Page 16 of Cozy Girl Fall

“He kissed me,” she confessed and the relief was instant.

Keeping it inside this whole time had been a gargantuan effort.

Maybe for some people it would have been weird to talk to their dad about this kind of stuff, but they’d always been close.

And, more than that, her dad gave the best advice—no holds barred.

“The other night, when the thunderstorm rolled into town. We got stuck at the orchard together and waited out the weather in Mom’s shop. ”

Her dad nodded, brows furrowed as he listened to her talk. “Well, I think it’s clear to me why he’s making it so hard for you to avoid him, Pen.”

“It is?”

He patted her on the arm. “He doesn’t want to be avoided, honey.

Maybe you and Tasha have this all worked out between you, but Ethan’s a person with a say in all this as well.

You’ve cast him in a role that he clearly doesn’t want.

Now, whether or not you feel you can be friends with him is up to you. ”

“But Tasha—”

“Should have nothing to do with you and Ethan,” Philip said firmly.

She sighed. “I guess. I just don’t want her to hate me.”

“I know it feels like a bit of a pickle, but really—what kind of friend would Tasha be if she didn’t let you and Ethan work this out for yourselves?

” He took off his glasses and cleaned them idly with the hem of his sweater as she reached for her mug and took a drink, cradling it in her palms as the steam curled up to warm her nose.

“But I still stand by what I said earlier, especially with what you’ve just told me.

Ethan’s a good man, he cares for you. I can’t believe he wouldn’t help you if you asked.

As for the rest … Well, that’s for the two of you to figure out. ”

“Maybe,” she murmured, playing with a loose thread of the floral fabric arm of the sofa.

She couldn’t help feeling like her dad was simplifying things a little too much, mainly because she did care about what Tasha would think and feel.

Besides, if she was being honest, she’d tried not to dwell on what Ethan had said to her.

Like if she didn’t think about it, she could pretend the words weren’t there, spoken into reality and haunting her dreams when she let her guard down.

“I don’t want to make things complicated with him.

” Philip nodded and she continued in a smaller voice. “I don’t want to hurt him again.”

Her dad reached over and squeezed her hand. “Maybe that’s for him to decide.”

She nodded but was still unconvinced even as she felt ready to move on from the maudlin conversation. Even her hot chocolate wasn’t enough to lift her mood. “Where’s Mom?”

Philip waved a hand and crossed one leg over the other as he unfolded his newspaper, the smell of ink oddly comforting. “Well, normally she sees her gal-pals on a Wednesday for brunch but one of them, Karen I think, couldn’t make it so they rescheduled brunch for today.”

“You didn’t want to join them?” she teased and laughed when he gave a mock shudder.

“I’m just fine with my crossword, thank you.” He glanced up at Penny and eyed her over the top of his glasses. “But I wouldn’t say no to a sandwich. If you’re making one.”

Laughter left her easily as she stood and made her way to the kitchen on the other side of the cottage’s ground floor. “Fine, but I’m not cutting off the crusts.”

“That’s OK, honey. I need more curly hair on my chest anyway.”

She rolled her eyes, glad her Mom wasn’t there to see her do it and give her a scolding.

The bread in the bread box was thick and fluffy, making her mouth water as she looked at it.

She hadn’t really done any cooking since she’d left her job in San Fran, not beyond pouring milk onto cereal and assembling the odd sandwich, and for the first time since she’d arrived in Magnolia Springs she realized that she missed it.

The floorboards creaked under her socked feet as she poked her head around the doorway to the lounge. “Do you think Mom would mind if I made us dinner tonight?”

Her dad’s eyes lit up as he smiled. “Not at all.”

She nodded, a little hesitant, and repeated the motion with more confidence. “OK, great.”

What would it be like to cook without the pressure of a head chef screaming at you that the entrees were late?

Or overdone when they weren’t? Working under her old boss had made her good at ducking flying plates, but she couldn’t say whether it had actually made her a better chef.

She missed cooking for the joy of it, trying something new, experimenting with a new flavor or dish …

The contents of the fridge were a little uninspiring so she grabbed her keys and her dad’s sandwich, handing it over to him before slipping on her shoes.

If she was going to cook dinner, she was going to do it right.

And that meant doing the one, dreaded thing she’d managed to avoid since she’d arrived back home: going to the grocery store.

In Magnolia Springs, there was only one general superstore to choose from, though there was also a local market just outside of town, as well as a few artisanal shops.

