Free The Secret of Joy by Melissa Senate

clothing and toiletries on the seat, then repacked a pair of jeans, her favorite black pants, a couple of sweaters and her two favorite shirts, the heels and cowboy boots, and zipped up the suitcase. She put the leather box in her tote bag. All packed and ready for Joy Jayhawk’s weekend singles excursion to Portland, Maine.
    She’d actually once gone on a singles getaway, at the constant begging of her friend Charlotte back in their single days. It had been a weekend camp of sorts for professionals in their twenties and thirties. Rebecca hadn’t been remotely attracted to any of the guys, so she’d ended up with her nose in a novel most of the time, their group leader popping by way too often to remind her she had to be “in it to win it!” Charlotte had slept with the guy she’d been ogling on the bus ride up, who’d ended up sleeping with at least three other women in two days. On the ride back, Rebecca had assured Charlotte that she’d meether Mr. Right in a less forced environment. Charlotte nodded tearily, then stared out the window and didn’t say a word for three hours, until they’d arrived at Port Authority. “We should do this again!” she’d said with “You gotta be in it to win it!” determination. And then she’d met her husband the next day.
    Rebecca wondered how many singles could fit in a minibus. Six? Three men and three women?
    She supposed she would be an extra, paired with Joy, sort of.
    This time it was easier to find her way back to Maple Lane. She pulled up in front of Joy’s tiny house just as a Land Rover did. A good-looking man in his late twenties, maybe early thirties, opened the backdoor and then a little boy hopped out and raced up the path to the front door shouting, “Mommy! Mommy! I’s going to be miss you this weepend!”
    Joy came out, a breathtaking smile on her face. She scooped up the boy and held him tight, then her gaze slid to Rebecca’s car, and Rebecca smiled, but Joy turned her attention back to the child.
    So Joy had a child. She assumed the man was her husband. The Jones on the mailbox.
    If Joy had a child, then Rebecca had a nephew.
    A nephew! And a cute one at that. The boy, three, maybe four years old, had dimples in both cheeks and a mop of wavy brown hair, lit with gold. He wore a red T-shirt with a huge 3 on it and blue jeans and red sneakers. He was absolutely adorable.
    “Mommy, look what I made you!” The boy turned to the man standing by the car. “Daddy, where’s the apple tree I made Mommy?”
    The man produced a green piece of paper from the backseat. Joy could see a brown tree (well, it was more like a brown line) and red dots. He walked over and handed the paper to the boy, who thrust it at Joy. She set him down and kneeled next to him. “I love it!” she said. “Let’s hang it up on the art wall.”
    The boy beamed and followed her into the house. A minute later, they were back. “I’m going to miss you, but I’ll see you very soon, okay?”
    He wrapped his tiny arms around her. “’Kay, Mommy.”
    “Okay, champ,” the man said. “We stopped home to say good-bye to Mommy and now we’re off to ice cream.” He put the boy in the car seat in the backseat of the vehicle.
    Rebecca waited for him to walk over to Joy for their goodbye, but he didn’t. He got in the driver’s side, pulled the door shut, and left.
    Well. It looked like Mommy and Daddy didn’t talk much. Or hug good-bye. Or say good-bye. Or kiss good-bye. Were they divorced?
    Again Joy’s gaze settled on Rebecca’s car, and Rebecca saw the spark of anger flare again. I have enough shit in my life, and now you’re here , it seemed to say.
    They stared at each other, and then Rebecca got out of her car. “Thanks for asking me to come. I can’t tell you how much this means to me. And I know it probably wasn’t easy for you.”
    “I really don’t know why I did ask you to come,” Joy said, pulling a tube of Burt’s Bees lip balm from her pocket and slicking it