Love on the Outskirts of Town

by Zoe York

  “How often does that kind of multi-ambulance response happen up here?” Shawntelle asked as they used antiseptic wipes on the gurney post-call.

  Matt thought about it. “Once a month, maybe? Sometimes there aren’t other paramedics available, and we use the cops or firefighters instead.”

  “I wasn’t sure about doing a rural placement. I wanted to work in the city, but…” Her cheeks pinked up.

  Matt shrugged. “I didn’t get my first choices for placements in college, either. I always left my applications to the last minute.”

  Her flush deepened. “Yeah.”

  “We’ll make it good for you. And there’s a lot to be said about rural emergency services. You get to know people in the community more.”

  Before he could add anything else, Will interrupted them from the front of the ambulance where he’d been doing the paperwork for the call. “Done. Let’s get back on the road.”

  They got the gurney in the back, then they hopped in. Matt gestured to the radio. “You do the honours, Shawntelle.”

  She grabbed the handset. “Two-zero-three-four, on the air.”

  They didn’t get another call, though, and an hour later, they were back at the station, the shift over.

  Matt sat down with the student to complete his post-shift placement report, then went to find Owen.

  “How’d it go?” the supervisor asked, barely looking up from his own pile of paperwork, twenty-times deeper than theirs. Never in a million years would Matt want Owen’s job, although the guy was a single dad with college tuition looming in the near future. It was probably worth the extra pay for him.

  “Pretty good.” Matt gave a quick summary of the shift. “We’d take her out again any time. She was helpful.”

  “Good.”

  “Hey, there’s something I wanted to ask.”

  Owen lifted his head, giving him his full attention. “Shoot.”

  “I was hoping to get the next few Mondays off. I’m already off this coming Monday, but I’m on the schedule the week after that.”

  Owen frowned. “You already have Wednesday nights protected as off so you can parade with the army.”

  Matt frowned right back. “I will take literally all the other shifts. I can come in at the last minute if you need me.”

  “Sure.” Owen crossed his arms. “Plus you’re close to maxing out on overtime and we still have three months left in the year. Don’t think I haven’t noticed you cramming your schedule as full as possible.”

  “So is that a no to Mondays?” If he was taking a lot of overtime, shouldn’t that mean giving him a day off would be easier, not harder?

  Owen shook his head. “Not a no. Just a… Is everything okay?”

  “Yeah, sure. I was just asking about the schedule.”

  Owen pointed at the door. “Can you close that and sit down?”

  Whoa. Matt rolled his shoulders, suddenly uncomfortable, like he’d stumbled into a planned conversation he knew nothing about. “My shift’s done.”

  “Yeah, but you walked in here, and now we’ve got an opportunity to talk, so we’re going to talk.”

  “About what?”

  “Close the door.”

  Shit. Owen wasn’t in the military anymore, but he’d been infantry for ten years. He still had a decent NCO bark, and friends or not, former partners or not, Owen was pulling rank.

  If his supervisor wanted to have a chat, they’d have a chat. Matt knew how to play this game. Deep breath, nod, say “yes, sir” as many times as needed until the talking-to was finished.

  After shutting the door, he sat where Owen pointed.

  “Relax.”

  Matt laughed, even though it sounded a bit hollow to his ears. “I’m a pretty chill guy.”

  “Not so much lately.” Owen raised his eyebrows, as if to say, want to argue that point?

  No, maybe he didn’t. “We all get jaded.”

  “Yeah. Is that it?”

  Matt shrugged. “Sure.”

  “Anything overwhelming you?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “For now. But I’m seeing some early warning signs of workplace stress.”

  “What?” Matt shook his head. “No. You’re reading this all wrong. I promise I’m fine.”

  “You’re juggling a lot more than you used to. Now you’re adding something on Mondays, and your personal life is none of my business, but—”

  “The Monday thing is personal. It’s not another job.”

