by Susan Wiggs
“That’s great, Dad. I’m not miserable either.”
“So you’re okay with letting that girl run off to California.”
“I’m sure as hell not going to beg her not to.”
His father sighed. “If staying together is important, you’ll make it work.” Fletcher kept trying to picture what it would be like to move to California. He’d have to say no thanks to Harvard Law and start the application process all over again for a West Coast school, putting off his plans for yet another year. Even if he did that, nothing was certain. If Annie’s project didn’t work out, then what? Would she move on? Go back to New York? Go somewhere else?
Fletcher had spent his life moving from place to place. He was done with all that. He wanted to stay put. He wanted to make a life for himself that made sense. A place to call home.
Neither he nor Annie would compromise. They’d parted ways—again. It was the right thing to do, even though it felt all wrong. He handled the situation like any red-blooded guy might. He got roaring drunk and banged Celia Swank. She was hot, and she wanted him.
And—he couldn’t dismiss the reality—he had money now and he wasn’t naive enough to believe that didn’t matter to Celia. After a few drinks, her motivation didn’t matter to Fletcher. She was good in bed. Damned good. Almost good enough to distract him from memories of Annie.
With Annie, the sex was something more than sex. It was a kind of closeness he could only ever feel for her. He tried not to miss it too much.
Celia was a welcome distraction, because he didn’t have to think too much when he was with her. He took her sailing on Lake Champlain in his father’s new boat. They had a weekend at Château Frontenac in Quebec City, went mountain biking, and even tried skydiving. It was all mindless fun, diverting in a way he needed just then. Only as summer started to fade and he was getting ready to move down to Cambridge for law school did he figure out what she really wanted.
“I’m pregnant,” she said.
Of course she was.
Is it mine? He bit his tongue to keep from asking. Celia was a lot of things, but stupid wasn’t one of them. She would not trap him like this unless she was confident of whose DNA she was carrying around.
Had she trapped him? Or had he wanted this on some level?
It was the oldest trick in the book, and he’d gone for it hook, line, and sinker. Yes, he’d been careful. Super careful. Yet still, Celia had managed to engineer a condom fail.
A kid. This woman was going to have his kid. And so he made a decision, the kind of decision that couldn’t be taken back.
With contracts signed and Martin in place as the resident chef and host of the show, they were getting ready to start on the pilot episode. Annie and Martin showed their latest demo reel to Leon and his team. It was good, maybe their best yet, but they rejected it. Again.
The casting director finally said it aloud, the thing she knew no one wanted to tell her. “You’re not right for this role.”
“Neither is anyone else we’ve tested,” Leon pointed out.
Martin fiddled with his phone. “Can I make a suggestion?”
“Please,” Leon said. “Time’s running out.”
Martin typed something on the laptop that was attached to the big screen. “I met someone in my yoga class . . .”
He hadn’t told Annie about this. She frowned as a not-very-good audition reel played across the screen. The talent—Melissa Judd—was lovely, but her delivery was rough and wooden, her personality overly brassy.
“That’s the look we’re going for,” the casting director said.
“It is?” asked Annie, but no one was paying attention.
“She’s the one,” Leon said. “I mean, she’s going to need some serious training, but Annie can help with that.”
“I can?” Annie stared at the frame frozen on the screen of the darkened room. “You’re kidding, right?”
Martin grinned and patted her shoulder. “Annie Rush, meet your new best friend.”
Annie drove herself to her apartment, feeling dejected. Her show had turned into a runaway train, and she was barely hanging on to it. The endless meetings and planning sessions, which had been so exciting at first, now left her exhausted.
“Snap out of it,” she muttered, poking her key into the lock of her apartment door. An “executive efficiency,” it was called, a euphemism for a drab rental that had seen better days. She set down her things and poured a glass of wine, settling in to spend yet another evening working. Her computer was like an appendage; she spent more time with it than she did with actual people.
This is what it takes to launch a show, she reminded herself. If it was easy, everyone would have a show. But it wasn’t easy. The kind of program she’d dreamed about—a cooking show that celebrated the ideas closest to her heart—was going to take a lot of hard work.
