“That’s wonderful,” I exclaim, eyeing the stacks of books waiting to be packaged and picked up for shipment.
“Well, yes, it’s encouraging,” Millie replies with a sigh. “But it’s going to take a lot more than eleven orders to keep afloat.” She squints at the screen. “I keep looking at these numbers every which way, trying to figure out if there’s any expense we can shave and put toward that inheritance tax.”
Percy purrs at my feet, and I scoop him up in my arms. His fluff tickles my nose. “I had some savings,” I say. “But after the divorce expenses, my account is pretty much drained.” I frown. “Did you know that my attorney charged two hundred and fifty dollars an hour? It’s criminal.”
“It is,” Millie replies.
I nod. “And that’s coming from a lawyer herself.”
“We have our own problems in the U.K., but the family law system is sorely broken in America. It’s all about righteousness and winning—manipulation, even—versus doing what’s right for children and families.” She frowns, turning back to the computer screen.
“I take it you ran your law practice differently, then?”
“Well, I wasn’t in family law,” she says. “It’s just toxic. But yes, I ran my practice differently. I was the rare bird who took on clients who needed my help most, regardless of their ability to pay. I loved my work, and it kept a roof over my head, but it was hardly a lucrative enterprise. Like you, I’m afraid I don’t have any extra funds to contribute, as much as I wish I did.”
“Millie,” I say quickly. “I would never ask you for financial help. The way you stepped in when my mother…the way you took over like you did, and completely pro bono at that, well, it was an amazing gesture of friendship. And all the legal work you did to benefit others”—I pause, smiling—“not many people would do that. It’s…pretty wonderful, actually.”
“Well,” she says, eschewing my compliments in her very practical manner, “if I were as wonderful as you profess, I’d be able to figure out a way to get us out of this ordeal, but I fear that the cards may be stacked against us.”
“We have to keep trying,” I say, swallowing hard. “She’d want us to.”
Her expression softens. “She would, and we will.”
“I might have been able to fix this all immediately if I had the money my dad had set aside for me in his will, but after the medical bills were paid, along with the funeral expenses, there was nothing left. The lawyers told me he’d made an investment that went sideways the year before he died. Nick was furious that we had to call off the kitchen remodel we’d planned, but I didn’t care about the money. My father was such a hard worker, and he gave me a beautiful life. It killed me knowing that he carried the burden of that financial loss into his death.”
“I heard that he passed,” Millie says. “I’m sorry.”
“Six years ago,” I say. “Complications from a heart attack.”
“I was at their wedding,” she says.
“You were?”
Millie looks as if she wants to tell me a story, but doesn’t quite know where to start—or whether she should.
“Were they in love once, all those years ago?”
She pauses, the corners of her mouth turning upward into a half-smile. “Your father was a generous man, and…he did love your mother, very much.”
I picture both my parents at our dinner table in Santa Monica, each of them with their own secrets. “Before my dad died, he told me that he wished things had turned out differently—that she’d stayed.” A rush of emotion swirls inside me as I recall the pain and regret in his eyes in his final days, the lonely void I’d spent my teen years trying so hard to fill for him, while simultaneously ignoring my own pain. By then, he was so very weak and his voice was just a whisper. I’ll never forget the last time we spoke. He told me he was sorry, and it broke my heart. The only person who owed us both an apology wasn’t there.
“I’m sorry,” Millie says.
I nod, looking away. “It’s just that, all these years, I haven’t been able to make sense of it. How could a wife—a mother—just up and leave her family?”
“Valentina, it was all very…complicated,” she replies.
“Well, you knew them. What happened?”
“I only knew your father for a short time, before they moved to California. I suppose it seemed like a fairy tale from the outside looking in—a dashing, successful American sweeping her off her feet and whisking her off to glamorous California, but over the years, your mother confided in me that there was more to the story.”
“Like what?”
Millie’s expression remains guarded. “Like any other troubled relationship, theirs was…complicated.”
I sigh. There was that word again. “Right, I get that people get divorced, obviously. But what I don’t understand is how she could run off to London, leaving her daughter behind, and when she gets here, everyone thinks she’s a saint. How is that okay?”
“Let me make something clear,” Millie retorts. “For your mother, being separated from the child she loved was never okay. In fact, she carried that sadness with her until her very last day.” She reaches for my hand, giving it a squeeze. “Let her reveal herself to you in her own way. I’m confident that in time, you’ll come to understand, and maybe even forgive her.”
I nod reluctantly.
“But look—she turned her pain into this beautiful place,” she continues, gazing around the store. “Sure, it’s your mother’s life’s work, and even if you don’t choose to forgive her, this place is about more than just her. The Book Garden has found its way into the community’s collective heart—and that’s worth fighting for, don’t you think?”
“It is,” I say, straightening my shoulders. “And I want you to know that I plan to fight, for as long as it takes.”
Millie smiles. “That’s my girl.”
“I just wish our financial outlook wasn’t so grim.”
“As you’ve said, we’re going to need to get creative.”
I glance out the window and eye the sign hanging beneath the awning above as it sways gently in the breeze. Outside on the sidewalk, a middle-aged woman walks by with an enormous bouquet of flowers in her arms—a compilation of blossoms in varying pink hues—which is when an idea hits me.
“The Book Garden!” I exclaim, turning back to Millie. “That’s it! What if we riff on that a bit? Maybe use the extra space up front to sell plants, even flowers? I mean, you’ve heard of bookstores selling gifts and toys, right?”
“Sure,” she says. “But—”
“We could sell houseplants, bunches of daffodils, maybe find someone to help us part-time, so you and I can focus on the business of books. It would be an added expense in the beginning, I know, but it might just pay off.” I smile to myself. “Books and green things. They can grow together.”
“I loathe houseplants,” Millie says before cracking a smile. “But your idea is actually…rather brilliant.”