I settle into an armchair that’s approximately eight thousand times more comfortable than it looks. The wine is good. The cinnamon roll Amber hands me is better. For about ninety seconds, I let myself believe this is just a normal brunch with friends.
Then Mads leans forward with this intense look.
“So,” she says. “Scott.”
“No.”
“Jessica—”
“We’re not doing this.”
“We absolutely are.” Jo waves her wine glass for emphasis. “You’ve been weird for weeks. Caroline’s been keeping a tally of your secret identity romance recommendations. Mrs. Sanders called Michelle three times yesterday to report on your ‘emotional state.’”
“Mrs. Sanders needs a hobby.”
“Youareher hobby,” Amber says. “You and Scott. She’s invested.”
“The whole town is,” Hazel adds gently. “You two have been circling each other for months, and now that everything’s out in the open?—”
“It’s not out in the open. Nothing is happening. I’m fine.”
Grandma Hensley pulls out a cocktail napkin and a pen and draws a short line. “That’s one.”
“What are you doing?”
“Keeping count. Every time you say ‘I’m fine’ when you’re clearly not fine, I make a mark.” She waves the napkin. “I predict double digits by the time we’re done here.”
“I’m not?—”
“Two,” she says, making another mark before I even finish the sentence.
“I didn’t say it!”
“You were about to.”
Michelle refills my wine glass. “Just let it happen, Jess. Resistance is futile.”
“This is an ambush.”
“More like friends helping each other,” Mads corrects. “Ambushes are hostile. We’re coming from love.” She reaches over and squeezes my hand. “We want you to be happy. And we’ve all watched you be miserable for weeks while the man you’re mad at fixes your building and sends you polite text messages and waits for you to stop punishing him.”
“I’m not punishing him.”
“You called him ‘Mr. Avery’ at the committee meeting,” Jo says. “In front of everyone. That’s punishment.”
“I’m just being respectful and professional.”
“You’re disguising punishment as professionalism, which is honestly worse.”
I open my mouth to argue, but a sound erupts from outside that can only be described as righteous fury filtered through a megaphone. Everyone turns toward the back window.
Reggie is standing on the windowsill.
He’s enormous—easily the biggest rooster I’ve ever seen—with iridescent feathers that shimmer green and black in the sunlight. His comb flops dramatically to one side. One beady eye is fixed directly on me, head tilted, as if he’s sized me up and found me lacking.
He crows again, louder and more pointed.
“Even the rooster thinks you’re being ridiculous,” Grandma Hensley says.
