Mrs. Nash's Ashes - Softcover

Adler, Sarah

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0593547799 ISBN 13: 9780593547793

Verlag: Penguin Publishing Group, 2023

Inhaltsangabe

A New York Public Library Best Book of 2023

A Most Anticipated Summer Read by Today ∙ Barnes & Noble ∙ BookRiot ∙ GoodReads ∙ Culturess ∙ and more!

A starry-eyed romantic, a cynical writer, and (the ashes of) an elderly woman take the road trip of a lifetime that just might upend everything they believe about true love.

Millicent Watts-Cohen is on a mission. When she promised her elderly best friend that she’d reunite her with the woman she fell in love with nearly eighty years ago, she never imagined that would mean traveling from D.C. to Key West with three tablespoons of Mrs. Nash’s remains in her backpack. But Millie’s determined to give her friend a symbolic happily-ever-after, before it’s (really) too late—and hopefully reassure herself of love’s lasting power in the process.

She just didn’t expect to have a living travel companion.

After a computer glitch grounds flights, Millie is forced to catch a ride with Hollis Hollenbeck, an also-stranded acquaintance from her ex’s MFA program. Hollis certainly does not believe in happily-ever-afters—symbolic or otherwise—and makes it quite clear that he can’t fathom Millie’s plan ending well for anyone.

But as they contend with peculiar bed-and-breakfasts, unusual small-town festivals, and deer with a death wish, Millie begins to suspect that her reluctant travel partner might enjoy her company more than he lets on. Because for someone who supposedly doesn’t share her views on romance, Hollis sure is becoming invested in the success of their journey. And the closer they get to their destination, the more Millie has to admit that maybe this trip isn’t just about Mrs. Nash’s love story after all—maybe it’s also about her own.

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Sarah Adler writes romantic comedies about lovable weirdos finding their happily ever afters. She lives in Maryland with her husband and daughter and spends an inordinate amount of her time yelling at her mischievous cat to stop opening the kitchen cabinets. Mrs. Nash’s Ashes is her debut novel. You can find her on Twitter (@sarahaadler) and Instagram (@sarahadlerwrites).

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1

Rose McIntyre Nash died peacefully in her sleep at age ninety-eight, and now I carry part of her with me wherever I go. I do not mean that figuratively. She's inside a small wooden box tucked away in my backpack as we speak. Not all of her, of course. Geoffrey Nash wasn't about to hand over his entire grandmother to the weird girl who lived in her spare bedroom. But Geoffrey was kind enough to give me three tablespoons of her ashes (again, not figurative; he portioned her out with a measuring spoon from the kitchen). Probably not the request he was expecting when he asked if I'd like something to remember her by, but he didn't seem to mind too much. I think he was mostly relieved I didn't want her highly collectible radioactive Fiestaware.

Geez, this is making me sound like a total wackadoo. I'm not, though, I promise. I know that's exactly what a wackadoo would say, but I'm really just a relatively normal person who happens to be traveling to Key West with a small amount of human remains.

I'm going about this all wrong; let me start at the beginning.

Mrs. Nash had been living in Apartment 1B for almost seventy years when my boyfriend and I moved into Apartment 1A. Thanks to rent control, she was paying like five dollars a month for her two-bedroom between Dupont and Logan Circles. And we became fast friends, because I am a damn delight and so was she. So when Geoffrey and the rest of the extended family began fretting over her living alone around the same time things with Josh imploded, I moved in with Mrs. Nash. It was the perfect situation: Geoffrey let me live there for practically nothing in exchange for cleaning, cooking, running errands, accompanying Mrs. Nash to her medical appointments, and generally attending to his grandmother's needs. But mostly what Mrs. Nash needed was friendship, which I was more than happy to provide since that's mostly what I needed too.

Well, one day about three months ago, we were in the living room, me sprawled on the Persian rug with some book on the War of 1812 I was reading for work and Mrs. Nash sitting with her eyes closed in her favorite threadbare chair, the sunlight covering her plump little body like a blanket. She appeared to be napping, but suddenly her cornflower-blue eyes fluttered open and she sat up straighter.

Millie, she said with a sense of urgency in her voice that sent a jolt of panic up my spine. I was relieved-albeit momentarily confused-when she continued, I would like to tell you about the love of my life. We met during the war. Her name was Elsie.

Anyway, that's the ultra-abbreviated version of how I wound up here, sitting cross-legged on the floor at National Airport, waiting to board a plane to Miami with a bit of Mrs. Nash in my backpack. There's a lot more to the story, of course, but right now I'm a bit too distracted to tell it properly-a man across the gate's waiting area keeps glancing my way when he thinks I'm not looking. Like he thinks he might know me from somewhere and is trying to figure it out. That's nothing new; people still recognize me sometimes, even though I haven't been on TV since I was fourteen. It's not a big deal when they do since I'm about as extroverted as they come.

