At that time I wasn't interested in saying "I do" again.
Frankly, I'm still not thrilled by the prospect, but Raven is the only person in this line of work that I feel confident in giving my money to. So I finally filled out her application, explained my situation, and included my preferences for a union that would ideally be founded on friendship, mutual respect, and shared interests.
I certainly don't expect to fall in love with whoever I'm matched to and that's fine by me.
Love hasn't exactly been on my side and I'd just as soon leave it to starry-eyed romantics like the girls who bring me boxes of romance novels with broken spines and worn covers to trade in for more romance novels with worn covers. Girls like Bethany.
My assistant's voice wafts through the open door. I hit save on the form and exit the file quickly. I really ought to do this when I get home anyway. Probably after a glass-- or 2-- of wine.
Beth's not heading into my office though, she's just talking with a customer. I listen to her explain the way the store is laid out, with fiction up front and center and more than half the floor space dedicated to romance.
The man's voice isn't clear enough for me to make out his question, but Beth doesn't seem to need help.
That girl is a Godsend.
The little used bookstore I opened years ago has done much better than I expected.
There was one in the town I grew up in. It was just a little hole in the wall place in back of a real estate office in our old downtown district.
Now that I'm running my own shop, I can't imagine how Vera managed to keep that store open in that location, but I spent a lot of afternoons wedged in the narrow aisles between book cases overflowing with every kind of happily ever after a teenage girl could imagine.
I hired Bethany because she reminded me a little of that girl from my memory. She started coming in here to trade back books she'd already read before she was even in junior high school. It started with Judy Blume and turned into Anne McCaffrey and then it was handfuls of Harlequins. Then she was picking out racier stuff to trade for and her mom just shrugged when I asked if it was OK with her.
"I read some pretty filthy stuff at her age," her mom had assured me and I'd had to laugh because I know I didn't even wait till I was old as Bethany was then before I was sneak-reading some decidedly age-inappropriate stuff in bed after my folks fell asleep.
So when Bethany turned 16 last year and casually mentioned looking for a job on one of her daily after-school visits, I didn't hesitate to offer her a few hours a week here in the shop.
Beth giggles and the sound of one of our plastic shopping bags crinkles as the man's voice says something that sounds like a thank you. Then the bell on the door jingles and new voices fill the store outside my private office.
The ladies are here for their weekly book club meeting.
We moved the store just a few months ago to a bigger space and the book club ladies are just thrilled that I have room for them to gather for their meetings now.
Getting up from my desk, I head out to greet them. I need to make sure the table is fully stocked with snacks for them to devour while they rearrange the furniture in the back room and chatter away for the next several hours over whatever they've been reading this week.
As I make my way through the door of the reading room I see that Bethany's already on it, opening packages of cookies and making sure the bowls of sweeteners and creamers are full while Elizabeth talks the poor girl's ear off, harassing her about boys, no doubt.
I'm really looking forward to Bethany graduating high school in a few months, I could really use her around the store a lot more than just after school.
Nathan
Over the next few weeks, I find myself coming back to Raven's site. I think I've read every one of the testimonials and everything I can find about the woman who calls herself a "marriage broker" that I can find on the internet.
"You already made up your mind," Helen mumbles as she kneels over the row of peas in her garden, "don't know why you're pretending to ask me my opinion on the matter."
The old woman deftly moves plants and immature pods aside and I watch her gnarled fingers sink into the top soil, grasping sprouting weeds and pulling them from her carefully tended row.
"What makes you think I made up my mind already?" I ask, a little irritated at her assumption but mostly curious as to why she seems so sure.
My neighbor straightens up on the over-turned 5 gallon bucket she's using as a garden stool. She dusts the moist soil off her hands and then wipes them on the faded denim of her late husband's overalls that she wears when she's working in her garden.
Helen sits up straight and turns toward me, her eyes narrowing in the afternoon sunlight as they study me for a full minute before the corners of her mouth twist in an expression that's somewhere between smirk and frown.
"Because you're askin' me for my opinion," she tells me, "and you never ask my opinion on something till you already know what yours is."
Helen is in her early 80s now. She's been on her own since her husband passed away 12 years ago-- a few years before I bought the land that butts up against the back boundary of her 2 and a half.
I watch her stand up enough to move her bucket a little farther down the row she's working on. She sits back down and leans over again, concentrating on the peas and the weeds and the bugs like she's forgotten I'm still standing here.
Her whole garden is technically on my land. I discovered that after I moved on to the property full time when my girls were still in high school. I wanted to put up a fence and found out Helen had been squatting on my land in the form of several rows of vegetables each year and two apple trees.
She started gardening when her husband fell ill and after hearing the old woman tell her tale-- about 50 times the first month I was here-- I didn't have the heart to make her pull everything out and move back 40 feet. Besides, she's the closest neighbor I have out here, she shares her harvest, and it's good for her to have someone to dote on.
"Well I think it ain't the craziest idea you've had," she tells the plants. "Nothing like the year you got it in your head to raise them ostriches--"
"Emus," I correct her.
