Peter and Valerie were sitting on the counter waiting for her. “Thank God. You’re back,” Valerie said, jumping down.
“I’m so sorry,” Gianna apologized. “It was just such a crazy night, and I had customers to deal with and—”
“Is it yes or no, Gianna?” Peter cut right to the point.
Although he didn’t get down on one knee again, he pulled the box back out of his pocket and snapped it open, holding the diamond up in front of her.
Gianna took a deep breath, considered her answer one more time, and then reached out and closed the box. “No,” she said.
“What?” Peter and Valerie both gasped simultaneously.
Gianna looked at Valerie. “Will you give us a minute?”
“No.” Valerie stuck her hands on her hips. “I want to hear this too.”
“I just want a couple of minutes with Peter. Alone.”
Valerie sighed deeply and then said, “Fine. But for the record, I think you’re making a big mistake here.”
Peter obviously did too. Once Valerie left he shook his head.
“I don’t understand. Everything with us was so great, Gianna.”
“I know,” she said, apologetically. How could she explain to him that although he was perfect on paper, she wasn’t sure he was her soul mate? That although she loved him, she didn’t feel a crazy spark toward him? “I’m not the one for you,” she told him.
“I’m pretty sure you are,” he objected.
“No. I’m not, Pete.” She took his hands in hers. “You should be with someone who doesn’t hesitate for a second when you ask her to marry you. I hesitated.”
“I can give you more time, if that’s what you need.”
“I’ve taken enough of your time. I know this is the right thing, as much as it hurts.” She had to honor her gut. She couldn’t hang onto Peter out of fear that she wouldn’t meet her Mr. Right. That wasn’t fair to either of them.
“This is what you really want?”
“Yes,” Gianna said.
Peter gripped her hands tighter. “There’s nothing else I can say or do to get you to change your mind?”
“No,” Gianna said, wishing that there was. That somehow Peter could say or do something to magically create the spark Gianna felt they were missing.
Peter closed his eyes for a split second, bowed his head, and muttered something like, “I don’t believe this.”
Gianna didn’t either. She never thought she’d turn down a wonderful man’s proposal at the age of thirty-seven in the hopes of meeting someone better for her. And yet, here she was.
Peter drew in a deep breath. Then in true gentleman form he leaned down and kissed her on the cheek. Keeping her close he whispered, “I hope you find whatever it is you’re looking for.”
His words were so kind that Gianna was momentarily tempted to take back everything she’d just said and accept his proposal. But then an image of Charli and Jack flashed into her mind and she bit her tongue. She really wanted a love like that. She deserved to find a love like that.
“Thank you, Pete,” she said instead.
He stuck his hands in his pockets. “I guess this is goodbye.”
Gianna just nodded and watched with tears in her eyes as Peter turned around and walked out of the kitchen.
thirty
NOW
DESPITE THAT EVENING’S unexpected turn of events, Charli couldn’t deny that she was thrilled to see Jack. She’d never believed that Jack “completed her,” or that any man would, but being with him did feel completely right. And Jack seemed just as pleased with his decision to show up. He kept saying how surreal it was to see her, and he had just admitted that this was the first time in five years that he felt like he was exactly where he was meant to be.
But as much as her heart was racing forward, her head was telling her to slow down. Jack almost hadn’t shown up. He’d been engaged to someone else. She couldn’t just gloss over that.
“I realize I have a lot of explaining to do,” Jack said, as if reading her mind.
“I know you’re not a bad guy, Jack,” Charli said. She’d been trying not to jump to any conclusions about him before she heard him out. “But what just happened here was hurtful to both your ex-fiancé and to me. I do have quite a few questions.”
“I’ll get them all answered,” he assured her. “I promise. But can I ask you to clarify what happened in Charleston first? I saw you kiss another guy when I flew out there. You said it wasn’t what I thought, but it certainly looked serious.”
“He was into me,” she explained. “That day he kissed me, I told him I wasn’t ready for a relationship and that I just wanted to be friends. After I got your last letter, I decided to go out with him and try to move on, but the relationship didn’t last.”
“So, I just happened to show up in Charleston at the exact wrong moment,” Jack said, shaking his head in disbelief. “Talk about bad timing. I was going to ask you to marry me that day, Charli.”
“You were?” Her eyes teared up as she thought of all the heartbreak that could have been avoided and all the time she and Jack could have spent together instead of apart if Christopher had never kissed her that day or if Jack hadn’t witnessed the kiss.
“Don’t cry,” he said, scooting in closer and reaching across the table to wipe away a tear that had fallen onto her cheek. “I didn’t mean to tell you that to make you upset, but because I think it will help you better understand what happened next.”
“What did happen next?” she asked.
Jack filled her in on how devastated he’d been when he flew home from Charleston and how his mom had encouraged him to start over in a new city where he wouldn’t be reminded of Charli. He chose Seattle and spent a year fairly depressed thinking of Charli dating someone else while working an unfulfilling job in sales at Brooks Running Company. Following that year, he decided sales wasn’t for him and got a job in marketing at Amazon. That was where he met Kendall.
