Oh, please, let me.
Hard to believe it was only a year ago, less than really, when we moved to Chancey. Driving down the hill toward town, the thick shade no longer hides just neat, big, old houses, it shelters the home of our friends – okay, maybe not actual friends, but people we know. At the bottom of the hill, I look out at the grassy triangle and know there are hundreds, maybe thousands, of daffodil bulbs waiting. I don't have to think about which way to turn, I do it automatically. And I can’t remember what I was so scared of.
It’s like a nightmare you wake from with heart pounding and fear in your throat, but then when you try to put the scene together, it slips away like egg white down a sink drain. You remember it being so real, and yet it’s gone, leaving no evidence behind.
It’s still a small town, and small towns are still not my favorite, but it doesn’t feel as alien, or as scary, as when we arrived. In some ways I feel like a completely different person than who I was back in the suburbs.
Not sure if that is a good thing or a bad thing.
My phone rings as I pull into a parking spot across from the store. It’s Laney, so I answer it as I turn off the car. “Hey there.”
“What are you doing? Can you come for dinner tonight? We can swim and then eat.”
“Um, sure. Oh, wait, no. Jackson is coming home. Did I tell you about Bryan stalking Brittani? I can’t remember who I’ve told what.”
She sighs into the phone. “You didn’t, but Susan did. Said she worked him like a dog out in your so-called garden yesterday.”
“She did. Although he loved it. Left the house with him out there working this afternoon by himself, as hot as it is. Anyway, Jackson is coming home and taking him out to talk it all over, thank goodness. I can’t get a read on the boy. I’m afraid he’s smarter than Will and Savannah put together. Not that his grades show it. A different kind of smart.”
“Okay, well, come over when Jackson leaves with the boy. Shaw says Will and Anna are having big problems. We need to talk about that, too.”
“Oh! And wait until you hear what happened this morning on the Will and Anna front. Had a run-in with her boss, Kimmy Kendrick’s husband. But, listen, I’ve got to go. Gertie is staring at me from the front door of the store. She’s hired someone to work with me.”
“Who?”
“Don’t know. But I will by time I come over tonight. I’ll text you when I’m headed your way, okay? Bye.”
I wave back at Gertie as I climb out of the van. “I’m coming.”
Gertie hollers. “Saw you pull up and wondered what was keeping you. I have things to do. Come meet Bonnie.”
Bonnie? I don’t know a Bonnie. I rush in the door and realize, oh yes, I do. I do know a Bonnie. She sat across from me at the lunch up at Laurel Cove Club House.
“Hi, Bonnie. Nice to see you again. So, you want to work here?”
Gertie rolls her eyes at me and says, “Well, that’s a nice how-do-you-do.”
“No, I just mean… that, well, I mean, that I’m surprised.”
Bonnie laughs and says, “Well, not as much as me! When I came in to take a look at the bookstore—I know you said not to come down yet, but I couldn’t wait—and Gertie here asked me if I wanted a job, I sure was surprised when I said, ‘yes.’”
Bonnie is older than me, with blondish-gray hair and very nice clothes. And a very nice voice. She seems, uh, very nice.
Gertie nods her head and lumbers back toward the door. “You ladies are going to do just fine. Now, to get things settled up at Andy’s place. Carolina, tonight will be my last night up at your house. Crossings, I guess I should call it. Got a load of furniture coming tomorrow for my place here. I’ll settle up with you later, okay?”
“Okay, and…” As I look at her, my mind stalls. Gratitude swells up, and I’m not even sure what for. “Um, thanks. Thanks for… everything.”
Gertie pulls open the door, looks back and me, and winks. I’m thinking having Gertie Samson on my side is not a small thing.
“What an unusual lady,” Bonnie says after the door closes. She looks around. “So, this is your store. We are going to have such fun! Let’s sit down and get acquainted.”
She sits on the couch, and I settle in the chair across from her.
