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Daisy glanced over her shoulder. “Blessed be,” she grumbled. “Rebecca Mitchel.”

“Good gracious,” Tessa said. “Who dresses up like that for a place like The Wilted Garden?”

“Don’t be so surprised,” Daisy muttered as she turned back around. “She was just the same in grade school.”

Rebecca’s silver hair was pulled into a bun at the top of her head, a few particular strands pulled to frame her angular face.

There wasn’t a wrinkle across her deeply olive skin.

The white dress suit she wore showed off her collarbones in a deep ‘V’ cut.

If the woman was as beautiful within as she was on the outside, Daisy wouldn’t have had a single problem with her. She might’ve even been jealous.

“I heard she doesn’t go to Ronald’s anymore after one of the servers got her order wrong,” Daisy whispered, running her hands over the condensation on her cup. “Apparently, Rebecca thought blowing up on the server was the way to handle the situation.”

“Why am I not surprised?” Tessa rolled her eyes. “Don’t tell me she’s about to cause a scene here, too.”

Daisy shrugged. “The sooner she leaves, the better I’ll feel. The last thing I need today is to be politely insulted by an old classmate.”

“Do you think she remembers?”

“Remembers what?”

Tessa leaned forward. “How she poured the punch all over your prom dress?”

“Well, I’ll be,” Daisy said. “I happened to forget that myself.”

“What was the point behind it, anyways?”

Daisy shook her head, the memory coming back to her like a childish nightmare. “Alan asked me to the prom,” she explained. “And she was jealous. If I could turn back time, I’d tell my seventeen-year-old self to just hand the boy over. Simple as that.”

Tessa straightened her back against the seat, eyeing someone over Daisy’s shoulder.

“Good morning, ladies,” Rebecca greeted once she reached their table.

She poised herself in front of them, one hand resting against her hip while the other gripped onto a shimmering handbag.

“A fine day outside, isn’t it?” She threw a look over her shoulder at the diner counter.

“Thought I’d start my day with a cup of coffee but,” when she turned back to them, there was a sneer pulling at her inked lips, “it seems simplicity is lost on Willowbrook these days.”

Daisy pressed her lips together as she tried to force a smile. “The sweet tea is perfect here. Maybe you can -”

“Always the same little girl from school,” Rebecca interjected. Though there was a smile on her face and a musical laugh filling the air, there wasn’t a hint of niceness in what she really said. She placed a delicate hand over her chest. “You have a way of making me laugh, Daisy!”

Daisy glanced at Tessa, who was holding a hand over her mouth to hide her laughter.

“Anyways,” Rebecca drawled, “I can’t bring a cup of sweet tea to my big interview. Can you imagine such a thing?”

Daisy knew that she was goading her to ask about the interview, and she hardly had any interest in hearing about it, though she wondered if it would make Rebecca leave them faster. She opened her mouth and Tessa delivered a swift kick beneath the table, her head slightly shaking.

“What interview?” Daisy asked, ignoring Tessa’s quick eye roll.

Rebecca grinned. “Well, if you must know,” she said. “I’m not supposed to mention it too much, but Willowbrook’s charity board invited me to interview with them. Isn’t that exciting?”

Daisy opened her mouth again, but was quickly silenced - except it wasn’t from Tessa that time.

“Who am I kidding?” Rebecca continued with another sharp laugh.

“ Of course you think it’s exciting! Out of all the candidates in town, they sought me out.

And how can they not choose me when I arrive in this delectable Chanel suit?

” Rebecca stretched her arms out, not caring for the busy restaurant all around her, to show off her outfit.

“You wouldn’t believe the searching I had to do to get my hands on a limited-edition suit like this one. I mean it’s just -”

Her voice continued on and Daisy quickly tuned her out.

The suit was gorgeous, of course, which annoyed her more.

Neither one of them even mentioned it, and all Rebecca could do was brag and brag and brag.

Daisy rested her chin on her palm, her other hand spinning her cup absentmindedly.

