And yet, incredibly, it also seems to have been inevitable.?*
I swing my head around to look at the closed door—behind which I can now hear Juniper swearing, by the way. I stare at that door as though I can see through it, considering the woman on the other side.
How tightly wound are our fates, and we didn’t even know it? How joined are our lives? I am who I am partly because of her. And she is who she is partly because of who I became after knowing her.
And again her words come, a distant echo in my memory:Is this fate? Do you think this is our second chance?
I don’t believe in fate.
But I do believe in Juniper.
I believe in that woman’s ability to make waves wherever she goes, to force people to grow around her, their own lives changing as they make room for her.
My gaze jumps back to the sticky note on her desk—the one that proclaims her desire to live a quiet, happy life.
I don’t know that a quiet life is in the cards for Juniper Bean. She is the stone in the stream that the water must rush around. And those people, whether they want to be or not, are history-makers. Any time your presencecauses people to change, you’re making history. Sometimes small history, sometimes grand—always worth paying attention to.
I sigh, sinking back onto the bed and running my hand through my hair. I place the photo of young Juniper back where I found it. Then I pick up my book and spend the next ten minutes reading the same page seventeen times in a row.
When the lock finally clicks and I hear Juniper’s cry of excitement, I get up and open the door.
I look her dead in the eye and say, “You don’t need to keep all that food under your desk. You’ll attract ants.” I pause at the rapid blush that climbs her cheeks, her look of triumph dying. “As long as you live in this house,” I finally go on, “I promise I will not let you go hungry. Okay?”
It’s not much of a vow; it shouldn’t feel as momentous as it does. But the gravity settles on my shoulders all the same—not stifling but grounding, like the comfort that comes from lying under a weighted blanket. I give her one last nod before making my exit.
The last thing I see is a pair of blue, surprise-filled eyes—the same eyes I first saw twenty-something years ago, peeking at me from over the edge of a garbage-filled dumpster.
* The easiest things for me to come up with: children and their mischief.
* These little details brought me so much joy to write!
* I always have to double and triple check when someone gives directions in my books, because I know I’ll forget later and write something different instead.
* The answer to that is a solidyes.All the time. I forgot a character’s last name once and had to look it up from the previous book.
* A thought and feeling of mine that I couldn’t help but weave into Juniper. I don’t want or need to make history. I’m grateful for the movers and shakers of the world, because we need them. But I’m also glad I’m not one of them. Am I allowed to admit that? I just want my heart and my family and my soul to be healthy and happy. I want to do good where I can. That’s what I feel most inclined to do with my personality and likes and dislikes and introvertedness!
* Although this isn’t always true, Aiden is someone who usually will not find a woman attractive until he begins to fall for her brain and personality. That’s when he will become attracted to her.
* My favorite part of this story. My very, very favorite.
FROM JUNIPER’S DESK
FROM GRACIE’S DESK
Scribblings, notes, and lists from 2022, found in the notebook I used to draftJuniper Bean Resorts to Murder,and not all of which made it into the final version.
16
IN WHICH JUNIPER MEETS THE WORLD’S MOST GLORIOUS ABS
Iam completely, totally,utterlystuck, and I don’t think I’ve ever felt this helpless.
I didn’t mean for things to turn out like this. But I keep hitting dead ends at every turn. The days keep ticking by with no news. Garrity has to coordinate with someone in Boise to analyze the photos Sandy is supposedly sending, and I still haven’t heard back from Matilda with any information about Thomas Freese, the man who was romantically involved with my mother and then bizarrely committed suicide.
I feel like I’m going insane with how helpless this whole situation makes me feel, and I wanted to dosomething.
So I did.
