Chapter eleven

Poppy

“Do you think I made enough?”

Mom asked as she moved the last piece of chicken from the oil-soaked paper towel to the cloth-lined basket on the counter. “There’s two pounds in the fridge, but I was hoping to have that later this week.”

“I could make another side,”

Rowan said, studying the basket of chicken like she was taking a crack at Einstein’s theory of relativity.

“You made plenty,” I said.

“Does Theo like green bean casserole, Poppy?”

Mom asked.

I love my family. I love my family. I love my family.

“Oh, that’s a great idea,”

Rowan said. “I’ll just run to the store for some crispy onions.”

She reached for her purse on the counter, clearly ready to delay the visit I’d been dreading for the past two weeks another hour or more. I lost it.

“We’re delivering this right now,”

I snapped. “Not in an hour. Not after Rowan realizes she should have made him baklava for dessert instead of brownies because he doesn’t like chocolate. Now.”

Mom and Rowan stared at me with wide eyes.

“The chicken will get cold,”

I added with a shrug.

“She’s right,”

Rowan said, tucking another cloth over the chicken. “Plus, Cal texted that they’d already finished moving everything in.”

“How is that possible?”

Mom asked. “They’ve been gone less than an hour.”

“Theo doesn’t have a ton of stuff.”

I grabbed a stack of containers and tossed a Ziploc baggie of biscuits on top. “Come on, let’s go. The chicken is cooling fast.”

“I need to change first,”

Mom said, motioning to her frying shirt. Yes, my mom has a frying shirt. It’s about ten years old and covered in oil stains, and even I wasn’t a big enough bitch to insist she leave the house in it.

“We’ll load the station wagon while you change,”

I said, heading for the door.

Rowan ran after me with the basket of chicken. “Do we need to drive? It’s just around the corner.”

I nodded toward the living room and the small jungle of plants Mom had gathered from her shop this morning. “You plan on carrying all the food and those?”

“Oh,”

Rowan said, frowning. “Maybe we went a little overboard?”

“You think?”

“You know Mom,”

Rowan said, opening the front door with her free hand. “She always goes above and beyond to welcome people to the neighborhood, but this is Theo.”

Like I didn’t know. Theo who had become so tangled in my life I couldn’t avoid him even when I tried. It’d been two weeks since the ice storm, and even with using a freaking puncture wound to bail on some stuff, I’d already had to suffer through game night, three dinners, and two classes. I couldn’t blame my family for the classes, but with my studio destroyed, they were the last link I had to any type of art that didn’t involve fondant or modeling chocolate.

And not once in all those meetings had Theo and I discussed what happened. At least I’d managed to eliminate all alone time with him. I swung by the pharmacy to chat with Wilson while he closed so we’d arrive at class together. Then I booked it out the door the second the lesson ended.

Theo, of course, pretended everything was perfectly normal. Scrolling through our text exchanges, you’d think nothing had happened. He still sent me links to interesting art articles and shared stories of his more memorable clients. He’d even found an art show coming to Staunton in May and suggested we go together. I tried to respond with my usual sass, but every time I had to force myself to pretend nothing had changed when everything had.

I’d lost my studio and practically any hope of being with Theo in the same night. To add a cherry to the shit sundae of January, Theo now lived within a frisbee toss of my house. OK, maybe not a frisbee I’d throw, but I bet Chris could fling one as far as Twill’s yard, and Theo’s house was clearly visible from there.

“Poppy,”

Rowan said, and I realized I was still standing on the front porch with a tower of sides while she’d loaded the chicken and was coming back for plants. “Does your foot hurt? Let me take some of those.”

I nodded, even though my foot felt pretty good, considering. She lifted the top container and the biscuits and probably would have grabbed more if I hadn’t nudged her with my elbow to move on. I followed her to Mom’s station wagon, where she’d already placed the basket on the floorboard of the backseat.

“I’ve been patient,”

Rowan said as she crawled in and tucked the container beside the chicken. “But something is clearly off between you and Theo, and I’m worried it’s my fault.”

I handed her the rest of the containers. “How? Nothing was ever on between us.”

“Please,”

she said, checking the lid on the coleslaw. “It’s clear to anyone with a pulse that you two like each other. And not ‘just as friends,’”

she added, air quotes and all.

