“So why are you telling me with no enthusiasm?”
A half laugh, half snort gets her attention. Wisely, she refrains from saying anything more, and instead gives me a few moments to remember I’m in front of my mother and not Grace. Word selection is important.
“I needed to apply for a position there,” I tell her. “Put together a formal résumé as well as a sample six-month schedule of ideas.”
“Even though the entire thing was your idea?”
“Protocol.” I shrug, the anger I’ve been able to keep mostly buried shifting just below the surface. “I was talking to Lynne, another editor at the magazine—”
“We had lunch with her, didn’t we?” Mom leans forward, resting her elbows on the table. Her gray eyes, like mine, are clear as she absorbs my story. “Isn’t she the one who met us for paninis last year when I visited?”
“Yup.”
“Why do I get the feeling I won’t be having any more paninis with Lynne?”
“Because if justice is served, she’ll choke on the next one,” I say, shoving away from the table. Standing behind my chair, fingers wrapped around the top rung, I look at my mother. “She told me she wasn’t interested in the position and to use her as a sounding board. Then she took my ideas and submitted her own application.”
The words slip through my gritted teeth, coming out twisted and sharp. I bite down hard to avoid adding that I’m 99 percent sure she accessed my computer and found my mock-ups. Her layouts, her design ideas—things I didn’t show her—were too similar to be happenstance.
My blood pressure soars so high my head almost explodes. But at the same time, my heart sinks. This wasn’t just a coworker betrayal. That I could’ve handled. This was a betrayal of the worst kind—from a so-called friend.
Lynne was my friend. If she’d said she wanted the position, I would’ve cheered her on. I might’ve even ensured we went after different jobs. But to backstab me like she did? Over something she knew was so important to me? I can’t.
“Oh, Neely, honey. I’m so sorry.” Mom gets to her feet but doesn’t come toward me.
“I had to quit,” I tell her. “It felt like such a betrayal to have put so much work into this and then be overlooked. It was my idea. My brainchild. I just refuse to work there out of principle.” I turn away so she doesn’t see the wetness washing over my eyes. “I’ll be fine. I promise.”
“You can stay here as long as you want. Forever, if you feel like it.”
Laughing, I sniffle and turn back to her. “I just need a couple of days to breathe. But thanks for the offer.”
She comes around the table, and I almost fall into her arms. She holds me close, her hands around the small of my back as she sways gently back and forth.
“I’m so proud of you. You know that, right?” she asks, planting a kiss on my cheek as she lets me go. “I’ve done a lot of things wrong in my life, but every time I look at you, I know I got one right.”
“Stop it,” I tell her. “Don’t make me cry. If I cry, I’m going to be mad.”
“Well, it’s true,” she says, dabbing at her eyes with a napkin. “You’ve always been my little crusader. Remember when you sold lemonade that one summer because you saw the animal shelter didn’t have enough funds for food?”
“I raised three hundred dollars,” I remind her.
“You did.” She laughs. “I think I spent a hundred on supplies.”
“I’m sure the animals appreciated it.” I lean against the counter again, my load a little lighter. After a quick sweep of my mother’s face, I shake my head. “I’m going to be fine. I promise.”
“I know, sweetheart,” she says, lifting her tea. Her tone is soft. It’s the one she always used when she’d come into my bedroom late at night right after my father left us and whisper to me that everything would be all right. “I worry. You know that.”
“I’m not going to be homeless. There are people looking over my résumé as we speak. Besides, like Grace says, when is the last time I took a few days off? Maybe this is a good thing.”
“I’ll never argue with getting to spend more time with you.”
“Right.” Despite the resoluteness in my voice, my spirit feels less convinced. My pride stings. “I put my life into that company,” I say before I can think twice. “I did everything right. I worked my butt off. I went out of my way to find gems of stories, the ones that resonate with readers. I had little girls sending me letters. Those things are . . .”
I don’t know how to summarize what those things are to me. Looking at my mom, I shrug.
“Those things are what make your world go ’round,” Mom whispers.
“It’s why I wanted to do this in the first place,” I say, my shoulders dropping. “That was my dream. Is my dream. To make a difference. To matter. To feel like I have a role in the world, and now . . .”
Mom sets her mug down, dabbing at her eyes with her fingertips. “This door closed, but another will open. It’s how life works. As much as you loved it there, it’s not where you are meant to be.”
With a half laugh, I pick up a napkin off the table and touch it to my cheeks. “I could just take a job today at some random magazine, but I don’t want just another job. I want to be needed. I want what I thought I had. The opportunity of a lifetime.”
“Give it time,” she says. “And who knows? Maybe a door will open here in Tennessee.”
I laugh. “I love your optimism, Mom, but I think that’s a stretch.”
“Never know.”
My growling stomach calls notice to the unattended pasta on the stove. Talk of work behind me for the time being, I want to move on. To anything. “I’m hungry. Let’s eat.”
She looks at the stovetop, then back at me. She takes in my cues, and a slow smile stretches across her pink-lined lips. “Let’s go for margaritas.”
“Really?” I laugh. “What’s happened to you? I come home, and you’re drinking decaf and tequila.”
“Oh, the tequila isn’t for me, sweetheart.” She leads me into the dining room, where our purses sit on a little table my grandfather made when Mom was a child.
“Who’s it for, then?” I ask, grabbing my purse.
“You.” She looks at me and grins. “I feel like it’ll help you tell me about seeing Dane at the café today.”
“Dane,” I whisper.
His name tastes like strawberry wine and balmy summer nights. As weird as it sounds coming out of my mouth, there’s something so familiar. His name just rolls off my tongue like I’ve practiced it a million times. Probably because I have. And my tongue probably wonders why this time isn’t followed by a curse word.
“I saw him in the bank last week. He’s so handsome, Neely.”
Rolling my eyes at the dreamy way she says it, like it’s the epitome of her life’s ambition to see the two of us together, I sigh dramatically.
“Well, I’m sure there’s some kind of scandal brewing under all that handsome,” I mutter, kind of hoping it’s true. I don’t want him to be nice. Or kind. Or anything reasonable that will make me not dislike him.
“I believe he lives a very boring life,” Mom says. “You know, he spends all of his time—”
“No.” I cut her off unapologetically. “I don’t want to know how he spends his time or what he looked like in the bank or what he’s doing with his life . . .”
I don’t want to know anything about him. Not because I’m not curious, because I am. I’ve wondered about his life a thousand times since I saw him today. It’s because I’m happier living with the little story I’ve created for him in my head than with any sort of reality that might be better.
“Let’s go for margaritas, but there will be no talk of Dane Madden,” I say firmly. “Deal?”
She laughs and almost dances toward the door. “Deal.”
“Since when did you become a decaf-loving socialite liar?”
She just laughs some more.
CHAPTER FIVE
NEELY
There are no organic strawberries.
A little petulant, I eye the produce in front of me. Graber’s is this town’s only grocery store, and their fresh produce section is lacking. I’m not entirely sure Graber’s even meets the definition of a true grocery store, but it’s all I have to work with. After two giant peach margaritas last night, I have no desire to drive to the next town over for anything.
“This will have to do,” I mutter, picking up a flat of blueberries.
“I thought you were allergic to blueberries.” The man’s tone behind me has a huskiness to it, like he hasn’t been awake long. I jump, not because I don’t recognize it but because I do.
My heart twists right along with my torso as I see Dane standing behind me. He’s fresh from a morning shower. A blue-and-black flannel, top button undone, sleeves rolled to his elbows, should not look this good.
He shouldn’t smell this good either. Dear Lord Almighty.