Total pages in book: 105
Estimated words: 102719 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 514(@200wpm)___ 411(@250wpm)___ 342(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 102719 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 514(@200wpm)___ 411(@250wpm)___ 342(@300wpm)
Am I sucker for believing Riley when he says he broke up with me for noble reasons? For believing he regrets it and would never, ever do it again?
He said he didn’t want to hold me back. That he didn’t fit in my world. But if that was true, why did he let things go so far that summer ten years ago? He would’ve known from the start we were headed for disaster. And a good guy wouldn’t have told me he loved me and then taken my virginity if he felt deep down we weren’t compatible. He wouldn’t have dreamed up a forever with me filled with books and music and food.
I probably should’ve been asking these questions earlier, when Riley was explaining himself to me this week. Then again, I was so swept up in the romance of it all that my rational brain must have fallen by the wayside.
Now that I am thinking about all these questions, I can’t make any of it make sense.
I can’t stop missing him.
So I do what I always do when I can’t tell up from down. I go see Granny during my lunch hour.
Laurel greets me with a smile at the assisted living facility. “She’s playing mah-jongg with her cocktail club on the back porch. Tread lightly—they’re drinking whiskey today.”
“She’s part of a cocktail club? That meets at lunch?”
“It’s their first meeting. She’s the founding member.”
Laughing, I shake my head. “Of course she is.”
I make my way down the familiar hall to the back of the facility. Sure enough, Granny is seated at one of several tables, each one tricked out with a colorful mah-jongg set.
I take a second to watch her. She’s sipping on what looks to be a whiskey sour, laughing at something the gal on her left says. Her eyes are lit up. Shoulders relaxed. Granny didn’t love coming to the facility after Pa died, but I have to say she’s really thriving here.
Or maybe she’s thriving being a single lady for the first time in sixty years.
“As they say, you gotta smoke ’em if you got ’em.” Granny sets her tiles face up. “Mah-jongg, y’all!”
The ladies at her table erupt in applause and laughter. Like an idiot I clap too, making Granny look up.
“Lulu.” She smiles at me. I feel like crying. “I didn’t know you were coming.”
My throat is impossibly tight as I reply, “I missed you.”
“Here, let’s go inside. You want a cocktail? I made a whole pitcher.”
And that’s how I end up in her living room with a very strong cocktail in one hand and my heart in the other.
“You look like you’re about to cry.” Granny peers at me. “Let it out, sugar.”
I sob. She frowns, hobbling to my side to pull me in for a hug.
“That Patrick really worked a number on you, didn’t he?”
Wiping my nose, I shake my head. “It’s not Patrick. It’s Riley Dixon.”
Her eyes go wide. “He hurt you?”
“No. No, the opposite. I think we fell in love. Again.”
I wait for Granny’s eyes to pop out of her head and land on the forest green carpet at our feet.
Instead, she goes very, very still.
The hair on the back of my neck prickles to life. “Granny? Why do I get the feeling—”
“That I already know about you and Riley falling in love years ago?” She searches my eyes, then reaches up to tuck my hair behind my ear. “Because I do know, Lulu.”
My stomach lurches. Tears spill out of my eyes. “What? How? We were so careful!”
“I know because your grandfather caught y’all almost necking and lost his goddamn mind. That afternoon in the kitchen—you were making cheese straws, if memory serves. I guess Jimmy glimpsed y’all touching and put two and two together . . .”
The words land like a bomb, detonating a kaleidoscope of emotion inside me. I’m crying, but I’m laughing too.
I’m shaking, but I’m curious enough to push Granny for more information. “Pa never said a word to me!”
“He didn’t need to. He had a word with Riley and then some.”
The saliva in my mouth thickens. Pulse drums in my ears. My thoughts race as I scramble to put the pieces together. “Wait, wait. First of all, it’s hilarious you call it necking.”
“Pa and I necked plenty. It’s fun, isn’t it?” She sighs. “I don’t miss being young, but I miss that.”
“We call it making out, but yes, it really is a lot of fun. I’ve missed it too. But you’re saying Pa caught us touching and then confronted Riley?”
Granny’s expression softens. She looks almost contrite. “He told Riley to stay far, far away from you, or he was going to let his mama go and make sure she never got another job on the island. Your Pa didn’t think Riley deserved you.”
The memory materializes, clear as day: the heat of early August. The smell of cheese straws in the oven, and Riley loading the dishwasher before turning to me.