by Debby Mayne
He laughs. “Your family is fun and interesting. They always have been, but I never really thought about it until today. I think your grandparents are responsible for the way everyone is.”
“Why would you want to blame them for all that crazy behavior?”
Elliot leans back and takes a deep breath before slowly letting it out as he shakes his head. “Blame isn’t the word I’d use in this case. It’s more about how they let everyone be who they are and love them anyway.”
“Oh.”
He leans forward again. “They remind me of how Christ loves us. He knows we’re all different and flawed, yet He still loves us.”
I’ve never seen this side of Elliot before. I know he attends church, but in Pinewood, almost everyone does, regardless of what they believe or how they act on Saturday night.
“Sounds like you’ve put some thought into this.”
He nods. “I have. Quite a bit, actually. In fact, I think it probably contributed to my divorce.”
Now I’m puzzled. “You’re blaming your divorce on your faith?”
“There’s that ‘blame’ word again.” He grins then grows serious. “When I got married, my faith was there, but I’d pushed it to the back of my mind and let other things, like my hormones and physical attraction, take front and center. But that quickly faded as I realized how little her faith meant to her.” He brushes something invisible on the table before looking directly at me and holding my gaze. “We never missed church until we started talking about divorce. That’s when I realized her faith was more for show than about how she felt in her heart.”
“Wow.” I swallow hard. “I never realized—”
“I know.” He drops his gaze. “I never wanted to get a divorce, but she wasn’t willing to work through the problems. Money and things meant more to her than a relationship. I worked hard to keep up the lifestyle she wanted . . . that I thought we both wanted. But neither of us was ever totally satisfied. I tried to talk to her about it, but she didn’t agree with me, and we had a lot of arguments.”
“That’s really sad.” I see the pensive look on his face. “But you seem to be doing okay.”
“I am. I’m still paying off my debt and probably will be for a while, but I think it’s time to start living again. I can’t continue living with regrets.”
“I agree.”
He gives me a gentle smile. “Now I realize that, even though divorce isn’t something the Lord wants for us, He allows it under certain circumstances. She always wanted a certain type of person, and I couldn’t—and wouldn’t—live up to her expectations.”
“I’m so sorry, Elliot. You’ve had to deal with a lot more than I ever imagined.”
“Even though it was a miserable thing to go through, I’m glad it happened.”
“You are?”
He nods. “It’s strengthened my conviction that I need to keep my faith in the forefront and not push Jesus to the back, only to pull Him forward when I need Him.”
I grimace. “I think we’re all guilty of that at times.”
“I know you probably don’t believe me, but when I look at you, I see Him.” Elliot pauses. “You are not only beautiful and smart, but your faith shows in everything you do.”
“Unfortunately, I’m guilty of doing exactly what you said you’ve done—pushing the Lord away until I need Him.”
“But you catch yourself because your faith is important to you.”
“Yes, it is. Very important.”
“Which is one of several reasons I want to do more things with you and see where He leads us.” His eyes twinkle as he smiles. “But it might be difficult to stop staring at your gorgeous face long enough to really see you.”
I playfully swat at the air in front of my face as my cheeks heat up. “Oh, stop it.”
“See? That’s another thing I love about you.” He stands. “You’re humble.” He gestures toward the front door. “I really need to get going now, but I’d like to see you again soon. Mind if I call?”
Be still my heart. “I’d like to see you again, too.” I’m not used to coming out and saying something like that, but this feels different.
He reaches for my hand as we walk to the door. Once we stop, he places his hands on my shoulders and turns me around to face him. “I had the best time today, Shay.”
“Me, too.”
When he leans over to kiss me, my heart feels like someone stuck a motor in my chest. The kiss is short and sweet, but the look he gives me afterward makes my insides melt and my knees turn to rubber.
“I’ll call you soon.” He tweaks my nose and leaves.
I remain standing there, staring after him long after he drives away. When I finally close the door, I close my eyes and allow myself to replay the last couple of minutes we were together. Nothing in my past even comes close to comparing to this, so I’m not sure what to think. All I know is that, in spite of my exhaustion, I feel like I’m floating a foot off the floor.
It’s been three days since my family reunion, and Tom has already called me a half dozen times. I get tickled by how our relationship is turning out.
At first, I wasn’t sure how I felt about him, since he and Justin acted like high school boys. But when I called him out on it, he apologized and never ignored me again.
Even Sara has noticed that I’m not the same. “It’s like someone has flipped your happy switch,” she says as she makes herself comfortable in my room. “Now you know what it’s like to fall in love.”
“I don’t know about falling in love, but I do like him a lot.”
“That’s how it starts.” Sara flops back on my bed. “I started liking Justin back in high school, and every time I saw him, I liked him more.”
I resist the urge to remind her that he could never tell us apart back then. “When did you know you loved him?”
“I’m not sure, but as soon as he told me he loved me, I said it back . . . and I meant it.”
Her face glows, letting me know she means it from the core of her soul. I swallow hard. “I’m happy for you.”
She sits up and clasps her hands together. “Do you really mean that?”