  “Okay.” Owen rocked back in his chair. “I want to be clear, I don’t have any concerns about your performance on the job—yet. But I’m starting to see some fraying at the edges. I know your family has been through a lot. And I know a thing or two about being tough, about being strong. Pushing stuff down deep.”

  “That's not what's going on here.”

  “It can be innocuous at first. Change in habits.”

  Matt opened his mouth to protest, then his eyes went wide. “This is about the extra shifts I’ve taken on?”

  Owen shrugged. “It’s out of character.”

  Matt laughed. “Yeah. I get that. Shit, man. I’m growing up, how is that a problem?”

  “I don’t know.” Owen scrubbed his jaw. “Look, as your friend, I’m worried about you. As your former partner, I know how you used to be on the job and now you’re not that guy anymore. Something happened.”

  “Yeah, my brother got blown up and barely came home in one piece. I’m trying to be a better man now.”

  “I see that. God, Matt, I know it’s been rough for you all.”

  “Not really for me,” he said, tense all over now. Fuck, he didn’t need Owen feeling bad for him. His life was fine. They’d dodged a real bullet, and his family had a lot to be grateful for. And now that he was really figuring out what mattered, it was going to only get better.

  “Okay, look…you’re an easy-going guy, so your breaking point isn’t going to be as clear to see as someone else’s. I gotta do my due diligence and touch base.”

  “Over a schedule change request.”

  “Yeah.”

  Matt shook his head. “All right. Thanks for the talk. I’ll keep your words in mind, how’s that?”

  “Come see me in a week or two, let’s talk again.”

  “Sure thing. I’ll bring you cupcakes. I’m perfecting my icing techniques, you know.”

  “Get the hell out.”

  Owen grinned.

  Matt: How’s your Tuesday night going?

  Natasha: Slow pub night. But might be able to close early, so that’s okay.

  Matt: I’m crawling into bed. Half shift tomorrow at the crack of dawn.

  Natasha: Yikes. Sleep tight. I’m so not a morning person.

  Matt: No?

  Natasha: Well, I can’t actually sleep in anymore—thanks, Emily—but if I had to choose…

  Matt: LOL @ thanks Emily

  Natasha: Are you a morning person?

  Matt: My sleep is so messed up because of work I’m honestly not sure anymore.

  Natasha: LOL

  Natasha: Well, I meant what I said. Sleep tight. And sweet dreams.

  Matt: Thanks. You too. And maybe I’ll text you again sometime soon…

  Natasha: I’d like that.

  She’d like that a lot, and boy, wasn’t that a weird feeling. That thought stuck with her as she headed home.

  But when she crawled into bed, she didn’t sleep tight. She didn’t sleep at all. Her mind spun with to-do lists and worry lists and an ever-growing collection of possibilities.

  A bed and breakfast for the twenty-first century. A new twist on her dream of having an inn, or maybe a first step in that direction. Like Lorelei Gilmore but with less coffee, more whiskey, and better taste in men.

  Although if she met a real-life Luke, she’d drink all the coffee in the world until he noticed her.

  Maybe her taste in men was just as bad as Lorelei’s.

  She rolled over and bounced her forehead against her pillow
. Go. To. Sleep. Easier said than done.

  Something she learned in those early days with Emily was that lying in bed when she couldn’t sleep was an exercise in frustration, so once she admitted to herself that her brain was working too hard to drift off, she got up. She went upstairs and quietly put the kettle on.

  Perhaps a cup of tea might help. If it didn’t, she’d toss back a shot of whiskey as a chaser.

  While she waited for the kettle, she grabbed her laptop off the shelf and opened it up. No new emails, nothing on social media…she really had no choice but to go and look at the real estate website again.

  There wouldn’t be anything in her price range, though. There hadn’t been either of the last two nights.

  She looked again anyway, with a tight chest and a dry mouth, because now that her sister was moving and she was being pushed out of the comfortable nest in the basement, she wanted to do this right.

