Page 44 of Something Old

“No,” Grant rushed to reassure her. “This isn’t one more lame apology attempt. I got the idea, was working on it, making it for you, weeks before all that mess.”

Madeline frowned, and Grant wanted to kick himself.

She rested a hand on the cat house climbing contraption that looked exactly like The Second Chance Shop—right down to the paint colors and hanging baskets of flowers on the verandah and the cherry red benches. “You shouldn’t have . . . it must’ve been so much work. But I love it. Totally. In every way.” Her eyes shone a little again.

A moment of silence hung between them. Then Grant made a risky comment. “See . . . maybe I do know you, after all. A little bit, at least.”

Nope, it was the wrong thing to say. The sadness was back like a weight. Her shoulders slumped under it, and she shrugged noncommittally.

It was absolutely the wrong moment to tell Madeline about Holly’s upcoming visit, but since it looked like a good moment was becoming more and more a thing of fantasy, and because he didn’t want Madeline to hear it from somebody else in the Greenridge rumor mill, he blundered ahead.

“Tonight was supposed to be a drop-the-present-and-dash kind of thing. I thought you’d be long gone, but since you’re not . . .” He trailed off.

“Since I’m not . . . ” Madeline repeated, prompting him.

“There’s something you should know. I mean, you probably won’t care, but . . . ”

“C’mon, spit it out,” Madeline said, with traces of her old teasing impatience.

“Holly’s coming back to Greenridge,” he blurted. “She wants to see me.”

Madeline’s head tilted, and she stared at him with such an openly quizzical expression that he wondered for a second if she hadn’t heard him or something.

Then, very quietly, she asked, “When did you find out? When did she call?”

Grant tried to think how best to frame it, but Madeline didn’t give him a chance to find the right words.

“Was it right around the time you barged in on me here and were such a jerk?”

He nodded miserably. “Before then, even. I know it’s not a good excuse, but it was—still is—messing with my head.”

“You’re right. It’s not a good excuse. Who isn’t messed up about something? It doesn’t give you a free pass to act like an ass.”

Like every human in the world, Grant’s first impulse was to defend himself—but with what? She was right. He had been acting like he should have a free pass because of his unhappiness—and not just with her, but with other people in his life too.

He swallowed hard. “You’re right.”

The silence stretched between them. Finally, Grant cleared his throat. “So . . . where are we? Are things better or worse now that you know about Holly and why I kind of . . . derailed and dumped on you?”

“Better or worse?” Madeline sounded genuinely baffled. “Neither. I suspected something had gone on that had nothing to do with me.”

“But it has everything to do with you. I want to roll back the clock. For us to be friends like we were.”

Madeline bit her lip, her eyes sad. Then she sighed. “We both live our lives like that, Grant—wanting to roll back the clock. But there’s no going back. There are only the present moment and the future, which none of us can predict.”

“But where does that leave us? Are we friends like before?” He was sure he already knew the answer, though—and he was right.

“No, we’re not friends like we were before, and we never will be.”

His breath hitched painfully. Then Madeline surprised him.

“But we’re the friends we are now, and who knows what the future holds? I know that’s not the answer you were hoping for, but it’s the best I can offer.”

Grant inhaled like a drowning man breaking the surface of the water and getting a gulp of air—not on firm ground yet, but at least with a fighting chance. “I’ll take it.”

“And now, dude, I’ve got to say—” She shrugged and tried to twinkle at him in her old way, but he could tell it was a lot of effort. “It’s very late. I’m locking up.”

The echo of the comment from that disastrous night when he’d overheard Madeline talking to herself felt like forgiveness to Grant. He wanted to ask her out for a late-night coffee or snack but thought better of the idea. He’d accomplished more than he’d dreamed possible already tonight. Things were not as they had been between him and Madeline, but they were better . . . and maybe with time, they could be better still.