Page 235 of Pumpkin Spice Promises

Beau stood several feet away beneath one of the maples lining the entrance to Marigold, arms folded over a faded Jones Automotive T-shirt. He had grease on one forearm, despite me making him promise not to go into the shop this morning, and the brim of his baseball cap sat backward because he’d spent the last hour helping Walter repair a hay wagon that had supposedly been repaired yesterday.

My fiancé was terrible at taking days off. He was also annoyingly handsome while failing at it.

“You think this is funny?” I asked.

“Extremely.”

The radio crackled again. “CARSON!”

I pressed the button. “What, Rosie?”

“The kettle corn trailer.”

“What about it?”

“It’s in the cider sightline.”

I closed my eyes. “What does that mean?”

“It means people standing in line for cider can’t adequately see the kettle corn.”

Beau covered his mouth.

I pointed at him. “Don’t.”

His shoulders shook despite my threatening glare.

I pressed the radio again. “Move it wherever your heart tells you, Rosie.”

“My heart has been saying six feet left for twenty minutes.”

“Then follow your heart.”

“Copy.” The line went dead. I unclipped the radio and considered throwing it into the nearest pumpkin display. Beau caught my wrist before I could.

“Those are expensive now.”

“The pumpkins or the radios?”

“Both.”

“I miss when Marigold was quiet.”

“No, you don’t.”

I looked around. “You’re right.” I really didn’t miss what it was like before the town forced their way back into Marigold.

The second annual return of the Willow Creek Harvest Festival had officially opened that morning, although “second annual return” was a phrase Darlene had invented and printed on approximately four hundred flyers before anyone could stop her.

Last year we’d rented nearly everything.

This year, permanent wooden signs marked the pumpkin patch, hayride route, vendor field, and parking pasture. Electrical hookups we’d installed during spring meant extension cords no longer crossed the grass like a fire marshal’s nightmare. We’d expanded parking twice, added another hay wagon, built two permanent vendor shelters near the barn, and learned the deeply valuable lesson that adults became surprisingly vicious when apple cider donuts sold out.

Sugar and Pine had arrived with three times last year’s inventory. But Clover still sold out of pumpkin cream cheese muffins before eleven.

Iris had upgraded from one rolling cart of fall romances to an entire tent decorated with fake ravens, string lights and a handwritten sign that read:

FICTIONAL MEN. REALISTIC EXPECTATIONS ARE YOUR PROBLEM.