Chapter 18 Sierra #2
She purses her lips briefly, then says, “I’ve received an offer to buy the property. A generous offer. So, unless you’d like to also make an offer to purchase, our business with one another is finished as of the end of this month.”
Shit. Ten days.
That’s all I have left in Orchard Cove? Officially.
That’s all I have left . . . with Mason.
I swallow as I grapple for something meaningful to say. And in the back of my mind clings the fear: that he only slept with me to try to win this battle.
That he’s the one who made this generous offer to buy Pier Seven from June.
But of course he’s the one.
Maybe he’s enjoyed sleeping with me, for whatever that’s worth. But ultimately . . . whatever he wants with me comes a distant second to how much he wants that building.
It’s like my greatest fear has been shoved right in my face.
But June is right in front of me, and this is not her problem.
“Okay,” I tell her. “I understand. Thank you for being honest. I’m not prepared to make an offer to buy. So . . . I guess that’s it.”
June frowns at me again. “This is not a rejection, Sierra.”
“Right.”
She sighs a little. “You can try,” she tells me, “but you can’t run away from your life.
You’ve heard of ‘wherever you go, there you are’?
So, live your life, and live the hell out of it.
You’re the only one who gets to. Not your sister, not anyone else.
See it as the privilege it is and stop waiting to be chosen by some man.
Or some place. Or some perfect business opportunity.
You be the one to choose. That’s my advice to you, unsolicited as it may be. ”
Once again, I feel so seen by this woman . . . I want to be annoyed with her, but I’m really not.
“You know what, June? I appreciate you.”
I give her a hug, and she stiffens.
But then she pats me on the back. “I . . . appreciate you, too.” She pulls away. “Now, go have fun.”
I watch her walk away up the beach, alone, silver hair blowing in the breeze.
And I wonder if one day I’ll end up as self-possessed and fiercely independent as her.
Or as alone.
I’m sitting at the bonfire when Mason sits down next to me. It’s just past midnight and Sophie vacated her spot on the log beside me a while ago to walk home with June.
There are about thirty of us still lingering around the fire, making s’mores and drinking. Layne is playing “Harvest Moon” on his acoustic guitar, a few people are singing along, and Bev and Bill are slow-dancing down at the shoreline.
Me, I’m staring into the flames and avoiding tomorrow.
“How was your day?” Mason asks me, as if we’re friends like that.
Or maybe he just wants to know how badly he demolished me in sales today.
I look at him, and when the slight smile falls from his face, I realize tears are shining in my eyes.
“Shit. That bad?”
I wipe my eyes. “It’s just the fire. My eyes are sensitive.”
“Okay . . .”
“And the alcohol.” I point at the big cooler Layne brought, filled with ice and cans of Elderberry cider. “I may be slightly drunk. I blame your brother. How was your day?”
“Decent,” he says carefully. “Didn’t get much sleep last night.”
I don’t know what to make of that. After we had sex at the cottage, I told him it would be best if he didn’t stay over, and he went home.
“Me neither,” I say. “I did have a realization. Wanna hear it?”
“Do I?”
“Yes. Maybe. I realize that you really meant it when you said I’m a formidable opponent.
And you really think that the meme and what Kyle’s family did to me is a crock of shit.
You were nicer to me than he was, about all of it.
” I’m staring into the fire, and I blink back the water in my eyes that insists on returning.
“And even if he’s trying to make up for it now by trying to be nicer to me so he can uphold his opinion of himself, you fixed my ice machine and you didn’t have to do that. It was very cool.”
I don’t want to lay too much gratitude on him all at once, so I add, “I even forgive you for ruining that three-legged race for me.”
He doesn’t laugh like I think he might.
“You are a formidable opponent,” he says seriously.
I take a breath. “June turned me down for the lease. She won’t be extending it. I won’t be staying.”
Mason doesn’t say anything for a moment, and my words hang heavily in the air between us.