She reminded herself that the production company was in her corner. They, too, wanted a young, hip program about good food, well prepared, locally sourced, the dishes accessible to any viewer. They had even used her title—The Key Ingredient—and made her a producer.
This was supposed to be a moment of triumph, the culmination of a long-held dream. And yet, when she glanced at the time on her computer and saw that it was just before midnight, she felt a wave of exhaustion and frustration. Tears squeezed from her eyes. Then the flood began, and she broke down in sobs—great, dragging, ugly-cry, what-the-hell-am-I-doing sobs.
Life was happening at warp speed all around her. It was unfolding like the pages of a flip-book of little animated stick figures. But at the end of each day, she found herself alone in this crappy apartment, hunched over her workstation with no one to talk to unless she wanted to talk about the production. The beach was only a few miles away, and she’d been there exactly once to film a fish market in Venice. The people playing volleyball, riding bikes, and Rollerblading through the park looked foreign to her.
She missed Gran. She missed Fletcher. She needed him with a yearning so powerful that she shook with it. The two of them had been so close, so intimate, so insanely happy together. How could they have simply given up on their love and parted ways?
At the time, it had seemed like a mature, rational decision. She and Fletcher had both acknowledged that there were too many complications to sustain a relationship. What kind of life would it be, living on opposite sides of the country? She thought her life would be so full she wouldn’t notice the ragged, gaping hole where her heart used to be.
He was keeping his end of the bargain by not calling, sending e-mails or text messages. They had made a clean break.
She finished off the bottle of wine and looked around the bland apartment. Listened to the blare and grind of traffic that never ceased. Heard the silence of her own loneliness. Being away from Fletcher created such emotional pain that she couldn’t eat or sleep. Sometimes she thought she couldn’t even breathe.
“This is insane,” she muttered, speaking the truth aloud for the first time since moving out here. “The way I’m living is insane.”
And with that, Annie jumped up and burst into action. Twenty minutes later, she was in a taxi, headed to the airport. She spilled her guts to the driver, who barely spoke English. “I have to do something,” she said. “There’s one more red-eye flight to Boston that’s leaving in an hour. I have to do this. I don’t want to second-guess myself or lose my nerve or let anyone talk me out of it.”
She was traveling light—ID, phone, wallet. There was a moment of temptation—“Maybe I should call Fletcher,” she murmured, watching the amber streaks of sodium-vapor freeway lights out the window. “No. He’d only bring up all the usual objections, and I don’t want to hear them.”
The taxi veered onto the airport exit and delivered her to her departure terminal. “What we had—we have—is worth saving. If I have to contort my life like a pretzel in order to make this work, I will.” She forked over the fare along with a big tip.
“Good luck with that,” sai
d the driver in a thick accent.
The damp, blustery weather swirled around Annie as she exited the taxi in front of Hastings Hall, a couple of blocks from Harvard Law School. She had only managed to doze on the red-eye, so she didn’t mind the slap of chilly air.
Cambridge was quiet in the early morning—a few earnest-looking joggers with earbuds and leggings, a knot of students clutching their morning coffee and pastry as they made their way back to the residence. She slipped through the entrance in their wake, and found Fletcher’s apartment number posted on a mail slot.
Her heart skipped a beat as she stood in front of his door. Her hair was a halo of damp frizz, and she probably had circles under her eyes, but she hoped he would look past that. She hoped he would understand when she explained that she didn’t just want him. She wanted a life with him. She wanted forever with him.
Here we go, thought Annie, knocking firmly at the door.
Fletcher opened it, and she stepped inside. It was a spare, furnished apartment, not so different from her place in L.A. Small, smelling faintly of soapy steam from the shower.
The surprise on his face was something more than surprise. It was . . . shock? Concern? “Annie. Hey, I didn’t know you were coming here. Is something wrong?”
“It is, but not in the way you think.” She spoke without preamble, not wanting to lose her nerve. “No. That’s my answer.”
“Your answer.” He furrowed his hand through his hair. Looked around as though seeking an emergency exit. “Uh, to what?”
