“If you missed her, then maybe you shouldn’t have left. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to get to the nursery.”
“Where are we sitting, Sade?” Jake asked, taking Raquel’s snub in stride.
“Over here.” Her shoulders slumped in defeat as she led him to their row.
When they stood for worship, his shoulder kept bumping into hers. She tried to ignore the low timbre of his voice. The way it seeped into her like lavender honey.
When Pastor Jay called for the congregation to greet one another, Jake kept a hand on her shoulder as she begrudgingly introduced him to the surrounding families. She surreptitiously tried to shrug his hand off.
“Sorry,” he whispered, dropping his arm to his side. “It’s weird to be the new guy at a place I basically grew up in. You’re my buffer.”
Buffer. Exactly what she said she’d needed against him. The ember in her stomach with Jake’s name on it pulsed a little bit. She looked up at him, and he was staring down at her. The pulse turned into a glow. She quickly threw dirt on it, to smother it.
When they sat for announcements, the length of his thigh was warm against hers.
Why aren’t these damn chairs bigger?
Sadie tried to listen to the sermon on the meaning behind the seven bowls of God’s wrath in Revelation, but Jake kept pushing his knee into hers.
“If you don’t stop that, you’re going to feel my wrath,” Sadie whispered.
“Your wrath sounds nice,” Jake whispered back, leaning down so his breath tickled her neck. The hairs on her arm stood on end.
She surreptitiously poked him hard in the rib cage, and his chest quaked in silent laughter.
Gigi, sitting to her left, smacked her on the leg.
After that, she kept her hands to herself. As soon as the pastor gave his parting benediction and the congregation broke out in a rumble of conversation, Sadie jumped up.
“I’ve got to get Gigi home,” she said, turning her back on Jake.
As they were nearing the foyer Sadie heard a gingersnap laugh and turned to see that Annabelle had cornered Jake. Annabelle’s grandmother, Mrs. Bennett, was standing near them with a faraway look in her eyes. Sadie had always gotten the impression that Mrs. Bennett’s head was a rabbit hole she’d gotten lost down a long time ago.
Jake looked over at Sadie with pleading eyes, but Sadie only grinned wickedly back.
“I’m just so glad you’re back,” Annabelle said with her sugar-spun voice. “I never had enough time with you back then, did I?”
Sadie knew the smile she would be wearing, so saccharine it hurt her teeth without even seeing it.
“Oh, I don’t know,” he said, trying to inch slowly away from her. “I’m really not that great once you get to know me.”
“Nonsense. Maybe I can convince you to join the town council,” she practically purred, wrapping her red-taloned fingernails around his forearm. “We could use someone like you.”
“Oh, um …” Jake intoned nervously.
“Sugar?” Gigi called from the door.
“Coming!” Sadie answered gleefully.
“Remind me not to do that again for another six months,” Gigi said when they were back home. “Leave the wolves to their feeding.”
Sadie had forced her grandmother to sit so she could make them both a glass of iced coffee. Bambi was lying splayed on the cool floor at Gigi’s feet, eagerly awaiting the bits of heavily buttered sourdough toast she’d drop down for him.
Sadie hadn’t yet had the nerve to tell her grandmother that they’d dognapped Jake’s puppy. Abby sat on Gigi’s lap, staring down at Bambi with what Sadie swore was a look of superiority.
“It’s not that bad, is it?” Sadie asked halfheartedly as she swirled caramel around the inside of the glasses. The kitchen had that stuffy feeling of windows too long closed, and Sadie opened the one over the sink to let in the apple-crisp breeze.
“Pfft, a bunch of holier-than-thou, Bible-thumping, small-town hicks, the lot of them.”
“Some of them might be,” Sadie conceded. “But not all of them. It’s community,” she said offhandedly.
“I know, I know. I’m just being a grouchy old crone. But you’re always doing all the work for everyone. You never stop. If it’s not the café, it’s something for me or the neighbors or that church.”
“Now I wonder where I got that work ethic from?” Sadie asked with a pointed look.
“Somebody stupid, probably,” Gigi said, laughing outright.
“Anyway, you know my philosophy. It’s safer to do things for people than it is to love them.”
“Sweetheart, you’re so worried about somebody breaking your heart that you’re gonna end up breaking your own. Now, I’m going out for a cigarette, and then I’m going to sit my butt down and watch the idiot box until it’s time to start dinner.”
“Do you really think you should be smoking?”
“Because quitting will make the cancer go away? It’s in my stomach, sugar, not my lungs. And on that note, I know you’re still not ready to hear it, but there are things you need to know.”
“The only thing I need to know is that I have a bowl of herbs charging under the moon to use for a spell that’s going to cure you.”
Gigi only shook her head.
“I recorded True Grit for you last night,” Sadie added, knowing how much Gigi loved John Wayne.
“That piece of trash? He should be ashamed of himself for filming that movie,” Gigi said in disgust. “I’ll just find an old episode of NCIS. And remind me to mop these floors before Jake gets here—they’re disgusting,” Gigi called from the living room.
Sadie looked down but couldn’t see so much as a smudge or speck of dust. The cherrywood floors were nicked and scratched with deep gouges in places, but polished to a high shine on the monthly. Gigi revered those floors, sweeping, vacuuming, and mopping them so often that Sadie thought they were probably cleaner than she was. In Gigi’s eyes, clean floors reflected a clean life.
“Now, sit,” Gigi said when they were both on the back porch with coffee in hand. She patted the chair next to her and Sadie sat. “And tell me what you want out of this life.”
“What?” Sadie laughed.
“I’m serious. I was never going to live forever. Now, I know the suddenness of it is a real son of a bitch, but you can’t tell me you’ve never thought about what comes next when I’m gone.”
“I haven’t, really,” Sadie said truthfully.
“Sugar, you have to want more than to live in this little old house with nothing but an old woman and a dopey dog for company. You do nothing but read and run the café.”
Sadie didn’t argue because it was the truth.
“Now, this town is in our blood. I’m not saying you need to leave it to make your mark. But I’m afraid your curse is stopping you from dreaming. So, what do you want out of life?”
“I”—Sadie started, searching for words—“I’m happy with my life.”
“Didn’t say you weren’t. But there’s a difference between being happy and being fulfilled. Happiness you feel in your skin. Fulfillment you feel in your bones.”
“I feel like you’re going somewhere with this,” Sadie said tightly.
“You don’t need a partner to complete you. But it sure as hell is nice to have someone to lean on. And what about that cookbook you wanted to make? Why’d you give that up? Or those online cooking classes you wanted to teach?”
Sadie hadn’t thought about the cookbook or classes in years. She’d gotten so lost in the mire of running the café and taking care of the townsfolk that her dream of sharing recipes and teaching others how to make them had gotten put on hold.
“Now you listen up, toot,” Gigi continued, covering Sadie’s hand with hers and giving it a pat. “I’m not going anywhere yet, but someday soon you’re going to need to ask yourself if you’re content with just being happy or if you want to be fulfilled.”