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Amanda poured her grandfather a mug of coffee. “Do you think you’ll be able to come?” she asked him, teasing.
“I hope I can squeeze it in,” Grandpa Wes said. “I have a busy schedule, you know.”
“Don’t I know it.”
Audrey appeared after that, Max on her hip. Now almost two and a half, Max was eager to speak and frequently babbled, making up little stories that nobody really understood.
“We went to the car college,” he told Amanda simply as Audrey put him in his highchair.
“The car college, huh?” Amanda sliced strawberries, kiwis, and bananas for the four of them, filling a bowl.
“Yes. Max loves talking about the car college. If only I knew what that was!” Audrey laughed.
“That’s where we see the cars,” Max said simply.
Audrey hunted through a toy box in the corner to find one of Max’s favorite toys, a green car that he now rolled along his highchair table as he made “pew, pew, pew” sounds.
“How was yoga?” Audrey asked.
“It was great. You should really come with me sometime,” Amanda said.
“Yes. If I ever have a lobotomy and lose my sense of self completely, I will come to yoga with you,” Audrey said.
Grandpa Wes sat at the breakfast table with his newspaper and a big bowl of fruit and yogurt, reading the news as, beside him, his phone exploded with text messages. Although Amanda told herself not to look, she did spot Beatrice’s name before she fully forced her eyes away.
“Someone really wants to reach out to you today,” Audrey teased as she fed Max, who was already covered in yogurt.
“What? Oh.” Grandpa Wes lit up as he raised his phone to read the texts. He then laughed to himself, as though Beatrice had told him the most delicious joke.
“You’re so cheesy, Grandpa,” Audrey said.
“We’re all cheesy,” Amanda reminded her. “We’re all hopelessly in love and pathetic about it. Right, Max?”
Max smacked his palm through a mound of yogurt so that it exploded across his bib. Audrey smiled and reached for a paper towel, never one to linger on the messiness of her son. She was the perfect toddler mother in that she hardly minded messes and was very quick to wave her sorrows away.
As Audrey cleaned up Max’s face, she turned to lock eyes with Amanda for a moment, and Amanda’s heart thudded with sudden sorrow. This was one of the final breakfasts with her favorite breakfast crew. This was the final week of her single life.
It struck her that time would continue to pass, that their grandfather would get older, and that his dementia would eventually rear its ugly head. Max would even, one day, probably run off to college and take on the world. Where would Amanda be at that point? Would she and Audrey always be this close? Or would time have its way with them, the way it did with everything and everyone else?
Amanda decided to walk to the Sheridan Law Office that morning. She packed her heels in her backpack and strode in tennis shoes, her sunglasses protecting her from the bright June light. As she entered downtown Oak Bluffs, islanders waved to her, congratulating her on her upcoming wedding.
Once at the law office, Amanda greeted their intern, Mallory, and entered her office, where she watered the plants and then got to work on her brand-new case, which involved a man who’d been accused of manslaughter. It was not an easy case to stomach, but Amanda knew that to be a defense attorney, she had to be strong. She couldn’t let the evils of the world get to her. The law was the law, a collection of rules and public obligations, one that gave her a sense of safety. It boggled her mind, sometimes, that people didn’t look at the law in the same way.
At lunch, Amanda sat outside the harbor with a sandwich, when Claire called with questions about the finalization of Amanda’s bouquet for Saturday.
“Hi, honey! I’m sorry to bother you so close to Saturday,” Claire said.
“Not a problem. What’s up?”
“I have a note here regarding the flowers you want on both your bouquet and the bridesmaid bouquets. But before I make anything, I have to tell you that I just got a specialty order of peonies in.”
Amanda leaned forward so quickly that she nearly dropped her sandwich. Every bride knew how beautiful it was to have peonies on her wedding day— and every bride on a budget knew how ridiculous it was to ask for that. Obviously, Amanda’s budget was much easier than others’, given that Kelli had offered up the hotel for free, Charlotte was planning the wedding for free, and Claire was doing the bouquets for free. But because Claire had been so kind about that, Amanda had chosen budget florals to ensure she didn’t break Claire’s bank.
“Are you sure?” Amanda coughed.
“Honey, of course! It’s your wedding day. And you know how much our family loves Sam.” Claire paused for a moment, then added, “I was thinking I could focus on peonies for your bouquet and then add just a few for the bachelorettes’.”
“That is beyond my wildest dreams,” Amanda said.
