The reminder of her bleak dating prospects felt particularly stark today.
Diana had gone to the Honey Bee Bakery after receiving an excited phone call from her older sister, Astrid. Diana had gotten the call as she was walking home from work. She’d assumed that her sister was calling to discuss the wedding dress shopping trip that Kylie had texted her about earlier in the week.
“Hey, Astrid, what’s up?” she’d said.
“Hey, Diana,” her sister greeted. Astrid worked in finance, and she had the brisk, no-nonsense personality to go with it. When Astrid wanted something, she made a list, executed the list, and reached her goals. No fuss.
Today, however, she sounded uncharacteristically nervous.
“Is everything okay?” Diana asked, instantly on edge.
Astrid let out a breathy laugh. “Yes, yes, everything’s fine. Everything’s good, actually. I’m… expecting again!”
“Oh!” Diana felt a bolt of excitement, the tiniest flicker of jealousness, and then a great crashing wave of confusion. “Wait, that’s good, right? You and Justin wanted another, didn’t you?”
As far as Diana knew, her sister and brother-in-law had been looking forward to having a few kids, not just the one they already had. Although goodness knew that Diana’s nephew, Devlin, was perfection.
“Yes, definitely!” Astrid said without hesitation. “It’s just… you don’t think Kylie is going to think I’m trying to upstage her, do you?”
Diana’s heart melted a little for her older sister.
“No, you goof,” she reassured Astrid. “I think Kylie is going to be happy for you, just like I am.”
“Okay,” Astrid said. “Yes, okay. My logical brain knew that but my hormone brain…”
“Ooh,” Diana teased. “Your hormone brainwaswhacky last time, wasn’t it?”
“Oh, shut up,” Astrid said with a laugh. “Anyway, thanks for talking me back down to earth. You’re actually the first person we told. Although if Mom asks, we told her first, obviously.”
“Obviously,” Diana agreed. “How far along are you? How are you feeling?”
As Astrid shared her symptoms and the progress of her pregnancy, Diana found her feet rerouting her toward Honey Bee Bakery.
It wasn’t that she wasn’t happy for her older sister. She was! She really was. She just… wished she had some of that same happiness for herself.
And when the ultrasound photo arrived in Diana’s text messages, the classic shot with the sweet little curve of a baby’s forehead, nose, and chin, Diana was glad she’d paused for the treats.
Her life was good. She didn’t dispute that. She’d worked hard to make her business a success and had been fortunate enough to see that hard work pay off. And she hated to admit that she feltlonely, not when she had so many wonderful friends and was part of such a special community here in Magnolia Shore.
But she was lonely. She felt it when she came home to an empty house at the end of the day, when she climbed alone into bed at night. She wanted to share her life with someone, wanted to complain about the bad times and celebrate the good ones. She wanted to make dinners with them and quibble over whose turn it was to wash the dishes. She wanted sleepless nights with a baby and the joyous milestone of seeing that first, bright gummy smile.
She wanted a family. And she hadn’t been able to figure out how to make that happen for herself.
And sometimes, on days like today, that ached.
“Hey there, stranger.”
Diana had been lost in her thoughts, but now she looked up to see June standing at the base of her porch steps, holding a mason jar full of tea in her hands.
“Hey yourself! What’s up?”
June held up the tea. “Benjamin is at a play date, and I don’t have to work for once, so I thought I’d pop over and see if you wanted to share. Mind if I join you?”
“Not at all!” Diana was sitting on the bench swing she’d installed herself—although she’d had to ask Garrett from the hardware store come over and re-install it after she realized she’d done it wrong. She shimmied over to make space for June and then opened the side of her blanket like a wing, so that Junecould tuck inside its warmth too. Spring had truly sprung, but with the breeze coming off the water, it could still be chilly in the evenings.
June took the offered spot, and snuggling up close to her friend did help keep some of Diana’s loneliness at bay, even if she still longed for a relationship that was more than just platonic.
“It’s herbal,” June explained, pulling two shatterproof cups from inside the bag she had slung over her shoulder. “I swear, like the exact day of my thirtieth birthday, my body decided that if I even smelled caffeine after three in the afternoon, I wouldn’t sleep for a month.”