I spin around to fully face her. “Yes, I absolutely do.”
Without a moment’s hesitation, she jumps up and throws her arms around me. “You have no idea how much that means to me. I was beginning to wonder.”
I pull away and give her an apologetic look. “Yeah, me, too. But now I think I understand.”
A grin tweaks the corners of her lips. “Now that you’re falling in love?”
“We’ll have to see about that later. In the meantime, we have a bunch of orders to fill.”
As we work, I think about what Sara said. Am I falling in love? I’m probably not at that level yet, but I do have a great big crush on Tom. The only thing that bugged me about him was when he kept chatting it up with Justin. However, I have to give him props for the fact that he stopped as soon as I let him know my feelings. That says a lot for the guy. Well, that and the fact that he’s such a gentleman. And he can cook. And he looks amazing in jeans.
Our phones vibrate in unison, signaling that another order is coming in. Sara already has her hand on her phone, so I finish up the bow I’m working on while she checks. I glance over at her, and her eyes look like they might pop right out of her head.
“What’s wrong?”
She slowly shakes her head as she turns to face me. “Remember how we’ve been talking about getting one big client that can take us to the next level?”
I point to her phone. “Is that the client?” Before she can answer, I lift my phone and see an order for more hair bows than we’ve made since we started in our business. “What are we going to do?”
She lets out a short giggle. “I guess we’d better start working on that order right now.”
“Yeah,” I agree. “And I think we need to shut down the shop until we get it filled.”
We’ve only had to shut down our shop one time i
n the past, when a small chain of children’s boutiques placed an order for all of their stores. They became regulars, but some of their locations were in towns that got clobbered when businesses started shutting down, causing them to scale way back on orders. They’re still clients, but the orders are now much smaller.
This business is much bigger, and I suspect it’ll keep us busy for the foreseeable future. “Do you think we can even make the fifty thousand bows they’ve ordered and have them delivered by the end of the month?” Sara asks.
“I think so.” I pause to do some mental math. “We might need to bring someone in to help.”
Sara folds her arms, lifts one hand to her face, and taps her chin. “How about Justin?”
“Justin?” I squint as I try to imagine my sister’s husband wrapping ribbon with his calloused hands.
“Yeah. I think he’ll be good.”
I let out a deep sigh. “I guess we can let him try. That is, if he’s willing to do it.”
“He’ll pretty much do anything I want him to do.” Sara laughs. “Plus, I think he’d like something to do besides watch TV when he gets home after work.”
I look at the breakdown of the colors they’re requesting and see that it’s mostly green, blue, pink, and yellow, with a much smaller number of orange, black, and white. “This order’s too big to rely on the ribbon from the local craft stores, so I think we need to order it from the distributor.”
Sara and I spend the next several hours comparing prices and placing orders for the ribbon we’ll need. Between calls, we chat about a strategy and how we’ll store the materials.
“What if this becomes a regular thing?” she asks. “We’ve just moved in here, and I’m afraid we might have just outgrown the place.”
“Well . . .” I ponder the situation for a moment before I look directly at her. “After this order, one of us can buy the other out of the condo, and we can start looking for some industrial office space to rent.”
She frowns. “But I like working from home. If we have to go somewhere, I won’t be able to work in my pajamas.”
“That’s the price we’ll have to pay for success.”
The sound of the front door opening and closing quiets us. I look at Sara as she slowly gets up. She turns to me and makes a goofy face. “I sure hope Justin won’t mind making hair bows.”
“It’ll be good practice,” I say. “Y’all might have children someday, and there’s nothing more precious than a daddy doing his little girl’s hair.”
She rolls her eyes. “I’ll tell him you said that.”
After she leaves, I strain to hear what she tells Justin, but all I hear is a light murmur. I straighten up and pretend to be immersed in my work when I hear them walking toward our office. I glance up and see Justin grinning at me.
“You’ll have to show me how to do this.” He glances around the room. “Give me a second, and I’ll go get another chair.”
He leaves Sara and me looking at each other. “That was easy enough,” she says. “He didn’t even flinch when I told him what we need.”
Since we don’t have enough materials for our new order, Sara and I take turns teaching him how to make the styles that have been ordered. To our surprise, he catches on extremely quickly, and within a couple of hours, he’s up to speed.
“You’re a natural,” Sara says as he attaches a bow to one of the clips. “Who’d have thought?”
“It’s not that different from what I do all day. Some of the automotive work can get rather intricate.”
Until now, I never realized Justin could do more than grunt single-
syllable words in a conversation. Maybe I need to give him more of a chance.
I pick up the bow and inspect his work. “Good job, Justin.”
I squeeze my eyes shut and say a prayer of thanks. When I open them, I see Justin staring at me. “The Lord sure has been good to us, hasn’t He?” Justin asks.
All I can do is nod. Justin is not so bad, after all. In fact, I finally understand why my sister loves him.