She says, “I know we sat across from each other at lunch, but we didn’t really get to talk. I’m Bonnie Cuneo. My husband Cal retired nine years ago, and we moved to Laurel Cove for him to play golf and for me to teach at Darien Academy. I retired last year and discovered I do not like golfing enough to do it every day. This sounds like the perfect job for me. My kids are grown and live around the country, I love books, and can’t wait to get to know Chancey better.”
I grin. “Okay, you know my name. Well, my husband Jackson works for the railroad so he travels a lot. We opened a B&B, Crossings, like Gertie said. Our three children are, well, still at home, I guess. The oldest one graduated from UGA last month, got married, and moved back home just last night.” All this makes me frown, and Bonnie reaches over and pats my knee.
She says, “Isn’t it hard when they get too old for us to fix things?”
“Exactly. I just want to help, and, well, seems I’ve done everything but.”
She stands up. “That’s what this place is for. All our fixing we can’t do on our children we’re going to use here. Now, who does the flowers? Gertie says that’s a separate business?”
“Oh, yes, Shannon is the florist.” I stand and follow her to the middle of the room. “We’ve been closed for painting, but she’s nice, very talented with flowers, young. In her thirties.”
We both look around, and Bonnie laughs a bit. “Okay, I know I’m new here, but have you ever thought of combining the two businesses? Not on the books, but on the floor? Incorporate the bookshelves and the tables with the florals? Like some beautiful private garden.” She wanders around, talking and thinking, while I follow her listening and smiling.
Bonnie is a fount of ideas, good ideas, and she talks and explains and lays it all out until I can’t wait for Shannon to come to work. So I call her.
“Shannon will be here in about ten minutes. I’m going next door to get us iced coffees. What can I get you?”
Bonnie laughs again as she says, “I’ll take one of those, too.”
On the sidewalk, the heat is oppressive. Heavy like putting on a winter coat that’s soaked with hot water. However, there’s not the afternoon quiet I expected. There’s music. A light jazzy sound, which grows louder as I get to the door of the bistro. There, sitting in the corner of their window is a speaker, the source of the music. Inside, the music is the same as outside.
“Great music,” I say to Peter.
He points toward the back corner. “It’s all Alex. Through my phone. It’s okay folks can hear it outside your place, too?”
“It’s perfect. And I got a new partner. Well, co-worker. Bonnie. She’s got great ideas. I need three iced coffees.”
Peter walks from behind the counter and shouts, “Alex, need three iced coffees.” As he walks he turns back towards me and asks in a lower voice, “So, how’s Savannah?”
“She’s fine, I guess. Isn’t she here?”
Peter stops and stares at me. Then he licks his lips, and I watch him search for words. “No. She’s not here. She doesn’t work here anymore.”
“What? She quit?” I pull my phone from my pocket and notice she’s not answered my last four texts. Now, that may sound alarming to you, but there are other parents, lots of other parents, to whom that sounds quite normal. So quit judging.
I text her again. “Where are you????” I know, seems like a phone call is warranted, right? But think about it, would she really answer that?
“Carolina,” Peter says, and as he pauses, I realize he wants me to look at him. So I do.
“She didn’t quit. I had to fire her this morning.”
“What? You fired her?” I lower my voice when I see Alex at the counter with my iced coffees in a litt
le tray. “Why?”
Peter pushes me into the nearest aisle. “She wouldn’t leave Alex alone. Hung out at the deli area when she was supposed to be working and would leave when she wasn’t working. Then, well, last night.”
“What happened last night?” I don’t want to know, but that’s what being a parent is all about. Doing things and asking things you don’t want to do or ask.
“She showed up at his apartment. And wouldn’t leave. He had to call me.”
“Why didn’t you call me?”
He takes a deep breath. “She said she’d told you she was coming down here. That you knew.”
“And you believed her?”
“Well, sometimes you don’t really get involved with stuff.” He holds out his hands at me. “I know it was a mistake now, but at the time… I mean, you know? Anna was at my house crying, and Alex was here with a, another girl, and she got upset. So, Alex was dealing with both of them. Savannah, well, she finally just left. Said she was going home. So…”
With a sigh, I turn around and walk back to the deli counter where I smile at the young man my daughter is enamored of. He’s placing the last coffee in a cardboard tray. “Thanks, Alex. Sorry about Savannah messing up your date last night.” I pick up the tray of coffees.
