Page 132 of Salty Pickle

It’s all here.

A shuffle on the floor makes me turn around. Court stands in the door with a folded blanket and a picnic basket from Mom’s pantry.

“Thought we could have an early dinner here before we head back.”

I rush up to him and wrap my arms around his neck. He lowers the basket and lets me hold onto him, his lips in my hair.

“I love you,” I say, and I’m surprised to find that I mean it. I’m not sure how love is supposed to grow or how long it’s supposed to take, but I feel it.

“I love you too, Lucy.”

I pull back. “Is it too fast?”

His expression is serious. Not the salty kind, the one I first knew. But earnest. “I think maybe it will only grow stronger from here.”

I take the blanket from him. “Let’s eat in the living room. The old rug is there. It will give us extra padding.”

“For dinner?” he asks.

“No,” I say. “For breaking in my new house.”

He sets the basket on the floor. “In that case, we’re walking way too slow.”

He picks me up and throws me over his shoulder.

I let out a squeal. It feels amazing, my body so close to his, only a normal belly between us.

When he sets me down in front of the fireplace, he does it slowly, carefully, until my feet are back on the ground.

Then he kisses me and undresses me, and we spread the blanket and remind ourselves of how we got in this predicament in the first place. Kisses. Touches. His mouth everywhere on my body.

Then he jumps up and runs, naked, back to the basket, where he’s stashed the condoms.

When we’re bundled up in the blanket as the sky gets dark, I tell him, “I think we’re going to be very happy here. I can teach Julian how to milk Matilda. Where to spot bearberries.” I poke his chest. “Of course, we’ll have to figure out how to support ourselves.”

“We will.” Court draws me close. “I think we’re going to need more goats.”

EPILOGUE: LUCY

Five months later.

Spring is a beautiful season at BeeBee’s farm. I peer out the window as Mom sticks another pin in my veil. It was hers originally, but we found a TikTok video about how to bleach the yellowing out of it to use it again.

Everything I wear is old, other than my wedding ring. We refashioned BeeBee’s gown, which Dad found stored in the trunks he’d put in storage after selling the farm.

I learned he kicked in quite a bit of money to help Court buy it for me. It’s a gift from two of my best three men.

The third one lies on his back on a blanket, shaking the Mickey Mouse rattle he’s finally figured out how to grasp. He’s my something blue in a smart baby suit.

“You ready?” Mom asks. “I hear the music starting.”

I nod.

I touch the old pine furniture that Court carved with his grandfather as I walk through the room. Court has made a new piece for the set, a bookcase, and in it, I’ve placed all of BeeBee’s cookbooks and sewing manuals that were stored in trunks.

His new wood shop is fully operational in Grandpa’s work barn, and the orders are slowly trickling in. Between that and my yoga classes, we’ve been getting by. It helps that the house is paid for.

Matilda is due any day, and once we’re getting goat cheese money again, I’ll increase the size of our herd to get a hobby farm going.

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