If I’d done that, the coleslaw would have slid off my lap and splattered all over the backseat because that’s the kind of month I was having.

“Not enough,” I said.

“Nope,”

Rowan said, shaking her head. “I’ve never seen you so into someone.”

“Fine. You’re right, but he doesn’t want to be with me. Happy? Want me to list all the reasons I’ve considered why he finds me undatable? We can start with personality traits and work back to physical.”

“Oh, honey,”

Mom said, suddenly behind me. “You’re perfect.”

Crap on a cracker. Today just kept getting better. I turned to face Mom, who was staring at me between two potted plants. “Can you just pretend you didn’t hear that? I’ll grab the rest.”

When I got back to the station wagon, Mom and Rowan were eerily quiet.

“Let’s go,”

I said, shoving the last plant in the back. “The chicken’s getting cold.”

“He has a lot of baggage,”

Rowan said from the back seat as Mom reversed out of the driveway. I shot her a death glare via the rearview mirror, but she continued undeterred. “Way more than Caleb, and you remember how hard it was for him to work through his before we could be in a relationship.”

Kind of hard to forget your sister sobbing her eyes out for two days straight because the man she’d fallen for was too broken to fall in love, or at least admit he had.

“Not to mention Theo’s parents abandoned him,”

Mom added. “They should have supported him the most. That surely messed with his head.”

“I pushed him too far with the whole topless snuggle,”

Rowan said softly. “I mean, looking back I realize you weren’t in any real danger of hypothermia. The thought just popped in my head. I figured it couldn’t hurt and might even inspire him to finally make a move.”

“Wow, did you know she was doing that?”

I asked Mom. “Or did you think I was freezing to death too.”

Mom shrugged. “He didn’t seem to mind.”

I slapped my thighs. “Unbelievable.”

“Cal says Theo hasn’t dated anyone in years,”

Rowan continued. “And that he’s still punishing himself for the accident. For what it’s worth, I think he genuinely likes you, Poppy, but he doesn’t think he deserves to be with you.”

I laughed so hard I snorted. “Because I’m such a prize?”

Mom gripped the steering wheel but didn’t say anything. I turned in the passenger seat to face Rowan. “Is she angry or sad?”

“Both,”

Mom shouted. “What kind of people disown their son because of a tragic accident? Logan Hendricks’s mother testified on Theo’s behalf, but his own parents scurried off to Greece because they were embarrassed. Who does that? And you, Poppy,”

she added, taking one hand from the wheel to jab a finger in my face. “Where did I go wrong raising you? How can you think so little of yourself?”

“Geeze, Mom,”

I said, as we turned onto Maple. “Reel it in. You raised Rowan and Chris into bright shiny stars of humanity. You did the best you could for me with what you had.”

“She’s kidding,”

Rowan chirped from the back seat.

Mom pressed her lips together and shook her head as we pulled up to the Jenkins’s place.

I guess I had to start calling the rancher Theo’s place since his black truck was in the driveway and would be from now on. Lauren’s beater sat across the street. Aiden’s beastly new truck was parked in front of us. This one was even bigger than the boat he drove when we started hanging out together last summer. He claimed he needed it to move his crew between construction sites, but no doubt he was compensating for something.

“Let’s just treat Theo like anyone else who moves here,”

I said. “Give him dinner and a plant, or twelve, welcome him to the neighborhood, have a little chat, and leave.”

“Fine,”

Mom said, slamming the station wagon into park. “But we are not done with this conversation, young lady. I will make you see the beautiful, amazing person you are if it kills me.”

“Pretty sure I’ll die of embarrassment first.”

“Poppy!”

Mom and Rowan shouted.

“Let’s go,”

I said, flinging open the passenger door. “Any longer and the chicken will need to be zapped in the microwave.”

Mom gasped, and Rowan did her best not to laugh. Before we could divvy up everything, Cal and Chris came running to help us.

“For heaven’s sake,”

Rowan said, swatting Chris’s hand. “I can carry the biscuits. You’ll eat two before we get inside.”

I sauntered up the walk empty-handed since I wasn’t entering the pissing match between Cal and Chris to see who would carry more, and Mom would be mortified to enter the house without something to hand Theo.