“No problem, Carolina. And it wasn’t like it was a real date or anything. Just, you know, a girl.”
I bite my tongue and make it to the front counter mumbling, “Just a girl. Just a girl.”
Peter rings up the drinks in silence. As I start to leave, he says, “You know—”
But I cut him off. “No, I don’t know. Obviously I don’t know.” I push out the door.
On the sidewalk, I stand still and let the sun wash over me for a minute.
Great. Just as I’m beginning to think our move to Chancey might’ve been a good thing, my children are facilitating a full-scale, scorched-earth campaign.
What Rambo did to that little southern town is nothing compared to the Jessup kids on the loose.
When you’re carrying a tray of drinks, it’s hard to be really mad and slam doors and stomp. Shannon has arrived, and she opens the door to the store for me. Bonnie meets me and takes the tray from my hands, and as she moves to the side, I see Savannah sitting on the couch.
While I’m making up my mind on what to say in front of Shannon and Bonnie, Savannah takes care of it for me.
“Peter fired me. Fired me!” she says as she wipes her nose with the heel of her hand. She’s crying, and her nose is running. She has on jean shorts and a loose muslin peasant blouse. She’s wearing those winter Ugg boots, which are hot when it’s freezing, so her feet have to be sweating, right? But never mind that.
I’m not giving in to her histrionics. “You went to Alex’s apartment last night after I was asleep. You are not allowed to roam around like that. And carrying on at work? Sounds like Peter didn’t have a choice.”
She sniffs as she stands up and then takes one of the coffees from the tray in Bonnie’s hands. “Thank you,” she says in her snot-thickened voice. Opening a straw she turns toward me, new tears running down her face. “Of course you’d listen to Peter. Your old boyfriend.”
Shannon yelps. “What?”
And Bonnie adds, “Oh my.”
My daughter takes a long sip of my iced coffee while she continues to cry. I grab hold of her arm and pull her with me out the back door. When the door behind us closes, faster than usual due to me shoving it, I squeeze harder on her upper arm. “I want to smack you right now. Peter is not my old boyfriend, and he only got to tell me his side of the story first because you didn’t answer any of my texts from this morning. Crazy mom that I am, I assumed you were hard at work and couldn’t answer me.”
I release her arm, take a deep breath, and reach for my drink. “Give me that.”
We stand at the back of the row of businesses on Main Street. It’s mostly weeds growing up around chunks of old black top. When Savannah’s eyes look above my head, I remember we are now standing at the bottom of the metal staircase going up to Alex’s apartment. More tears fill her eyes and begin to roll down her cheeks.
After a quick sip, I hand her back the drink, then I wrap my arms around her. “Sweetie, he’s just not worth it. You’ve never been like this about a guy.”
“I know,” she whispers in sobs. “Do you think I love him? Is that why it’s so awful?”
“No, I don’t think you love him. I think…” What do I think?
She sobs on. “Everybody says it’s because I love him, and if he just realized how much I love him, well, then…”
I chuckle a bit and lean back to look in her face. “Everybody? And these everybody’s, why would they know? Are they in long-lasting, good relationships? Do they know what it means to be ‘in love’? Honey, I’m glad you have friends to talk to, but honestly, they don’t know any more about being in love than you do.”
She jerks away and opens her mouth to say something, but stops. Then I see a bit of light in her eyes as she admits, “Okay, you might have a point there. But he drives me crazy. He’s so different from the guys here, or even back in Marietta.” She puts the straw back in her mouth and looks down at the ground.
“It’s maturity, I guess,” I say with a shrug. “Or maybe it’s him being from the city? And he is older and has helped run a business. Plus…” I nudge her shoulder to get her to look up from her drink. “Plus, he’s the first guy I ever remember not falling all over himself to be the object of Savannah Jessup’s attention.”
She smiles and looks back down. She sticks out a foot. “Why in the world am I wearing these boots? My feet are dying. Let’s go inside.”
