“Are you sure you’re good with this? Because if you guys break up you will still have to work in the same office,” Candy said.

“Breaking up with a guy you work with, or work for, is messy. Trust Candy. She did it.” Tessa smirked.

“Shut up,” Candy grumbled, turning bright red.

“It was the middle of the night, if I remember. Brian had to give you a shirt because you were topless. Or were you completely naked at the time?”

“Enough.” Candy took the contract from Sarina.

“I’m still getting over the fact that you and Tyler finally got back together.” Tessa sighed. “It’s been fifteen years? I’m telling you, the two of them had the kind of love affair movies are made of. It’s epic.”

All this stuff happened in Keep Coming Back To Love. Candy and Ty were a second (third, fourth) chance romance that finally worked out and Tessa, who has been there for the whole thing, can’t resist needling Candy about it. For most of this book, Candy has been the strong woman and adult mentor to Sarina so it’s nice to see her more human side. Especially since poor Mick is going to walk into this office and find three strong women and a contract he’s afraid to sign. A little bit of lightness before the dark.

“What about this?” Mick tensed, waiting for the hammer to fall. She hadn’t fired him or humiliated him in front of Jami, but that didn’t mean the danger had passed. There was always punishment.

“If Jami doesn’t finish it today I’ll have to come in and finish it up over the weekend. It wasn’t like I was doing anything.” She went out to Jami’s desk. “You should give Jami your appointments for next week so she can add them to the calendar. I don’t want you to accidentally stand up a client.”

No hammer. Yet. “I’ll write them down when I get back.”

“When I enter them, I‘ll teach you how we use the calendar app so you can do your own.” Jami handed him a sticky note. She seemed upset, but she hadn’t yelled at him so far.

Sarina handed him two bags and a large box that said North Face on the sides. “Just give these to Maureen. She knows what to do with them.”

“Do you think we should send her bigger bags?” Jami asked. “Those fleeces are bulky.”

The whole gift bag thing came from teaching in Korea. My students’ mothers were very grateful for the effort and care we gave their children and they showed it with presents. On our first field trip we ended up with an embarrassment of lunches. Seven mothers each sent in enough food for my co-teacher and I to share with other teachers. We ended up feeding, not just the teaching staff, but the administrative staff, and the bus drivers, and having some to give to the staff of the children’s museum we went to. After that the moms organized and we never had more than one lunch per field trip. We also got random gifts throughout the year, one mom had a budget of $50/teacher/month. Teacher’s Day when it was normal to send gifts to teachers. Teacher’s Day was better than Christmas.

Then, just as I was working through these scenes when Candy’s daughter is in the PICU, a friend who is a medical librarian posted a comment about how North Face fleeces were taking the place of lab coats in the hospital. So one of Candy’s clients thoughtfully sent a bunch of North Face fleeces to add to the gift baskets.

One of the lovely things about writing a bad cook is getting to look up cooking disasters on YouTube. That’s how I ended up watching these videos last summer and screaming with laughter. How does that man keep a straight face as he says, “Never add water or ice to cool down the cooking oil.”