“Being with her initially helped ease my heartache,” he said. “The same way it sounds like dating that guy I saw you kiss in Charleston eased yours.”
“Yes, but eventually I broke up with him,” Charli said. “Because I couldn’t stop thinking about you. It feels like you forgot about me completely when you met Kendall. Until today.”
“That’s because you’re looking at what I did and not why I did it. I was trying to forget about you,” he admitted. “And in that process I completely suppressed my true emotions. I mean, Charli, I managed to forget the date of our reunion—something I thought I’d never be able to do. And I almost married someone I shouldn’t have.” He placed his hand over hers on top of the table. The gesture was both comforting and familiar and at the same time made her heart race wildly. “You’ve always been the girl for me, but because I love you so much, you are also the person most capable of hurting me. I was afraid to put my heart on the line again. Being with Kendall meant I didn’t have to, so for a long time that option sounded better.”
Charli’s mind immediately went to Tim.
“My mom mentioned earlier this evening that she ran into your parents a while back and they told her you were seeing someone else. Did you ever think about staying with him and not showing up for a similar reason?”
“Yes,” she admitted, softening toward Jack even more. She guessed she couldn’t really fault him for something she had been somewhat guilty of herself. “I never blocked out the date of our reunion, but I did consider not showing up. Luckily, I have a friend who encouraged me to follow my heart. Which has always been with you.”
Jack smiled softly. “My heart has always been with you too. It just took me a bit longer than you to get over the fear of potentially having my heart broken again. I hope you know that while I was happy with Kendall, it was a completely different level of happiness than I feel being with you, right now. I can’t believe how close I came to jeopardize never feeling like this again just because I was afraid of getting hurt. I’m so gl
ad I took a risk. That we both did.”
“Me too,” Charli said. “I guess the bright side is that we found our way back to each other even though we both tried to move on. I think that really speaks to what we once had.”
“And to what’s to come,” Jack said, optimistically. “That is, if you can find a way to forgive me.”
Charli could tell that Jack was still filled with guilt—both for breaking the heart of his ex-fiancé and for making Charli question the bond they had. These past twenty-four hours clearly hadn’t been easy for him and she was reminded how much she cared for him by how much she didn’t want to see him hurt, even when he was hurting because of something he’d done to her.
There was one thing she was still hung up on though. “What about the rehearsal dinner cake order?” she asked. “It seemed insensitive to me that you ordered your cake from here and that you got the Chocolate Mint Cloud. That was our cake.”
“Kendall’s parents were in charge of the cake for the rehearsal dinner and the wedding,” Jack explained. “Our wedding was going to be very small and non-traditional so everyone was helping out where they could. I honestly didn’t know they’d placed the order here till you mentioned it. They must have found Hayden’s through its good reviews on Yelp or OpenTable. And they knew I liked mint desserts so they ordered the Chocolate Mint Cloud. I promise I had nothing to do with that.”
Charli let out a deep sigh. “The idea behind this pact was so that we could come back to each other and pick up right where we left off with only good memories to return to.”
They both chuckled at how far off that was from what had actually happened.
“The bigger point of it though was for us to pursue our dreams,” Jack reminded her. “And I’m dying to hear how it’s been for you to chase yours. You must be just months away from getting your PhD at this point.”
“I’ll be done in June, as I anticipated,” Charli told him. “These past five years truly have been fulfilling intellectually. But I feel so terrible for you. I was devastated when I learned that your dream didn’t pan out the way you’d expected.”
“Being with you is my dream, Charli,” Jack said, tracing his thumb back and forth over hers. “Your letters helped me realize I was chasing after the wrong dream. I didn’t feel the same way about baseball as you did about your research. Part of it was the less-than-glamorous lifestyle and being thrown together with guys who saw my success as the price for theirs. But most of it was because I came to realize that you were part of the formula that made baseball fun. Without you, the game wasn’t the same,” he admitted. “I wrestled with my decision to quit for a long time, but I knew it was the right call. And I don’t regret my decision to move to San Jose and play for the Giants. If I’d just followed you to Charleston five years ago, I would have always wondered about that path. I’m sure I will have more career goals and new dreams in this lifetime, but I have every intention of living out these dreams with you, from here on out.”
“So, what does that look like, in your eyes?” Charli asked. “Where do we go from here?”
“I currently work with Kendall,” Jack said, “so regardless of whether or not you’d shown up tonight, I would have been looking for a new job. I would never want her to feel uncomfortable going to work and if she had to see me every day, she probably would. I do like marketing, and would like to continue working in that field, but for the time being I would love to move out and be with you until you finish your PhD. I could work a few side jobs and then depending on where you end up getting a job, I could search for a new marketing position there. Assuming that all sounds okay to you.”
“That sounds like a dream come true,” Charli admitted and Jack’s face lit up.
“Do you remember when we made this pact, what the first thing you said you were going to do when you saw me again was?” she asked.
