Page 1 of Love, Second Chances and Other Nonsense
Prologue
Adam
The farmers’ market buzzes with life, stalls piled high with colorful produce. I trail a few steps behind Caitlin as she winds her way through the crowds, stopping at each vendor to inspect what’s on offer. I’m more interested in the way the sun turns her hair to burnished gold than I am with the displays of vegetables.
Her fingers hover over a pile of new potatoes before selecting one, testing its weight in her palm. She’s completely in her element, determined that the dinner she’s planning to welcome my parents and sisters to Colorado tomorrow will be perfect. The thought of introducing Caitlin to my family sends a wave of both excitement and apprehension through me.
“Let’s get some of these,” Caitlin turns to me with the potato she’s holding. “I’ll make those roast potatoes with parsley butter that you like.”
I nod, stepping closer. “That sounds great.” The truth is, I couldn’t care less about the specifics of tomorrow’s dinner. She could serve cardboard with that butter, and I’d probably ask for seconds. But I love the joy she gets from planning the meals she serves. Caitlin Hughes shows love through food.
“I want everything to be perfect,” she says, selecting a handful of the potatoes and placing them in her canvas bag. Her hazel eyes are serious, scanning the next row of produce. “Thesetomatoes look incredible. I’ll make a salad with shallots and fresh basil.”
“It’s going to be amazing,” I assure her, resting my hand on the small of her back. “You know that, right?”
She shoots me a quick smile but doesn’t pause her methodical selection of tomatoes. “Dinner or meeting your family?”
“Both.”
The morning sun is gentle on her face, highlighting the spray of freckles across her nose and cheeks. I still notice them every day, even after two years together. Still lie awake counting them sometimes when she’s sleeping.
“I just…” She pauses, a tomato suspended in her hand. “I know how important your family is to you, Adam. I want them to like me.”
Someone asks about the price of sweet corn behind us, and a dog barks nearby, but I focus only on her. “Hey,” I say, taking her free hand. “They’re going to love you. How could they not?”
Caitlin places the tomato in her bag and gives a small shrug. “People don’t always love me right away. I talk too much when I’m nervous. I’ll probably knock something over or say something stupid without thinking.”
“That just means you’re human,” I laugh. “Nobody is expecting perfection here.”
She doesn’t laugh back, just gives me a look that says she’s genuinely worried. Sometimes I forget how much having my family accept her means to her. She has so little family of her own.
“Seriously,” I say, more gently now. “They just want me to be happy. And you—” I pause, squeezing her hand. “You make me happier than I’ve ever been. They’ll see that.”
We move to the next stall, where Caitlin stops to examine some peaches.
“You have two sisters,” Caitlin says as she adds the peaches to her growing produce collection. “Lauren is the oldest; she’s thirty-two. She works with your dad at the family rental company. She’s married to Jake. Hailey is twenty-eight. She’s an accountant.”
“You’ve got it.” I nod, feeling a surge of affection knowing she’s committed these details to memory.
She moves toward a stall selling fresh herbs. The scents of basil and mint mingle in the air between us. “And your mom’s the one I need to impress the most.”
I can’t help but laugh at how accurately she’s zeroed in on the family dynamic. “My mom can be a little intense. About everything. But especially about her children’s lives.” I choose my next words carefully. “She can be a bit much sometimes, but it’s because she cares. She just wants us all to be happy.”
“Is this your diplomatic way of saying she’s nosy?” Caitlin asks, selecting a bunch of basil.
“Maybe,” I concede with a smile. “But I’m serious; once she sees how happy you make me, she’ll be completely won over. She might try to plan our wedding by the end of the weekend, but that’s just how she shows love.”
Caitlin freezes momentarily at the word “wedding,” and I realize what I’ve said. We’ve talked about marriage in abstract terms, but I haven’t proposed yet. The ring is hidden in my sock drawer at home, waiting for the right moment. I feel my ears getting hot.
“I just meant…you know, eventually. She gets ahead of herself.”
Caitlin recovers quickly, paying the vendor for the basil. “I need some sort of fruit to make a dessert,” she says, changing the subject. “And maybe we should get some extra herbs just in case? Rosemary for the roast?”
I follow her to another stall, watching the way she moves through the crowd with easy grace despite her claims of clumsiness. It strikes me how completely she has changed my life. Before Caitlin, I was just going through the motions without really knowing what I wanted. Now, all I want is her. I want mornings like this and evenings cooking together in our small kitchen. I want our hiking trips and lazy Sundays and the way she laughs with her whole body when something really strikes her as funny.
“Oh!” Caitlin’s voice pulls me from my thoughts. “Look at these flowers!”
She’s stopped at a flower vendor’s stall, where buckets of colorful blooms catch the late morning light. In her yellow sundress, she looks bright and vibrant, like she belongs among them. Her hair falls loose around her shoulders, and she tucks a strand behind her ear as she leans in to smell a bunch of daisies.
