Poppy’s handwriting is on the back, not Kiara’s. Just a simplefor J xx
I finish off the bottle and finally brave the walk to the houseboat.
The first tendrils of the new day reach across the horizon. The air, damp and slightly chilled, smells fresh, which, in my inebriated state, turns my stomach. My body aches so badly, I can hardly putone foot in front of the other, but that’s how I want it. I’ll fall asleep, and when I wake up, I’ll smell rosemary and mint lingering on the pillows, and for half a second I won’t remember that Poppy is gone.
I can hope, anyway.
“Poppy?” I call as I climb below-deck, feeling like a fool. “Gator, buddy?”
There’s no answer. I walk through the houseboat, checking every corner, even though it’s obvious I’m alone. The evidence she ever lived here at all has been erased, minus a few straggling details: a hair pin on the countertop, a singular pink sock on the bed. It’s as if she and Gator never existed. Without her, the space feels colorless. I’ll have to find somewhere else to stay until the restaurant’s sale goes through.
Maybe things would have gone differently if I’d managed to tell her the truth—that I have been thinking of staying. Of keeping Fable. Slowly, in the back of my mind, ever since Poppy started to make it something magical.
Why couldn’t I trust myself to say that? To consider the life she wanted to offer me, even if it meant acknowledging how badly I messed up my past? I love—
I don’t know, and I’m too tired to dwell on it.
Chapter 48
Peanut Butter
Poppy
“Poppy,” Julia says gently. “Can we come in?”
I turn over in bed, looking at her and Caroline, standing in the doorway to my bedroom. Julia has a mug in hand. The smell of coffee wafts over. I wrinkle my nose.
I texted Julia the moment I hunkered down in the houseboat, begging her to rescue me. She and Caroline wrapped me up in an embrace so all-encompassing, I swear I can still feel it, and packed my things while I coaxed Gator into a cat carrier. Mom arranged for a car to the airport before there was the slightest risk of running into Jack again.
They sit on the edge of the bed, Caroline on one side of me, Julia on the other. Julia holds out the mug. “Here.”
I hadn’t expected to see Jack when Dad arrived at the airport after us, but it stung all the same.
And then, the entire flight, I fought to keep myself from crying.
I wasn’t that successful. I think I traumatized the old gentleman next to me. I’m also fairly certain he complained about me, but we were both in first class, so it wasn’t like there was abettersection he could move to instead. Laughter bubbles in my throat at the memory of his paunchy face. I gnaw on the inside of my cheek to stop it. I laughed once, on the ride home from the airport, and that was a terrible mistake that quickly led to tears.
It’s been a few days now—three, four, I don’t know—and I never realized heartbreak could hurt this much. Julia keeps coming in, sometimes with Caroline, sometimes alone, to tempt me to eat, or watch a funny video, or hear another piece of the story, unspooling slowly, about my time with Jack. Mom has, too; she listened to me ramble until it dissolved into sobs, holding me all the while.
I haven’t seen Dad yet.
Julia strokes my hair as I take a tentative sip of coffee. It doesn’t taste like anything. Nothing has tasted even remotely good to me, not even Caroline’s pain au chocolat. Scrambled eggs? Jack’s were the best. Mangoes? Not in my smoothies anymore. Even something as simple as parsley made me tear up the other day, thinking about how precise he is when he tweezes herbs on top of a dish. He’s an artist with an edible canvas. An alchemist.
“I’m so sorry,” Julia says. “I know how much it hurts.”
My mind keeps running over my last conversation with Jack, trying to imagine a different ending for it. If someone asked me before things ended if it would be easier to walk away, to be the one leaving instead of being left, I would have said yes without hesitation. Now that it actually happened, I’m not sure.
All I know is that he’s a thousand miles away now, and everything hurts.
I shouldn’t have pushed and pushed until he cracked.
“I love him,” I confess eventually. I’m sure it’s obvious, but I haven’t said it aloud. “I should’ve told him that.”
“Oh, Poppy.” Caroline takes the mug out of my hands, and Julia wraps me up in a tight hug. “It won’t feel this bad forever.”
“Doubtful.”
“Trust me on this one.” After a long moment, Julia adds, “Look, Dad wants to talk to you.”
