Page 14 of Love Off-Limits
We moved up to the ice cream counter and placed our order. Dark chocolate salted peanut butter for me, and orange blossom for Darcy. Darcy pulled out her wallet as we stepped up to pay, but I stopped her. “I got it.”
She didn’t argue. We both knew I made more money than she did. I never made her pay whenever we were together.
We wandered aimlessly down King Street toward the gallery, enjoying the breeze blowing in off the harbor. Another month and it would be too miserable to spend any intentional time outside, though Darcy would have to anyway. The tourist season was just picking up. Why they didn’t all stay home in July and August and come back in October was beyond me. The beaches, maybe? Or an intense desire to melt into the pavement.
“Oh, no,” Darcy said under her breath. “Come here.” She shoved me to the side and hauled me around the corner and onto a side street just past the Darling Oyster Bar.
“What gives?” I said, yanking my arm out of her grasp. “You almost made me drop my ice cream.”
She peeked back around the corner. “Sorry. It’s nothing. Just some guy. I didn’t want him to see me.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Just some guy? Anyone I should be concerned about?”
“Not at all. He’s just another tour guide. But he keeps changing up his route so that he crosses mine and it’s getting on my nerves. I don’t feel like talking to him right now.”
I was only half-listening to her explanation because on the side window of the oyster bar was a clipping from Bon Appetit magazine featuring the restaurant, pasted so that people passing by could read it. But the article wasn’t the relevant part. On the bottom right corner of the magazine spread, there was an ad for Stonebrook Farm. It featured a picture of what I could only assume was the farm, nestled into the Blue Ridge Mountains. It was just as idyllic as Olivia had described. Rolling hills, a big red barn, orchards in the background, and what looked like an enormous farmhouse that was probably the event center. At the bottom of the ad were the wordsA Hawthorne Family Property.
I tapped the glass. “That’s it. That’s her farm.”
“What?” Darcy turned back. “What is?”
“Right there. That’s where Olivia works. Where she lives, I guess. Her family owns the place.”
“Oh, yeah. That’s totally it.” Darcy leaned closer to the glass. “It’s gorgeous.”
“What do you mean that’s totally it?”
Darcy looked at me like I’d grown a third head. “I Googled it. Didn’t you?”
I hadn’t. But...why hadn’t I?
Fear, maybe. Or the very tangible connection between Olivia and Stonebrook Farm and my thoughts about leaving.
“You really should just call her, Ty.”
Olivia and I had exchanged a few text messages after the wedding, but her responses took long enough to come in, it hadn’t taken long for me to get the hint. It had been over three weeks since we’d last exchanged a message. I couldn’t fault her. She had her reasons, and I understood them. That didn’t mean I liked them. But I could be an adult about things.
“Neither one of us is in a place to make a relationship work. We’ve already had this conversation.”
“It’s a dumb conversation, and that’s a dumb response,” Darcy said. “Explain to me again why she isn’t up for long-distance?”
“I don’t know, exactly. But her dad is recovering from a stroke, and it really just seemed like she’s needed at home right now.”
“So you go to her. If you really like this woman, you shouldn’t just give up.”
“I hardly know her. I can’t just up and move to North Carolina.” Though after Olivia had mentioned working at Stonebrook, the thought had crossed my mind.
“I didn’t say move, dummy. I just meant drive up there every once in a while. It’s not that far.”
“Right. Easy to do whenRandom Ishoots every day.”
She rolled her eyes. “You’ve taken time off before. You’re not the only one who knows how to hold a camera.”
I winced at her words. She hadn’t meant it as an insult—that all I did was hold a camera—but the truth stung. Sometimes it seemed like all Ididdo was hold a camera. There was no way around the fact that there wasn’t a lot of creativity involved with my part of theRandom Imachine. I had an eye for a good shot. But so did the rest of the camera guys on the crew. And while I liked the editing and had learned quite a bit over the years, it wasn’t my primary responsibility.
“Sorry. That’s not what I meant,” Darcy said. “I just mean Isaac will give you time off if you want it.”
“I know what you meant.” I motioned with my head toward King Street. “Come on. Is this thing open yet?”
