Shit.
She’d have to swing by the mini-mart on their way to the drop-off location. Directions were also on the counter, written in perfect writing, sitting right next to the binder, with a sticky note stuck to the paper.
I owe you . . .
Bear
Harley’s eyes filled with tears and her nose tingled with emotion. It was the first sign that Teagan still remembered the good moments together, and for now it was enough.
“Are you sad?” Poppy asked.
She turned to find the girls in the doorway and a laugh escaped. “No, I’m happy.”
Lily was looking like a Gap ad in white capris, white sandals, and a white cardigan with a pinkKIDDIE COVE PRE-K shirt. Poppy looked like she’d fallen out of a 1980s music video—her hair was still matted in the back, and she was sporting a pair of battered red high tops with dog-sized bite marks in the toe, purple dinosaur–printed pajama bottoms, matching tutu and cape, with a unicorn headband and—of course—the school appropriate T-shirt.
They were proud of their fashion choices. And wasn’t that what mattered?
“Dressed, fed, and ten minutes to spare,” Harley called into the inner depths of the house, hoping Teagan heard wherever she was hiding. “You can come out now—we’re leaving.”
She had the girls out the door, into the back of Nonna Rose’s Ford Fairlane, and strapped in their car seats before Teagan had a chance to emerge and steal kids’ dreams everywhere by explaining that fruit snacks weren’t real fruit.
Nonetheless, Teagan appeared out of nowhere.
“Did you pack the sun lotion?” she called from the porch. “They have a field trip to the tidepools today and the weather calls for full sun.”
“Lotioned up and ready to roll,” Harley shouted.
“Ready to roll, Mommy,” Poppy repeated. “With the ragtop down so our hair can blow?”
Harley pulled out of the driveway and Lily, eyes big and smile even bigger, raised her hands in the air as if she were on a roller coaster.
“The speed limit is twenty-five, texting and driving is illegal in California, and remember, no sugar before noon.”
Harley just waved. With her middle finger.
Chapter 8
There are so many other things I should be
doing with my life right now but instead, I am stuck
here crushing on you.
—Unknown
Teagan sat at the kitchen table, sipping her morning coffee, watching the sunrise, and thinking back on how the past week had gone. Pacific Cove had cornered the market on breathtaking mornings. The sky was painted in the colors of late spring, pinks and yellows casting a warm glow over the Pacific. Waves crashed against the rocky shore, sandhill cranes glided gracefully overhead, and in the distance a raft of otters bobbed up and down with the incoming tide.
Teagan breathed in the sweet, caffeinated silence. Harley was gone, the girls were upstairs watching a cartoon on Teagan’s tablet, and she had an entire twenty minutes to herself. The time between sunrise and breakfast was coveted.
It was just her, the rising sun, and the dog fast asleep at her feet. Harley had done Teagan a solid, making the girls their lunch for school. The brown bags sat on the counter, each one with the girl’s name in superhero font, with a sketch of the respective Wonder Twin. Harley had always been so artistic, the creative sister. It was a talent and passion she’d shared with Zia Iris.
There was even a bag for Teagan. It readTEEand the T was a Red Rider BB gun. She rolled her eyes but could not stop herself from laughing.
Teagan decided that maybe having Harley around wouldn’t be so bad. The girls loved her, Teagan had the time she needed to bake and catch up on some much-needed sleep. More importantly, she had the space to come to terms with the past year and organize her emotions.
She pulled the button top off her brioche bun and leaned down to give Garbage Disposal a nice treat. He loved her breakfast brioche. Well, he loved everything, but her brioche ranked somewhere between a T-bone and flip-flops.
“What the hell?”