She's right, the emu ranch was a little out there. The birds did make me some money but they were a lot more work than I was up for for a hobby business, so one year is all I invested in that venture.
Helen shakes her head without looking up and makes a noise that lets me know she doesn't care what they were, they were stupid.
I try to suppress my laugh.
"--and you've been single a long time." She turns her head and looks back at me, giving me a look like she's sizing me up before turning back to her gardening, "Men aren't built for being on their own, Lord only knows how you managed this long."
Before I can take exception to what I think is a pretty harsh judgment of my gender, Helen goes on, "I expect your girls are gonna have a say in this too? You're not gonna make me do this all on my own, are you?"
She doesn't look up, but her fingers stop moving between the plants while she waits for my answer.
"Yeah," I say, "if I decide to go through with this, the girls'll be on the team for sure."
Truth is, I'm not sure what the girls are going to say when I tell them I've decided to get married again, let alone when I explain that I need them to help my match-maker pick their new step-mother for me.
Helen sits up and holds her hand over her eyes to shield them from the afternoon sun as she looks up at me, squinting more from her thoughts than the sunlight.
"You're a damn liar, Nathan Wright," she tells me bluntly, "you haven't told those girls one word about this nonsense, have you?"
"I said I haven't made up my mind yet," I remind her.
"The hell you haven't! You get on your fancy phone there and make sure your girls are up for this before you drag me into your shenanigans."
Helen waves a dirt-covered finger toward the smart phone in my shirt p
ocket. She's scolding me with her best old-lady voice, but she can't keep a straight face for long before she breaks into a bright grin that tells me she's pretty excited about getting dragged into my "shenanigans."
With Helen on board, I feel like I'm committed to going through with the final steps of Raven's process. I don't want to let the old lady down after getting her all excited about helping me out. So after listening to her share a few more opinions of my plan, another story about how she met her husband, and a few choice words about the state of her fall garden, I head back to my house with my phone in my hand.
Half an hour later I'm about to say good bye to my surprisingly enthusiastic oldest daughter as she tells me again how excited she is that I'm finally going to start dating again and that she can't wait to tell her sister.
I try to break in to explain that I'm not "dating" again but Summer cuts me off.
"Yeah, Dad, I heard you the first kajillion times! OK, I get it, you want us to find you a wife, fine. I mean, it's not like you're just gonna sign up for this match maker chick and then marry who ever we tell you to, right? You're gonna date her first, right?"
"Well actually, Sweetheart," hearing her put it like that does make it sound pretty crazy, "I already signed up for the match-maker--" I may have conveniently left that part out of my conversation with Helen, not that it'll be news to her, "--and yeah, that's exactly the way it works. You and your sister are going to work with the rest of my team to narrow down Raven's choices. And that's who I'll marry."
Summer goes silent on the line for a moment. When she starts talking again she sounds far too grown up for my liking.
"Dad, are you sure about this? Marriage is a big step, and you haven't even dated in a long time. Why don't you just try to meet someone the old-fashioned way first?"
"You can't get much more old-fashioned than an arranged marriage, Pumpkin," I point out with a soft laugh.
Another laugh echoes mine at the other end of the line, "Yeah, I guess not," she agrees. "Have you told Dani yet?"
"Not yet," I tell her.
"Oh good! I wanna do it! Please, can I?"
And there's the kid I know so much better than the 21 year old young woman Summer's grown into. I breathe a sigh of relief, both for getting to think of my daughter as a kid for a little while again, and for not having to go through this conversation all over again with Dani.
"Yeah, sure, Sweetie, if you want to tell her, go for it."
"Awesome Dad, I can't wait."
After explaining a few details about the process and letting her know that Raven will be getting in touch with them soon, I get to set the phone down and relax.
Truth is, I did already have my mind made up. About a month ago when I sent in my application to Raven. I just didn't expect her to be getting back to me so soon asking about the people who are going to work with her to narrow down her final choices.
Now that I've got a team to help Raven pick my new wife for me, all that's left for me to do is sit back, relax, and wait.
Turns out, that's a lot harder to do than I'd expected.
Tiffany
I cut my errands short and shoved half a burrito down my throat while driving back to the bookstore. I was trying to beat Raven here, but as I pull into the lot and see the sleek convertible parked among the mini vans and family sedans that I'm used to seeing when the book club ladies are meeting, I'm pretty sure I didn't make it.
Since there's no one that I'm close enough to to trust with a decision like picking a husband for me, Raven is handling my match herself. I'm still not sure why she agreed to bend her rules to help me out but I'm grateful to her for giving me the benefit of the doubt.
Not having a team of my own personal friends and family has meant a lot more interaction with Raven and her assistant, Jessica, than they tell me their regular clients have. For the most part, I haven't minded a bit but today, Raven flew all the way out here to meet with me in person and since I got back to the store late it looks like she's in there by herself-- at the mercy of the book club ladies and my hopeless romantic assistant.