“When you asked me if the show in California was what I’d been dreaming of, I said yes. Turns out I was wrong. The correct answer is no.”
“Oh. So that didn’t pan out?” He rubbed the back of his neck with his hand.
“On the contrary, the show seems to be working out great. But here’s the thing. It’s a job, but it’s not my dream. I discovered that there’s a difference.” She took his hands in both of hers, welcoming the familiar warmth of his fingers. It felt so good to touch him. The thing about living alone was that, other than the occasional social handshake, you never touched anyone.
“Annie—”
“I hate the way we left things between us,” she said, breathing a sigh of relief at getting the confession out at last. “I hate not being with you. I miss you every minute of every day. Nothing is right without you.”
“Annie, hold on a second.”
“No, let me finish.” She stepped toward him and touched two fingers to his lips. Those soft lips she couldn’t stop thinking about. “What I came to say is that I made a mistake, leaving you. I’m in love with you, Fletcher. I have been for a long time. Forever. And it’s not going to go away and I can’t live my life without you. Do you hear me? I love you. I love you. Nothing makes sense without you. So I flew all night long to tell you that. And to ask you—can we figure out a way to put our lives together? Please?” The words came out in a stream of emotion. She felt vulnerable and hopeful, a bit scared, but also filled with certainty.
Maybe he didn’t feel the same way, but she was going to be brave. She was not going to let fear or false pride stop her from saying what was in her heart. No regrets.
“So that’s it,” she said, holding his gaze with hers. “I love you, Fletcher. I don’t want this to end. I don’t want us to end.”
“Annie,” he said. “Stop talking. Just stop.” He stepped away from her, rubbed the back of his neck again. “Aw, Christ. It’s too . . . There’s something I need to tell you.”
The stiff set of his mouth touched off a tingle of apprehension. She’d been sure he loved her. She’d been certain he would want to make a plan with her. “What is it?”
“I can’t . . . I still feel . . .” He seemed to be fumbling for words. Then his gaze hardened. “We can’t be together.”
“No, don’t say that. I’ve been thinking about it nonstop, and I know it’s going to be complicated, but we’ve always been complicated, haven’t we? Still, don’t you think what we have is worth saving? We could—”
“I’m getting married to Celia Swank.” He bit off the name as if it tasted bitter.
For a few seconds, she couldn’t process the information. I’m getting married to Celia Swank. It sounded like the start of a bad limerick.
She stood in stunned silence for several long seconds. At some point, she realized the shower had been running since she’d arrived. It stopped suddenly. Then there was the creak of a door, and in walked Celia, wrapped in a towel. “Hey, Fletch, do you think we could—” Celia turned to stone when she saw Annie. “Oh. I didn’t realize we had company.”
As all the blood in her body seemed to drain to the floor, Annie took a step back. Then another. A feeling of mortification swept over her in a wave of wildfire. “Wow,” she whispered, winding her arms across her middle as if to hold herself together. “Just . . . Wow.”
Celia’s eyes narrowed. “I’m going to get dressed. It’s going to take a few minutes. That should be long enough for you to say whatever it is you came to say.” She whirled around and slammed the door behind her.
Celia Swank. Celia? Really? Annie felt a burn of resentment toward the woman. Then she realized her resentment was for Fletcher.
“How long did you wait after I left?” she demanded. “Did you start nailing her as soon as I headed for the airport, or did you at least wait until my plane left the ground?”
“Annie, I’m sorry. I—”
“Sorry? Sorry? For what? You must be thrilled. You found someone who wants to follow you to Harvard. Good for you, Fletcher.” As she spoke, she backed toward the door, suddenly needing to flee. She groped behind her for the door handle and found it, stepping back into the hallway and nearly colliding with a guy carrying a tray of hot coffee.
“Watch where you’re going,” the guy said.
Fletcher looked as if he wanted to say something more. Annie realized that it didn’t matter what else he told her, what explanation he could offer. He was going to marry Celia Swank. End of story. It was the end of their story.
