We talked about her plans to let Beth take over the place and eventually give her the option of buying the place if she wanted to.
All that "I need to get back to the book store," talk that Tiffany used as an excuse to get on an earlier flight was pure bullshit.
My neighbor is looking in my direction, but her eyes are focused in the distance over my shoulder.
Finally she sighs heavily and shakes her head, "I don't know what to say," she briefly makes eye contact and then quickly returns to her gardening, "I thought we had a nice day."
For the first time in all the years I've known Helen Montgomery, she sounds like an old woman. Her voice hits my ears with a vibration that makes her seem frail. I'm struck by the urge to get down on my hands and knees and help her dig the stubborn weeds out of the dirt for her so she can take a break.
So I do.
Well, I get down on my hands and knees between the rows of bush beans and start helping with the weeds at least. I guess it shouldn't surprise me in the least that Helen doesn't take the opportunity to rest.
Instead, she picks up her bucket and moves a few feet farther down the row so we're not working in the same place.
"Well what did she say her reason was, Nate?" She asks after a minute of both of us working in silence.
"She didn't," I answer, "Raven sent a pretty standard email and then followed up with a few phone calls. Tiff won't answer my calls. All Raven said was that Tiffany told her that she doesn't think it's going to work out."
"That's a load of crap and you know it." Helen's word have their spunk back in them, but her voice doesn't. "Something scared her is all, give her a minute, she'll come around."
I hear Helen shift on her seat and I turn toward her in anticipation of whatever's worth taking her attention off her garden.
"Nathaniel," Helen stares down her nose at me with a look of pure determination, "that woman loves you and she would much rather be Mrs. Wright than Mrs. Something-that-doesn't-fit-anymore.
"We just have to get to the bottom of this and figure out what spooked her."
Tiffany
Avoiding Nathan is one thing, it turns out avoiding my match-maker and my assistant is quite another.
"I don't get it," Bethany whines, "you were so happy."
I'm hoping she can't see my face behind my computer screen. It's not exactly an eye roll, but it's definitely the sort of expression that would convince Beth that I want to talk about it.
Which I don't.
Which is why I'm in my office, working on the book keeping, instead of out in the store spilling my guts to my 18 year old assistant.
"Fine," she huffs when I don't answer her, "but you know it's true. You and Nathan are meant to be together, that's why you found each other."
The relief that floods through me when she finally turns on her heel and heads back out front actually makes me feel even worse.
Everything was so perfect. From that first night, I knew Nathan was The One.
My eyes go unfocused and misty as I stare at the computer screen.
Well...the Next One, I guess.
I feel like shit. getting so wrapped up in Nathan like he's the love of my life and just...forgetting...Paul.
What kind of wife does that?
Bethany is right, I was falling hard for Nathan. I was ready to marry him. I was going to sell my house-- mine and Paul's house-- and move away and live happily ever after.
Like it was the first time. Like I didn't already find my soul mate. Like...like...
I should have known better than to come back down to the store. Between the never-ending roller coaster ride my emotions have been on lately and Bethany's insistent optimism about my future with Nathan, being down here is just as hard as being at the house.
Maybe harder.
At least there's no one at the house telling me how I'm supposed to feel or what I'm supposed to do. It's just me and the house. Me and my memories of every room and every piece of furniture we bought together and every time Paul made me laugh there.
I feel terrible that I ever thought about selling our house.
I can't believe I was going to--
"Just point, I know she's here."
The familiar voice shocks me out of my thoughts. I find myself searching the office for an escape hatch. Of course, there's isn't one.
All I can do is sniff and try to wipe away any evidence that I've been crying-- for the last 2 weeks-- before Helen busts through my doorway.
Bethany's worried face is visible over Helen's shoulder. The silent question of whether or not she should follow the old woman in or call the police is enough to make me laugh-- but just a little.
I give my curious assistant a shake of my head to let her know everything is fine or, at least as fine as it's going to get. Beth's mouth opens to say something but Helen's already in my office and doesn't bother with pesky formalities like explaining herself before she slams the door in my assistant's face.
"What the fuck, Tiffany?"
Helen stands with her back to the closed door, both fists on her hips, glaring at me.
I'm not sure if I'm more surprised to see her here or by her choice of words.
Definitely by her being here.
"What? You don't think an old lady knows how to book a flight?"
This isn't the inappropriately sassy woman that I've come to know. She's not joking around. Helen is pissed.
She looks at me like she has a lot more choice words for me but then she takes a deep breath and shakes her head.
"You're lucky I like you," she tells me in a defeated tone as she pulls out the chair in front of my desk and takes a seat. "You're damn lucky Nathan loves you," she warns, "or I'd kick your ass.
"Now, you wanna tell me what this nonsense about calling off the deal is about?"
What do I say?
I haven't had the courage to answer Nathan's calls. When Helen started calling me, I had a feeling it was because Nate must have told her I backed out. I didn't expect anyone to actually show up on my doorstep. Especially not Helen.
"I just--" The tears well up in my eyes and no amount of sniffling can keep them from spilling over. I grab a tissue and curse myself for being such an emotional wreck about it all.
"I just can't do it, Helen," I look up at her, expecting her to understand, "I can't marry Nathan."
After all, it was Helen that made me realize how unfair I was being.
"And just why the hell not?"
I'm floored that Helen, of all people, doesn't seem to understand. She leans on my desk and stares at me with piercing eyes that accuse me of unspeakable evil.
"You were talking about Harold," I see her face soften when I say her husband's name but she still seems clueless about my realization.
"And what about him?" She sits back in the chair and folds her hands in her lap, patiently waiting for me to continue.
"You said you'd never get married again," I remind her.
"What's that got to do with you and Nate?"
