HANGING OUT WITH MEREDITH AND MY SISTER turns out to be therapeutic. Mer’s become something of a friend, and in the two weeks since my dad moved into a room at the extended-stay, we’ve spent a lot of nights talking our way through trays of warm chocolate chip cookies. Ally can lift her head now, and when she sees me, she smiles a gummy smile that makes my heart feel like it might burst.
I’ve decided on the Seattle Culinary Academy as the strongest contender for the first couple of years of my culinary education, and I’ve spent an inordinate amount of time baking, learning, practicing. Mer pretends to be displeased—I’m not helping her lose the last of the baby weight!—but she rarely leaves me alone when I’m in the kitchen. I think she’s found comfort in my pastries, and in the act of creating her own. The other day, I shared my tried-and-true crust recipe with her, and she managed to fashion a passable lattice to top her cherry pie.
I’ve seen my dad only twice since he moved out, lunches initiated by him. They were quiet meetings, punctuated by the scrapes of silver against china and a lot of uncomfortable ahems.
He’s not seeing Mrs. Tate anymore, he claims, but it’s hard to take his word at face value. He hasn’t mentioned Max. I know he takes exception to the two of us together, though I think his objection comes more from principle than anything else. I went behind his back to spend time with the boy he told me to stay away from. He must have a Fatherhood Handbook tucked away somewhere, and it must advise him to remain quietly pissed for some predetermined number of days.
His disapproval doesn’t bother me.
Tonight, I give Ally a bath, then volunteer to rock her to sleep. After I lay her in her crib, I find Meredith and Marcy scrapbooking at the kitchen table. This is a new hobby, one Mer jumped into to fill time not monopolized by the baby. I’m glad Marcy’s joining in, though like me, her creativity comes more in the way of butter, sugar, and good chocolate than stickers, card stock, and fancy scissors.
I make a pot of coffee, fill three mugs, and join them. Glossy photographs litter the table, along with dozens of sticker sheets, printed pastel paper, and strips of waxy paper covered in glue dots, a miracle of scrapbooking I’ve only recently learned about. “What are you working on?” I ask, setting their mugs a safe distance from the memories.
“Ally’s baby book. This page is dedicated to her first time in the bathtub.” Meredith picks up a photo and passes it to me. I smile at the image: Ally sitting in a mesh bath seat, rosy pink and wailing, hair covered in sudsy shampoo.
“She’s just the cutest thing,” Marcy says, thumbing through her own stack of photos.
“Can I help?”
“Sure,” Mer says, scanning the table for a suitable task, obviously trying to figure out where I’ll do the least damage. She selects a few pictures, a celadon sheet of card stock, and a strip of glue dots. “You can glue these pictures to card stock, then cut them out. Leave about a quarter-inch of green border.”
I study the example she holds up. I’m pretty sure I can reproduce it.
The pictures she’s given me are of Ally’s first full day of life. I recall it with perfect clarity. The tension incited by Dad’s stunt contrasted with the immediate-yet-unforeseen love I felt for my baby sister. There’s a picture of me holding her stiffly, then one each of Dad and Meredith snuggling her close. I flip to the next picture and find Ally in Marcy’s arms. I stare at the photograph a beat too long, overcome by a rush of memories.
The final photograph in the pile steals my breath. It’s the one I took of Max holding Ally like a little football—the moment I realized I was in love with him.
“You okay, sweetie?” Marcy asks, leaning in for a look at the picture I’m holding.
I pass it to her. She grins, then shows Meredith.
“That was a good day,” Mer says.
“That was a crazy day.”
“Max was such a grouch on the way home from the hospital,” Marcy says, handing the picture back to me. “I had a feeling something had happened between the two of you, and Jill, I can’t tell you how hard I hoped it’d work out.”
I sip from my mug to hide a smile.
“You should’ve seen the two of them on Valentine’s Day, before they left for Seattle. I caught them smooching in the hallway—”
I choke on coffee and laughter. “Meredith!”
She shrugs. “It’s true.”
I’m flushing raspberry-red when my phone chimes. I find a text from Max: I miss you.
I hear his words as much as read them, whispered low and gravelly, his breath moving tendrils of my hair, tickling my neck. I grin at my phone.
“Max?” Meredith asks, slapping pink teddy bear stickers to the layout she’s working on.
“Tell him to come over,” Marcy says.
I tap out a response: I’d ask you to come over, but there’s a whole lot of crafting going on around here.
His reply comes quickly: Meet me outside?
“So, I think I’m going to take a break,” I say, pushing card stock and photographs in Meredith’s direction. “I’ll be back … eventually.”
She and Marcy wave me off with wily smiles. I doubt my scrapbooking skills will be missed.
I swing by my bedroom to slip on shoes and grab a jacket before dashing for the front door, fueled by the burst of excitement I always feel when I’m moments from seeing Max. It’s something like the tingly zip that comes with sucking on a lemon drop, that moment when the bright, sweet-tart flavor finds its way under my tongue.
He’s waiting in the middle of the street, and when he sees me racing toward him, his face becomes an explosion of happiness. I don’t stop running until we collide, until his arms circle around my waist to hug me closely, warmly, completely; my feet dangle over the pavement.
An eternity passes before he loosens his hold. I slide down his body until my shoes find solid ground, then tip my head to look up at him. He’s glowing in the golden light of the streetlamps, and I feel it, too—illuminated—because he’s Max and I’m Jillian, and my life is so much better because he’s a part of it.
“Love you, Holden.”
He flashes me the grin I adore, the one that makes my heart flutter and my cheeks flush and my insides dissolve like sugar in simmering water. The grin that’s all mine.
He kisses me. “Love you, too, Jilly.”