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The outside deck had grown into the social hub of McCall, and she’d had to hire more waitstaff to handle the buzz of constant activity, even through the winter months. And of course, Family Dinner for the locals still happened every Sunday afternoon. The diner closed after the brunch rush, and all the locals came out of the woodwork right on time and streamed through the glass doors, carrying homemade side dishes to go with Sara’s roast. When she’d had to pause it during the pandemic, the locals who could manage it showed up anyway, always with food and Tupperware, and helped deliver hot meals to some of the more vulnerable residents who couldn’t leave their houses.
“Thanks, Mara.” Sara smiled warmly as Mara handed her a cup of coffee the second she got to the counter. “I got a message to meet Mary here this morning. Has she gotten here yet?”
Mara nodded toward the back of the diner where Mary was sitting on one of the couches. Bright summer light streamed through the window behind her, and she was already halfway through an enormous lemon poppy seed muffin. Sara smiled as she walked over, plunking her bag down beside the couch and sinking back into it with a sigh.
“This was such a good idea, Mary.” She signaled one of the servers to come over as she shrugged off her jacket.
Mary finished a bite of the gooey lemon pudding center and leaned over to give Sara a quick hug. “Your lemon muffins are always a good idea. But what did you want to talk about?”
The server arrived just then, and both gave her their orders before they turned back to each other.
“Wait…what do you mean?” Sara said, stirring sugar into her coffee with a look of confusion. “Sam said you wanted to meet me at the diner at noon, so here I am.”
“Well, that’s ridiculous, because Sam called me at the break of bloody dawn to tell me you needed me to meet you here at noon. She said it was super important but wouldn’t tell me what it was. I’ve been worried sick. It almost put me off my muffin, and that’s saying something.”
They stared at each other for a moment, equally confused.
“This just makes no sense at all,” Sara said, pulling her phone from her pocket. “I always love to see you, but I feel like I must be missing something here.”
“Well, give her a call, because if there’s no emergency, I’m going to enjoy my pancakes and hashbrowns in a leisurely manner as God intended.”
Sara dialed Sam’s number and clicked it over to speakerphone when she answered. “Sam, I’m here with Mary, and—”
“Babe,” Sam interrupted, the smile in her voice as audible as the words. “Just turn around.”
Sara and Mary both turned and looked out the diner window where Sara’s sister Jennifer wa
s standing. Sam and her husband Brian Murphy were a few steps behind her, and she was holding a baby in her arms.
They laughed when Sara and Mary gasped and covered their mouths in shock at the exact same instant. Murphy motioned for them to stay where they were when he saw them jump up, and it was just a few seconds before all three of them came through the door of the diner and headed for the couch where Mary and Sara were still mostly speechless with shock.
“Oh my God,” Sara whispered as she carefully touched the cheek of the tiny baby swaddled in the enormously blue blanket she’d bought for Jennifer weeks ago. “What the hell happened? I didn’t even know you were in labor!”
“Well, that’s the thing,” Jennifer said, slowly transferring the baby from her arms to her sister’s. “I didn’t know either until about twenty minutes before the birth at midnight last night.”
“What?” Mary leaned in and stroked the baby’s downy head with the softest touch. “You’ve got to be kidding me. It’s your first baby.”
“I know, right? I had a backache most of the afternoon but no active cramps. I just thought I’d overdone it painting the nursery.” She smiled at her sleeping baby in her sister’s arms. “I even took a warm bath, which didn’t help, and tried to sleep. When I finally realized I was actually in labor, I knew it was too late to get to the hospital because she was already crowning.”
“I was losing my mind.” Murphy shook his head and raked a hand through his hair. “I didn’t know what the hell to do except call an ambulance and try to catch her like a football.”
“A girl?” Sara looked up at Jennifer in shock.
“Her?” Mary’s voice caught as Sara handed her niece over for her to hold. “I thought you guys were having a boy.”
“Yeah, that’s what the doctor told us, but evidently, sometimes those ultrasounds can be tricky to read when they’re turned the wrong way,” Jennifer said. “And she’s a couple of weeks early, but after they’d checked us out at the hospital and told us everything looked great, we got to take her home.”
“I can’t believe you didn’t call me!” Sara examined the baby’s tiny fingers and looked indignantly up at Jennifer.
“There literally wasn’t time.” Murphy pulled Jennifer closer and kissed her cheek. “Thank God, the ambulance got there in a flash, and about fifteen minutes after that, we were parents.”
“Well, it makes sense. I don’t know if you remember, but our mom said all her labors with us took under five hours each, including the first.”
“What’s her name?” Mary said, obviously too entranced with the baby to even look up as she wrapped her tiny fist around Mary’s finger.
“Well, Murphy is our last name, of course,” Jennifer said, glancing back at her husband. “And her middle name is Elizabeth, after her late grandmother on Brian’s side.”
Mary and Sara finally looked up from the baby, waiting for her to go on as Jennifer looked at Brian.
