Chapter 1
The Wrong Kind of Surprise
Maisie
By the time I spot the giant compatibility quilt going up in the town square, the mayor’s voice is already echoing from the loudspeaker. It’s loud enough to catch, but just distant enough that the words blur into a garbled stream.
Somewhere hidden by the crowd, kettle corn crackles in an iron drum, and a little kid squeals with delight as a balloon slips free and dances into the sky.
I dodge Peaches—the town dog and part-time celebrity—as she trots past in a pink bandana with a red rose tied to her collar. No one’s sure who she belongs to, but she shows up to every festival like she’s on the planning committee.
I’d laugh, but I’m too busy stumbling across the cobblestones. I’m still wearing my lime green linen apron—the one with deep pockets, streaked with potting soil and a stubborn smear of yellow stargazer lily dust, the kind that clings to your fingertips no matter how careful you are. In one hand, I’m squeezing a pair of floral scissors with a stress-ball grip.
The breeze snatches at my sometimes frustratingly strawberry-blonde curls, and I can feel beads of sweat forming on my forehead. The scent of eucalyptus and lilies perfumes the air behind me like a floral contrail—an unmistakable tell that I just sprinted here from a last-minute bouquet drop-off at Dr. Samuel Brook’s place.
Even though I’ve got natural strength from years of hauling flower buckets and arranging weddings under pressure, I’m still breathless by the time I reach the town square. My curls are escaping their scarf, my cheeks are flushed, and I’m gasping for air as if I just finished an underwater breath-holding contest. I bend over, palms on my thighs, taking a second to compose myself.
Blood rushes in my ears, and my heart’s doing double time beneath the apron straps. Somewhere in the square, someone laughs, and it feels miles away—as if, in a strange way, I am losing control of my story, not just my breathing.
“Maisie Quinn . . . and Beau Calla…”
The mayor’s voice crackles through the air just as I reach the edge of the crowd. I barely register the second name—it blurs at the edges, swallowed up by the roaring in my head and the distant clang of the church bells, announcing my doom.
Wait—what?
My phone buzzes in my pocket again. Five missed texts from Jenna. All caps. All increasingly urgent. I duck behind a planter of ornamental kale and check the most recent:
WHERE ARE YOU?? THEY’RE ANNOUNCING MATCHES!!
I suck in a breath, slide the scissors into my apron pocket, and scan the square. It’s already a mess of heart-shaped balloons, flower streamers, and a terrifying amount of glitter. The Stitch Sisters, Sweetpines’ very own belovedquilt club members, are out in force, wielding clipboards and highlighters as if they’re about to direct a military operation. Nearby, a child wails dramatically as a sticky lollipop splats against a vendor’s sandwich board. The vendor groans. The mom sighs. A pair of teenagers burst into laughter.
And smack in the middle of it all, I spot Jenna. Beaming. Waving me over.
“Sorry I’m late,” I puff as I reach her side. I half-expect her to glare or lecture me for cutting it close, but instead, she looks as though she’s been hooked up to a caffeine IV and a gossip column all at once.
Jenna squeals, but barely looks at me. “Maisie Quinn and Beau Callahan,” she repeats like a prophecy. “You heard that, right?”
My pulse jumps. Not the excited kind. The roller-coaster-plunge kind. “I’m sorry—whoandwhat now?”
Her earrings jingle with the force of her excitement, and her lipstick is an unapologetic cherry red, definitely brighter than it was this morning. She’s practically vibrating with matchmaking energy. She grins wider than the Cheshire Cat.
“You. Matched. With. Beau. Callahan.”
A slow-motion reel kicks on in my brain.
Beau Callahan. Older. Quiet. Tess’s big brother.
He left town before I could drive, but I must’ve seen him once or twice—back when Tess, Jenna, and I were inseparable.
One of those bestie sleepovers, probably.
I turn to study the compatibility quilt, recently hoisted high with the ceremony due an ancient relic. Its themed squares—theater masks, pies, cowgirls—are all filled in, except for one. But a volunteer is temporarilyscrawling our names with a fabric pen onto a square adorned with a toolbox and a bouquet of roses. The Stitch Sisters will make the names permanent with thread overnight.
The quilt flaps gently in the breeze, neat stitches of metallic thread catching the light. You can see the town’s pride woven into every square.
I gape at Jenna. “You didn’t.”
She waves a folded event program above her head like a victory flag. “You needed this.”
