Kids are Chancey

by Kay Dew Shostak

  KIDS ARE CHANCEY

  Copyright © 2017 by Kay Dew Shostak.

  All rights reserved.

  This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in articles and reviews.

  ISBN: 978-0-9991064-1-9

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2017909079

  SOUTHERN FICTION: Women’s Fiction / Small Town / Railroad / Bed & Breakfast / Mountains / Georgia / Family

  Text Layout and Cover Design by Roseanna White Designs

  Cover Images from www.Shutterstock.com

  Published by August South Publishing. You may contact the publisher at:

  AugustSouthPublisher@gmail.com

  To the Shostak kids

  Robert, Ryan, and Lizzy

  You are my best stories

  Table of Contents

  Foreword

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Foreword

  Hey y’all,

  Just a quick note from me, Patty, to say thanks for coming to mine and Andy’s wedding earlier this month. Wasn’t the reception at the Lake Park just beautiful? Something about dancing in a wedding dress. Even seemed to chill out Anna and Will some. Maybe it was that they were actually already married, since they’d eloped, or maybe it was because she’s, well, you know. But things were pretty tense those days before the wedding and even during the wedding. However, they did seem to get along better when the dancing started.

  Speaking of tense, let me apologize for Diego Moon showing up and getting all upset at Mr. Peter. Why, everyone knows nothing was going on with Mr. Peter and Jordan Moon. For crying out loud, have you seen Diego Moon? Besides Mr. Peter is like a duck on a June bug about getting his bistro opened and can’t think of nothing else. Sooner he could get Jordan and Diego back together and her back in New York with her little girls, sooner he could open his new place up.

  Just between you and me, I’m excited about the changes on Main Street. Mama says she’s got things figured out for me and Andy to let Carolina have her bookstore back. Working with Carolina is fun, but maybe you’ve noticed she’s not real decisive? Yeah, I like that Andy doesn’t spend time talking or thinking about things, he just does them! But Carolina’s real sweet, bless her heart.

  Hope you stayed at the reception long enough to hear that Ms. Laney told everyone she’s having a baby! Sure surprised a bunch of folks. Guess that’ll keep her from being jealous of her sister moving up to Laurel Cove. Them are some mighty fancy houses up there. Wait, does that mean Carolina is on her own with the B&B and the bookstore? Hmm, hope she gets better at making decisions. Maybe she’ll ask Savannah. LOL

  Gotta go. We’re leaving on our honeymoon this weekend and I still ain’t packed. I’d like to say I’ll miss you and Chancey, but you know I’d be lying!

  -Thanks, Mrs. Andrew Taylor

  Chapter 1

  “Some would say it’s poetic justice. That you got what you deserved.”

  Oops, did I say that out loud? Apparently so, since my sixteen-year-old daughter Savannah is staring at me, unblinking with her head tilted just a bit. Yeah, there we go, hand moving to her hip and chin tilting up ever so slightly. Alert sirens and red lights flashing in my head can only be dimmed with rapid retreat. “Not that I think that. I think he’s crazy, and you’re right.” Smile just a bit and turn slowly away. There, now I’m safe to roll my eyes.

  Must be the heat that got to me. Our AC unit died yesterday, and the house is hot. Open windows let in a little breeze, but by this time of the afternoon, the breeze isn’t even refreshing. “Want a piece of lemon in your tea?” I ask her.

  “Sure.” She sits her glass on the counter beside mine. “When’s the air going to be fixed? My room is like an oven.”

  Her room under the eaves holds all the hot Georgia air that rises from the rest of the house, and the tiny half-windows don’t let in much breeze at all.

  “FM says ‘no time at all,’ that’s all I can tell you. If you get a better answer out of him, let me know. I’m going out to the deck.” When I called Jackson yesterday morning (was that just yesterday?) to tell him the air wasn’t working, he was already south of Atlanta. He’d left super early to beat the Monday morning traffic. Jackson, my husband, is an engineer who works with railroads. No, he doesn’t drive trains, he’s a civil engineer working with tracks and roads. He’s heading up a big project in South Georgia, so he’ll be there most of the week. Heck, most of this year. He said to call FM, an older friend who’s lived his whole life in Chancey, and get an idea of who to call. So I did.

  Well, FM knew a guy. A guy who’s been doing air conditioners since they were invented. A guy who’ll fix us right up. All I know is that in Marietta, in my beloved suburbs, I didn’t have to know a guy. I just had to look up a website, call the number listed, and everything would be okay. No standing around talking about how ‘the guy’ used to play on this part of the river when he was a kid, or hear how he and FM played football against each other in junior high, or listen to his woes about his grandkids going bad. Give me a guy in a uniform with a name patch, those disposable footies he puts on, who just hands me a bill when he’s done. Oh, and since our rush job is a “favor” for FM, we get squeezed in between his “real” jobs. I do not need to have a relationship with my repair guy, but apparently that’s how it’s done in Chancey.