“Kiss you so hard,” Jack said without missing a beat. “Believe me that is all I’ve been able to think about since the moment I saw you. You’ve somehow gotten even more beautiful, Charli,” he said, eyeing her up and down. “And that dress,” he whistled.
If only he knew how many different ones she’d tried on. She’d gone back and forth all evening in her hotel room, debating all the different options she and Rebecca had shopped for and packed. She felt so silly, knowing that Jack had never seemed to care what she wore. And she typically didn’t put a lot of thought into it either. But she’d wanted to tonight. Because tonight was special. Not only because she was back with Jack, but because she had remained true to herself. Was there anything more wonderful than that?
“What do you say we split a slice of cake,” she said, “for old time’s sake. And then let’s get out of here and make up for all that lost time.”
“I think,” Jack said, smiling, “that’s the best idea I’ve heard in the last five years.”
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thirty-one
NOW
IT WAS A little after one o’clock in the morning and the last few customers had just finished up and headed out into the now-calm night. Gianna’s closing manager, Kim, locked the front door, and Gianna and the rest of her servers got to work wiping down the tables and chairs in their sections.
Kim came up to her as she was blowing out the tea candles that were still lit.
“You know, you or I could assign someone else to clean up for you,” she said. “You don’t need to stay.”
It hadn’t taken long for word to get around that Gianna had turned down Peter’s proposal. Everyone was feeling sorry for her.
“Two servers have already offered, but I want to keep busy,” Gianna said.
Kim nodded and then went into the kitchen to count the day’s receipts and send the credit card reports.
Gianna picked up some left-behind items—a black cotton sweater hanging on the back of a chair, a business card for Molly Neilson’s Pet Grooming Services, a Blackberry cell phone. She crumpled up the business card, stuck it in her pocket, and put the lost-and-found items on the windowsill. Then she moved to the table where Charli and Jack had sat and ran a warm, damp rag over the dark wooden tabletop.
The long-lost lovers had been among the last to leave. After Peter walked out, Gianna had brought them a slice of the Chocolate Mint Cloud Cake, which they shared just like they used to, and then they’d ordered a bottle of Cabernet and took their time drinking it as they caught up.
When they finally asked for their bill, it was around midnight. “It’s on the house,” Gianna told them.
“No, I insist,” Jack had said, holding out his credit card.
Gianna shook her head. “You already paid me in full tonight. Seeing you two together after so many years . . . I couldn’t be happier that you both showed up.” She didn’t get into the details—how they’d saved her from making, what could have been, one of the biggest mistakes of her life. How they’d given her something to believe in again. She was eternally indebted.
“I couldn’t be happier either,” Charli had smiled, and it was such a real and genuine smile that Gianna felt excited, for the first time in years, about going back out into the dating world. She wanted to find someone who could put that kind of an expression on her face. And she finally felt there was a chance of that.
She flipped their chairs up and then moved on to wipe down the funeral party’s table. Years from now, even after hundreds of new customers had eaten at that table, Gianna would still think of it as the place the funeral party had once sat.
She chuckled to herself, picturing the ladies in their crazy black get-ups. It was too bad things hadn’t turned out differently for Kendall. Gianna truly wished that Jack had not been her Ex, and that her fiancé had come into Hayden’s with a change of heart at the last minute and told her that he’d just had temporary cold feet. As much as Charli deserved to find love, Kendall deserved to find it too.
But Gian
na felt strongly that Kendall would get her very own happily ever after someday. She hadn’t realized, until seeing Jack “rise up” in Charli’s life after Kendall “buried” him, how cyclical relationships really were. And it was a reassuring realization.
Who knew? Maybe on this very night in Kendall’s hometown there was an unhappy couple breaking up, and tomorrow (or the next day, or the day after that) the guy was going to appear in Kendall’s life just like Jack had appeared in Charli’s. She was hanging onto that same belief for her own personal life.
Looking across the room as she stacked all of the chairs on top of the table, she made fleeting eye contact with Valerie. Although Gianna had pulled her aside once Peter left and explained her reasoning for rejecting his proposal, Valerie still wasn’t a fan of her decision.
“I want you to be happy,” Valerie had said. “And I feel like you just took a huge step away from that.”
“But I didn’t,” Gianna had tried to assure her. She hoped Valerie would see that in time. After watching Charli and Jack together, Gianna knew that true love had a look—an absolutely, positively, destined look—and she was banking on Valerie recognizing that look between Gianna and her future husband, whenever she met him. It was a look Valerie couldn’t have possibly seen between Gianna and Peter because it had never been there, as much as Gianna had willed it to be.
“Gianna,” Barbara called, looking up from the chair she was wiping off in the front of the room. “Someone’s knocking on the door.”
Gianna glanced up at the clock. It was one fifteen in the morning. Whoever it was had to be drunk. She walked over to shoo him away.
But as the figure came into focus, she realized it wasn’t a drunk. She recognized the guy immediately—the dark features, the hipster style. It was that scumbag customer who made his girlfriend so upset she felt compelled to shatter a wine glass. What did he want?
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