Blush - Jamie Brenner Page 0,113

they were also feeling pressure.

“That’s what this is for,” one of them said, holding up her cup.

“I’d like to get through this semester without a drinking problem,” Sadie replied.

“Have you tried knitting?” someone suggested.

Exasperated, Sadie put down her cup and said, “Okay, let’s do this. We’re going to go around the room and everyone has to name one book. Fiction only.”

At first, the responses were disappointing. Pride and Prejudice, Little Women, blah blah blah. But then, after a bottle or two was empty, the conversation took a turn. Someone mentioned, offhandedly, that she’d reread Anne Rice’s The Witching Hour three times. “And it’s a thousand pages.”

The room erupted into chatter about everyone’s favorite Anne Rice novel, interrupted only by someone bringing up Outlander. Someone declared her passion for J. R. Ward.

“When I was in high school I discovered my mother’s stash of Nora Roberts and read all of them. I ordered her new one just last week.”

Sadie typed the authors and titles into the notes section of her phone. She had a lot of catching up to do. She wondered if maybe it was time for this non-joiner to start a group of her own.

“What do you all think of starting a book club?”

The women looked at one another. “A book club? We don’t have time to read more books on top of our class assignments. Are you crazy? That’s why we just watch Jane Austen movies.”

Sadie suddenly missed her mother and grandmother.

Fifty-two

Vivian’s garden, like the vineyard, was in peak bloom. Leah and Steven sat on a stone bench among the giant purple Gladiator alliums. With their thick stalks and fluffy tops Leah always thought they looked like something out of a Dr. Seuss book. She had not chosen the spot by accident; surrounded by her favorite flowers and with the sight of her childhood home in the near distance, she felt buffered for the conversation.

My terroir, she thought.

Leah didn’t know if Steven had showed up because he missed her or because he was giving her an ultimatum to come home or because he wanted to end their marriage. The way things had been between them lately, any one of those scenarios was possible. Okay, maybe not the end of their marriage. But it seemed like at the very least a temporary separation might be on the table. Their child was grown and out of the nest, their physical relationship was lagging, and they didn’t agree about what their shared future should look like. Yes, they’d had a brief honeymoon moment when she showed up at the apartment that morning. But it had been more of a truce than a turning point: nothing fundamental had been solved.

She’d often wondered why marriages ended for people in their fifties. It had always seemed like things must get easier after child-rearing and careers. But now she saw the perilous, less-obvious pitfalls of midlife relationships.

“So I’m guessing you’re here to tell me that you’ve lost your patience with all of this. And I understand. I do. I love you, and at the same time I—”

Steven reached for her hand.

“I’m here to support you,” he said.

“You are?”

“Don’t look so surprised.”

“Well, I mean, you haven’t been happy about this. We’ve been apart most of the summer. And I’m not blaming you—it’s just an observation.”

“I can’t say I haven’t felt a little pushed aside. And no, I don’t fully understand what you’re doing. But I understand why you’re doing it.”

She realized her hands had been clenched, and relaxed. “That means so much to me, Steven. I’m sorry if you felt . . . abandoned. But this place . . .” She looked around, searching for the words.

“I know,” he said. “You’ve always wanted to be part of the family business. I know that better than anyone. Maybe I should have told you to fight for this twenty years ago.”

She shook her head. “I wasn’t ready.” But she was now, and she knew that her confidence came from all the years of running Bailey’s Blue. One of the most important decisions she’d made about the shop came early on: she specialized. “I was thinking about the shop, and what worked and what didn’t. One thing we did really right was the way we opened with just blue cheese.”

He nodded. “It was an instant brand identity. It even gave us direction for what the store should look like—those blue accents everywhere. And the hats and aprons . . .”

“Exactly. That’s what Hollander Estates needs: rebranding. We need to build