  When I accidentally sold our home back in the Atlanta suburbs, there were lots of things I hated about moving to a small town. And this part of small town life wasn’t even on that list.

  “And he’s probably just doing it to get back at me.” Back on the deck where there’s a merciful breeze, Savannah sets her glass of tea on the table and flops into the chair across from me.

  “FM?” She’s interrupted my private soliloquy on small town repairmen, so it takes me a moment. “No. Ricky?”

  She stretches her legs out to prop them on the planter at the edge of the deck. Missus planted it with pink geraniums last month for the Mother’s Day brunch we hosted here at the B&B, and they are loving the heat of June. Bunches of pink flowers with white centers crowd each planter. However, as the flowers die, handfuls of petals fall onto the deck, and I have to keep sweeping them up. Of course, compared to the work the garden in the yard is, give me geraniums anytime. Savannah’s foot taps one of the flower heads, and a small shower spreads pink beside the p
lanter.

  “Yeah, Ricky,” she says, adding, “but I really don’t care.”

  Then quit talking about it! Okay, I did better that time and didn’t say it out loud. Savannah’s high school boyfriend hit the ground running at Georgia State, where he’s enrolled in summer classes and working on building up his legs for football. Apparently, he’s the toast of the town and is slated to be the starting quarterback in the fall due to a couple injuries and some bad grades on other players’ parts.

  Now, supposedly just as apparent, all that glory should’ve been additional feathers in Savannah’s cap. She was planning on attending games as the star quarterback’s girlfriend right up to this past weekend, when Ricky came home with Miss Georgia State on his arm. Not sure she actually has that title, but she should. She’s stunning, poised, and smart—majoring in pre-med and helping Ricky ace his classes. He surprised everyone by coming home and then showing up with her in church on Sunday. His girlfriend Charisse looked like a woman beside Savannah. Of course, thanks to a viral YouTube video, everyone around here remembers lovesick Ricky pouring out his soul to cold-hearted Savannah at Valentine’s, while at the same time burning down the town gazebo. So, like I said earlier, poetic justice.

  I hear voices inside the house, but before I can get up, FM steps out onto the deck. “Carolina, got some bad news. That part Earl needs he can’t find at the junkyard. Looks like he’s going to have to buy a whole new part.”

  Standing up, I point FM to the chair at the end of the table. “Sit there. You look hot, and it’s in the shade. Let me get you some tea.” In the kitchen, I speak louder. “So why would we want a part from the junkyard, anyway?”

  “Well, it’d be cheaper. That’s what Earl’s been doing, having his wife call the local junkyards and checking their inventories.”

  I pour his tea but take a minute before I go back out. I’m breathing, in and out, real slow. Okay, I’m good now. FM is the very salt of the earth, even though he’s married to the devil. Okay, Missus’s not actually the devil. Anyway, I don’t want to upset FM. “But I told you, we’re good with doing a whole new system. We knew that was a possibility when we bought this place last summer. It was figured into the final closing costs. We have the money sitting there in the bank, just waiting for the system to conk out.”

  “Thank you, honey.” he says as I hand him his glass. “But no need to throw away good money. Earl is going to check with some other places that might have it. ‘Course that’ll mean adding a trip a bit farther away, but he says it’d be worth it. Good tea, Carolina. Real sugar. I can always tell. Missus makes hers with those saccharine pills and Splenda. Leaves a bad taste in my mouth, but it’s better than that unsweet stuff some folks’ll drink.” He leans back. “So, Savannah, you get to talk to Ricky’s new girlfriend? She’s real smart. Bet you and her would be good friends if you end up down at Georgia State next year. That’s still your first choice, right?”

  “No. I never seriously considered it.”

  FM raises an eyebrow. “What? You were all excited about their theater program! Yeah, I remember you talking about it. Right, Carolina?”

  Oh, no, not going there. “Wait, back to the air conditioner. We don’t have air because Earl is scouring the Southeast for a used part?”

  FM nods. “Lucky it’s not too hot yet.”

  Savannah stands up. “I’m going where there’s air conditioning. Call me when ours is fixed.” She stomps past me and into the house.

  FM sniffs. “She seems right out of sorts. We didn’t even have air conditioning when I was her age. Shoot, I wouldn’t have it now if Missus had told me she was getting it put in. I was good with a couple window units when the heat builds up in August.”

  “Well,” I say, “we have a business to run, and it’s getting up into the eighties this weekend.”

  “Want me to set up a couple window fans in the guest rooms? Which ones are booked?”

  “No, I want a new unit!” I pause to calm down. Everyone in this crackerjack box of a town thinks our B&B, Crossings B&B, is their own private project. They all know what’s best. “Sorry, FM, but I want it replaced. Does Earl even do new units?”

  “Of course he does. He just doesn’t fly right into replacing good things for the sake of making things fast. You want it done right, don’t ya?”

  FM looks so sincere, so helpful. I stand up and walk toward the kitchen door. I’m not made for confrontation. That’s why we have a B&B in the first place. “Sure. You know best. I’ve got to go.” Sitting my empty tea glass on the counter, I shake my head.

