Page 178 of Pumpkin Spice Promises

“Hello to you, too.”

Meme’s eyes lit up. “You went out?”

“Rosie invited me.”

“Was Beau there?”

“No.”

Gerald sat again. “Jones boy?”

“Don’t encourage her,” I teased as he grinned.

“Comes from a good family that one.”

“Gerald,” I warned, but he was oblivious.

Meme pushed a plate toward me. Apple pie. Gerald nodded toward it. “Eat. You’re too skinny.”

“I am absolutely not.”

“Everybody under seventy is too skinny.”

Meme nodded solemnly. I took the pie. Arguing with them was useless.

Gerald looked toward Meme. “Tell her about the festival.”

She smiled. “No, you tell it better.”

He leaned back. “I met my Jinny at the Harvest Festival.”

I’d heard pieces of this story before, but never all of it.

“Right at Marigold?”

“Yep. Fifty-one years ago.” His face changed when he said her name. Jinny had been gone for nearly ten years. “We carved our names in that old willow tree the next year.”

I smiled. “You believed that story?”

“Course not.” He winked. “But she did.”

Meme laughed.

Gerald’s expression softened. “So I carved whatever she wanted.”

Something squeezed my heart. “Did it work?”

“I had forty-two years with her.” He looked toward the window. “Worked enough for me.”

My phone buzzed against the counter. Meme’s eyes immediately dropped to it. I grabbed it before she could.

Beau

You home yet?

I tried not to smile, and failed if Meme’s giggle was anything to go by.

Carson