Always the Baker, Never the Bride (36 page)

“We’re reassessing.”

Emma sighed. “What does that mean?”

“It means I still want to be married to your father, may the Lord help me. So we’ve entered into a form of … well, into …”

“Mother, what?”

“Counseling.”

“Counseling,” she repeated. “Marriage counseling?”

“Sort of.”

“Sort of marriage counseling. What is that?”

“Actually, we’re seeing Reverend Ramos.”

“Miguel?”

“Yes. He’s been quite helpful, Emma Rae.”

“You and my father are seeing a
reverend
?”

“We are.”

“Does he
pray with you
?”

“Sometimes. But mostly, he listens, and he asks questions that provoke discussion between us. And you know better than anyone that getting your father to talk about his feelings is nothing short of miraculous.”

Emma realized that her jaw was hanging open, and she shook her head and leaned back against the chair and closed her eyes for a moment. She tried to imagine Gavin and Avery Travis joining hands with Miguel Ramos and letting him pray for their
marriage.

She could hardly even think it. In her head, they’d been long divorced. Now to find out that they had a marriage was—

Well, she didn’t know what it was!

“You’ve spent more of your marriage apart than together, Mother.”

“We’ve been together more than you know.”

“Why doesn’t that surprise me?”

Avery revealed a tentative smile. “I’m sorry, Emma Rae. We should have handled this differently, all the way around. But remember when your father came to Atlanta and moved back in with us?”

“That was the happiest time of my life.”

“Until your high school graduation, when he withdrew again and went back to Washington.”

Emma noticed a glaze of tears in her mother’s dark eyes, and she reached across the desk toward her. It took a few seconds, but Avery surrendered her hands and clasped them with Emma’s.

After Care
, she realized in that instant.
My father is in Phase, like, 236 of After Care.

For the first time since she’d found them in that clutch in the consultation room, Emma remembered that her mother was probably the strongest woman she’d ever known.

“How do you hang on to your hope?” she asked her.

“Sometimes, by a thread,” Avery admitted. “But if I didn’t know
that I know that I know
that your father is the man God intended for me, I’d have snipped the thread and moved on a long time ago.”

Now it was Emma’s turn to tear up.

“Oh, Mother,” she sniffed, squeezing Avery’s hand. “God has a lousy sense of humor.”

“Look who you’re telling.”

Fee jacked herself up to the counter and sat there, kicking her feet.

“Baseball cake presented,” she announced as Emma sprinkled powdered sugar over three champagne pistachio cakes.

“So Danny and Callie are safely married?” Emma asked her.

“Looks like it.”

“Thank God. Jackson would have throttled me if I broke up the hotel’s first wedding couple.”

Fee laughed as she hopped down to help Emma move the cakes from the center island.

“Listen,” she said when they were through, “I was wondering about something. You know, speaking of weddings. Don’t let this blow your mind or anything, but I was kind of hoping you’d be my maid of honor.”

Emma turned slowly toward Fee and smiled. “Really?”

“I know, you probably didn’t expect me to go with tradition, but there are some things you just can’t sacrifice, you know? And having your best friend standing up there next to you when you make the biggest commitment of your life, well—”

Emma sliced Fee’s words right in two with her embrace. “Of course I’ll be your maid of honor, Fiona. I’d love that.”

“Oh, good,” she replied, and the words were muffled against Emma’s shoulder. “Thanks.”

Thrusting Fee away from her, and clamping her by the shoulders, Emma exclaimed, “Have you started shopping for the dress?”

Fee shook her head.

“I want in on that, okay? The dress and the cake are the best part!”

“Speaking of the cake, we kind of really want a crème brûlée.”

“Really?” Emma grinned from one ear to the other. “I’d love that. When’s the date?”

“We haven’t decided on that yet. We’re talking about spring or summer, but there’s no rush really. I’ll let you know.”

Emma regarded her friend with interest. Something was off. But what was it?

“Emma Rae?”

She looked up to find Danny standing in the doorway in blue jeans and tennis shoes, with a tuxedo jacket with tails.

“Danny. Congratulations.”

“Yeah, I just stopped in to—” He glanced at Fee. “Can I talk to you alone?”

Fee got the message and grinned. “Don’t have to hit me over the head with a baseball bat.”

“Thanks,” Danny tossed at her as Fee made her way past him, out of the kitchen.

“Sure thing. Em, I’ll see you out front in ten?”

Emma nodded, grateful for the boundary.

