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“That’s no excuse. It was only a couple of inches. And you made it in fine.”
Adele frowned at Frankie. “All right, what’s really bugging you?”
Frankie ignored the question. “Do you think Elinor and Mitch are a match?”
Adele blinked in surprise. “Elinor and Mitch? Does Mitch know?”
“Funny, Mom.”
“What happened yesterday?”
“Elinor latched on to him like a little Christmas leech and wouldn’t let go. That’s what happened.”
“You were wanting Mitch to find someone,” pointed out Adele. “You should be all puffed up like a toad over this.”
If one more person told her what she’d wanted for Mitch, Frankie’s head was going to blow off. “I wanted William to find Elinor, not Mitch.”
“I guess she didn’t get the memo.”
Frankie ignored the crack. “Everything I did for her—helping her with a makeover, campaigning for her for Mrs. Claus. Now she thinks sheisMrs. Claus. She thinks she’s me!” Frankie fumed.
“So, you’ve spent all this time helping Elinor come out of her shell and look her best, and now that she’s out, you’re dissatisfied with her and want to put her back. Good luck with that. Looks like you’ve created a monster, Frankiestein.”
That she had. “It’s not that I don’t want her to be happy.”
“You just don’t want her to be happy with Mitch,” Adele suggested.
“She’s living my life!”
“No, she’s living hers. Maybe not the way you want her to, but we don’t get to decide how other people live their lives. The only life you have any control at all over is your own.”
“I don’t like the way my own is going,” Frankie grumbled.
“Then what are you going to do?”
Good question.
Adele put an arm around Frankie’s shoulders. “I had a dream last night.”
Frankie rolled her eyes. “Oh no. Here we go.”
“This is serious. It was about you.”
“Me? What did you dream?”
“You were at some kind of fair, standing next to a merry-go-round. It was slowing down, and people were calling to you to get on, but you wouldn’t. In fact, you were backing away. They gave up, and it started going faster. Everyone was laughing and having fun. You finally tried to get on, but it was going too fast and it bucked you off and sent you flying.”
“Yikes. What kind of dream is that?” Frankie protested.
“You tell me,” said Adele.
The bell over the door jingled, and in rushed Elinor, her cheeks rosy from the cold. She was smiling, wearing the lipstick Frankie had bought for her. Frankie had felt like a fairy godmother when she’d helped Elinor with her makeup. This morning she felt more like Maleficent.
“I’m sorry I’m late,” Elinor said breathlessly. “I had two cars almost skid into me.”
“See? Told you,” Adele said to Frankie.
“It’s all right,” Frankie said, determined not to sound like Scrooge. “We probably won’t get a lot of customers in today after how busy we were yesterday.”