If only Rebecca could ruin her white suit before the interview, she might get a good taste of the reality around her.

Daisy smirked to herself. She wished Rebecca had the chance to feel how Daisy did on her prom day, when a bright red punch soaked her entire dress.

“Well, ladies,” Rebecca said, “I believe I’ve lingered long enough. Wish me luck, won’t you? Though you and I both know it won’t be necessary!”

Rebecca spun around before either one of them could say another word.

She took a single step, glancing over her shoulder to give them an exaggerated wave, when a waiter slipped out from behind the counter in a hurry, a large tray of food in his hands.

Rebecca kept walking forward, not looking where she was going.

Crash!

The tray flipped forward, the food splattering across Rebecca’s white suit. Cherry red tomato sauce splashed across her entire torso, slowly dripping down to her matching dress pants. The waiter winced, trying and failing to stop the food from clinging to her skin.

“Why you little–!” she screamed.

Then Rebecca screeched, the sound so sharp Daisy thought it would cause the glass windows to shatter.

Before the waiter could even try to beg for forgiveness, Rebecca was already storming out of The Wilted Garden , her feet stomping noisily against the tile.

She slipped once at the front doors before shoving them open and disappearing around the corner.

Daisy turned back to Tessa, and they barely lasted a second before bursting out in hysterical laughter. They were so buried in their amusement that they didn’t notice Lucy stop by to deliver their sandwiches and refill their glasses.

As Tessa began to eat, teasing and mocking Rebecca’s freak accident, Daisy’s mind wandered elsewhere.

What had she thought before the crash took place?

Didn’t she want Rebecca to feel the same as Daisy did, when her prom dress had been ruined?

The two things didn’t have to be connected, but it was hard to ignore the possibility, or how close they were in timing.

Daisy pushed around her food before sliding the plate away and asking for a box from a passing waiter.

“You hardly ate,” Tessa noted. “What’s bothering you?”

Daisy pressed her lips together. Keeping something like that away from an empath like Tessa was slowly growing to be impossible. She could sense the shift in the mood, practically see the storm cloud hanging over her head. Daisy sighed.

“Yesterday,” Daisy explained, “I received a potion in the mail. It spilled and broke all over me before I had the chance to see what it was. I think…I think it did something to me.”

Tessa’s eyes narrowed. “Did what?”

“Well, it had a note attached to it. ‘Now you’ll get what you deserve.’”

“Cryptic.”

Daisy nodded. “And the next thing I know, things that I wish are coming true. First there was Old Lady Witherford -”

Tessa shrugged. “An accident that was bound to happen.”

“We talked about the business being slow, and the next thing I know, we’re crowded.”

“There was a news story.”

Daisy pressed her lips together. “I know for a fact I wished for Rebecca’s clothes to be ruined in the same way my prom dress was.”

“Karma was coming for her long before she came to our table,” Tessa said.

“How about Ethan, then?”

Tessa raised a brow. “What about him?”

“What can explain his sudden change of heart in one day? Asking me out suddenly?”

“I think you hold yourself to a low standard, Daisy,” Tessa said in a serious voice. “Why’s this bothering you so much? Is it so unbelievable that good things would happen for you?”

The words sunk into Daisy more than she thought they would.

Perhaps there was a part of her that just didn’t want to settle with the fact that good things were coming to her.

So much heartache and troubling times surrounded her twenties and early thirties.

Now that she was older and wiser, the reality of the world settled in around her, and Daisy didn’t expect good tidings to be granted so easily.

It didn’t make sense, and she wasn’t one who trusted it so easily.

Daisy leaned against her hand again, unable to avoid the unsettling feeling in the back of her mind.

Tessa reached to hold onto her hand. “Why don’t we test it?”

“How?”

She shrugged. “I don’t have the faintest idea. But we’ll do it together, right?” A smile filled her face. “We’ll figure it out.”

Daisy watched her best friend and allowed the relief to seep into her. Even if it was all in her head, at least she had someone like Tessa around to keep her anchored through it all. She gave her a smile.

“We’ll figure it out.”