Chapter 2
At nineteen, he gave me a small glass jar filled with lemon candies.
The label read: FOR EVERY BAD DAY WE HAVEN’T HAD YET.
I kept it for years.
My parents saw none of those things as proof that he loved me.
To them, Miles was only the son of a cleaner, a young man with no university degree and no family connections.
Someone who would never belong at their table.
—
Their disapproval became harder to ignore after college.
I returned to Westbrook at twenty-three and began working in the marketing department of my father’s company. Miles had completed an apprenticeship and was repairing heating systems in schools, clinics, and apartment buildings.
He left home before sunrise most mornings.
By seven, his hands were already marked with oil or dust.
My father called him “the furnace boy.”
My mother referred to his apartment as “that room above the pawnshop,” even though it was above a bakery.
Every dinner ended the same way.
“How long are you planning to wait for him to become successful?” my mother would ask.
“He is successful.”
“He repairs boilers.”
“He keeps buildings warm.”
My father would shake his head as though I had said something childish.
“You have always confused effort with achievement, Sloane.”
The summer I turned twenty-seven, their criticism changed.
It became sharper.
More urgent.
That was also when Bennett Hale returned to town.
Bennett’s father, Silas, had been my father’s business partner for decades. Their families vacationed together when I was a child. Bennett had gone to boarding school and later moved to Chicago, where he worked in property investment.
According to my mother, he had recently sold his first company for “an extraordinary amount.”
She mentioned the figure three times during lunch.
“I’m happy for him,” I said.
“He’s single.”
“I’m not.”
My mother stirred her coffee.
“You and Miles are not married.”
“We’ve been together for eleven years.”
“That is not the same thing.”
A week later, Bennett appeared at my father’s company carrying two coffees.
He placed one on my desk.
“Oat milk, no sugar,” he said. “Your mother told me.”
“That sounds like her.”
“I’m in town for a few months. I thought we could catch up.”
I thanked him but refused the dinner invitation that followed.
Three days later, flowers arrived.
I sent them to the reception desk.
The following Sunday, I went to my parents’ house and asked them to stop encouraging him.
My father was standing near the fireplace, reading a document.
“You could at least be polite,” he said.
“I have been polite.”
“Bennett is offering you an opportunity.”
“He’s asking me to dinner.”
“Exactly.”
May you like
“I love Miles.”
The document in my father’s hand crumpled slightly.
