he headed inside to let everyone know his butterfly bride had fluttered away.
1
Present Day
MARIAH RIPPED off her rainbow wig and clomped up the stairs to the apartment she shared with Nikki, careful to point her flappy feet outward so she wouldn’t trip. If she never in her life had to make another Pokémon animal balloon at a kiddie party it would be too soon.
As she unlocked the door, she heard the phone ring. Maybe it was the temp agency with a new job adventure for her. She’d had enough of Party Time Characters, the company she’d created with four friends from her acting class. She was near her six-month mark—her max for sticking with a job—so she’d sell Leon the costume inventory and he could take over.
She lunged for the phone, tripped over her flappy feet and crashed against the table, catching the phone as it fell.
“Hello?” she managed on a gasp of air.
“Hello, sweetie. This is your mother.” She always said that, as if Mariah wouldn’t instantly know the honey bubbly voice of Meredith Monroe.
“Hi, Mom,” Mariah said on a sigh, rolling onto her back. “Thanks for the package. The paint-by-number set was nice, except in my painting class we work freehand.” Even long-distance, Meredith continued to try to nudge Mariah’s life into a shape she recognized. She’d been doing it for the eight years since Mariah had left Copper Corners.
“The saguaro blossom taffy hardly melted at all.” She hated saguaro blossom taffy.
Sensing the apartment was empty, Mariah unzipped the clown suit and slid out of it, holding the phone against her ear. Cool air washed over her sweaty body. Ahhh. She unhooked her bra and tossed it to the side, then lay back to rub her back on the carpet. No wonder the Disney costume characters went on strike over their working conditions. These costumes were deadly hot.
“Your father will be glad. He knows how much you love his taffy. I’m not calling about the package, though. This is urgent. It’s about Nathan.”
“Nathan? What about him?” Her heart took the same hop it always did when she heard his name. She hadn’t seen him since before they’d jilted each other on their wedding day, but she still had that maddening reaction to him. It was like a superstition or a tired habit.
“It’s so terrible. We’re fit to be tied beside ourselves.”
“What happened?” Was he sick? Dead? Married?
“He’s leaving us. We can’t believe it.”
“Why is Nathan leaving?”
“It’s insane, I know. He’s perfect here. Personally, I think he’s having a midlife crisis.”
“Mom, the man is only twenty-nine. He can’t have a midlife crisis. Why does he say he’s going?”
“Oh, some nonsense about figuring out what he really wants. He sounds like you, with your self-actual-whatzit, and live-for-the-moment hooey. Have you been talking to him?”
“Of course not.” She never talked to Nathan. She made sure of that. An arrangement she was positive he preferred. She’d been home five times in the past eight years—visits she kept short to minimize her mother’s meddling—and though Nathan was always invited for a dinner, he begged off, saying it was a family time.
Which made no sense because Nathan was like a son to her parents. A fact on which she depended, since it took the pressure off her. She counted on Nathan to be the good kid she could never be.
“This just ruins everything for us,” Meredith said. “Now your father won’t retire.”
“What?”
“I’ve been talking to your father about retiring until I’m green in the face. Finally, he agrees, but only if Nathan takes over,” she said in her dramatic way. “Now Nathan’s leaving, so your father won’t retire.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
“I know. You have to talk some sense into him.”
“You can put him on, but I doubt Daddy will listen to me.”
“Not Daddy. Nathan. You have to talk to Nathan. Convince him to stay. It’s the only way. You know your father. He won’t budge. The Monroe Doctrine—never give an inch. Come and talk to Nathan, please. Otherwise, I don’t know what we’re going to do.” The catch in her mother’s voice didn’t even sound theatrical. She really was upset.
“Why would Nathan listen to me?”
“Because you’re you. I know you don’t want to hear this, but he still cares about you.”
“Mom, stop it.”
“I know, I know. You’re past all that. But my point is he’ll listen to you.”
“I doubt it.”
“Wait until you see him. He gets more handsome every year.”
“Mother.”
“I know, I know. You have a full life. A new boyfriend every time I turn around. Someone like Nathan couldn’t possibly appeal to you. He owns his own boring custom-built home, has a dull management job and lives in an annoying little town where everyone supports each other through the good times and the bad.”
“Okay, Mother.”
“What? I’m agreeing with you. So, just talk to him. Come for a visit. We haven’t seen you in a year. You’ve probably changed your hair color three times since then.”
“I don’t see the point.”
“We miss you. Who knows how long we’ll last? You know Fred Nostrad had a stroke and died at sixty-five, not one week after his retirement dinner at the bank.”
“Are either of you sick?” Her heart clutched for a second.
“Not so far. Though your father’s cholesterol…through the roof.”
Mariah blew out a breath. It was just Meredith playing the life-hangs-by-a-thread card.
“So, come out. You can see us and remind Nathan that Cactus Confections is his home. What more could anyone want than to run a candy factory?”
“Maybe something more meaningful?” Though Nathan was pretty much a nose-to-the-grindstone guy. Work was work.
“What’s more meaningful than candy?”
“Millions of dentists agree, I guess.”
“Your father has been happy here for thirty years. You could have been happy here, too, you know.”
“I’m happy here, Mom,” she said. Absently, she rubbed the callus on her thumb from making Pikachu balloon animals. Well, she would be happy as soon as she found another job.
“Well,
