Page 6 of Home Town

“So you do know what I do for a living.”

“What’s that, dear?” her mother asked in response to Josie’s mumbling.

“Nothing. You were saying something about a celebration?”

“Yes. It’s the 250th anniversary of the settling of Sidney... Or almost.”

“Almost?”

“Well, the actual two hundred and fiftieth anniversary was a couple of years ago, but you know, the pandemic, so we’re kind of fudging it. No one’s going to do the math. Probably. Just be a little hazy with the details and I’m sure it will be fine.”

Josie stifled a laugh. Only in Sidney, New York would they lie about their own anniversary.

“All right. Let me search flights and I’ll let you know when I can be there. Okay?”

“Perfect. Peanut Butter! Get out of the fish tank! I gotta go, Josie.”

The click of what Josie knew was the landline’s kitchen extension being slammed back into the cradle on the wall as her mother ran to save the fish from a cat named Peanut Butter had Josie shaking her head as she smiled.

Maybe going home for a little while wouldn’t be so bad. It would certainly be interesting.

Deciding to grab a cup of tea before she dove into finding a flight, she opened the door and stepped from her bedroom into the hallway—then froze.

By the sounds coming through the door of the other bedroom, Quinn and Bailey were at it again. Or rather, just finishing up, given the crescendo that leveled off to silence just in time for her to hear it as she walked past.

Lucky her.

She scowled, and rather than tiptoeing by and pretending to not hear, she pounded one fist on the door and said, “Dammit, Quinn, it’s barely seven in the morning!”

“Then don’t fucking listen!” he called back.

After which Bailey added, “Sorry, Josie!”

She doubted Bailey was all that sorry. Her best friend was too head over heels in love with Quinn.

Josie voiced that opinion aloud with a laugh. “No, you’re not!”

She really wasn’t mad at them, even though they could try to be a little quieter. It was just getting to be close quarters around there in the two-bedroom, one bath beach-view rental that cost them all more than it should because of the location.

It was definitely time to go home for a little bit.

“I really am. But he’s leaving in like two hours,” Bailey explained through the closed door but Josie still heard the catch in her voice.

“Which is confidential!” Quinn added the warning.

“Who the hell do you think I’m going to tell?” She rolled her eyes, then continued to the kitchen to put on the tea kettle.

She knew how this morning was going to go. They’d been through this before. Every time Quinn got called away with the team.

Bailey would cry her eyes out while obsessively checking her cell phone and the international news. She’d bake up a storm, something sweet and decadent and the reason Josie had put on ten pounds in the past year of them living together. But then Bailey would channel her sadness into writing another best-selling song.

Given the culinary and career benefits of Bailey’s grieving Quinn’s absences, Josie had learned to keep her mouth shut and let things play out as usual.

As she reached for the tea kettle she realized her parents would be gone for most of the time she was in New York and she’d have the whole house all to herself.

She wouldn’t know what to do with all the peace and quiet, even with the bunch of rowdy, possibly feral kittens tearing up the house and terrorizing the fish.

But her leaving for New York also meant Bailey would be here alone. Without Quinn and without Josie, her best friend, for support.

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