  She didn’t want to rent. Didn’t want to make the best of a tiny one-bedroom apartment over a grocery store.

  And she definitely didn’t want to go hat-in-hand to her parents up in Tobermory, either. She’d lived with them off and on until she got pregnant—then she wasn’t welcome, not with “the choices she had made.”

  Like Emily was something to regret.

  Never.

  “What are you looking at?”

  Natasha jumped at the unexpected sound of her sister’s voice. She shook her head as she glanced over her shoulder. “Nothing.”

  Meredith stepped closer and Tasha waved her hands in front of the computer screen, but her sister just knocked her fingers out of the way. “That doesn’t look like nothing.”

  “You are so nosy. It’s just something that might work for step one in my Big Dream Plan.”

  “Ah, the capital-P Plan! I remember that.” Meredith grinned and pointed to the kettle, now whistling. “Shall I make tea while we house-hunt together?”

  Tasha groaned. “It’s a futile effort. Everything is so expensive. And I don’t want that to be on your mind, either.” She swallowed hard. “Tomorrow I’ll start looking for rental places.”

  “Is that what you want?”

  “I want a long-lost relative to bequeath me a rambling mansion I need to share with a Chris Hemsworth look-a-like who’s always losing his shirt. Reality demands some compromise on what I want.”

  Meredith didn’t say anything to that. She made them tea, then shoved a steaming mug of something herbal in front of Natasha. “Move over. Let’s do some dreaming.”

  They didn’t find anything that night, but the next day, Tasha didn’t call any rental agents, either. She felt something—the edges of a dream, maybe—percolating deep inside her, and when the bar slowed down, she let her mind wander.

  The next morning over breakfast, she showed her sister the apps she’d found. Three of them, all very popular, featuring short-term vacation rentals.

  “If I found the right place, a house split into two or three apartments, Emily and I could live in one and we could list the other two on these websites.”

  Meredith scrolled through the apps, chewing on her lower lip. She didn’t say anything. Her silence didn’t do anything to dampen Natasha’s enthusiasm, though, which was a good sign.

  “That’s not the whole of the plan,” she whispered, the corners of her mouth twitching up in a smile. “That’s just phase one.”

  “How many phases are there?”

  “Three at least. Maybe four.”

  The kids bounced into the kitchen, and the conversation paused.

  They picked it up later that night when Meredith was still awake when Natasha got home from the bar.

  “I’ve been thinking about your plan all day,” her sister confessed.

  “Me too.”

  “It’s risky.”

  “Yeah. I’d need to keep another job, for sure. But it’s a way to maybe help offset a mortgage I’m going to need to carry anyway. And it’s also a way to test out if I want to get back into hospitality and innkeeping.”

  “I was wondering about that.” Meredith poured tea that Natasha hadn’t asked for but gratefully took. “I remember you wanted to have an inn when we were kids.”

  “I think it was from watching White Christmas every year.”

  Meredith laughed. “So from the very beginning, you knew it was a lean business model.”

  Tasha nodded. “Yep. I guess so. And I don’t think I have unrealistic expectations. I just want…something of my own.” She took a deep breath. “And I’ve found a couple of potential houses. Really more just to give me an idea of what duplexes and triplexes go for. None of them are in the right towns or right price range. But they’re not out of the realm of possibility.”

  “Show me.”

  So they opened up the computer again and poked through real estate listings. They took turns running searches, and when their cups were empty, Meredith made more tea.

  Halfway through that second cup, one of them expanded the search further north, and a listing caught Natasha’s eye. Her pulse ratcheted up. There was no way…

  She clicked into the listing and scanned for the words that would make it a no-go. As-is. Septic tank. Former grow-op. None of those were listed. It even had central heating. Sure, it needed a new kitchen, new floors, new windows, new…almost everything. But the bones were outstanding. And it was already sub-divided into three apartments.

  “Is that the price for the entire house? Not an apartment inside it?”