“Hell Cat,”

Aiden shouted, when I walked in the open front door.

Mrs. Jenkins had left her couch, but there wasn’t anything else in the room except a single box marked Books in Theo’s neat handwriting. No rug. No lamps. The floral curtains were still on the windows, so at least the neighbors wouldn’t be able to see Theo painting at night with his shirt off.

“Stop calling her that,”

Lauren snapped. She waved a burning sage stick in his face before passing it over the couch. “It’s mean.”

“Lighten up, Lauren. It’s just a nickname,”

Aiden said, but his voice lacked its usual cockiness. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say he was blushing.

“It’s OK,”

I said. “I call him Hammer Dick.”

I didn’t, but the name just popped in my head.

Aiden smirked and Lauren hurried down the hall, leaving a trail of smoke in her wake. “Great nickname.”

“Don’t get used to it.”

Theo smiled at me from the arched doorway that led to the kitchen, which made me feel warm and miserable at the same time. Theo’s smiles were rare, and I treasured every one he gave me, locking them in my memory like a miser guarded his gold.

“Come look at this,”

he said, grabbing my hand. My chest tightened; my stomach danced. I hated how my body reacted to him still. He pulled me through the large, dated kitchen to the glass sunroom Mr. Jenkins added to the house for his birds. The man was obsessed with cockatoos. I’d made a couple bucks bird sitting a time or two in high school, which had actually been pretty fun, despite Mr. Jenkins’s three-page instruction guide. All the cages, plants, and toys were gone, leaving a room with three glass walls and a linoleum floor that had weathered a decade of bird droppings.

“What do you think?”

he asked, dropping my hand and holding his arms wide.

“I think you may never get the smell of bird shit out of here.”

Theo waved his hand. “Turpentine smells worse. It’ll cover that up.”

“You’re making this your studio,”

I said, turning in a circle to admire the room with new appreciation. The light was fantastic. The floor easy to clean. The one interior wall even had built-in cabinets Mr. Jenkins had used to store his bird seed and whatever other crap birds needed. They’d be perfect for storing paint and brushes. Theo had already stacked several canvases in the corner beside a box labeled Art.

“We could add a sliding door to the back yard for ventilation. That space over there is directly behind the kitchen sink. Aiden said he could easily put in a utility sink and a counter so you wouldn’t have to drag anything into the kitchen to clean.”

“Theo, you just moved in. There’s no rush for Aiden to renovate the house. It’ll be years before I can buy it.”

“But you need a place to work now. Why not here?”

“Because it’s yours,”

I said, putting my hands on my hips. “You’re right. This space would make a great studio for you.”

“We can share it. It’s twice as big as your shed, and I only had a tiny corner to work in before.”

“You want me to stroll into your house at 2:00 am when I get an idea for something I want to sculpt?”

“Sure,”

Theo said. “If we put in a slider, I won’t even know you’re here. The door between the kitchen and this room is an exterior door. It’s solid as a rock. I doubt I’d hear a thing.”

“By the time Aiden puts the door in, I could rebuild the shed.”

“That sounds like a challenge,”

Aiden said, stepping into the sunroom. “How far have you gotten with the insurance claim, Rose?”

Mom peered over his shoulder. “Nowhere. If y’all hadn’t come over to cut up the tree and cart off the debris, it’d still be there. The insurance company says it was the town’s tree. The town says it’s mine. They’re battling it out. I’d make a fuss, but I know several families dealing with the same problem, only the trees hit their homes. When you put it in perspective, our claim just isn’t a priority. I doubt we’ll have a decision for months.”

“Yeah, that doesn’t sound promising, Hell Cat,”

Aiden said wrapping his arm around me. “I got a door guy who needs work. I’ll call him, assuming my new tenant doesn’t mind the noise for a couple days.”

“Don’t mind at all,”

Theo said, staring at his boots.

“Well, we better eat before the chicken gets cold,”

Mom said with a smirk.

Aiden and Mom went inside, but when I turned to follow, Theo walked ahead of me and pulled the door closed.

“I’ve been meaning to talk to you,”

he said. He shoved his hands in his pockets and stepped away from the door as though giving me the option to leave.

