Poppy was a sucker for built-ins. The house that she’d bought was a run-down fixer-upper, and it didn’t have any history or charm, but she was hoping to add some in.
She tried not to gawk but failed. “Wow,” was all she could muster. “That is…really something.”
“Tabitha calls it the Princess Castle. She’s convinced there’s a secret passage behind the shelves.” Deacon gestured to the glass doors, which led to the backyard. “The ADU is out back. I’m sure you’re ready to get settled.”
They stepped outside onto a flagstone patio strung with lanterns. There was a pool that sparkled in the sun, and beyond it, a path led to a guest house, a miniature, self-contained cottage that looked out onto a slope of pines.
Tabitha skipped ahead, bouncing up the steps and throwing open the door theatrically. “Ta-da!”
The guest house was compact but thoughtfully designed, and most importantly, free. One of the draws of taking the nanny position was that room and board were included. A tiny kitchen, with new stainless-steel appliances, marble countertops, and white shaker cabinets already stocked with coffee, tea, and a basket of fruit, sat in the far right corner. A sunlit living room with a cozy blue velvet loveseat and a wall of bookshelves was directly to the left. Opposite the kitchen sat the bedroom, which housed a window seat, a king-sized bed, and a small writing desk by the window. It felt like the inside of a snow globe, or maybe the set of an indie movie about a writer who drinks too much tea and falls in love with her neighbor.
Or maybe she’d just been reading too many small-town romances lately.
“This is beautiful. It looks even better than the pictures. It’s like a reverse catfish,” Poppy teased.
“Good, I’m glad.” Deacon walked to the door, and Tabitha, who had already grown bored of the house tour, skipped out and was picking flowers in the garden. He followed his daughter outside, and Poppy stepped out onto the patio area. “If you need anything, don’t hesitate to ask. And I don’t know what your plans are, but we’re having spaghetti tonight, you’re welcome to join.”
“Thanks, but I’ve got a lot of studying to do.” It was true that she did have studying, but also ever since finding out AJ was in town, she’d felt on edge, and it had made her exhausted.
He smiled, clearly not taking any offense to her declining the invitation. “Alright. Well, see ya tomorrow.”
Deacon and Tabitha walked back up the path and disappeared behind the sliding back doors, leaving Poppy blinking beneath the late afternoon sun. She lingered just amoment on the flagstone patio, toes curled over the edge as she watched the perfect little family through the window. Tabitha twirled on the kitchen tile as Deacon pulled pasta from a box, and Rocco nosed around for dropped treasures. It was a scene so wholesome and self-contained she felt like a voyeur just existing on the same property. It was also, inconveniently, exactly the sort of scenario she’d spent her whole childhood yearning after.
The feeling she’d always tried to hide scraped at her from the inside. It was a secret torment that she couldn’t run from, the hollowed-out ache of not being enough that had always been a part of her as much as her sense of sight or smell. She didn’t think she was born with it, like her other senses. She was fairly certain it had been put there by a father who never claimed her, loved her, or knew her.
Thinking about it had the same effect as getting gremlins wet after midnight, it grew and multiplied. So she did all she could to extinguish it like she would a fire, suffocating it and robbing it of oxygen. She closed her eyes, forced her mind to go blank and then physically shook her arms out before heading back to her car to collect her belongings.
The trunk of her Civic was a testament to someone who’d planned a move without enough boxes. One duffel bag with shoes and toiletries, a laundry basket buckling under the weight of half-folded clothes, two garbage bags with clothes, a battered Celine Dion tote bag filled with romance novels, and a sad grocery sack bursting with random kitchen items: her new mug, four ramens, two boxes of cereal, a bag of chips, Ritz crackers, and a fancy chef’s knife she’d impulse-bought at Williams Sonoma last year.
Poppy loaded herself up, pack mule style, and shuffled across the garden path to her new front door. She almost dropped her Celine tote twice but managed to make it in one trip. The senseof accomplishment she felt upon opening the door was probably out of proportion, but it felt like a small, private victory.
The interior was even more charming in the fading light, every surface turning soft gold. Poppy stood in the center of the living room, arms full, and just breathed for a second. She could appreciate the space more now that she was seeing it alone. It was always pressure when looking around with someone else. The blue velvet loveseat looked like it would swallow her whole if she gave it half a chance, which she loved. A big comfy couch was just what she needed. She dumped her belongings on the rug, then padded over to the wall of bookshelves and ran a finger over the smooth, empty wood. The possibilities made her giddy.
She unpacked quickly, eager to erase any evidence of the moving process. She folded her clothes into the cedar dresser, inhaling the delicious scent, letting the aroma fill her lungs. She lined up her shoes by the door and arranged her meager kitchen supplies with the care of a chef opening a new restaurant. She even found a hook to hang up the pink apron her niece Zoya had made her last Christmas with FOR POP-TART USE ONLY, embroidered on it. The bathroom was small but had everything she needed, stocked with fluffy towels and little bottles of shea butter and vanilla hand soap. By the time she collapsed on the velvet loveseat with her computer, the place already felt a shade more lived-in.
After a moment of self-congratulation for not procrastinating, she opened her laptop and flipped to her online grad seminar. The tabs on her browser—neurodiversity studies, pediatric therapy, tuition payment deadline reminders—felt like little paper cuts. She tried to muster enthusiasm for her readings, but her mind wandered, restless and unsettled, making it impossible to concentrate. It had been that way ever since Yaya announced AJ was in town.
The knock at the door was so abrupt it made her yelp. Poppy froze. No one knew where she lived. The only person who had her address was Zion, and he always texted before he came by. But the knock came again, insistent, and this time she crept to the door and squinted through the peephole.
Her mom’s face was so close, which warped the perspective so much she almost didn’t recognize her at first. She wore an expression somewhere between curiosity and outright terror as she surveyed the area as if she expected to find a ransom note taped to the door. Poppy sighed, braced herself, and opened up.
“Oh good, you’re alive,” her mom joked, sort of.
“Hi, Mom. Come in.” Kerri Wilson looked like a Pinterest board for “boho chic mom,” all drapey linen and stacked jewelry, her brunette hair twisted into a messy bun. She circled the place twice, taking in the shelves, the kitchen, and the window seat, pausing just long enough to prop open a window “for ventilation” and test the smoke detector because “you never know.” She wrinkled her nose at the sight of Poppy’s ramen stash but didn’t say anything because Kerri Wilson “did not meddle.”
“It’s very…cozy,” she declared finally. “I mean, the price is clearly right, but are you sure you’re comfortable living this close to a strange man and his child?”
“He’s not a serial killer, Mom.” Poppy rolled her eyes, but with affection.
“You never know, honey. You have to be careful. Did you see what happened to the girl in Nevada City?”
“You have to stop watching Dateline.”
“I can’t, I need to know what’s out there so I can protect you.”
“Mom, I’m thirty.”
“So was the girl in Nevada City,” she relayed as if Poppy had just proven her point.