“So that cake,” Danny commented. “It was out of hand.”

“You liked it?”

“I can’t believe you can do that with cake, Emma Rae.”

“Well, I’ve been designing cakes for a long time.”

“Listen,” he broached, and then hesitated, pressing the toe of his shoe into the corner of a checkerboard square on the floor. “Seeing you again …”

“Can I just stop you right there, Danny? I have something I need to say to you.”

“Yeah. Okay. Sure.”

“You are the luckiest guy on the planet. Callie adores you, and the two of you are going to make a really good life together.”

“Well—”

“But only if you get one thing straight in your head, Dan.”

He looked up at her with embers of curiosity burning the blue of his eyes into a deep indigo.

“Men have a tendency to get distracted,” she told him. “They have something good in their hands, but they wonder if that shiny thing over there might be better, so they make excuses and they let themselves drift away from where they’re supposed to be. It’s kind of like when we went down to Clearwater on spring break. Do you remember that?”

“Y-y-yeah.”

“You were out there in the Gulf on that big inner tube, remember? And you fell asleep for just a few short minutes, and by the time you woke up again you’d drifted so far away that we had to get a boat and go out and tow you back. Do you remember that?”

“Yeah. Good thing you were paying attention to how long I was out there.”

“Well, that’s kind of how life is. You can be floating along, and then get distracted by something else for just a few minutes and, before you know it, you’re so far from shore that you might never get back.” Emma narrowed her eyes and asked him, “Do you see what I’m saying?”

“Kinda.”

“Don’t get distracted, Danny. Focus on Callie, and stay focused on her.”

“Yeah, okay.”

“You and I are different people now. I’m not the one for you. I probably never was. You’ve found the person you’re supposed to be with, so man up and make it work. Okay?”

“Well, yeah,” he said on a sigh. “I was only just gonna tell you that it was cool to see you again. Once I thought about it, it kinda made me appreciate Callie even more.”

“Oh.” Emma bit her lip and smiled. “That’s great. Hold that thought, and you two will be really happy.”

Danny snickered. “Whadja think? I was gonna go all ape over you again? Nah, I’m over that. Callie’s my bride now. You take care, Emma Rae. You’ll find somebody eventually.”

As he trotted through the kitchen door, Emma gave an inward groan.

All that sage advice built up inside of me, and I wasted it on Danny Mahoney. Not so sage after all, am I?

The Five Most Important Questions to Ask Yourself When Composing Your Wedding Vows

1. When you were a kid, what did you imagine about your future spouse?
   
2. What does marriage actually mean to you now?
   
3. What are the three best things about the person you’re about to marry?
   
4. What is your favorite memory of your fiancé?
   
5. What do you see when you look down the road of your marriage?
   

24

T
he instant she saw it in the newspaper, Emma knew what she had to do. And what a stroke of sheer genius it turned out to be too.

My Fair Lady
was playing for one afternoon only on the big screen in an old retro theater downtown. It was the first movie Emma ever remembered seeing, and her Aunt Sophie had been the one to take her. She recalled that Sophie knew every word to every song back then, and Emma had seen it again so many times on her small screen at home that she knew them now as well.

When she glanced over at her aunt in the darkness of the refurbished 1920s theater, she saw that Sophie was enrapt. With her hands clasped together under her chin, her blue-gray eyes wide and reflecting the movement on the screen, wonder emanating from her smooth features, the woman looked half her age.
Eliza
floated up the staircase in her dark green jumper with the bright-white petticoat, singing about her evening and how she could have danced all night, and Sophie looked to Emma to be as light in her seat as wind in the trees. As her caretakers tried to prepare
Eliza
for bed, and all she knew for certain was that she could easily have danced all night, Sophie sang out along with her in a full, crystal clear voice. The ladies in the row behind them chuckled as she did.

Emma lost herself a bit as well, stepping directly into Audrey Hepburn’s peach-colored suit and curved straw hat with the flower as she sang to Jackson—errr,
Freddy
—about the importance of stepping up to the plate. Words, she shouted from somewhere deep inside, were useless now. If Jackson wanted to create a future with her, words would no longer do him any good at all; he’d have to show her!

Sophie reached out and grabbed Emma’s hand as
Eliza
vowed that life would go on without
Professor Henry Higgins
, despite his beliefs to the contrary, and she clutched it to her heart when
Higgins
finally admitted that he’d grown accustomed to
Eliza
’s face. Emma and Sophie left the theater hand-in-hand, and Sophie was luminous.