Page 73 of The Disasters of Dating
I nod. “Yeah. How do you know Poppy?”
She leans forward and grabs my hand. “She is perfect for you, Keat. I’m so excited right now.”
“But how do you know her?”
“She and my sister, Paisleigh, have been best friends since they were, like, four years old.” She laughs. “Has she guessed your sign yet?”
Oh, my heck, it’s the same Poppy. I was holding out hope that there might be two Poppy Ashcombes who work at The Wandering Reader and have a best friend named Paisleigh. But she even knows about Poppy’s horoscope proclivities. There can only be one ofthosePoppy Ashcombes. I smile, but I’m not feeling easy in the least. My worlds are colliding! “Yeah, but she was wrong. Four times.”
Shay’s eyes widen. “No way. Poppy’s never wrong about that kind of thing.”
I shrug, feeling a little proud that I’d thrown her off. “We may have gotten off on the wrong foot at our first meeting. It gave her some false assumptions that she factored in.”
Evan clears his throat. “As much as I’d like to hear more about this—” He looks at his fiancée. “Shay, if we are going to make our reservation on time, we need to get going.”
She glances over at Evan. “Yeah, okay.” Then stares me down, pointing her finger at me. “But this isn’t over. When we get back from Montreal, you’re coming to dinner at Evan’s and we’re going to chat.”
Normally, such an invitation would thrill me. But Shay has a gleamin her eye that makes me a little frightened. “Okay. But, hey, can you tell your sister not to mention this to Poppy? I don’t want her to be weirded out.”
Shay waves a hand at me. “It won’t weird her out. If anything, knowing me will give you more street cred with her.”
I laugh. “I’m sure it will. No one who knows you can do anything but love you. But I would like to be the one who tells her. Okay?”
Shay nods. “Okay. I didn’t tell Pais. I just asked her the question. I’ll make up an excuse about why I wanted to know where Poppy worked. Maybe I’ll say I want to ask her if I can sell some books in her store.”
“Thanks, Shay.” I relax back into my chair. “I’ll look forward to my debriefing.”
Shay smiles, her head shaking. “I love this whole thing so much!” She’s downright giddy!
Evan gives me wide eyes as he grabs Shay’s hand. “Come on, Princess. We’ve been looking forward to this trip for months. Let’s not miss it because of Keaton’s love life.” He gives me a serious face. “Hey, you can’t miss the board meeting on Friday—I don’t care how cute she is. I need you here in person. Nathan, Greg, and Lawrence will all be here, and I need you here too.”
I give him a firm salute. “Yes, sir.”
He motions to the papers. “Now go home. You put in enough hours every week. You don’t need to come in on a Saturday.”
I smile. “I wanted to read over these. Then I’ll head home. I promised Lowell we could go play basketball this afternoon and then go for pizza.”
Shay sticks her head back in the door. “One thing you should keep in mind is that you’ll probably have to move to Utah if you marry her. I can’t imagine she’ll move away from Utah. Not with everything that happened.”
Evan gives me a goodbye nod, and they both disappear. Shay already has us married? And what was everything that happened?
I watch them as they wait for the elevator. She must be talking about Poppy’s dad dying. But I already knew that moving out of state was likely a no-go for Poppy.
I settle back and look out my office window. We are not in a high-rise in downtown Boston. We’re on the top floor of a low-rise building in Charlestown. But I can still see downtown in the distance. Am I willing to let this go? I don’t think I’ve seriously considered it before. I mean, I’ve only known Poppy for a few weeks.
I open my phone and pull up Poppy’s contact info.
What are you up to today?
I know texting her won’t give me answers. It may take years for me to know if I’m willing to leave the East Coast.
I set my phone down, thinking it will be a while before she answers. But my phone vibrates immediately.
Poppy
Just getting stuff put together for work today. I got some new oils for the diffuser! You?
I smile. New oils. Poppy’s the only person I know who’d exclamation point that. I look down at her face on my screen and then out at the view of Boston. My gaze immediately dropsback to my phone.
