by Dana Roquet
Chapter 3
Dave Cameron turned off the lights and pulled the door of the old farm house closed, locking up for the night. He was satisfied with the progress and it had been a productive last few days. He had finished determining the layout of the upstairs bathroom cabinets and those, plus all of the fixtures including the antique tub and the new shower would be delivered and installed tomorrow.
He had also finished replacing all of the rotted wood out on the front porch and had completed the formal staircase to the second story of the house, just today. He had found a fancy Victorian-Rose ball capped newel post, with turned spindles and intricately detailed tread end mouldings. All it needed now was a classic oak stain to become a breathtaking focal point in the front foyer. He was stoked that his own instincts, research and the clues that he had been able to uncover from the much abused original set of stairs had proved to be a very close match to the detail in the photographs of the ornate staircase that Torie had provided him with.
He had paused often during the last couple of days to send cell-phone photos to Torie, getting brief text messages back from her with her approval, and having her close by was proving to be a big help. Over the last two months while he had been working on the house before her arrival, it had been difficult to completely visualize her ideas. Now that she had provided him with the photographs and talked about her goals, he had a much clearer understanding of what she hoped to achieve.
He had found Torie Mills to be not only passionate about the house and the restoration, but as they had shared dinner that first night in Oskaloosa, he had been struck hard by just how completely drop-dead gorgeous the woman is. She had effortlessly lit up the room for him like a sunny day. He had found himself so preoccupied with gazing at her that he would not have been surprised to learn that his mouth had been hanging open and tongue lulling out like a simpleton had he not consciously kept his mouth and tongue firmly in check.
She possessed the most expressive large blue-gray eyes, which had shined with excitement as she had warmed to the subject of her new home. She had also had a wonderful blush come up in her cheeks when she had become embarrassed for being so ‘over-the-top’ with what she had called her ‘chatter’ but that had been her opinion, not his. He hadn’t said anything, but he could have listened to her talk all night and he’d been mesmerized by simply watching her mouth as she spoke.
Then as the evening hours had raced by until they were two of only a few patrons still occupying the large restaurant, their intense discussion of strategy had mellowed to a quiet, companionable ease and he’d been unable to keep his mind from wandering down some non-work-related and rather steamy paths as they had enjoyed a cup of after dinner coffee and then another.
His marriage had been over for almost two years now, and he had been feeling, just in the last six months or so, that he was ready to get back out there in the dating world again, except for the fact that he had found that Fremont, being such a tiny community, presented a daunting challenge for him to find someone who, one, interested him and two, whom he hadn’t known on a friend level for his entire life.
His relationship with his ex-wife Laura had begun as a blind date, arranged by well-intending friends and the attraction between them had been immediate. They had fallen in love quickly, married and he had brought her home to join his life here and live out their happily ever after. But she had been a city girl all of her life—from Des Moines, born and raised and he knew now that their marriage had been doomed to fail from the very beginning.
At first, she had seemed to be perfectly suited to him and for living in the small town that he intends never to leave. But after three years with him, she had called it quits and without much fanfare, had packed up and moved out and on. The divorce had been amicable because with no kids and her not wanting the house, there wasn’t much to fight over. He had simply bought her out of her share of their mutual possessions and they had parted company as friends. He is pretty laid-back in that way, even Laura had said that he was the most accepting and loyal man that she could have ever hoped to find. It was the small-town life that she couldn’t tolerate and Dave knew that there are a lot of people who feel that way about small-town life.
David Cameron’s roots were deeply entrenched in Fremont and Mahaska County. The land that he lived on a mile north of town just past the cemetery was part of the same land that his mother’s family has owned since the early 1840’s when the McFall’s had become one of the earliest settler family’s, quite literally by accident, when an injured ox had forced the family to stop at a spring just north of the cemetery land while it was being nursed back to health.
Samuel had left his wife and children there, including a couple of older boys to mind their possessions and had also left them in the company of a family group of friendly Indians who were also camped along the creek; while he had traveled on by foot, out west until he had reached their original goal some fifty miles away which had been Des Moines. After taking a look around and finding nothing there but a small fort and a single dwelling, Samuel had decided to return to the fertile lands of what would become Fremont and stake his claim.
Dave’s farm, a portion of that original claim, had been passed down from his great-great-grandfather William McFall, to his son—Dave’s great-grandfather Jacob McFall, who had left it to Dave’s grandfather Joseph McFall, and finally it had been passed down to his mother, Anna McFall Cameron. His Grandpa Joe had lived with Dave’s family until his death in 1991.
Direct descendants had lived in the same house continuously for the last 130 years and Dave had been the only one of his family of four siblings who’d had any desire to keep the homestead after his parents had retired from farming and moved to Arizona to enjoy their golden years away from the cold Iowa winters. He had purchased the property outright from his parents about six years ago now and he had spent the last five years working on restoring the place. He still owned a total of 910 acres of land—the ten acres that the house and outbuildings sat on; and nine hundred acres in crops. He rented the cropland out to his neighboring farmers for the actual farming operation and he took a share of the profits at the end of each growing season as the rental payment. His passion was and always had been carpentry, woodworking, and restoration.