  Natasha groaned. “The entire house. Don’t you dare get excited. I can’t afford it.”

  “It’s so pretty.” Meredith clicked through the gallery of photos, and Tasha rubbed her chest, trying not to get excited. “It needs a lot of work, though.”

  “Yeah. But it sounds like a steal.”

  “Stop it. This is not a good idea.” And not just because it was so far north it was definitely inside Matt Foster territory.

  That should make her run scared in the other direction.

  It didn’t.

  Her sister grinned. “We should go and see it.”

  “No.”

  Meredith winked, and Natasha groaned again. “Maybe.”

  “Email the real estate agent. See if we can get an appointment to view it. I’ll book time off work so we can go together.”

  “This is crazy.”

  “I know. That’s the best kind of way to start an adventure.” Meredith propped her elbow on the table and leaned on it. “Seriously, though… When Dan told me about the job in Ottawa, he wasn’t going to apply for it. I told him he needed to do it, just to see what might happen. Let’s see what happens here. If it’s perfect, we can help you with the mortgage. I know you’ll want to carry it yourself, but we can co-sign the loan. It’s seriously the least we could do after booting you out of this place.”

  Natasha nodded. It wasn’t going to be perfect, so it didn’t matter.

  Chapter Nine

  On Wednesday night, Matt grabbed a ride into Wiarton with his brothers. It was their regular Army training night, but it was also the commemoration of Sean’s early retirement from the Forces. Jake drew the short stick to be the designated driver.

  When they arrived, a fellow Pine Harbour resident and reservist, Ryan Howard, was waiting for Matt outside the orderly room.

  “What can I do for you, Sergeant Major?”

  Ryan grinned. “Your choice tonight.” He held up a shiny gold loonie. “Since the senior NCOs are being invited to the officers’ mess for your brother’s mug-out tonight, we want to contribute to their bar.” The officers’ mess would be well-stocked with all the wrong things. Bringing their own beer was a good idea.

  “You’ll need more than a buck.”

  “We’re going to flip on who goes to pick up the booze from the liquor store. You can call heads or tails.”

  “And what does the loser get to do?”

  “Give the Mental Resiliency talk to the recruits.”

  Matt groaned. He grabbed t
he coin out of Ryan’s hand and flipped it between his fingers before tapping it back into Ryan’s palm. “I’ll get the booze.”

  “That’s not how it works.” But Ryan still handed over the purchase order and told him to drive the MILCOTS in the yard.

  At the liquor store, Matt had to wait a few minutes, so he headed back to the beer section to see if there was anything else he wanted to grab. The first thing that caught his eye was the local craft beer section—and the Neustadt beer Natasha had recommended to him.

  He grabbed a six-pack of it. Everyone else could drink what was ordered in advance. Tonight, he was going to get a little tipsy and give some serious thought to what he wanted, who he wanted it with, and what the cost of that might be.

  Training dragged when he got back to the unit. Matt couldn’t shake thoughts of Natasha—and Emily. Of his brother and that winter storm when Jake’s “friend” was in a minor car accident and she’d called him, because she was pregnant and needed a place to stay. Matt’s brother had had a lot of explaining to do in this very armouries to Dani’s brothers.

  Probably a hell of a lot more explaining to do to Dani.

  And once again he burned at the painful reality that Natasha had been discarded in the aftermath.

  Nobody had given her a second thought.

  Matt hadn’t, that was for sure.

  Would he still be twisted up like this if he’d met her then? Would he have felt that zap of awareness for her when she was pregnant, when she thought it might be his brother’s child?

  Across the parade square, Jake laughed at something his LT was saying, and Matt swung his attention toward his brother.

  Do you ever think of her? Probably not. Matt didn’t think about the trail of women he’d left in his own wake—a trail of carefully constructed one-night stands that right up until the minute he met Natasha he wanted to resume.

  Would he use and discard her, too?