Penny hated the grocery store. It was loud and busy and they moved everything around a dozen times a month, making the experience wholly frustrating.

Thankfully, she’d picked a rare quiet moment to come in and get out with the short list of groceries she needed to make chicken parm.

It was one of her favorite dishes and she hadn’t made it in literally years because she’d had no time to cook for herself while working at the restaurant in San Francisco.

It should be a crime for a chef to have to live off microwaveable meals.

It was more than a little strange to be walking around the town’s grocery store as an adult, though.

Everything seemed smaller than she remembered and, all told, she was actually on the verge of enjoying herself when she pushed her cart around the corner of the next aisle to grab some herbs.

Instead, she immediately stopped in her tracks and backed up to remain unseen.

Running into Ethan at the grocery store wouldn’t have been ideal to begin with, but to see him there with his ex-fiancée ?

Penny grimaced, hoping they hadn’t seen her before she’d backed away.

Enduring small talk with the two of them when everything was so confusing between her and Ethan right now might be more than Penny could handle.

So, like the scaredy cat she was, she waited in front of the aisle end where bags of chips had been stacked on the plinth and shamelessly eavesdropped.

Ethan’s low chuckle made her heart beat faster even as her stomach dropped to the floor at Shelby’s answering giggle. What could be so funny?

“We always did have a good time together,” Shelby was saying, and Penny dared a glimpse around the corner.

Her hands curled into fists at their proximity, the way Shelby overtly leant into Ethan and batted her eyes at him was ridiculous.

The consolation Penny had was that Ethan didn’t seem to be reciprocating.

“I know, Shel. I just think going for drinks would be a bad idea. I don’t want to blur the lines.” Ethan’s voice was smooth, gentle, and Penny held her breath to listen more closely. “Besides, I thought you were dating someone now?”

Shelby scoffed. “Nothing serious. Not like us.”

Us? Penny bit her lip and forced herself to remain still. It was bad enough that she was snooping on their conversation, let alone if she went charging in to—

To do what? You’re just friends.

Her shoulders sagged and her cart wobbled as she leant her weight into the handles. God, what was she doing? Decision made, she’d started to leave when the sound of her own name made her pause.

“Is this because Penny’s back in town?”

“I don’t know what you—”

“I’m not stupid, Ethan. I’ve seen the way you look at her.”

There was a tense beat of silence that had Penny’s hands tightening on the handles of her cart as she waited to hear what they would say next.

“I don’t think it’s any of your business, Shel,” Ethan said, so softly Penny almost missed the words. “I’m sorry you’re hurting. But what I feel for Penny is between me and her.”

What I feel for Penny— what did he feel for her?

And why did the words fill her with relief?

OK, now she really did need to leave. But she also really wanted some fresh herbs for the meal.

She hovered in place, deliberating for a few moments longer, before deciding to bite the bullet and move round the corner.

It had been quiet for a little while now, so with any luck Ethan and Shelby had moved on.

The wheels of her cart squeaked a little as she got it moving again and barreled into the next aisle with the careless abandon of someone who definitely hadn’t been eavesdropping, only to find her performance was for nothing and the aisle was empty.

She grabbed the herbs she wanted and checked her mental list, realizing she’d got everything she needed. Except …

“Wine,” she muttered, heading back out of the aisle and turning left to grab the last-minute addition to her list. Then, as soon as possible, she was getting the hell out of here.

Grocery stores , she thought and sighed. Trouble every time.

Her mom was still out when Penny got home, so she unloaded the groceries from her car without any interference, swapping her boots for slippers as she came in the door.

After she’d laid out everything she needed on the counter and set the oven to preheat, she tied her old apron round her waist and smiled at the small hole in the top of the pocket on the front.

She’d had the thing for years and had secretly been a little bummed that she’d forgotten it when she’d moved out.

Penny had assumed her mom would have thrown it out—it had certainly seen better days—but instead it had been left hanging on its usual peg on the back of the kitchen door, like it had been waiting for her all this time.

The methodical movements were like muscle memory for her, she’d made the recipe so many times, and it soothed her.

Brain shut off, internal worries fading, Penny focused on slicing and flattening the chicken breasts and heating oil in a pan.

It had been a long time since cooking had felt calming for her; she was too used to the extreme pressures of cooking for hundreds of people and constantly being told she was doing it wrong by her boss—despite never receiving a single complaint from the customers.

This was what she loved, and as she placed the chicken into the hot oil to fry, she wondered why she was fighting so hard to get back to a career that had been slowly killing her.