Page 41 of The Summer We Mended
“Just one piece,” she murmured.
Anna smiled.“One is all we need.”
“Can we do some, too?”Nora asked excitedly.
“Of course,” Lily replied.
She got up from her wheel and led the kids to the other wheels she used for teaching.She got them both set up, gently instructing them on what to do and when.Anna watched but also busied herself with cleaning.She knew that this needed to be her mother’s time and that she didn’t want to intrude or force anything.She just wanted to watch her mother in her natural habitat so she could remember how much she loved creating and teaching.
Her heart was light as she watched silently.She smiled to herself as she watched her mother’s and the kids’ eyes light up.When the kids brought over their own attempts, a lumpy mushroom, a dish shaped like a fish, and something Blaze insisted was a spaceship, Lily praised each with the same warmth she used to show in her classes.
“You’ve still got it, Mom,” Anna said quietly.
Lily looked at her.Her smile was watery but real.“Maybe I do.Maybe it’s just buried a bit.”
Later, they broke for lunch, sitting on the porch steps and sharing sandwiches and lemonade.Lily was quiet, watching the kids play in the yard.
“If we open the studio,” she said slowly, “we keep it small.Just weekends.Maybe some walk-ins.No big summer rush.I want to focus on the kids, I think.”
Anna grinned.“Whatever feels right.We’ll keep it manageable.”
Lily reached over and squeezed her hand.“Thank you.For not giving up on me.”
“You’ve never given up on anyone, Mom, especially not me,” Anna said.“This is just me returning the favor.”
It had been a long time since Anna had seen the light in her mom’s eyes and the excitement she used to get over her studio, but it was finally back, and Anna couldn’t be happier.
ChapterFifteen
Jess
The late morning sun filtered through the gauzy curtains in Claudia’s sunroom, painting the table in golden rectangles.Jess sat at the dining nook, laptop open, fingers hovering above the keyboard.Her shoulders ached from the tension she hadn’t been able to shake since returning to Oak Bluffs.Job applications lined her browser tabs like tiny paper boats, each one threatening to sink.Her resume, tweaked and rewritten more times than she could count, stared back at her with silent judgment.None of these jobs appealed to her.
Jess had another document open, a list of all the side hustles she had contemplated when she first began her tech company in Silicon Valley.She had done the marketing, the accounting, and all the photography and videos for her company.She was a one-man show, doing the job of fifty people by herself.
She had gotten good at all of it.She’d started consulting other entrepreneurs and helping them with their marketing and business plans.She had an entire folder in her Google Drive with business plans for other companies—her fail-safe if her company didn’t take off in the first few years.
Except it did.
She had made her first million within two years, and her income continued to climb.She turned around and poured it right back into her company, her people.She was unstoppable.
Or so she thought.
She let out a long breath and shook her head.She closed that folder and went back to looking at the “grown-up” jobs her parents thought she needed to look for.
In the backyard, she could hear Maisie’s shrieks of laughter as Claudia pushed her higher and higher on the old wooden swing set Henry had restored last fall.The sound should have brought Jess peace.It didn’t.
She forced herself to click another application link and start the process all over again.Upload resume.Fill out fields.Answer questions that boiled years of experience and sacrifice down to checkbox bullet points.She hated this.Not the work, she’d always worked hard, but the way it made her feel: small, invisible, unaccomplished.
Once, in another life that now felt a million years away, she’d been a business owner.Her own hours.Her own clients.A community she built from the ground up.Until Clark tore it all down.
The screen blurred a little.She blinked, then shoved back from the table and stood.“Lunch,” she called, her voice catching slightly.
Outside, Claudia and Maisie came in through the sliding doors, both pink-cheeked and laughing.Claudia had leaves in her hair.Maisie had dirt smudged across her forehead and grass stains blooming across both knees.
“We built a fairy house!”Maisie beamed, climbing up onto the barstool at the kitchen island.“Grammy says if we leave a little sugar out, they might come visit tonight.”
“Do they take coffee too?”Jess asked, fetching sandwiches and apple slices.
