AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Except maybe Nick, but I’m even on the fence about that one. Because…what would be the point?
We move on to other topics, touching briefly on my mother’s trip to the Caribbean with Vance and how Sarah’s parents are adjusting to their new life in Oregon, before saying goodbye and promising to catch up again soon. We do this every other month or so, both of us leaning into a friendship instead of cutting off all communication like most people do.
I mean, we care about each other. If life had turned out differently, we would have stayed together. So, maintaining our friendship, especially when we were friends first, before we started dating, felt like a natural choice. An easy choice. A simple one. A way to maintain a slice of normalcy even as we grieved the end of what we were.
chapter nine
Busy
It takes exactly two seconds for Junie to wobble off in the direction of where Marie’s son Leo is playing in the yard with a few other children of varying ages, and my heart swells and pinches at the same time. I love that my daughter seems comfortable running off to play with other kids, but it hurts a bit, too, knowing she can let go of my hand so easily, not even looking back.
“I wish Nina had been that easy to set up with other kids,” Marie says as we step back over to where her group of friends are sitting on cushioned outdoor furniture in a large circle. “Any time I tried to do a playdate, she wanted to drag me around, too. It was exhausting.”
The woman to my right—a redhead with a large smile—leans forward. “My Tessa couldn’t be left with anyone other than my parents until she was almost four. She’d literally scream so hard and for so long she’d pass out.”
I wince. “That sounds hard.”
“It was anightmare.Be thankful your girl can run off early.”
“It’s nice to see Junie like this,” I share, “but it wouldn’t hurt to see a little more ‘stranger danger’ in her, you know?” Shaking my head, I glance over to where she and Leo are tottering aroundafter a soccer ball. “I’m just always terrified she’s going to go missing one day because she’s so dang friendly.”
It’s a thought that plagues me more often than I’d like to admit. Sometimes I’ll find myself lying in bed, staring at the ceiling, listening for the soft sounds of her sleeping, as if she might have somehow gotten up and wandered out to the road, like she could hitchhike away from me.
She can’t even open a door yet.
Even so, I’ve heard from quite a few people that the fears infiltrating the minds of a mother are rarely rational.
“I’m Busy, by the way,” I say to the redhead.
Her eyes flash. “Oh, soyou’rePatty’s daughter who just moved home.”
I’m not sure I like the way she says it, as if she’s heard so much about me. I nod anyway.
“That’s me.”
“I’m Tilly. My daughter Tessa is the one who looks just like me,” she says with a laugh. When I glance over to where the kids are and spot the girl with wild red hair flying around her head, it’s easy to see what she means.
“Let’s do a round of introductions, actually,” Marie interjects, and the chatter around the circle slowly fades. “I’m Marie, I’m thirty-three, and I have two kids. Nina is four and Leo is two.”
With that first spiel out of the way, the rest of the women launch in behind her. Sophia and Marlow and Becka and…it’s honestly hard to keep them all straight and after a few people, they all begin to blend together. Some of them look familiar and I try to place how I know them, though don’t really have much success. I honestly feel slightly bad for how intense I was with Reid about how important it is to remember people’s names because ifIwere the one getting quizzed after today, IknowI’d fail.
When the intros finally get to me, I give my friendliest smile and try to greet everyone with my eyes. “I’m Busy. I’m twenty-two and my daughter, Junie, is almost two. We just moved back to Cedar Point at the beginning of June.”
The faces all appear friendly, and I get a lot of smiles and ‘welcome home’ comments. Maybe this doesn’t need to be as intimidating as it feels.
“So, Busy, you’re helping Briar open that bookstore, right?” Tilly asks, crossing her long, elegant legs and taking a sip from her champagne flute.
I nod. “Yeah. I’m her assistant. Painting, cleaning, lugging things around.” I shrug. “If she needs it, I’ll do it.”
“Bless you for being able to work with your sibling,” she says on a laugh. “I don’t think I’d ever be able to work for my sister. It would feel too much like I’m getting bossed around.”
“I’m sure working with family isn’t a good setup for everyone,” I reply, knowing plenty of people who fit that bill. “But Briar’s amazing, and it’s really fun getting to spend so much time with her.”
“Ignore Tilly. She just knowsshewould want to be the one to do the bossing,” says a beautiful brunette sitting next to Tilly who gives me a friendly smile. “I know all those introductions can run together, so I’m Sarah, by the way.”
I nod my head with a smile…that promptly freezes on my face, realization dawning.
Reid’s Sarah.