Oh God, I hope Raven doesn't tell them who she is or why she's here.
Rushing in through the back entrance, I toss the trash from my lunch into the waste bin, drop the mail I needed to pick up from the post office box on the counter, and hastily dab at the spot where I dribbled grease onto my blouse.
Naturally, it's a losing battle. That's what I get for having boobs, they catch everything.
With an equally ill-fated attempt to finger-comb my hair all I manage to do is get my bangs wet, making me look like a little like I just woke up.
Great, I think as I catch my reflection in the mirror, instead of looking like a put-together-but-slightly-frazzled business owner, I just managed to make myself look like a disoriented mental patient. I'm sure Raven is going to take one look at me in our first in-person meeting, come to her senses, and tell me she's had second thoughts about taking my case.
My hand is on the doorknob, ready to make my entrance as confidently as I possibly can, when I hear several female voices break into laughter from the general vicinity of the front register.
It's easy to recognize Elizabeth's high pitched, old-lady cackle above Bethany's self-conscious giggle. I also recognize Letty's belly laugh and Alice's unabashed chortle-- those are just the voices I know but it sounds like quite the turn out for the book club meeting this afternoon and I wonder just what could be so entertaining that has them all congregated at the front desk.
Instead of making the grand entrance I'd been prepared for, I push the door open by just a few inches and take stock of the situation.
Raven Swann is an unmistakable presence commanding the attention of what I can only estimate is the biggest book club turn out the ladies have ever seen. There must be 20 women gathered around the woman standing at the register with Bethany.
In person, Raven's taller than I expected and absolutely stunning.
Sure, her photos on her website show her dressed up and looking flawless, but for our video calls, she's always been casual. She's just wearing jeans and a t-shirt but standing in my little book store right now, she looks like a model.
For starters, she towers over most of the older women by nearly a full head. She might be wearing heels, I can't tell from where I'm hiding behind the door of the break room, but her posture is also perfect.
Her hair is long and straight and lays perfectly down her back in exactly the way mine refuses to do no matter how much straightening I put it through. When she leans down to listen carefully to something one of the older women from the book club is telling her, it falls forward over her shoulder and shows a fiery auburn in the store's overhead lighting.
"OH EM GEE!" Bethany's exuberant squeal breaks through the hush that had fallen over the gathering and breaks me out of my thoughts, "That's right! She totally turned me on to her too!"
Beth grabs her e-reader, taps at the screen a few times and shoves it toward Raven.
"She loves this stuff," I hear Beth gushing.
Raven already looked like she was enjoying the conversation but when she takes the reader from Bethany and skims through a few passages of what ever's on the screen, her face lights up in a smile that can only be described as triumphant.
I wonder what book Beth showed her.
Suddenly several of the book club ladies pull their phones or e-readers out of their purses and the store's main room fills with indistinct chatter as they all try to talk at once.
Raven takes her time looking at each screen that gets held up for her inspection, nodding like she's putting together clues in a mystery and just then I push the door open a little farther and the hinges creak loudly.
There's no more hiding. Every head in the shop turns to look at me and Raven looks up at me with a smile that makes me feel naked. Like she's looking beyond my tangled hair and stained blouse at something inside me that I'm not sure I want anyone to see.
I'm not sure what that
could be, but my instinct is to hide it. Of course, it's too late. Whatever it is, the woman I've hired to find me a husband has already seen it.
* * *
"They're all very fond of you," Raven says as she takes a seat in my office.
I don't really use my office for meetings or anything. I have a desk with my computer set up for keeping the books and making orders, but mostly the little room is an oasis. Just a little place where I can have a minute to myself when I get the chance.
Raven chooses the chair with the bright yellow upholstery by the window. I found that chair at a garage sale and couldn't resist the happy color. It's perfect right next to the west-facing window in my office, right beside the little window-sill herb garden that I was surprised did so well this summer.
"How long has Bethany known you?" Raven asks casually as she crosses one long leg over the other, the fabric of her skirt making a soft sound as she moves.
"Bethany?" I feel like a total clod compared to the polished woman sitting across from me. I try to shadow her, leaning back in my own chair-- the one with the purple velvet that looks like it came from a whorehouse but feels so decadently extravagant I can't help but favor it-- I cross my legs the way Raven has hers but instead of feeling sophisticated, I feel like it makes my thighs spread against each other unattractively.
I uncross my legs and sit up straight, as if my 5 foot 3 inches has any hope of achieving Raven's regal posture.
Giving up any further attempts at making a good impression, I fall back in the chair and sip my diet soda from the Styrofoam cup.
"Beth's been coming to the store since she was about 8, I guess," I tell Raven with an absent-minded shrug, "she kinda grew up in here."
"Why didn't you consider her for your team?" Raven wonders aloud.
She's making notes on her phone with a stylus, not looking up at me as she asks so I'm not sure I'm really supposed to answer or not until she looks up with one eyebrow raised.
A Sensible Arrangement: A Modern Match-Maker Romance Page 2