Chapter 72: One Year Later

Julia

“Come on, Vaughn,” I whined into the phone. “You’re not going to find her. You’ve been looking for a damn year now and she hasn’t shown up anywhere. Not even the slightest hint or clue where she could possibly be.”

He didn’t reply. Nothing new. He rarely speaks, not since she left anyway. She left us all here in Wears Valley to fend for ourselves. So selfish.

“She’s gone, Vaughn,” I stated bluntly. “She left you. She left everyone in this town.”

I took a deep breath to fill the silence on the phone. I wish he wasn’t hurting like this. I wish she hadn’t done this to him. “How many different places have you been now? Looking for her,” I asked, agitated by how she could just leave without even saying goodbye to my cousin. Calling me a bitch and throwing me down into the dirt, as if I was the one who set her life on fire.

“Eight countries. Fifty two cities. One hundred and two towns,” he muttered into the phone. “All her favorite places she wanted to visit.”

“Exactly.” My point proven. I inhaled deeply. “Vaughn, listen. You have to come—”

“Julia,” he snapped. “I’m not fucking coming home.” He paused. “Not yet.”

I felt the blood rush to my head. He says it every damn time. He doesn’t realize it’s now or never. We are starving. All of us.

Mark tried to take over the farm. Autumn was a total flop, and he couldn’t bear the winter. He and Sabrina packed up and left. No one knows where they went. She must have really loved him, leaving behind everything her father owned. I still think she stole something for money, but no one says anything. Everyone in town is barely surviving.

Gannon keeps up everyone’s houses for free. The poor guy. The general store owner is trying to keep prices low, but supply trucks barely come through the valley anymore because it “isn’t worth the drive.” Nick still runs the diner, but all he sells is fish Denny and Lanna catch since there’s no working farm left. Will and Lily eloped. No surprise there. They never stay anywhere long. Regis locked himself away with his money. Elliot and Natalie try to grow crops, but everything comes up under average. No matter what they do, it fails.

We don’t know how Mollie did it. Her potatoes were massive. Her pumpkins were unbelievable.

Mom and I tended the animals for a while. Until sickness swept through. Mom was diagnosed with MS a little after Mollie left. Now she’s confined to a wheelchair. No muscle control. The doctor can’t give us a timeline. After that, Elliot and I got married and started a family. Our wedding brought a little joy to town. Vaughn wasn’t there. He was still chasing after that selfish woman.

I was doing okay running the animals alone. Until I got pregnant.

“I’m with child right now,” I snapped into the phone. “If I crouch too low, the baby might slide right out of me. We need someone who knows how to run a farm.”

“When?” I demanded. “Mom is sick. She’s dying. She can’t move. Lanna is doing more work than Elliot lately, and I spend so much time alone in the barn I’ll probably give birth in a haystack. Taro is almost gone. Gannon had to send Eliza back to her drunk mother. Charlie works himself to death gutting fish. Trucks aren’t even bringing flour anymore.”

A tear clung to my lashes. “If someone doesn’t take over the farm, I’m going to have to leave. I can’t feed myself, let alone a child. If Elliot leaves too, there’s no hope for this town.”

“Fuck, Julia,” he growled. “What do you expect me to do? Forget she exists and come back pretending everything is fine?”

Her. That’s what he always calls Mollie.

“Yes,” I said. “Get back here. And her name is Mollie. She left you.”

He inhaled sharply.

“She didn’t care. She could be anywhere. She could be dead. She could have another boyfriend.”

Silence.

“You don’t need her,” I softened. “You have family. You have us. You can take over the farm.”

He exhaled. Defeated.

“If she wants to come back, she will.”

“Is the barn built?” he asked suddenly.

“Yes. The barn and the coop.”

“Good. Expect me in a week.”

“I love you.”

“Tell Elliot and Natalie to stop with the crops and focus on animals. You shouldn’t be doing that alone.”

Click.

He’s coming back.

I ran into the living room. “Mom!”

I knelt in front of her chair and turned her toward me. “Vaughn is coming home.”

Her eyes lit up. She couldn’t smile much, but I knew she was happy.

“He’s going to fix everything,” I said. “You’ll see.”

Vaughn

“This,” I muttered, surveying Wears Valley, “is a fucking disaster.”

Weeds everywhere. Broken fencing. Missing stones in walkways. Buildings boarded up or collapsed. The diner barely standing. The motel abandoned. It felt like a ghost town.

Why did Mark destroy everything if he was just going to leave?

Everyone thinks Mollie was selfish. They’re wrong. They don’t know why she left.

She left because she loved us too much.

I passed Mirabelle’s place. I couldn’t face her yet.

The farm sat over the hill.

I remembered Mollie in the fields. Brushing her animals. Running through her garden with her dog. Daydreaming out the kitchen window.

The house wasn’t hers anymore. It was bigger. Prettier. Wrong.

Nothing went as planned.

We should be here together.

I turned the crystal doorknob. That would be the first thing to go.

Inside made me sick. Bright modern walls. Generic art.

I stared at the wall separating the kitchen and living room. That would go too.

When Mollie comes back, I want it to feel the same.

She will come back.

She has to.

Julia

“He’s been up there for hours, Ma,” I sighed, watching the farmhouse.

“He’ll come,” she whispered.

Lights shut off. Vaughn emerged, cowboy hat low.

He dumped a garbage bag on the couch. “Do you want these?”

Inside were expensive paintings.

“I don’t care,” he shrugged.

He wasn’t the same. Money meant nothing to him.

“Did you want to see Mom?”

He hesitated. “Yeah.”

I helped him into her room. When she saw him, life returned to her eyes.

“I’ll fix everything,” he promised her. “I swear.”

Mollie

“Hey.”

I stared at the New York traffic.

“I’ll give you fifty dollars.”

I laughed. Homeless Mollie didn’t care anymore.

I chose a cupcake over dignity.

Later, I curled up in an alley to sleep.

“You’re still here?”

The same man.

Then pain. Darkness.

Mollie

I woke up in a hospital.

No insurance. No money.

“Pregnancy test,” the nurse said.

Two weeks to figure out my life.

I sat on a park bench, crying.

I need a job.

Unfortunately, I’m only qualified for two things.

And there are no farms in New York City.