Usually the way this situation plays out is they approach me, saying something like, "Hey, aren't you that girl from that show?" Then I respond, "If you mean the actually kinda problematic kids' show from the early aughts about the time-traveling redhead and her poorly rendered CGI lizard companion, then yes. That's me. Millicent Watts-Cohen, also known as Penelope Stuart on Penelope to the Past." Then they say, a little sheepishly, "Right. Yeah, that show was awesome, and you were great in it." Except I know they are lying because the show was terrible. The history it taught was inaccurate at best and flat-out offensive at worst, the special effects sucked, and I was never talented at acting so much as at having a cute face and a good memory. Sometimes they'll mention a Penelope episode they claim was their favorite, but it's usually a conflation of two or more, or even a different show altogether. I never bother correcting them, just smile and nod. And I'll usually agree to a selfie when they say, "Oh my god, my friend/sibling/partner/parakeet will never believe this!" because it keeps them from taking an unflattering stealthy pic of me eating a corn dog a few minutes later, and also staves off the biannual tabloid rumors that I've died from huffing glue.

It's possible this guy is a fan; he looks about my age, give or take, and thirtyish is the right demographic. Except something about the way he's looking at me feels familiar. Like maybe he recognizes me from real life.

I think I might recognize him too. But I can't seem to place him. Did we go to school together? Not grad-my master's program was small and absurdly insular-but maybe undergrad. I'm running through a mental catalog of various classrooms I've been in over the years, hoping he'll snap into the memory of one of them, when a man's voice interrupts my mental riffling.

"Hey, are you . . . ?"

I turn to find an almost perversely muscular dude in a tank top, which feels like a real choice on a cloudy day that didn't even break sixty-five degrees in the DC area. His shaggy, sun-bleached hair sticks out from the edges of a flat-brimmed Nationals cap with its iridescent sticker still in place. His biceps are the size and color of whole honey-baked hams. He's wearing sunglasses-indoors. This person is what I imagine would result if a beach bum and a lax bro had a thirtysomething baby.

My meeting-a-fan smile automatically plasters itself to my face as I stand. "Penelope Stuart on Penelope to the Past," I say. "That's me. Millicent Watts-Cohen."

"Whoa, yeah, I thought it was you. That's so rad. I can't wait to tell my boy, Todd. He won't believe it." He pulls out his phone and holds it up. "Can I get a selfie?"

"Yeah, sure," I say.

We lean in toward each other, and he angles the phone downward to get us both in the frame. His proximity assaults my nose with the scent of beer and an excessive amount of musky body spray. Even after he snaps a few shots and tucks his phone back into his shorts pocket, his grin remains. "Todd and I watched every episode of Penelope to the Past like a million times back in the day."

"That's great. Always nice to hear that people enjoyed the show," I say.

"Ha, no, the show itself was kind of garbage-no offense."

My smile droops in response to this surprising development. Not that I'm offended (I mean, I wholeheartedly agree with him), but these lines aren't part of the usual script for this interaction.

"You were like the hottest girl our age we'd ever seen. Especially that episode when your family was on vacation in Mexico. You know, the one where you went back to Aztec times? You were in this little yellow bikini, and your, you know . . ." Don't do it, I think. Don't do it. But he raises his hands to his chest and palms invisible breasts, then mimes them bouncing while he slo-mo runs in place. ". . . When you had to escape from the human sacrifice." He laughs and nudges me with an elbow. "Ha, yeah. You know what I mean. You know."

Oh god.

It's not that I was unaware until this moment that my awkward fourteen-year-old body starred in a lot of my fellow teenagers' early sexual fantasies. It's that most people keep this shit on the internet, where they can say gross things anonymously and without inflicting it directly upon my person. That's one of the main reasons I don't do social media. I learned a long time ago that I can't stop the world from objectifying me, but I can choose to shield my brain from absorbing the worst of it. Luckily (and perhaps surprisingly) this is the first time in years someone has been so candid when meeting me. But as much as I want...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Penguin Publishing Group
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2023
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0593547799
• ISBN 13: 9780593547793
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 352
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: BERKLEY; https://www.penguin.com/?s=BERKLEY; ; Unit 2 Limavady Business Park; Limavady; County Londonderry; BT49 0HR; Vereinigtes Königreich
• Verantwortliche Person: gpsr@libri.de; gpsr@libri.de; ; Friedensallee 273; Hamburg; 22763; Deutschland