Page 113 of Fall is Brewing

Scrumpy, meanwhile, trots down Main St. with an apple clenched proudly in her mouth.

Brooks watches her, then groans. “Maybe Jace was right.”

I glance at him. “About what?”

“They are unionizing.”

I laugh so hard I have to lean into him.

Scrumpy crosses the grass, steals another apple from a basket near the Hartley booth, then darts toward Calder's display as if boundaries are a concept she has chosen not to recognize.

“She finally chose sides,” I say, wiping tears from my cheeks.

Brooks's hand tightens around mine.

“No,” he says, watching her babies tumble after her between our booths, stealing apples out of both our baskets. “They’ve clearly decided we’re both too damn good to choose between.”

Scrumpy disappears into the edge of the town square, her babies stumbling after her in a crooked little line.

Standing beside Brooks, his hand warm in mine, I realize maybe that had been the answer all along.

Some things were never meant to grow on just one side of the fence.

Epilogue

18 MONTHS LATER…

Willa

"We're going to be late."

"We're not."

I glance at my watch. "We're absolutely going to be late."

Brooks keeps one hand on the steering wheel and the other drumming absently against the gearshift as his truck bounces over the gravel drive toward Cartley Coffee. Outside the windshield, Orchard Falls glows beneath thousands of tiny white lights strung between apple trees and storefronts. Our first ever Barnstormer's Ball is just about to begin in the festival area we built just beyond the hill. Big-band music drifts across the evening air every time Brooks rolls through another open stretch of road. On the road ahead of us, the Rolls Royce from the transportation museum takes a couple for a little ride around the property.

"I can't believe Dad texted you five minutes before we're supposed to leave," I mutter, smoothing the skirt of my swing dress for what has to be the twentieth time. "What kind of emergency could the coffee roaster possibly have that can’t wait until tomorrow?"

"He just said it wasn't heating. If it doesn’t roast the beans, we’ll have nothing to sell tomorrow.”

"Which is impossible because you literally serviced it yesterday."

"I know."

"So why are we driving over there?"

He glances sideways, a hint of a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. "Because your father texted."

I sigh dramatically. "I knew making him manager of Cartley Coffee was a mistake,” I tease.

Brooks chuckles because we both know it wasn’t a mistake. My dad was made to run a coffee shop. He hated working in the orchard, but damn, that man was meant to be out talking with customers over the latest roast.

"I think he mostly enjoys reminding me I’m still technically his landlord. Forcing me to get out there at all hours.”

"He's impossible,” I groan.

"So I've noticed."