years. That’s a good one.”
“Yeah,” I say, a small smile tugging at my mouth. “It is.”
“And the wedding ring?” she asks, glancing at me.
I arch an eyebrow. “I’m having to tweak that one a little.”
Her eyes light up immediately. “The bride who came in with her brother? The one who got the ring stuck on his hand?”
I laugh, shaking my head. “Yes. That one.”
“Oh, I like him already,” she says.
“You would,” I mutter. “I’m going to go in on Sunday and repair it so she has it well ahead of the wedding. With very clear instructions that no one else is allowed to try it on.”
She laughs, delighted. “Seems reasonable.”
“Bare minimum, honestly.”
She studies me for a second, her expression softening in that way it always does when she’s about to say something I may or may not be ready for.
“You’re very good at what you do, you know,” she says.
“Considering you’ve given me the keys to the store,” I say as I glance over at her, “I’d hope so.”
“I mean it,” she adds, nudging my arm lightly. “You take care of these precious things. You make them better than they were. You’ve always had a knack for that, for taking such great care of others.”
Something in my chest shifts, subtle but there. I look back out at the street. “That’s kind of the job.”
“It’s more than that,” she says quietly. “It’s ingrained in your being.”
My gaze drifts, not really tracking the passing cars or the muted glow of the streetlights flickering on. Instead, my mind goes somewhere else entirely—back to the shop. To the small safe tucked beneath the counter. To the small velvet box locked inside it.
Exactly where it’s supposed to be. Out of sight. Out of reach. Untouched. The perfect example of “how I make things better.”
My fingers curl slightly against the arm of the chair before I force them to relax.
“We’re still talking about jewelry, right?” I ask, trying to sound nonplussed.
My grandmother hums softly beside me, like she hears what I didn’t say but chooses, for once, not to push.
“For now,” she says.
I huff out a laugh, shaking my head as I push up from the chair. “Oh, you’re quite dramatic when you want to be.”
She just smiles, entirely unbothered. Petulant.
I grab my phone and tap the screen, pulling up the app. “I’m going to order us a couple of chicken Caesar salads to be delivered,” I say, glancing down at the time. “I’m meeting the girls around seven-thirty for a drink.”
Her brows lift immediately. “Oh?”
I don’t even look up. “Just a couple of girls getting together, Grandma.”
“And are we all going out to have a nice time, or is someone playing wingman tonight?”
I pause, then glance over at her. “No one is playing anything. We’re just having a drink.”
“Mm-hmm,” she says, like she doesn’t believe me for a second.
I finish the order and set my phone down. “You’re very invested in this.”
“I’m invested in your social life,” she corrects. “Which, historically speaking, could use a little encouragement.”
“I have a social life.”
“You have work.”
“That counts.”
“It does not.”
I roll my eyes, but there’s a small smile there anyway. “We’re having a drink. That’s it.”
She studies me for a second, then leans back in her chair, satisfied. “Well,” she says lightly, “try not to be the most responsible one there.”
“I always am.”
“I know,” she says. “That’s the problem.”
Alexandria’s settled into a perfect summer evening rhythm—storefronts are lit, groups of people lingering as we stroll down King Street, and for once, I don’t feel like I have to rush either.
Lucy nudges her chin toward a storefront up ahead.
Lucy Snyder has been one of my people since middle school, back when we lived a few streets apart and spent summers biking between each other’s houses.
Honestly, the fact that we’re still going strong after all these years is a testament to our friendship considering we also survived years of antagonizing moments courtesy of her twin brother, Liam.
“There it is,” she says. “The shop I was telling you about.”
I follow her line of sight, slowing a little as we get closer. The windows are still covered in brown paper, the kind that means something’s coming but not quite ready yet.
“Huh,” I say. “It’s pretty cool she’s putting a record shop on the street.”
Lucy makes a small noise beside me. “Oh, it’s more than that. It’s a—” She stops herself, a grin spreading across her face. “Actually, no. I’m going to wait. You can walk in and see it for yourself.”
I glance at her. “You’re being suspicious.”
“I’m being fun,” she corrects. “Trust me, Juliette is going to be frothing at the mouth over this.”
I laugh. “Juliette froths at the mouth over anything that even remotely fits her aesthetic.”
“Exactly,” Lucy says. “So just imagine.”
I shake my head, but I’m smiling. Juliette is our resident plant whisperer, and somehow the center of more things than she probably realizes.
She might be back in town by now or still off somewhere with Sawyer.
Who, of course, plays hockey on the Dominion because, apparently, that’s how things work around here.
I glance down the street again, taking it all in—the shops, the people, the steady hum of a place that somehow manages to feel both small and full at the same time.
“I swear,” I say, half to myself, “it’s like I closed my eyes and now everyone around here is involved with hockey in some way.”