Page 12 of For My Finale
Chapter Five
The morning rush was winding down, leaving behind the usual battlefield of used mugs, spilled sugar, and a counter that looked like a crime scene from an oat milk massacre. Blossom moved efficiently, wiping down surfaces with practiced ease.
“Too much cheerful,” groaned Ives.
“Shouldn’t you be at school already?” asked Blossom.
“Eh, there’s a special assembly about the Bicycle Proficiency Test,” Ives said. “Since I’ve already passed mine, I thought I’d skip it and give you the pleasure of my company instead.”
“I’m charmed,” Blossom said.
“So, what’s new?” asked Ives, holding out her cup for a refill.
“New?” asked Daisy, pushing open the door just in time to hear Ives’s question. “New? I’ll tell you what’s new!” She was practically gasping, and she clutched onto the cafe counter like she needed support. “What’s new is that Lilah Paxton has moved into Bankton!” she finally managed to huff out.
Blossom, who knew that keeping any kind of secret in town was practically impossible, sighed and came clean. “Yeah, um, about that. I sort of know.”
“Know?” Daisy blinked. “What do you mean, you know?”
Blossom shrugged and tamped down some espresso grounds. “Um, she lives next door.”
There was a silence so thick that Blossom could have cut itwith a butter knife. Then Daisy let out an ear-piercing squeal.
“What?” she said, grabbing Blossom’s arm and shaking it. “You… she… what?”
Blossom gently removed Daisy’s fingers. “Daze, you’re the postwoman, remember?”
“And?”
“And, didn’t you find out that Lilah Paxton was in town from some sort of letter or change of address card or something?”
“Yeah,” Daisy said. “Her name was on an envelope…” She trailed off for a second. “Right, yeah, I see what you’re getting at.”
“We have almost the same address,” Blossom agreed.
Ives cleared her throat and raised an eyebrow. “And when exactly were you planning on telling me this?”
Blossom felt heat crawl up her neck. She knew that she’d deliberately not told Ives, but now that didn’t seem like the best decision. “It’s not a big deal, it’s really not.”
“Mmm-hmm,” said Ives, a slow, knowing smirk starting to spread across her face. “Totally normal to have an A-list celebrity as your next door neighbor and say nothing about it. Right. Sure.”
“Ives,” Blossom said. “It’s not like that.”
“Right, nothing to do with the enormous crush that you’ve got on the woman,” said Ives.
“Next door,” Daisy said, clutching at her heart like she might actually faint, which, given the fact that she was more rotund than she should be for her age, was a definite possibility. “You saw her? You talked to her? Is she glamorous? Is she completely stunning? Is she….” She took a breath as she ran out of questions.
“She was soaking wet, covered in mud, being chased by Billy apparently, and then she didn’t like my tea,” Blossom said, trying to make the encounter sound as bad as possible. Though now that she thought about it, she didn’t have to try that hard.
Daisy looked scandalized. “She insulted your tea?”
“She insulted everything,” Blossom said. “But given that she thought Bill had almost trampled her, she was having a roughday, so I forgave her.”
“You’d forgive Mussolini,” Ives said.
“For inventing the radio?” asked Daisy, confused.
“That was Marconi,” Blossom said to be helpful. “Mussolini was the fascist dictator. Italian.” She turned back to Ives. “And I certainly wouldn’t forgive him.”