When I look at the side of his face, his eyes are downcast. Maybe I want to ask him about the offer he made June, and when that happened, and why he didn’t tell me. But maybe I don’t.
He doesn’t bring it up.
So, I don’t, either.
“I’m sorry you didn’t get what you want.” He looks in my eyes. “You deserved to win.”
I laugh. “It would be nice. Just to win at something.”
He glances at the ribbons still pinned to my chest. “I think you win a lot more than you give yourself credit for.”
I look away. “Not at the things that matter.”
Silence falls between us again.
Layne starts playing U2’s “All I Want Is You” on his guitar, and it’s so hauntingly bittersweet, I push to my feet. “I think I need to go to bed. Sleep off the cider.”
I don’t even say goodbye.
I just turn and make my way up the sand toward the beach walk. And I know Mason is with me. I hear him. I feel him.
“You don’t have to walk me home,” I tell him, but he does anyway.
Together, we walk along the path, where paper lanterns made in the kids’ craft tent today now dangle from every possible tree and bush.
“Maybe you could help me out here,” he says after a moment. “So I know whether to offer a shoulder to cry on or just tell you to forget him.” Our eyes meet briefly. “How serious was it? Your relationship with your ex.”
I guess he thinks that’s what I’m really upset about?
But I don’t correct him.
“That is a great question, Mason Grant. I thought it was serious. We were together for three years, but we didn’t even live together. He had his place, I had mine.”
“What’s your place in the city like?”
I think about it and all that comes out is: “Cold. I actually don’t spend a lot of time there.”
The concept of “home” hovers in the back of my mind. Where the hell is mine?
“June said home is the place where you feel most like yourself,” I say. “How fucked-up is it that I don’t know where that is anymore?”
Mason says nothing for a long moment, then offers, “You will. Sometimes . . . it takes time.”
I raise an eyebrow at him. “And how would you know? You’ve probably always known where home is.”
“No.” He pushes his hands into his pockets. “I thought I did. But there were times that I questioned it. I almost left. I did leave, actually, for a short while.”
“But you came back.”
“Yeah, I came back.”
“Well, all I fucking know for sure is that Kyle is not my home.”
“Maybe, for now,” he says, “that’s all you need to know.”
I glance at him as the moonlight and the glowing lantern light shifts over the curves of his face. It plays in his eyes, making me see something in their depths that’s not really there.
I know it’s just a trick of the light.
He didn’t tell me about the offer he made to June, the one that may have cost me the ability to keep leasing the building; if June didn’t have a solid buyer, maybe she would’ve leased it to me for the rest of summer.
It was a solid play on his part, making that offer. I can’t blame him.
He’s a formidable opponent, too.
But his silence tells me the truth, clearer than any words or any misconstrued spark of desire in his eyes.
To Mason Grant, I’m still the enemy.
I feel the emotions swelling up in my chest even as I try to push them down. To hold them back.
Because I’m starting to understand that I have a deeper longing to stay in Orchard Cove than I thought. And maybe it only has a little to do with the smoothie bar.
But is it just my confused feelings for Mason making me feel this way?
Is it just that I want more of him?
I’m really not a complicated person. Sometimes, I’m disturbingly predictable.
Ever since my biological father rejected me for his other family—his other kids—I know I’ve been hesitant to get close to anyone. To trust. To attach. To believe I’m good enough to be anyone’s first choice.
My busy, high-pressure work life—running my own business, trying to grow it, and never knowing for sure if I’m going to have enough money to keep going, to make rent, to support my life in the city—has provided me with such convenient means to avoid true intimacy.
This has never been more obvious to me than when Mason walks me all the way through his property in the moonlight without a word, down the secret path, through the secret gate, and right to my door, and he kisses me goodnight, on the forehead . . . and I don’t say what I mean.
When he says “Goodnight” like it’s a question and hesitates on the step, I just let him go.
I say, “Goodnight.”
I don’t say, I want you to stay.