Just Friends(59)

Her body relaxes in my arms slightly. Which from her, feels like progress.

“I’m sorry, con.” She wipes at her eyes and pulls away from me. “It’s just been a lot with the convenience stores now that Lottie is…” She trails off.

“Gone?” I offer.

She nods quickly.

“I’ve overlapped or forgotten to schedule multiple employees for their usual hours and every time it feels like I’ve just messed up their entire livelihoods, and I feel so bad. I didn’t think managing seven locations would be easy, but this is—”

She shakes her head. In the silence, I’m aware that this is where I’m at risk of losing her. What she’s admitted in the past two minutes surpasses anything she’s ever communicated in the past twenty-two years.

“Mom, let me help you,” I blurt, before evaluating the logistics of that offer. Especially after last night, I’m even more confused about the house and where I stand with Declan. But my mom was priority above all those feelings. Making myself uncomfortable so that she wouldn’t have to be was easy after a lifetime of seeing her give up everything for my happiness.

“No, no, no, no. I’m sorry for burdening you with this, con. I should have never done that in the first place.” She waves at the space she was crying in as if it’ll push the memory away like a cloud of smoke. “I’ll figure it out, it’s okay.”

All her effort trying not to burden me worked when I was a child and didn’t have the full context to understand. But now, I saw everything, and I felt burdened by her inability to accept help.

She starts to head back to the front of the convenience store, and I realize if I want her to accept my help, I can’t just offer it.

“Hey, Mom?” I call to her retreating form.

She pauses. “Yes, sweetie?”

“Email me the log-in for the master schedule. I’ll be in charge of it from now on.”

“Sweetie—”

“Nope,” I interject, walking up to her and grabbing her shoulders. “Don’t you dare bother with trying to convince me otherwise. I want to do this. So, please. Do me a favor and let me.”

She gives me a soft smile, and the way her shoulders melt under my hands bolsters my decision even further. This time, she’s the one to pull me in for a hug, and it feels like the sun warming my skin on a chilly day.

I lose track of time holding her, bodies intertwined in the back room of a convenience store that once belonged to Lottie, surrounded by cardboard boxes of candy and soda. Without her saying it, I know that my mother feels like she’s failed me. Believes it was weak to let her daughter catch her in a moment of pain. But she doesn’t know how relieved I feel seeing her cry.

She was the only other person who’d felt the cataclysmic shift of life before and after Lottie. I felt isolated in those memories, and it was eating me from the inside out. But seeing that I wasn’t alone after all made it seem bearable.

We were both carrying the same weight up the same mountain. Both refusing to share the burden, thinking that shouldering it alone would spare the other. And yet, it only made it heavier for both of us.

I look at the photo over her shoulder, staring at Lottie’s smiling face and the tiny version of me clinging to her leg, and let it cement the decision churning inside me. New York City was about helping my mom, but staying in Seabrook could be too.



* * *



“Blair?” My mom swings open the door to the back room of the convenience store two hours later. I’m still on the same red crate, in the flow of writing my romance novel, with a new tab open to the convenience stores’ master schedule sheet.

“Yeah?” I shout.

“Someone is here for you.” She nods toward the front of the store.

My eyebrows furrow in suspicion, and I awkwardly stand to follow her.

A few customers are milling about the small store. The cash register is left useless without my mom running it. My eyes scan the aisles, but I don’t see anyone.

“Who is it—” I start to ask, but my mom raises her eyebrows and flicks her eyes behind me. I spin around.

Declan is standing by the ice cream freezer, wearing a tan Carhartt jacket and a small smile.

“Hey, Blair,” he says gently.

In a panic, I look back at my mom, only to find a poorly hidden grin on her face. She drops it in an instant and scurries back to the cash register.

“I’ll leave you two to it. And don’t worry. My ears are closed!” she shouts with her hands over her ears like a child.

“Oh my gosh.” I drag a hand over my face, feeling like a teenager again. “You don’t need to close your ears, Mom. We’re… we’re just friends.” The words feel like sandpaper coming out of my mouth. But I do my best to neutralize my expression and turn back around to face Declan. “Do you want to…” I jerk my head indiscreetly at the front door.

He nods with his lips pressed together like he’s holding back laughter and follows me to the metal bench in front of the store. I situate myself on the cold metal and try not to let the confusion show on my face.

He relaxes beside me like he’s been lounging for hours and digs into his jacket pocket.

“I know this is abrupt, but…” He reveals a folded piece of paper and stretches it toward me. Gingerly, I take it, conscious not to let our hands brush. “Last night I was sketching renovations for the coffee shop, and then I got to thinking about the layout of the house Lottie left you. And—I can only imagine how difficult it’s been to process her death and the fact that she left you a house here, especially when you thought you’d be in New York City right now, so I thought sketching some of the potential improvements you could make to the cottage might”—he shrugs his shoulders—“might help bring the vision to life, let you picture yourself in there more. But no pressure either way. I just like sketching stuff in my free time, so don’t feel like you have to—”