Page 28 of The Scent of Happiness

“I see you still have it,” Emma said.

“My journal? It’s the only thing I’d save if my house was on fire.”

“I’m glad Theo didn’t talk you out of it.”

“He tried. I told him I’d make him copies of the relevant pages. But I’m going to have to copy the whole thing, because what’s relevant? My suppliers? My process? I just hope he can decipher it.” Her journal was a map of her thoughts in the moment, which meant it was the kind of mess she’d never let Emma see. She always meant to go back and organize it using a coherent system, but she’d start inventing new recipes and it would slip her mind.

“He’s going to have to decipher it,” Emma said. “How else can he give you good legal advice?”

“True. I explained the basics of soapmaking to him, and he seemed to get it.”

Brooke replayed their conversation in her mind as she poured the new soap into its mold and scraped out her mixing container. She loved to talk about soap and would go on and on to anyone who would listen. But even when they’d turned to other topics, she found it easy to open up to Theo. He seemed genuinely interested in her life and their conversation flowed naturally. At first, anyway.

Brooke banged the mold on the countertop to get the air bubbles out of the soap. “We talked about other things too. We bounced around from this to that.”

“Like you do.”

“Like I do. And Theo…well, he’s not the same person I knew back in the day.”

“So you’ve said. He’s had a bit of a glow-up.”

“Ugh, I hate that term. It’s not about his looks. He’s just…different. Better, I guess.”

“So you showed him your recipes and then what?”

“Then we talked. Then it got weird. Then he left.”

Emma gasped. “Weird how? Are you okay?”

“Not like that.” Brooke waved her gloved hands. Bad choice of words. Very bad choice of words when Emma was in the room. “We were talking. It was easy. Kind of fun. And then he did that thing that men do…you know, where they say something, but their body language is the exact opposite? And they’re shocked when you figure it out.”

“Oh, that.”

“Yeah,” Brooke said. “That.”

Emma stacked up a few bars of Arctic Sapphire and lined up her photo. “What were you talking about when it got weird?”

“High school, mostly. It’s the one thing we have in common.”

That made Emma turn from the camera. “Oh no. Nobody wants to relive high school.”

“Why?”

“Are you serious?”

“I liked high school.” Brooke hadn’t liked the classes or tests, because she was so bad at them, but she liked seeing her friends every day. She liked belonging to things.

“Only the popular kids say that.” Emma went back to her camera.

“They do?” Brooke leaned her hips on the counter. “What does popular even mean?”

“Brooke, you were the prom queen.”

“So? I put in the most hours on the dance committee. That’s literally the only reason. Everything at school was like that. My friends and I didn’t expect things to just happen. We made them happen.” She remembered staying up until past midnight decorating for homecoming, and stuffing freshman welcome folders all weekend, and begging the new teachers to be their advisor for student council because none of the old teachers would do it. It wasn’t glamorous. It was grunt work.

“Which means everyone knew who you were,” Emma said.

“My school wasn’t that big.”