Page 35 of Let’s Give ‘Em Pumpkin to Talk About

Twenty-One

G race was at the table, touching up her perfect coral lipstick using a compact that looked like a scallop shell.

Sadie had swiped on some eyeliner that morning, but she wouldn’t be surprised if it had already smeared into raccoonish circles from the sweat she broke while biking into town at breakneck speed.

She joined Grace and immediately began mopping her brow with the napkins on the table.

“Why can I see your nipples?” Grace asked.

Now that was a greeting. “Because I’m not wearing a bra. I came as fast as I could.”

“Sadie!” Grace snapped. “You’re in public. What you do in your own home is one thing, but have some respect. There are children here.”

“They all have nipples, too.”

“Honestly.” Grace paused, narrowing her eyes and giving her a long assessment. “You’ve been having sex. It’s Josh, isn’t it? Fuck, I’ve never been more jealous of you.”

When had Grace ever been jealous of her? Grace was the perfect daughter, after all: good student, well-liked, all her ducks both in a row and wearing cute outfits. Sadie had never offered up anything to bruise Grace’s ego. Sadie’s ducks had been trampled by hogs and caught up in a tornado.

“How can you tell? Do I have jizz in my hair or something?” Sadie asked.

“Don’t be gross.”

“You’re the one who brought up my nipples.”

“You’re staying at his house. You have this weirdly relaxed and satisfied air. The breezy, no-bra vibes confirmed it,” Grace said. She paused for a beat. “Take it from me. He’ll break your heart. Love is a lie.”

“I’m afraid it’s going to be the other way around, Gracie,” Sadie said, and promptly changed the subject. “Anyway, I’m not going to ask if you’re okay because I know the answer, but what’s going on? I don’t think your problem is actually with my nipples.”

“I mean, it’s not not your nipples,” Grace said under her breath. “But yes, it’s over with Kyle. Then I made the mistake of calling our mother before texting you. So now she and I are fighting, too.”

Sadie nodded. Their mother had a failed marriage, so Grace’s predicament would naturally dredge up big feelings for her. And big feelings always led to her lashing out.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“No. It’s pathetic. He’s been cheating on me for months with someone from my fucking book club. Why does he have to be such a stereotype?”

Sadie had harbored suspicions, but shooed them away. Surely her sister was too canny to fall for that many late nights at work. Apparently anyone could live in a distorted reality.

“Do you want to talk about our mother? Whatever she’s saying, she’s being defensive about her own past. She’s thinking about herself and not about you.”

“But if I told you what she’s saying, you’d agree with her,” Grace said. She took a sip from her coffee and pushed a plate of pastries toward Sadie. One of them was some kind of filled croissant and Sadie bit into it with gusto, raining buttery flakes onto her shirt.

“Try me,” she said through a mouthful of sweet and nutty almond paste.

She wondered who else was going to support Grace through this time of sadness and anger.

Their mother was clearly going to be no help.

And there was bound to be awkward side-choosing among Grace’s friends considering how small towns intertwined people’s lives.

She wanted to say this was why you didn’t join clubs, but she knew it wouldn’t be helpful.

Sadie’s napkin blew off the table and when she reached down to get it, a beady pair of eyes were staring her down from inside Grace’s L.L.Bean tote. She yelped.

“Who the fuck is that?” she asked.

“Brutus. You remember Mrs. Schnegenberger?”

“The school librarian? Sure.”

“She’s going into hospice care and she asked me to take care of her dog until she gets out.”

Sadie’s brow wrinkled. “A, that’s not how hospice care works. And B, how is Mrs. Schnegenberger still alive? She was an old lady when I was a kid, so she’s gotta be, like, vampire years old now.”

Grace shrugged. “She’s positive she’s not actually dying, and that they won’t figure this out until she has the record for longest time spent in hospice. She’s writing to Guinness and everything.”

“Is this the best time for you to get a dog?” Sadie asked. “I feel like dogs thrive in a stable home and I love you, Grace, but I don’t know if you have that in you at the moment.”

Grace sat up straight. “I most certainly do. I’m keeping the house, I have my job, I have a lot more free time now that I have no husband and no friends. I’m perfectly capable of caring for another life.”

“You have me,” Sadie offered.

“You’re not a friend, you’re family. And anyway, SPICE is three weeks away and then you’re back to California again.”

“I could call you more often.”

“Face it, you’re not a phone person. About the best you can do is respond to my texts with one-word answers or skull emojis.”

Sadie wasn’t a particularly good daughter, being that she didn’t speak to one parent and often fought with the other one to avoid her feelings.

She wasn’t a good girlfriend, because she could never manage to be what other people wanted.

She wasn’t a great friend because people didn’t like the way she showed up in their lives with the frequency of a comet, preferring the vastness and solitude of space.

Clearly, she wasn’t much of a sister either.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“You don’t have to be sorry,” Grace said. “Your skull emojis convey a lot. But if I waited until the timing was perfect to get a dog, then I wouldn’t have Brutus, and I love him.”

Sadie leaned over again to get another peek at the orange Pomeranian. He snarled at her. She hissed back. He dived into the safety of the tote bag.

“Don’t antagonize him.”

“It’s all I know. Anyway, are you coming to SPICE?”

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Grace said.

Despite her current state of affairs, Grace was someone who had deep relationships and showed up for people. Sadie was neither used to saying nor hearing such earnest words. But maybe she could get used to it.

“You have to tell me more about Josh.”

“It’s too gross,” Sadie replied. “I like him. You won’t be able to stomach it.”

“I absolutely can. Let’s take the pastries to go,” Grace said. “We’ll throw your bike in the back of my car and I’ll take you home, yeah? I want to see the pumpkins and where you’re living these days.”

She had expected more emotion from this meeting, but Grace was stoic. Or she knew Sadie was better for distraction than a heart-to-heart.

Sadie needed to learn how to be someone who could withstand being leaned on. Maybe she could do it for Grace. Heaven help her—or hell, she wasn’t picky—she could do it for Josh.

Then she remembered her first meetup with Grace upon her return to Indiana. Grace had obviously had such a crush on Josh. Now that Grace was getting divorced, that crush could blossom…

Sadie would be leaving for Los Angeles again soon, and however fond she was of Josh, she had zero interest in a long-distance relationship.

Her own sister’s complaints about her ability to text made it a certainty that Josh would grow resentful of the distance she’d put between them, emotional and physical.

Perhaps she should tell Grace that when and if she was ready to date again, she had her blessing to pursue something with Josh.

It wasn’t as if she had any immediate plans for visiting again anytime soon.

By then, enough time would have passed that this big rock of feelings for Josh would have surely eroded to something manageable, a smooth river stone that could fit into any pocket.

As Grace wailed along with the singer on the radio, matching a riff note for note, she thought of how well suited the two of them would be.

And then she thought, Fuck no .

That thought came from someplace deep within her, the primal kind of urge that she simply couldn’t tune out.

It was the same urge that prompted Sadie’s next thought. Josh is mine.