We enter the business, and I’m surprised at how bright it is. Used to feel like a black dungeon, but with the shiny white walls and the blue ceiling, it really is like a different place.
Even my daughter notices. “Patty isn’t going to believe how great this place looks.” She lowers her voice. “Who’s that new lady up front? The old one.”
“Shh. That’s Bonnie. Gertie just hired her to work with me. Patty’s going to work at Andy’s place.”
As we near the front flower counter, she sighs. “Everybody has a place to work except me.”
When I open my mouth, she holds a hand up. “I know. My own fault. Went a little crazy.”
Shannon grins. “But it just feels so right at the time, doesn’t it? I heard about your little midnight trip to town!”
I reach out my arm towards Bonnie. “Bonnie, this is my daughter Savannah. She’s usually not this emotional.”
Bonnie steps over to Savannah and puts out her hand. “Nice to meet you. And don’t worry, I’m sure you’ll find another job soon. And another boy.”
Savannah’s eyes brim again, and she turns away from us. Over her shoulder, she says, “Mom, can I take your iced coffee? I have to go home and get out of these boots.” Her voice shakes, and she rushes out the door. It closes behind her, and I head towards it.
“Maybe I should go make sure she’s okay to drive.” But as I stick my head out the door I see her striding across the street, heading toward the gazebo. I wait until I watch her walk up the couple of steps. She sits on one of the seats there in the deep shade. Looks like as good a place as any to nurse a broken heart.
I close the door and turn around. Shannon is beside her counter. “Peter was your boyfriend?”
“Uh, no. She was just mad. It was around the time of all that ghost stuff.”
She sighs. “Oh, good. Didn’t want to break girl code and steal a friend’s man. So now, about the business. Bonnie told me her idea of combining our shops, and I love it. We’ve already done a little mixing, and I think we can make this a really neat place. But what should we call it? Sign painter is coming tomorrow.”
Bonnie brings a stack of books with red covers to sit next to a red, white, and blue arrangement. “I have to admit the thought isn’t original. My friend, Mindy Lee, has a place in northern Illinois, town outside Chi
cago called Crete. Mindy’s mother ran a florist shop in the next town over, and when she retired, she started doing flowers in a corner of Mindy’s bookstore. Eventually they were pretty equal. They came up with an interesting name.”
“What’s the name of their place?” Shannon asks.
Bonnie laughs. “That’s what I’m looking up on Facebook right now.”
I haven’t moved far from the front window, and I keep peeking out at the park. “Y’all think Savannah will be okay?”
Shannon just waves a hand in the air. “Those long legs of her’s and her confidence? She’ll be fine.”
Bonnie shrugs as she looks at her phone. “And a little humility can be a good thing for a teenage girl. Here is it. Petals and Pages.”
“Oh, I like that. Petals and Pages sounds perfect!” Shannon exclaims.
“Listen, I’m going to go check on her,” I say as I pull open the front door. Outside I look both ways before jogging across the street. The park is pretty, all spruced up for the big holiday weekend. Wave petunias spill from containers on the edge of the gazebo floor. The stone paths are clean of any weeds or trash, and the flower gardens are full of blooms and bees.
Nearing the back of the gazebo, I hear Savannah talking. Oh, she’s on her phone. Then she laughs. My heart actually skips, and I smile. She’s fine. So, I pause and take another look at the shaded park.
Petals and Pages, or was it Pages and Petals? Oh, we could use the ‘&’ sign! Petals & Pages. Oh, I like that even better. Wait, Pages & Petals. Hm, wonder which should go first. Shannon was there first, but… then I hear it.
“Sure, Alex, I understand. It was too distracting to work together anyway, wasn’t it? Oh, you miss me? Really?” She giggles. “Want to go swimming?”
Still talking, she’s up and skipping down the gazebo steps. At the bottom she sees me, but all she does is shrug and continue towards her car. Still on the phone. Tears dry. And a date planned.
Well, so much for a dose of humility.
Unless you’re talking about me.
Chapter 24
“Think we have a name for the store,” I shout to Jackson, who’s out on the back deck.
Kids are Chancey Page 16