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“Fuck,” Fallon suddenly blasts. “I’m an asshole. You don’t owe me or anyone an explanation.”
Even if I don’t, maybe talking about it, getting it out is exactly what I need.
My hands palm my belly. “It’s okay. I don’t expect you to understand. I don’t even understand it myself.” I pick the words out, pick them apart, still not used to talking about it. Admitting it.
“We were together for a while before it started. And when it did—it was survival. It was like living with a ticking bomb. I focused on work so I wouldn’t have to talk about what was happening at home. To my body. I didn’t call because I was embarrassed.” I wipe my face before the tears start. “I didn’t know how to leave. But I knew how to stay. It’s like when it’s late at night and you’re staring at that static on the TV, but you can’t make yourself get up to turn it off.”
I cast my eyes down, then back up at Fallon. “But you’re right. You would have helped me. And I’m so—”
“No,” Fallon growls, cutting me off. “If you apologize, Dakota, I will poison your next batch of cinnamon rolls. He did this. Not you.”
A tear rolls down my cheek and I wipe my eyes.
“You don’t deserve assholes who hurt you. You deserve cupcakes and rainbows and tight-jean wearing Marines.” She inhales a shuddery breath and squeezes my hand. “Leaving is powerful. And you are powerful. You had a path, and you made it happen, Dakota. Fuck, I can’t even tell Dad I don’t want The Corner Store.”
I smile through my tears. “We’ll tell him together.”
Maybe our father was right. The Corner Store turned out to be the best kind of therapy.
I blow out a breath, feeling surprisingly purged, and reach for the tray of cinnamon rolls. “I think I need another cinnamon roll. And I’m going to shove it into my mouth like a lady.”
Fallon smirks and grabs a fork. “Fight you for it.”
I laugh and the two of us devour the mound of sugary mush.
Food is love. Food is friendship and healing and memory. In every bite, I remember my little sister and that summer our mother left. We still have so much more to say, but we have time.
The muscled body pushing through the saloon door makes Fallon jump. She drops her fork with a clatter.
“Jesus!” She turns her fierce scowl on Davis, who stands in the doorway, his cheeks red from the wind. “Lurk, much?”
“Everything okay?” Davis asks, studying me with his intense stare.
I hold up my fork. “Everything’s great.”
Fallon slips off her stool. “Gotta go.”
“Why are you limping?” Davis’s big body pivots to watch her as she passes him. His eyes narrow. “What’s wrong with your leg?”
“It’s an injury callednone of your business.” Fallon pauses at the sink and dips to grab her duffel bag off the floor. The edge of something powder-blue and lacy peeks over the top of it. “I have practice. Close up, Dakota?”
Davis’s hand lands on my shoulder.
“You got it,” I tell her, a sweet happiness spreading through my stomach.
At the door, she glances over her shoulder. Gives a cavalier shrug. “I can’t take Dad to chemo tomorrow. So, if you want…”
“Yeah,” I say, smiling. “I want.”
Abowl, a bag of flour. I stand at the kitchen lodge counter, searching my body for the thrill that comes from the chase—the knowledge that my hands will soon create something beautiful.
Pastry chef. I am a pastry chef in the deepest part of my heart.
It’s easy to find. It’s in my heart. The flex of my fingers. The breath long held that finally comes in an exhale.
Fallon’s words from last week have woven through me like a siren song. I dream about them. I wake up to them.
Now, it’s time to test them.