Torie, it seemed, was as stoked about restoration as he was and it would be great when she got moved into Fremont, into the rented house and could spend some time with him helping out. She seemed determined to get her hands dirty, and he was looking forward to her company more than he cared to examine too closely.
He had always worked alone on his projects except for occasionally taking on a promising student or two from the Indian Hills Community College at Oskaloosa as interns; in order to mentor them and nurture their interest in the profession of historic restoration. He hadn’t had any such opportunities since the fall-winter semester of last year, so having Torie’s company while working on her place—he was looking forward to that. That she was a wealthy, successful, beautiful woman with long auburn hair that hangs down her back in sleek layers, huge blue-gray eyes that are framed by dark flirty long lashes that can melt a man, and a sexy, slim figure that happens to end with a pair of legs that seem to go on forever didn’t hurt matters either, Dave had to admit to himself.
Just as he had climbed into his pickup truck and closed the door, his cell phone rang and his face brightened when he saw the caller’s phone number and he answered with a cheerful “Hello.”
“Dave. Hey, it’s Torie. I was wondering what you’re up to tonight and kinda hoping that you don’t have any plans, reason being, that if you don’t, I thought that maybe I’d see if you’d like to meet me for dinner? I was thinking that I might come into town and grab something to eat at the Finish Line. My treat,” she added quickly.
“I just closed up the house. I’ll run home and shower and should be able to meet you there by, say, six fifteen?”
“Perfect. By the time I clean up and drive in from Oskie, we shou
ld arrive at just about the same time.”
“Okay, see you in a bit,” he said and snapped his phone closed, unable to help the smile that spread across his lips. He could feel that old feeling starting and he already knew that he was heading for trouble because she was taken but he was going to lose his heart to Torie Mills, he could tell it already.
He clicked on the radio and cranked it up as John Cougar Mellencamp sang about “Little Pink Houses” as he turned onto the gravel road toward home.
***
The Finish Line Diner was one of the few remaining establishments that hugged the edge of Highway 23 which cut through town and ran perpendicular to the old downtown business district. The building had been around since 1892 and although it had gone through many changes in name and ownership, it had always managed to continue to be an eatery. It was currently outfitted as a retro fifties’ style diner with a black-and-white checked racing theme. It had red vinyl bench-style booths situated along the picturesque wall of plate-glass windows facing the parking lot, café-style tables and chairs scattered about, and a black-and-white checked main counter with a dozen swivel stools.
Dave was the first to arrive and he parked in the gravel lot, deciding to wait outside for Torie. He leaned against the side of his truck watching down the highway until he saw her silver Nissan Pathfinder come into view and he pushed off, coming to his full height as Torie arrived, parking next to him. He reached out a hand to help her open her car door and as he did, she smiled up at him warmly. Yeah I’m a goner, he thought fatalistically. God, her smile is irresistible.
“Hey!” he said casually.
“Have you been waiting long?” she asked with concern as she stepped out.
“No. Just a few minutes,” he assured her and couldn’t help but give her an appraising look up and down. She wore a simple turquoise-blue long-sleeved dress that ended about halfway up her thighs and casual flats. From what he could see without ogling her like some kind of letch, she appeared to possess about a mile of silky smooth, well-toned legs.
“Wow!” he said. He couldn’t help himself, it just sort of popped right out of his mouth and he immediately felt like a fool.
Torie didn’t seem to mind. She looked down at her dress and then reached into the vehicle to retrieve her purse and a jacket from the seat.
“Well, thank you. I haven’t gotten a wow in a while. Not overdressed, am I?” she asked self-consciously, tucking her long auburn hair behind her ears.
He watched as her bangs fell over her forehead and into her eyes and she swept them away from her face gracefully with her fingers and he swallowed—hard. Damn, he thought. She’s absolutely beautiful.
“Um—no,” he stammered as he attempted to recover his equilibrium. “I think I’m underdressed.” He looked down at his own navy button-down shirt, blue jeans, and brown leather Rockport’s appraisingly while he waited for her to close and lock her car door and then she turned to him.
“Shall we?” she asked flashing a brilliant smile.
He swept his hand toward the diner gallantly with a slight bow. “After you.”
“I’m absolutely starving!” Torie growled with feeling, walking before him and Dave hurried to intercept her before she could reach for the handle and opened the diner door, allowing her to precede him.
***
As we sat across from each other in a booth against the windows enjoying our dinner, I told Dave a little bit about my relatively dull life growing up on the west side of Des Moines and then I sat enthralled, listening as he described his experience of growing up in Fremont, which was much more interesting to me, by far.
By the time that he was of school age, the last classes of the independent Fremont High School were graduating. When it was his turn to attend high school he and his classmates had been bussed to Eddyville as Fremont had merged with other districts to save and pool their tax dollars. The unused and dilapidated old high school building had been demolished around 1997 to make way for a new grade school.