“All right, then.” The world felt different to her now—alien, inhospitable, cold. The way it had felt when her father had left. So much for the romantic, transcontinental journey to bare her heart. “There’s nothing more to be said. Except, I guess, good luck with that.”
“Hang on, Annie, listen—”
“To what?” she demanded, scorched by humiliation. “You’ve told me everything I need to know. Good-bye, Fletcher.”
19
Now
Annie was awakened by the uncanny sense that she was being watched. She opened one eye, and then the other. The blur next to her bed resolved into a chubby, earnest face.
“Knox,” she said, gazing at her small nephew. His head was just about level with the height of her bed. “I didn’t hear you come in.”
“Mom said I have to be quiet,” he told her.
“Well.” She pushed herself up on one elbow. “You were very quiet.” She scooted over and patted the spot next to her. “Climb on in.”
He gave a fleeting smile and hoisted himself into the bed next to her. “Can Dug come?”
“Okay.”
Knox leaned over and said, “Dug, up!”
In a flash, the shiny brown dachshund bounded onto the bed, greeting them with ecstatic swipes of his whiplike tail. Annie smiled and twirled the dog’s silky ears. “I like Dug. He’s cute and gentle.”
“Yep.” Knox peered into her face. He was solemn, his skin impossibly soft, his eyes unabashedly searching.
“Hey, do you remember me?” she asked him. “You were really little last time I visited. You were still in diapers.”
“I’m a big boy now,” he said, showing her his undies, printed with some superhero she didn’t recognize.
“Yes, you are. And you’re very nice to visit me in the morning.” She sat all the way up, looping her arms around her drawn-up knees. The room had the same lace curtains that had hung in the same two gabled windows all
her life. The bookcases and study nook brought back memories of novels she’d read, homework she’d struggled over, friends who had come for sleepovers.
“When I was little, this was my bedroom,” she told her nephew.
“It’s the guest room now.”
“Am I a guest, or do I live here?” Annie wondered aloud.
He looked at her blankly. His chubby hand absently patted the dog’s head.
“This room has a secret hiding place,” Annie said. “Want me to show you?”
He nodded eagerly. She swung her legs over the side of the bed and planted her feet on the floor. It was a relief not to have to think about every single movement these days. Her legs felt strong at last as she crossed to the built-in bookcase against the wall.
“Over here,” she said, releasing the hidden latches. The bookcase swung outward on hinges to reveal a space behind, now draped in cobwebs and dust bunnies.
Dug skittered into the nook, sniffing madly. A spider ran for cover.
“Spiders are yuck,” Knox said, taking Annie’s hand.
Her heart melted a little at the moist softness of his fingers. “I think so, too, but they don’t want to hurt us.” She found a flashlight in the drawer of the nightstand. “Hold that for me, will you?”
Knox eagerly complied, crouching down next to Annie. She showed him a little corner cubby where she’d stashed an old Hush Puppies shoe box. She blew away the dust and opened the lid. “See? Treasures.”
Knox eagerly inspected her trinkets, a collection of odds and ends left over from her childhood. Looking at the random objects, Annie was flooded with memories. Each item was attached to a specific moment she could recall with perfect clarity. Her collection of honor beads from Campfire Girls were in an old blue Crown Royal pouch, reminding her of the clubby after-school meetings she’d attended with her friends. The engraved metal dog tags worn by her childhood pet, a loyal Lab named Bunky, brought on a sweet-sad stab of affection. She and her little nephew sifted through the box, examining the carnival prizes, key chains, a mood ring, a Mariah Carey CD, a love note from a boy in her sixth-grade homeroom. There was a book of matches and a packet of rolling papers, half gone. She paged through a packet of snapshots, feeling an ache of nostalgia. “This is what I looked like when I was about your age,” she said, showing Knox a Christmas-morning shot of her at the age of three or four, hugging both her new doll and her old dog. There was a shot of Annie driving the tractor when she was so small she had to stand up to reach the pedals. Another showed her and Gran in matching aprons, making something wonderful in the kitchen. The most recent, probably just before they got a digital camera, was a picture of Annie with Fletcher Wyndham on prom night. Ancient history.