The Honey - Don't List

To fans of her signature décor, the idea that Melissa Tripp is throwing in the towel on the home renovation game may come as a shock. But Tripp encourages everyone to rest easy, saying, “There will always be brilliant, creative women rising to the top in this world. There will be the next Melly Tripp any day now. It just can’t be me anymore. Trying to be that person every day was eating me alive.”

In fact, the next creative genius rising to the top may very well be someone close to the Tripps. In a jaw-dropping revelation, Melissa admitted recently to Entertainment Weekly that the Comb+Honey creative inspiration these past few years came more and more from her gifted assistant, Carey Duncan, 26, who worked tirelessly behind the scenes of New Spaces as well as the single-season ratings darling Home Sweet Home.

“Carey has been with Russ and me since the beginning,” Tripp tells PEOPLE. “She only ever worked for us. When things got busier, I didn’t have as much time for the designing aspect of the business, and Carey easily stepped in. But because [Duncan] is a beautiful artist and designer in her own right, her aesthetic became a huge part of the brand, and it grew more and more difficult to figure out where her ideas ended and mine began. That worked fine for a while, but at some point we all registered that Carey wasn’t getting creative credit for the work she was doing.”

Melissa becomes emotional when she discusses her relationship with Duncan, who Tripp says is “more daughter than employee,” and admits the two “talk almost every day, trying to work through what happened, who we are, and what her future can and should be. She needs to get out into the world and find herself, and I want to be the loudest voice in the stands, cheering her on.

“Life went from calm to chaos so fast. I think none of us fully realized what her contribution had become.” Melissa Tripp wipes a tear away and nods, resolute. “I had my turn. Now I want the entire world for Carey.”

“She didn’t come out and say it was all you from the start,” Kurt says, reading over my shoulder.

I close the magazine and tuck it under a stack of papers on the kitchen counter so that Melly’s photo—soft makeup, contrite smile, down-home plaid flannel—doesn’t just sit there, making me wonder how much of that was real and how much was Melly being a brilliant, calculating business-woman. My throat feels tight, like something is lodged there high up, making it hard to breathe or swallow.

I realize the situation was totally messed up, but even after everything, I didn’t think I would take Melly’s disgrace quite this hard.

“This is enough,” I tell him. Frankly, she gave me more credit than I ever let myself imagine. “This is good.”

Now I want the entire world for Carey.

Whether she means it or not, the words are there in stark black and white. The baton, being so cleanly passed, makes me feel both empowered and overwhelmed. On the one hand, I could call Ted, send him some of my sketches, and see if he knows anyone who wants to see this particular phoenix rising from these ashes. But on the other hand, although I love designing, I don’t want to be the next Melissa Tripp. Of all of us, Melly was the only one who ever wanted the world. The rest of us just want our small share of contentment.

And I’m slowly working on mine. It’s been six weeks since the fire, and my life doesn’t look anything like it did that night.

For one, I got the hell out of Wyoming for a while: the first thing I did when the police dismissed me was take my own trip to Hawaii … the following day. I left the police station, took a cab to a hotel in Laramie, booked my trip, and then slept for almost fifteen hours straight. When I woke up, I had four missed calls from James, two from Melly, and one from Rusty. I sent Melly a text letting her know I would send a formal resignation soon, and then left for the airport.

Five days and four nights in Kauai, and after arriving and sleeping for ten solid hours, I had no idea what to do with myself. I only read half a book. I took a lot of naps. I went for long walks, and then came back to the resort and was generally bored out of my mind. I realized I have no idea how to unwind because I hadn’t had two consecutive days off in a decade.

You’d think with all that time on my hands, I’d spend some of it thinking about Melly and Rusty. You’d assume I’d take some time to process everything that happened with James. But it was like a brick wall went up, and every time I tried to bring forward the chaos of the previous week, some protective instinct would kick in and I’d literally fall asleep. On the chaise by the pool. In the chair on my balcony. Once even at the table in the hotel restaurant.