A sense of dread washes over me as I walk into my office on Monday. This job that I once thought I loved now seems like a burden. It’s not hard, and I’m paid well, but I’m bored to tears. The feeling has been coming on for a while, but until now, I’ve been able to shove it to the back of my mind because there’s always so much busywork to do. Besides, until now I’ve had no idea what else was out there.
I know I should be appreciative of having such a sought-after position with a reputable company that is practically recession proof. But I look around and realize that I’ve never had much passion for it. I’ve always enjoyed the position more than the actual work, and the sheen from that has worn off.
The receptionist delivers a stack of envelopes to my office, and I look at them in dread. I know what they are—purchase orders—and I know that it will take almost exactly an hour and a half to go through them. Then I’ll return calls until lunchtime, which will be the highlight of my day.
After a deep sigh of resignation, I rip open the first of the envelopes. I’m about halfway through them when Puddin’ calls, her voice frantic.
“Shay, you gotta help me. I have to find a way to buy La Chic, or I’ll be out of a job.”
“Calm down, Puddin’. You and I both know that you don’t need that job.” I start fidgeting with the papers I still have to look at.
“You don’t understand.” Her voice drops. “It’s not the money I need as much as what it does for me. When I come here, I feel alive.”
That single word—alive—grabs my heart. My hand stills as an idea pops into my head. I’ve never been impulsive in my entire life, but I not only understand what my sister-in-law is saying—I feel the same way.
“What are you doing for lunch?” I ask.
“I promised Amanda I’d help wrap up the books to show the guy who wants to buy the shop, so I’ll be there.”
“Can you get away for an hour or so? I have an idea that might be good for both of us.”
“An idea?” A momentary silence falls between us. “Can you take a late lunch, say around one thirty?”
“Sure. I’ll come by the shop. Will Amanda be there?”
“I’m not sure. In fact, I never know about her anymore. Since she and her husband decided to move, it’s like she’s completely detached.”
I totally get it. That’s the way I’m feeling now about my job. “I’ll see you at one thirty.”
I manage to get through my paperwork quickly. Then I pull out one of my blank legal pads and start jotting down some ideas to share with Puddin’. A brief twinge of guilt flickers through me, but it quickly passes. It’s not like I haven’t put in the time in this job. There have been weeks when I worked sixty-plus hours.
All the phone calls I have to return are based on minor problems that any lower-level manager could handle. Every few minutes, I glance at the clock on the wall. Time drags, but that’s always how it seems when there’s something you’re waiting for.
As soon as it’s time to leave, I grab my purse and head for the door. The receptionist holds up a finger, signaling that she needs to tell me something when she’s off the phone. I glance at my watch and make a face, letting her know that I’m in a hurry.
She quickly gets off the phone. “I was about to let you know that some of the home office people are stopping off this afternoon around three o’clock.”
I try to remember anything being said about a meeting. “When did you find out?”
“About ten minutes ago.” Her face lights up with a wide smile. “I think something major is about to go down.”
A few years ago, that would have had me on edge, but now, not so much. All I want to do is have lunch with Puddin’ and share my thoughts that might solve both of our problems—or create new ones. Whatever the case, there’s not an ounce of doubt in my mind that I’m due for a major change.
I nod. “I’ll be back by then.”
I parallel park in front of L
a Chic. As I walk up to the front door, my pulse quickens. If everything turns out like I think it might, I’ll be parking here quite a bit very soon.
Puddin’ gives me a tentative grin as I walk in. “Let me go tell Amanda you’re here. She’s in the back packing some of her stuff.”
When she returns with Amanda, I notice the distant look in the woman’s eyes. Yes, Puddin’ was right when she said Amanda was detached. She’s mentally somewhere else, and I’m not even sure we should trust her with her own shop for an hour.
“Where do you want to go?” I ask. “It needs to be someplace where we can have some privacy.”
Puddin’ gives me a strange look and nods. “Let’s go to the Blossom Diner.”
By the time we get there, most of the lunch crowd has dissipated. We’re able to get a seat in the corner, away from the front door.
Both of us order salads and sweet tea. Once the server leaves, Puddin’ puts her forearms on the table and leans toward me. “Okay, so what are you thinking?”
One of the many things I love about my sister-in-law is her directness. “How would you like to have a business partner?”
“A what?”
Since we don’t have much time, I figure it’s best to dive right in. “I have enough money saved up to buy La Chic. I’ll work at my current job for a few more months—at least until they can find someone to replace me. Then we’ll be co-managers of the shop.” I pause. “What do you think?”
Her eyes have widened so big, they look like they might pop out. “Are you serious?”
I nod. “I’ve been bored silly with my job for a while now, but it didn’t hit me that hard until I lived with the twins. I got to see two women who had some control over their daily work. I figure if they can be successful, you and I can be, too.”
Puddin’ shakes her head, belying the grin that takes up a large portion of her face. “You totally stunned me with this one, Shay. I never expected this from you.”
“I never expected it from me either.”
For the next fifteen minutes, we talk about all the things we can do with the shop, giggling like a couple of teenage girls. We nibble at our salads, but neither of us is hungry because we’re so excited about what the future holds.