  Time is the most precious commodity in the suburbs. Here, it’s money. Sanity is in short supply both places, but at least in the ‘burbs, crazy is air-conditioned.

  “Please tell me that was not Earl Shurbett’s truck I passed leaving here,” my friend Laney yells as she waltzes in the front door. At the door into the kitchen from the living room, she stops, leans against the doorframe, and takes a huge breath. She pushes her big dark sunglasses to the top of her head, corralling her mass of hair back from her face. “Was Earl here? What’s broken? Call and fire him right this minute.”

  FM yells from the deck. “We are not firing Earl. Everything’s under control.”

  Laney looks out the French door to the deck, then she holds her arms up so that her blue caftan floats around her. “Lord, it’s hot in here! The air is broken, isn’t it? How am I supposed to work here? Let me call Shaw. He’ll get someone to take care of this.” She pulls her phone out of the depths of the blue silky fabric swirling around her and punches it twice as she yells, “Should’ve known if Earl was here, you weren’t far behind, FM.” With flattened eyebrows, she shakes her head at me. “Can’t believe you let him call Earl.” Then into the phone, “Shaw, Carolina’s air quit. Call somebody to fix it. Love you.”

  She punches the phone once more and plunges it back into the folds of her muumuu. “Here I am all ready to work, and this place is an oven. Why didn’t you tell me the air quit?” She opens the fridge and pulls out the gallon pitcher of iced tea.

  “’Cause they called me. I called Earl. It’s under control,” FM yells again from the back deck.

  Laney takes the glass I hand her from the cabinet and pushes it against our ice dispenser. Under its noise she whispers, “Earl can’t fix nothing. Shaw knows a guy.”

  Great, another guy. “Want lemon?”

  “No,” she spits. “What is it with everyone suddenly wanting to put lemon in iced tea? Some Yankee plot, I’m betting.” She puts the pitcher back in the fridge and sashays out to the deck. She’s always sashayed, but these caftans she’s taken to wearing while pregnant take it to a whole new level.

  “Hey, FM. So, when’s Earl figure the air will be back on?”

  “Directly. That is, unless you just messed things up calling Shaw. Who’s Shaw gonna call? Terry? He calls Terry, and you might as well throw the whole system down the hill into the river.”

  Laney sits in the chair where Savannah sat earlier, and I just lean against the railing. “Who’s Terry?”

  “Some fool kid who doesn’t know a hammer from a wrench. Just knows how to send out bills.”

  Laney primly sips her tea. “Unlike Earl, who never has to send a bill because he never actually fixes anything. Earl should actually send out checks to folks for having to listen to all his stories.”

  “Quit fussing with each other,” I say. “I just want it fixed. Laney, have you quit over at the Charming House B&B yet?”

  “Law, yes. They ain’t ever gonna open. Besides, they’re too bossy with me in my delicate condition. Can you believe I didn’t even know I was pregnant? And climbing all those stairs they have and using all that cleaning stuff? Besides, they were too bossy.”

  We were shocked when Laney made her announcement to a few of us at the double wedding two weeks ago. She had only figured it out when she fainted and had to be taken by her new employer to the hospital over in Collinswood. She and her husband Shaw then went to see
a doctor specializing in births for older mothers. Although apparently she’d blissfully sailed unaware through almost six months of pregnancy, and everything looks great for a healthy baby at the end of the summer.

  FM stands up. “Well, I better be going. Anna wants flank steak grilled with veggies tonight for dinner.”

  “How’s she feeling?” I ask as I sit back where I was earlier. Although she’s twenty-five years younger than Laney, my daughter-in-law Anna, who is also FM’s granddaughter, is having a rough pregnancy. Even though we knew about Anna and Will’s bundle of joy first, it was just as surprising because we found out about the baby in the same conversation in which we learned they’d eloped. Before that, we didn’t even know they were dating. But, honestly, it’s too hot to think about all that. “Strange to have two babies in our little world on the way, isn’t it?”

  Laney takes a long drink and nods. “I’m just thrilled it’s only one baby for me and not twins this time, like with the girls. That was seventeen years ago, but I still remember how awful it was. Did you know the older you get the more likely you are to have twins? I was a nervous wreck until we had the ultrasound and found out there’s only one in here.” She pats her stomach.

  FM shakes his head. “Those ultrasounds are amazing. Did you see the picture of the last one Anna had made?” he asks me.

  “Oh, yes. I saw it.” I add under my breath, “Everyone saw it.” As he turns to leave, I speak up, “You have a good day, FM. Tell Missus we said hi.”

  “Sure thing. Me and Earl will be back in the morning,” he yells as he walks through the house to the front door.

  “Earl Shurbett.” Laney dismisses the man with a wave of her hand. “Wait’ll you see Terry Minns. Good-looookin’!”

  I shake my head. “I don’t care what he looks like as long as we get some air. The house is unbearable until after midnight. Savannah’s room is an oven, and she’s more unbearable than the heat.”