My grandfather had graduated from one of the earlier Fremont high schools back in the year 1914. That early school had been built in the year 1890 and was referred to today as simply ‘the 1890’ by virtually everyone as a way of distinguishing it from earlier and later schools. It had been demolished shortly after my grandpa’s graduation but I possess several photographs of the interior of the schoolrooms and my grandpa Arlan seated with his classmates in several rows of wooden topped desks complete with ink well ports and scrolled cast iron legs, so I do have some idea of what it might have been like to attend there. It’s hard to comprehend in this day and age that his graduating class had been a whopping six students.
“It’s too bad that all of those old buildings are gone. I don’t even know where the 1890 high school sat. Do you?”
“It was just out west of here,” he pointed out the window and then across the street to the buildings and a park with swings and play equipment on the other side of Main Street along North Pine. “All along there used to be the old town square.”
“Really? I didn’t realize that,” I marveled. “I must’ve driven past there a hundred times and had no idea.”
“I doubt most people living in town know either. It’s all been gone for nearly a century,” Dave said.
You know,” I continued. “I have a family history that describes where the old one-room schoolhouse was located—one of them anyway, Olive Branch, I think it was. In 1978, when the history was written by my grandfather, it still sat out east of town. Do you know where it would be?”
“No, but we could maybe try and find it. If it simply deteriorated and collapsed, we may be able to find something. Might be something that we could tackle on a weekend day,” he offered.
“I’ll dig out my history,” I said. “That’d be great.”
The waitress arrived just then to clear the dishes and as she did so, we both sat back in our seats, not realizing that we’d been hunched over the booth toward each other, engrossed in our conversation.
“Can I get you folks anything else, Dave?” she asked and moved her eyes to me, conveying the same question.
“No, Char,” Dave spoke up. “I think we’re good to go, unless you’d like some desert?” he looked at me. “Char makes a really great apple pie,” he said with a charming smile while raising his brows enticingly.
“I couldn’t eat another thing, really,” I declined and looked up at Char, a pleasantly attractive woman, probably in her mid-fifties and possessed of a mass of golden-blonde curls that she wore pulled up into a puff of a bun at the crown of her head. She wore a crisp white uniform with a black-checked apron and her name tag was decorated with a checkered finish line flag and her name, Charlotte, in black lettering, appeared to have been typed up with an old fashioned label maker.
“Thank you, though. Everything was wonderful,” I said honestly.
She nodded with an added friendly wink and ripped the receipt slip from her tablet, placing it face down on the table.
“Whenever you’re ready,” she said, balancing a load of our dirty dishes in the crook of her arm as she left us.
Dave reached for the bill just as I did, and we both ended up covering half of it with our hands.
“I told you this was my treat,” I reminded him trying to slide the paper out from under his fingers.
“Well, only under one condition.” He kept his hand over it, holding on firmly.
“What condition?” I asked suspiciously, but I couldn’t help but smile at this silly tug-of-war we were engaged in.
“We go downtown and you let me buy you a drink,” he demanded with a no nonsense tone in his voice that made it clear that this condition was non-negotiable.
“Downtown? Downtown Fremont?” I sputtered with a laugh. “I thought we were downtown right now.”
“Technically, you gotta go around the corner and down South Pine to Stevie’s,” he informed me and continued. “Did you know that Stevie’s just happens to be one of only tw
o bars in town and just happens to be directly across the street from its only competition?”
“No I didn’t but—” I began but he interrupted, forestalling what he’d anticipated was going to be a decline.
“And did you know,” he continued enticingly, obviously intending to prey on my unhealthy interest in all things Fremont. “That Stevie has had a good-natured feud with Tim, the owner of the dueling establishment, Tim’s Time Out, for many years now?”
He asked this rhetorically because he went on before I could even open my mouth to respond. “What I am offering to do for you, Miss Mills, is to give you a personal introduction to both of these iconic pillars of the community. You just can’t pass up a chance like this,” he said, trying again to wriggle the tab out from under my grasp while giving me a grin and a flash of his irresistible dimples and straight white teeth.
Unable to lift or turn my left hand enough to be able to view the face of my wristwatch without possibly losing my hold on the bill, I looked up at the clock on the wall above the counter and saw that it was still early, not quite 7:30.
“Oh, what the hell,” I said giving up with a sigh. “I’m in.”
So I won the bill and paid it, and we headed out to bar-hop in Fremont, Iowa.
***
We started out at Stevie’s where we sat at the bar and Dave made good on the aforementioned promise of an introduction to the famed proprietor; Stevie. That conversation turned out to be brief because he was pretty busy with customers and couldn’t spare a lot of time to talk. So this left Dave and I to ourselves, enjoying our icy cold beers and getting better acquainted by swapping back-stories and delving a little deeper into our respective personal lives. I told him the basics about my relationship with Derek, and he told me a little bit about his one and only failed marriage to his ex-wife, Laura.
The place was pretty crowded, and we ended up with our bar stools close together and facing each other with our feet sharing one other’s footrests as we found it necessary to lean in close to be able to be heard over the noise of the country music blaring from an ancient jukebox that a table of three women across the bar kept feeding quarters to, and the sports play by play absolutely blaring from a big-screen television hanging directly above us. I gotta say that I found Dave Cameron to be extremely charming, very funny, pretty damn handsome and he smelled like Cool Water, one of my favorite men’s colognes.