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And that’s the first time I’ve ever sacrificed recipe creating for anything else, especially a person.
3
AUGUST
“Imean, I knew I’d walk into a couple fires on my desk coming back from paternity leave, but I never thought I’d find this.”
Warren’s voice hits me as I sit up, sleep glazing my head like a fog I can’t swim out of.
“Huh?” I say, thinking I must still be dreaming if I’m hearing things.
“Auggy, when did you get into town? And why didn’t you call me? I thought we were past the days of me finding you on my office couch.” His exasperated sigh and the groan of an old desk chair have me rubbing my eyes.
Wait. Warren’s office? I blink once, then twice, and realize where I am. The memories flood into my head of arriving in Hope Crest, my mother’s house, and then falling asleep inside Hope Pizza.
“Oh, shit. I’m sorry, I totally overslept.” I go to grab my duffel bag but realize it’s not in the spot where I left it.
If he’s in his office, it means it’s pretty far into the morning hours. Restaurant workers keep different work schedules, and even if Warren is the accountant for the business and can work a regular nine-to-five, I know he’s been home tending to Alana and their new baby.
Instead, when I look up, Warren is holding it with one dark eyebrow raised on his forehead. He looks almost the same—tall, dark, and handsome—as the last time I saw him. “Nah, I’m onto your tactics. You’re not taking off. Why would you come here and not sleep in our guest room?”
Sighing because he knows me too well, I decide I’m too exhausted and emotionally strung out to lie. What sets Warren apart is that there is always a kindness to his face, and it makes people melt around him.
“It was late when I got in. I went to my moth … the house, and then I didn’t want to sleep there. Leona gave me a key a while back, so I thought I’d sleep on your crappy couch for old times’ sake.”
A flinch of sympathy passes over Warren’s features, and I notice the way his eyes droop a little and that he’s unshaven more than usual.
“Plus, did you really need another late-night wake-up call from someone who isn’t your newborn?” He and Alana had their second baby a mere week ago.
A hand scrubs over his face. “Not exactly, but you know I would have picked up the call if it was from you. But that’s beside the point, since you didn’t even tell me you were coming into town. What are you doing here, kid?”
The way he calls me kid doesn’t irk me like it would if it came out of some people’s mouths. When he says it, it’s almost an endearment, like I’m a part of his extended family.
“Had to come back to settle her affairs.” He knows who I’m talking about; there is no need to call her my mother.
After all, Warren hates her almost as much as I do. “Shit, I didn’t … of course, you’re the only one around. Sorry, my head is all jumbled from the baby.” Again, he looks pissed. “You didn’t have to do that. You know I would have handled it for you, or hired someone to help, or?—”
“You’ve done this. You know how it goes.” I give him a sad smile because both of us have now been through the death of a parent.
“Yeah.” He stares down at his desk. “Even if you don’t want to be here, it’s damn good to see you.”
“Damn good to see you, too.”
Seeing each other meant him coming to visit me in New York, which he and Alana had done numerous times over the course of my four years there. Warren knows I’d never come back to Hope Crest if I could help it.
“I’m sorry this all happened right after graduation. Of course, there is never a good time, but this was supposed to be such a happy time for you.”
“Well, no one was there to see me graduate, so maybe it didn’t happen.”
“I’m sorry, Auggy. You know Alana and I would have been there in a heartbeat. But there was this whole labor and delivery thing …” He smirks.
I wave him off. “Psh, I see how it is. Birth of your second child trumps my college graduation. I’m so unimportant.”
I’m joking, of course, but a little twinge of sadness reverberates through my chest. Warren is much like me, an orphan with a biological family that was more messed up than mine. He found his sense of belonging in the Ashtons by marrying their prodigal daughter, who also happened to be his best friend. I’m eternally happy for him that he now has the life kids like us always dream of.
But it doesn’t mean it sucks any less for me. Warren is, for all intents and purposes, my pseudo-family. He coached me through my tough moments growing up. He’s the one I called for advice the first time I got a flat tire or when my professor was flunking me even though I knew I wasn’t failing. Having only a few people in this world I can trust means I hold them dearly in my heart, and it would have been nice if he could have come to my graduation. Of course, I completely understand why he couldn’t, but it would have made me feel a little bigger in the grand scheme of the world if someone I love like a father figure could have seen me finally succeed at something.
“You know that’s so far from the truth. And … it might be good for you to be back here now. Closing one chapter before moving on to the next in your life. The death of a person is never a good thing. But this one? Well, it might just take some of that weight off your shoulders.”