I waited. He backed further from me until he’d wedged himself between one of the glass walls and his box of art supplies.

“More like apologize,”

he said, looking down at his boots again.

“To me or your shoes?”

“You, but I’ll never get this out if I look at you.”

“OK,”

I said. Because what else do you say to someone who apparently can’t stand the sight of you but invites you to share their awesome new studio space?

“Your friendship means a lot to me, and I never want to do anything to risk it. I’m sorry I crossed the line. I promise to never let that happen again.”

“Well, that sucks,” I said.

He lifted his head and his eyes darkened when they met mine before he turned to face the glass wall. “You should know,”

he said, his voice so deep I swear I felt it roll through me from across the room. “We can never be anything more than friends.”

I figured as much, but actually hearing him say it hurt. Bad. I wanted to ask him why. Was it something I did? An annoying quirk? Or several? I wasn’t the easiest person to be around, but Theo never seemed to mind spending time with me.

Or was Rowan right. Had he taken some vow of celibacy to atone for the accident? Pretty sure sex wasn’t involved in the crash, but I guess, maybe, it made sense in some fucked-up way. If Logan couldn’t have a girlfriend, Theo wouldn’t either.

“Yeah, all right,”

I said, trying to sound relaxed, even though I wanted to ugly cry so bad my stomach hurt. I wrapped my arms around my waist hoping to ease the ache. “We’d better get inside before my brother and your friends demolish all the food.”

I flung open the door and stepped into the kitchen where everyone was hovering over the containers, since Theo apparently didn’t own plates. A single plastic spoon rested in the mac and cheese. I’d be skipping that side. Ditto for the coleslaw, baked beans, and mashed potatoes. Since I’d taste tested a few of Rowan’s brownies already today, I didn’t want those either. So, I grabbed a drumstick and a biscuit before tucking myself between Chris and Lauren.

While I choked down enough food to not bring attention to myself, the others talked about the wedding, the bakery, and whether Cammie had shared any more details about her family, which, shocker, she hadn’t. Aiden and Chris even snuck in some football stats. No one mentioned that Theo hadn’t followed me inside. Or that he stayed in the glass room until Lauren shouted it was time for her to get back to Karma.

“Thank you, Lauren,”

Theo said, stepping into the kitchen as Mom added water to the devil’s ivy she’d brought. “The place smells and feels great.”

Instead of saying anything, Lauren hugged him, longer and harder than I’d ever seen her hug anyone. A stab of jealousy shot through me while they stood locked in each other’s arms. Finally, she stepped away from him, grabbed my hand, and dragged me from the kitchen. I pulled myself free as soon as we were outside. “Is there something you want?” I asked.

“Get in the car.”

She walked ahead of me across the street and slid behind the wheel of her old sedan.

I could have turned around and gone back inside, but honestly, I appreciated how she’d gotten me out of the house without having to say goodbye to Theo. I huffed but joined her.

“That door to the sunroom isn’t soundproof,”

she said as I buckled my seatbelt.

Well, wasn’t that great? The only thing worse than being turned down was having an audience while it happened.

Lauren started the car but faced me as the engine groaned to life. “Believe what he told you, Poppy. Either accept what he’s willing to give you or move on. He’s a huge part of Cal’s life, so he’ll be part of Rowan’s, but he doesn’t have to have a place in yours. If it hurts too much to be his friend, let him go.”

And now I understood the hug. Lauren believed in karma more than anyone I knew. In her mind, her little lovefest in the kitchen offset the pain she might cause Theo by suggesting I drop him from my life. No doubt, she’d keep hugging him like that forever if I took her advice.

I stared out the window, and we drove around the corner in silence. Lauren pulled up to the curb in front of my house and blew out a breath. “I get it, Poppy. More than you know. But sometimes loving someone isn’t enough to save them. At some point, you have to protect yourself.”

I raised my eyebrows and waited. Lauren never talked about her life before she came to live with her grandpa in middle school. From her silence, Rowan and I assumed Lauren’s early childhood was bad, but after years of trying to learn more, we knew not to ask questions.

“Better go,”

she said, “so you have time to get a good cry in before your family comes home.”

And that’s exactly what I did.