Chapter Thirteen
Present Day
Acouple of days after the wrap party for Liam’s television show, Lily packed her bags and waited for Liam in the living room of his rental house, listening as he shuffled through his walk-in closet and styled his hair. The plan was for her to head back to Nantucket, reconnect with her family, continue her matchmaking work, and attend a few wedding planning meetings. Due to a few reshoots, interviews, and auditions, Liam would stay in Los Angeles for another week or so, but would be home before Thanksgiving. After that, they’d rent an adorable beachside property for the foreseeable future. They’d buy a house, eventually, but maybe not till after the wedding.
It was all happening.
When Liam emerged, jangling his keys, he smiled down at her and reached for her hand. “You okay?” he asked, his eyes searching. Ever since their argument at the wrap party, things had felt sensitive and strained, as though a single bad look ormean-spirited word could destroy them. They weren’t used to fighting. Maybe, before they got married, they needed to figure out how to do it properly.
Lily got up and kissed her fiancé with her eyes closed. “Thank you for hosting me out here,” she said, her hands on his cheeks. “I loved my little California life.”
Liam’s grin showed all of his perfectly white teeth. “I loved having you here. Seriously. I don’t know what I would have done if you weren’t around. I was going crazy.”
It sounded nice. Lily decided to believe him.
Liam and Lily were quiet on the drive to the airport. Lily flicked through radio stations and eventually settled on a talk radio show that, incidentally, featured her Grandpa Victor Sutton. He was talking about his psychiatry practice, his newfound belief that he didn’t have all the answers, and his and Grandma Esme’s ongoing adoption process of Kade. This twelve-year-old boy had initially been Victor’s client.
“The thing is, we’re all going through something,” Grandpa Victor was telling the host in his impassioned and gritty voice. “Even when we think we’re ‘through’ something, we’re going through something else. We’re constantly evolving.”
“And how does that work with a life partner?” the radio host asked.
“You have to be with someone who evolves with you,” Grandpa Victor said. “You have to be with someone who looks at the grand scheme of life and realizes it’s a beautiful and difficult process that needs to be met head-on.”
Lily glanced at Liam and wondered,Is he willing to meet life head-on with me?But she quickly shook the thought out and switched the station to a song.
At the airport, Liam and Lily kissed and said their goodbyes. Lily waited by the door and watched as Liam sped off toward the highway, going far faster than he’d dared when she was in thecar. She said a brief prayer for his safety, then entered the glass doors. It was time to go home.
She first noticed the magazines when she landed at Newark Airport many hours later. At every single newspaper stand and convenience store throughout the airport, magazines featuring several gossip-driven stories were sold for six ninety-nine. In the corner of the cover was a photograph of Liam and Bex, howling into a karaoke microphone, throwing their heads back. The mini heading asked:Love on Set?Her hand shaking, Lily pulled a magazine from the rack and flipped through to find the nothing article, which spoke about Liam’s new show, which streaming site it was going to be featured on, and who the other co-stars were. The writer called the actors and actresses up-and-comers in Hollywood. And he said that “romantic tensions were brewing” between co-stars Liam Reynolds and Bex Shepherd.
Lily’s mouth went dry. As she fitted the magazine back in the slot, she told herself that these kinds of gossip articles were fabricated. They were meant to drive interest and viewership for television shows and movies. Nothing in Hollywood was ever real. But as she limped to her flight gate, she thought about Bex and Liam, about the intensity of their chemistry the night of the wrap party. (If she were honest, she’d felt that chemistry every time she’d been around them. If she were honest as a matchmaker, she might have paired the two of them up.)
Lily slumped in a plastic airport chair and put her face in her hands. She could feel nervous and curious eyes around her, trying to make sense of the twenty-three-year-old girl with a broken heart.
When her gate back to Nantucket was called, Lily sniffed twice and pulled her hands away from a face she was sure was blotchy and red. She gathered her things and checked her phone, praying for a text from Liam, one that met her sorrow head-onwith awow, that article is so stupid. I’m sorry about that. You know how the gossip train runs.
But instead, there was a message from, of all people, Yoko Reynolds.
YOKO: Hi, Lily. I heard from my son that you will be returning to the island this week. Please let me know if you’d like to come by for dinner. It would be good to reconnect.
Rebecca and Chad waited in their humming car for Lily to emerge from the Nantucket Airport. Chad popped out, looking bigger than he had a month ago, broader and taller. He hugged his eldest sister, threw her bags in the back, and hurried back into the warmth of the car. The blustery island made Lily’s cheeks bright red with cold. Rebecca hugged Lily tightly and said, “Welcome home! We’ve missed you!” Lily had missed them, too. Desperately. But as they drove back to Rebecca’s place, the sun dropped into the Atlantic, and Lily felt dark and sad.
That night, Rebecca ordered them pizza and opened a big two-liter bottle of diet soda. Chad ate more pizza than Lily had seen anyone consume at once since her own high school years and eventually passed out on the sofa. This left Rebecca and Lily to tiptoe into the cozier den, where Rebecca opened a bottle of wine and asked Lily for more details about California. Lily kept things bright. She told her mother about the sunshine, about the people and their clothes, about the taco trucks and the film parties and the rental where she’d played “house” with Liam. She could feel her mother fixating on her face, onher expressions, as though Rebecca wanted to take issue with something that had happened out West. But Lily found she was a good actress. Maybe she’d learned a thing or two from Bex and Liam.
The following morning, after Chad left for school and Rebecca took off to prep things for the restaurant, Lily drove off to visit Mick Hamilton. Her private fear was that he hadn’t seen anyone since his awful date with the trust fund woman. She worried he was going to go wild in that studio-house of his, painting and painting till the rest of the world didn’t make sense to him anymore. She wanted to remind him there were other opportunities to fall in love. She’d even prepared a short but powerful list of potential dates for him.
Mick was expecting her. He’d cleaned his kitchen to a sparkling shine, and he’d baked scones with blueberries and made a pot of coffee. He’d even tried to tend to his chaotic dark curls. “Please, sit down!” he said, gesturing toward the kitchen table.
Lily felt a blush crawl up her chest. “This is too much!” she said, and it was. But she sensed he needed to show his generosity to someone, anyone. Maybe she was his only friend.
The scones were divine: buttery, soft, and slightly sour. “Where did you learn to bake these?” she cried.
Mick looked pleased. “I have plenty of time to try out new recipes. I brought some cookies to the Sutton Book Club the other day.”
“You went!”
“I’ve been going,” Mick said, lowering his chin. “Your grandmother is a literary wizard. The way she analyzes books opens my mind to new possibilities. I think it’s even helping my painting a little bit. I find myself moving in different directions based on what a book makes me feel.” His cheeks reddened. “That sounds cheesy, I guess.”
“It doesn’t,” Lily said. “I love it. It’s beautiful.”
