Page 8 of Fake it ’Til Fall

Except Liam is still getting married in November. To Carla. At my family’s vineyard. In a ceremony my mother insists is too profitable to decline and too visible to mishandle. Which is how I, Daisy Thorn, former fiancée, current office manager, occasional latte artist, and full-time cautionary tale in affordable, yet emotionally unsupportive, ankle boots, have become the invisible woman behind the wedding that will confirm to all of Winterberry Cove that Liam did not ruin his life by losing me.

He simply upgraded venues.

And brides.

And probably emotional stability.

Which feels rude, honestly. Emotional stability should not be transferable like airline miles.

Let’s be honest, the Thorns aren’t exactly beacons of stability. We are complicated at best and dangerous if put in the same room as the Wolfcraft family. Well, not always, since my brother married Winnifred Wolfcraft, and they are disgustingly happy in a way that makes our family look less like a cautionary case study and more like people capable of growth.

They’re the exception.

The rest of us have been instructed to behave around the Wolfcrafts at all times, or Soren will take visitation away from both families.

Which is a serious concern now that Winnie is pregnant. Obviously, Mom has to be extra nice to them, or they’ll ration baby updates like winter-time sugar. One sonogram photo per trimester. No rollovers. Grandparent privileges subject to emotional maturity.

None of us are expected to qualify.

I shift the toner box higher and reread my mother’s email because apparently I enjoy suffering in high resolution.

Darling,

Carla is concerned the aisle runner may compete with the natural tones of the vineyard stone. I told her you have such a gift with visual harmony, and we’d love your thoughts before I approve the rental adjustment. Also, Liam’s mother asked whether we can add two more tables to the rehearsal dinner. I said I’d check with you because you’re so good with flow.

Love,

Mom

Fucking flow?

I stare at that word until the supply closet seems to shrink around me.

I’m so good with flow.

I am also good with donor databases, emergency copier maintenance, soothing interns who accidentally email the wrong attachment to two hundred volunteers, and convincing wealthy people that literacy programs deserve funding even when the entire office is operating on discount coffee and printer prayers.

I am good with flow because my entire personality is a woman standing in a flood saying, Fantastic, I’ll just add drowning to the agenda.

At the nonprofit, being good at things means people give you more things to do.

In my family, being good at things means people forget to ask whether it hurts.

“Daisy?” Mira calls from somewhere outside the closet. “Did we ever get the updated grant numbers for the after-school program?”

I tuck my phone beneath my chin, wedge the toner box against my ribs, and reach for the stack of folders balanced above the paper towels. “Yes. They’re in the shared drive under Q3 Program Metrics, not Q3 Metrics Final, because Q3 Metrics Final is from last month, and Q3 Metrics Final—Final is somehow a draft.”

Mira appears in the doorway and studies me with deep professional concern. “You scare me in the best way.”

“That’s what I put on my dating profile,” I lie.

Listen, I do not have a dating profile.

I downloaded an app in June, stared at the first prompt for twenty-three minutes, then deleted it after realizing I had no answer to What are you looking for? that didn’t sound like a woman seconds away from joining a cult with decent dental.

I haul the toner out of the closet and return to my desk, which is less of a desk and more of a paper-based habitat with a keyboard somewhere beneath the ecosystem. Every morning, I tell myself I’m going to organize it. Every afternoon, I accept that I’m simply a raccoon with a meeting calendar.

The office is bright in the way old buildings try to be bright when they have tall windows and unreliable wiring. Outside, Boston has decided to do that mid-fall thing where the air feels newly washed, like the city is trying to charm you before winter arrives and steals your will to live one frozen sidewalk at a time.