Chapter 10 - The Garden Party
Six months later. Early October.
The wisteria vines that clung to the second-story balcony of 1402 Rosewood Terrace had turned a brilliant, fiery gold. The afternoon air was crisp, carrying the scent of woodsmoke from the neighbors’ chimneys and the sweet, rich smell of fallen leaves.
My backyard looked nothing like the artificial, stressful circus that Evan and Madison had tried to stage in April.
There was no white commercial tent. There were no rented gold Chiavari chairs, no hired string quartets playing royalty-free pop songs, and no sixty acquaintances pretending to care about people they barely liked.
Instead, a long wooden harvest table—built by a local woodworker out of reclaimed Douglas fir—stretched across the slate patio beneath the cedar archway.
Sitting around the table were eight people.
My older brother, Jack, freshly retired from the Army and now running a flight school outside of Eugene, was laughing loudly at the head of the table, carving a roasted pork loin with my grandmother's silver carving knife—the very knife Evelyn Mercer had coveted.
Beside him sat his wife, Sarah, and their four-year-old daughter, Lily, who was currently busy decorating her paper napkin with crayons.
At the far end of the table sat Marcus Vance, wearing a surprisingly casual wool cardigan, arguing cheerfully with Sarah Lin, our forensic accountant, about the economic viability of small-batch pinot noir vineyards in the Willamette Valley.
And sitting beside me was David.
The locksmith who had come to replace my deadbolts in April had returned two weeks later to bring me an extra set of high-security brass keys he had forgotten in his truck. Then he had returned a week after that to ask if I wanted to get coffee at the French bakery down the street.
We had taken things painfully slow. No rushed promises, no grand romantic gestures, no moving in after three months, and no shared bank accounts. Just quiet, honest conversations on the back porch, working side-by-side in the garden on Saturday mornings, and learning how to trust the sound of someone else’s footsteps on the old fir floorboards.
"Penny for your thoughts?" David asked softly, leaning closer and refilling my glass with local apple cider.
I looked at him, seeing the genuine warmth in his hazel eyes, the small laugh lines around his mouth, and the honest dirt under his fingernails from helping Jack carry firewood up from the shed earlier that afternoon.
"I was just thinking," I said, resting my chin in my hand, "that the wisteria looks better in gold than it ever did in white."
David smiled, his hand resting gently against mine on the warm wood of the table. "Everything looks better when it’s real, Claire."
From the head of the table, Marcus Vance suddenly raised his glass of pinot noir, tapping his knife against the crystal until the conversation quieted.
"A toast," Marcus announced, his deep voice carrying over the gentle rustling of the autumn leaves. "To the Holloway estate. To the woman who preserved it, to the family that built it, and to the absolute certainty that in the end, the balance sheet of life always reconciles."
"Hear, hear!" Jack bellowed, raising his glass high.
We all clinked our glasses together in the center of the table. The sound was bright, clear, and true—ringing out across the slate patio, through the restored cedar arch, and settling into the deep, fertile earth of the garden.
May you like
I looked down at my right hand.
Margaret Holloway’s platinum ring sparkled in the warm autumn sunlight, surrounded by the people who truly loved me, sitting in the home that was entirely, undeniably, and permanently mine.
