Page 179 of Never Let You Go

I lean toward her. “One last thing. No matter what you do, you’ll never love him the way I do. And he knows that.”

I only get a few hours of agitated sleep. I’m high-strung when I get to the big hotel where the baking testing takes place the next day.

I take deep breaths and calm down.

I need to pass. No choice.

I concentrate. Think one last time about my purpose. And understand Christopher’s focus, on screen: this needs to get done.

I try to channel his strength.

My assignments are easier than I anticipated, and I don’t encounter any problems. I’m asked to do brioches, croissants, a baguette, and a specialty bread.

I take a moment to plan on paper the order in which I’ll prepare each bread, so I’m done in the allotted time, demonstrating my organizational skills in the bakeshop. I also write down the proportions from memory, so I don’t mess up at the last minute. No more overflowing dough for me.

I finish with fifteen minutes left for the cleanup. It might be the last time I ever do anything related to baking, so I tackle it like a personal cleanse. A clean slate before I begin a new chapter in my life.

“You have been taught well,” the examiner tells me. He speaks with a French accent. “Who iz your master?” he asks, looking down his list.

Master?

“Ah yes,” he says. “Monsieur Wright.”

He harumphs. Cocks an eyebrow. Jots down his notes. “He will receive your results by electronic mail,” he says, straightening, then walking away, hands behind his back.

“Did I pass?” I ask, forcing him to turn around.

“Mais oui, bien sûr,” he shrugs with a frown.

Torn, I deflate. Then I remember why I did this.

It doesn’t make me feel better.

fifty-three

Alexandra

Two weeks later

The last biting sun rays duck behind the mountain. “One more hour,” Sarah says, “and that should do it.”

Now that it’s cooling down, I feel like I could go on for hours. I don’t feel my legs anymore, and the blisters on my feet are healing.

When Sarah picked me up from the exam, I asked her if I could join her on her backpacking trip. I needed to get away. And I needed a buffer between my time in Emerald Creek and my move back to New York. Between my scorching love story with Christopher and the next slice of my life, at Red Barn Baking.

Something to ease the pain. To make the transition less brutal.

While I was in Montpelier taking the exam, Sarah grabbed all my stuff from my room, dumped it in Grace’s garage, even my phone—especially my phone—except whatever gear I needed for backpacking. She arranged for everything to be picked up and shipped to New York. She told Grace I’d come back soon to say a proper goodbye, once the dust settled.

I also wanted Skye to know I hadn’t abandoned her. That I would still be in her life, even if I knew that was probably not going to happen long term. But I can see myself coming back to Emerald Creek for a visit, staying at Grace’s, and seeing Skye there.

For the first two days of the hike, when I wasn’t breaking down sobbing against a tree, I’d focus on the searing pain of the blisters on my feet to get out of my head.

“Breathe into it,” Sarah, who believes yoga cures everything, kept saying. I could have killed her. Until, one day, I tried it. And maybe it was the dehydration—water is freaking heavy to carry on a trail—but it worked. Breathing into your pain makes it go away. “It’s because you’re telling your body it’s all right, so it stops acting up and sending you pain signals.”

“So, I’m tricking my body.”

“You gotta do what you gotta do to make the pain go away.”

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