It startles me, the sudden flush I feel race into my cheeks, down my neck, across my chest; an animal waking up in my stomach.No,I tell myself.Like an allergic reaction.
“Okay, well,” I say. I shove one of the tote bags I brought against his chest, and, for a split second, his hand covers mine. It bounces the heat that’s spread to my fingers right back up my arm to my face again and I wriggle my hand out, wave him off. “Chop, chop.”
Everett’s smirk seems almost amiable.
I head in the opposite direction after he’s disappeared into the crowd. This market is smaller than the one we usually go to, but it has some of the same vendors, people I recognize from over the years. There’s something calming about the clamor ofit all: parents pushing strollers and dogs leaning against legs, a college-aged couple inspecting summer zucchini next to someone picking up local honey next to someone mulling over a pair of handmade earrings.
Hank used to bring me to markets like this growing up. On Saturdays, we’d go to the pier so he could place his seafood order for the week, early enough that I sometimes wondered if I was still dreaming. Then we’d grab breakfast—always at a different spot, always somewhere Hank somehow knew everyone. We’d eat greasy diner breakfasts at counters before the place opened, grab pastries at the back doors of bakeries, wander long enough for the farmers markets to start.
And it was always the best part of the weekend. The whole ritual of it. When I was little, and still just visiting in the summers, Hank holding me up high so I could see the bright spreads of produce. When I was older, Hank teaching me how to pick out the best cuts of meat, how to spot a good sourdough from a mile away. By the time I was old enough to help out in his kitchen I was splitting lists with him, right down the middle, a tradition I’ve only ever shared with one other person.
The thought startles me as I’m picking up a carton of crimson strawberries, my grip almost slipping as it makes contact. “Sutton!” A hand wraps around my arm, startling me enough to firmly dislodge Everett’s face from my mind.
Laurel is turning me away from the table, something pointed in her tone. “You’ll never guess who I ran into,” she says, grinning at me toothily as she flicks her eyes toward the man next to her.
My eyes land on his shoes first, mostly because I’m trying to keep my balance after Laurel spun me around so suddenly, but it means that I do one long sweep up him, like I am full-on, audaciously ogling him. In fairness, it’s not a bad sweep. At thetop of brown chinos and a cream well-tailored button-down is a set of broad shoulders, a well-kempt mustache, thick dark hair just graying at the temples. He’s holding a bag of lemons in one hand, the other casually in his pocket. And he smiles at me.
“Cooper, this is Sutton,” Laurel says, piloting me into a handshake with the guy holding the lemons. “Sutton, this is Cooper. Achef.”
“I’m guessing you’re a chef too, if she’s saying it like that,” Cooper says, pulling one large hand out of his pocket and holding it out for me to shake. I take it, feeling like something of a damsel in distress about to be tossed over this burly man’s shoulder, in a good way.
“Something like that,” I say. The words taste sour in my mouth as soon as I say them. It’s one of Everett’s catchphrases, and I realize now I don’t know when it made its way into my vernacular.
“She’s writing a cookbook,” Laurel says. She plucks a strawberry from the tasting tray and bites into it. “She’s brilliant. Cooper here—” she discards the strawberry stem “—lives just down the beach from us.”
“Oh?” I say. “How do you two know each other?”
“I’ve done some private events for Laurel before,” Cooper says. “She’s one of my favorite clients.”
“Please, Cooper, we both know we’re excellent friends,” Laurel says. “We’re in the same support group now. Cooper is recently divorced.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” I say, as Laurel mouthssingle dadover his shoulder and shoots me an enormous thumbs-up, a grin splitting her face in two.
“Thanks,” Cooper says as Laurel dances to the next row of samples behind him, leaving us relatively alone. “It’s okay. Youknow, I’d love to pick your brain about what it’s like writing a cookbook sometime, if you’re free.”
I fight the cringe I feel at the wordspick your brain, a deep-seated pet peeve I have that Gabe used to tease me about (Can I pick your brain about the history lecture I missed this morning, Sutton? Any time for me to pick your brain about what to get Zoey for Valentine’s Day?)and smile at Cooper. “Of course,” I say. “I’d love to chat.”
“Great,” Cooper says. He pulls out his phone. “There’s a great lunch spot a few miles down the coast that does the best fish taco around. You can’t miss it while you’re here.”
“Sounds amazing,” I say.
“Well, let me grab your number,” he says, and passes his phone to me just as I feel an invisible presence behind me.
“Your tomatoes,” Everett says flatly. Almost involuntarily I let out an excited little “Oh” and pause in putting my number into Cooper’s phone to turn and inspect the two heavy boxes of Sungolds Everett is carrying before I remember exactlywhois holding them.
“Cooper, this is Everett,” I say, turning quickly away from the tomatoes and jabbing a thumb over my shoulder.
“Have we met before?” Cooper asks Everett. “You look familiar.”
“Maybe through Laurel?” Everett suggests, which sets my stomach to simmering.She texted you first, I remind myself as envy settles in. I was the first person to know something was wrong. Even with the distance that’s grown between us over the last five years. Even if she and Everett see each other more than I see her, Laurel and I are still best friends.
“I don’t think so,” Cooper says. When I look up at him, it’s clear he’s digging for the answer, rubbing a thumb over his chinbefore it inevitably comes to him, face lighting up. “I know,” he says. “You directed that movie that everyone was so into a couple years back—what was it?”
“Cooney,” I say flatly, before Everett can answer.
“That’s it,” Cooper says, grinning at me before looking back at Everett over my head. “My daughter wouldn’t stop talking about it. She’s twelve, but already knows she wants to go to film school. Where did you study?”
“Devon College,” Everett answers, sparking a hundred memories from one single night in my head, and I am suddenly so incredibly done with standing in the middle of this conversation.
