Page 4 of Dear Ripley

They lit up. Approaching the counter and leaning in towards me. “Harlow Merrington is having a baby and she’s coming back to town. Imminently. Her mother is absolutely delighted. We play bridge together, you know?”

I held the interested expression on my face with some effort, even as the floor fell out from under me. “What? Really?”

They nodded sagely. “Yeah, about time that poor girl got some good luck.”

My eyes tightened. I tried to seem only politely interested. “How do you mean?”

“Oh, terrible story.” They tutted in that way only older people seemed to do. Every time it happened, I wondered when I’d hit the age that I got my tutting privileges. “Four miscarriages, her wife ran away with a colleague, and the state she’s been living in is one of those awful homophobic places where they say gay adoption is legal, but in practice…” They trailed off, shrugging in that bone-deep, ancient way they did when the weight of homophobia weighed in on them. I could only imagine what it must be like at their age. They’d only been out as nonbinary for a few years—well into their eighties before they even felt safe in the world to be themselves. Knowing that kind of discrimination was still out there…

I frowned, shaking my head. “What are they afraid we’re going to do? Love the kid for who they are? Jesus fucking Christ.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t try calling him, dear. We’ve been trying that for a very long time and nobody seems to be listening.”

I laughed a half-laugh, the sound bitter and resigned. “You’re not wrong there, Freddie. It’s good she’s able to come back here with the baby, though,” I said, even as my insides tightened at the prospect.

They brightened again. “Absolutely. A new little baby around, Harlow back in town… what wonderful news. And, you know,” they looked at me in a way that told me I both already knew where they were going, and that I didn’t want to, “I’m sure with Harlow back, Alicia will be around plenty too.”

Yep. That was it. Exactly what I didn’t want to know, and exactly what the tightening in my stomach already knew.

Eight years it had been without her. Eight years where she hadn’t set foot in Jackson Point once. Eight years of only seeing her parents when they went to see her. I always knew when they were gone, but they didn’t mention it, and nobody else around town directly addressed it with me either.

Small towns had long memories.

There had been times I’d hated her absence, usually times when I’d seen her family, or Harlow had been back visiting her own mom, and, with her, came the flood of memories, the desperate yearning that accompanied those unsure smiles from Harlow. They were always weighed down with neither of us knowing whether we were supposed to speak to each other, whether she was supposed to mention Alicia, whether, if I spoke to her, she’d mention it to Alicia when they spoke… So we didn’t speak. We smiled, nodded awkwardly, and went our separate ways. And, for weeks after, I’d ache with feeling so close and so far from Alicia all over again.

But I knew it was the right thing that she stayed away. If I couldn’t handle seeing her best friend, there was no way I could handle seeing her. And yet, here we were, the place where she might finally be coming back.

Well, she definitely would be. She might not come back for her family, they might have an agreement where they went to visit her, to keep her away from here, but Harlow was pregnant and about to have a baby. Heavily pregnant women couldn’t travel. Little babies weren’t the most conducive to travel, either. And, even after eight years, I knew Alicia well enough to know she wouldn’t be missing out on Harlow’s pregnancy or baby.

Alicia Burton was coming back to Jackson Point, and I was going to need to find a way to deal with that.

“Ripley?” Freddie said, their voice concerned in a way that told me it wasn’t the first time they’d tried to regain my attention.

I shook my head, my ears burning in shame. “So sorry, Freddie. I was miles away.”

They smiled like that was the best news ever. “I’m sure you were. I always did love a second chance, you know?”

I stared at them, my eyebrows raised. “Second chance at…?”

“Oh,” they said, leaning against the counter in an overly casual fashion, “all kinds of things.”

Somewhere deep in my stomach, I was pretty sure I knew what they were getting at, but my head and my heart weren’t ready to go there. That wasn’t a possibility and it wasn’t going to happen, so I laughed it off. “Okay, mysterious.”

They laughed, still looking at me with that knowing glance I suddenly hated.

“What can I get you this week?” I asked, awkwardly looking away after they’d simply stared at me, expectant, for far too long.

They breathed a laugh, shaking their head as though I was the one being ridiculous. “I think Davey’s in the mood for something springy. Daffodils, maybe?”

“You got it,” I said, walking from behind the counter and towards the bucket of daffodils I’d just gotten in. I’d known Freddie would want some soon. The pair were big fans of spring and were always eager for spring flowers the minute I could get them in the shop.

Despite no longer being directly under Freddie’s gaze, my stomach roiled and my heart thudded the entire time I was arranging and wrapping the pretty yellow flowers. Part of me wanted to wake up, to experience the relief of discovering this had all been a horrid dream, that Alicia wasn’t coming back to Jackson Point and my life could continue on in the peaceful way it had been since she left. Though,peacefulmight have been an overstatement.

Whatever life had been, it hadn’t been this kind of turmoil. I hated the part of me that wanted to hope, even as it existed alongside the part that dreaded seeing her again, the part that didn’t know if it could handle that yet.

People didn’t talk about divorce enough and, suddenly, I desperately needed someone to tell me whether this was normal, whether the acute agony of seeing your ex again after eight years was supposed to feel like this. I needed someone to tell me how to make it go away. It had been eight years, I was supposed to be okay now—I’d thought I was, for the most part. And I needed to do a good enough job of convincing Alicia I was over it all, over her, doing great by myself.

Oh,god. What if she showed up with someone else? She could be married again by now for all I knew. Eight years was a long time. Would she come back with a new spouse in tow? Surely not? But, eight years. That was supposed to be enough time and distance to be happily living your life, right?

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