"Well, it made me think," I say as my eyes land in my lap, "you loved him so much. You said you'd never find another man like him again. It made me realize that getting married again would be selfish of me. I don't want to betray Paul's memory like that. For what? Because I'm lonely?"
I shake my head vehemently and grab another tissue.
It's not fair, I think. It's not fair to have to choose between Paul and Nathan. I didn't even explain it all to Raven when I told her I couldn't go through with it, but Helen lost her husband too. She knows what it's like to find true love and lose it.
"Harold was my One and Only," Helen says softly, "that's true, I did tell you that." She looks down at her hands in her lap, turning them over as if seeing them for the first time. "I had him for 43 years. Not a day goes by that I don't still talk to him. But Sweetie," she leans forward with her elbows on my desk again, "love isn't a one and done deal for everyone. Just because you fell in love with Nathan doesn't mean you didn't
love your first husband. It's not an either/or sort of thing."
"You don't think I'm betraying Paul by getting remarried?"
"Is that what you think?" All that anger has disappeared from Helen's voice and she looks at me with deep sympathy. "Raven told me you came to her asking for something sensible, that you didn't think you'd find love again in this lifetime and you were just looking for companionship."
"Pretty much," I agree.
"She also told me the day she gave me your file that she knew you were ready to love again, and she knew Nathan was the right man for you. And I knew it too, as soon as I talked to you that first time. And his girls know it. Nathan knows it...and so do you."
Her hands reach across the desk for mine and I accept the gesture gratefully.
"I already told Raven." New tears start falling and Helen squeezes my hands.
"And I already told Raven you didn't really mean it," Helen whispers.
I can't help but laugh, but then reality dawns on me, "But Nate-- I fucked it all up, Helen. I didn't even have the guts to tell him myself. He'll never forgive me."
"Girl you are trying way too hard to cheat yourself out of a good thing," she tells me with another squeeze of my hands.
By the time my unexpected visitor leaves my office, she's got me convinced that all I need to do is call Nathan up and explain it to him.
But my call goes straight to voicemail.
And so does the call I make 15 minutes later.
And the one I make an hour later.
"The book club ladies are here." Beth's voice is as soft as her knock on my door. "Are you OK?" She asks when she sees me with my head on my desk.
How do I explain it to Bethany? She's 18. She's never had her heart broken. Her whole life is ahead of her. She deserves to go on believing in happy endings. I don't want to be part of dulling that sparkle in her.
I shake my head against the wood and try to stifle the sob.
"Tiff?" She sounds concerned. And closer. When I lift my head up, I'm not surprised to find her in the chair that Helen was sitting in just a couple of hours ago.
"I should get home," I sniffle. "You can take care of the ladies."
Bethany looks slightly panicked for a second and then she smiles, "Actually, they're expecting you to share your thoughts on that mystery you recommended last month, remember?"
Was that today? I try to think back. So much has been going on. I remember making the recommendation and I remember promising them I'd talk to them about it when I got back from Colorado and...dammit. I guess they probably are expecting that today.
"Let them know I'll be in in a few minutes."
I give in.
I feel like shit, but Beth looks ecstatic.
"They'll be so excited," Beth chirps as she jumps up while I make my way to bathroom.
I'm going to have to work a miracle with some makeup if I don't want to spend the next 2 hours explaining why I've been crying to a bunch of nosy book club ladies.
Nathan
I'd already been working on a plan but it looks like my damn neighbor beat me to the punch.
Ever since I got the call from Raven a few hours ago, things have been a blur. I check for new messages as soon as the plane lands and the captain tells us it's safe to use our cell phones again.
Three missed calls from Tiffany but no voicemail.
My stomach lurches into my throat. Looks like Raven has her information right after all.
I hope.
I also have a text from Helen letting me know where she's waiting for me in short term parking. I can't believe I'm about to get into a rental car with an 82 year old woman at the wheel.
"What's wrong? You gettin' cold feet?" Helen jokes as I stop shy of actually getting in the car when I find her.
"Just thinking you should let me drive," I shoot back.
"You're not an authorized driver," she tells me, "Now do you wanna stand there all day or do you want to get the girl?"
That seems like an easy decision to make. Without further delay, I climb into the passenger seat and buckle up.
"What the hell made you come all the way out here?" I demand as Helen drives.
This morning I got a a call from Raven, who'd just gotten a call from Tiffany's assistant, Beth, who told her that Helen had shown up at the bookstore.
It took me long enough to wrap my head around what Raven was telling me, it didn't occur to me to ask what Helen was even doing out here until my plane was already in the air.
"Well somebody had to get to the bottom of the problem," Helen grumbles defensively.
I haven't decided how I feel about all this interference yet.
"You should have told me you were planning on this." I can grumble too.
"Well you should have told me you were planning a knight in shining armor move," Helen grumbles back.
It was hardly a knight in shining armor move, I think as Helen steers us into the parking lot of a little brick front building with a sign that says "Twice Told: Used Books."
Tiffany's store.
I've rehearsed this moment at least a hundred times in my head, but there hasn't been a single version where Helen drove me here like my mom driving me to pick up my junior prom date.
In my version, I show up, declare my undying love for the woman I can't live without, and drop to one knee. Tiffany sees me and falls into my arms, confessing that she just got scared and that she can't live without me either. Then we live happily ever after.
OK, in my version, there's also a lot of seriously hot fucking between the "of course I'll marry you" and well into the happily ever after.
Turns out, the real life version involves almost as much help from our friends as getting us together to begin with did.
Helen took it upon herself to fly out here and confront Tiff. Bethany overheard their conversation and took it upon herself to call Raven and tell Raven everything she overheard. Raven took it upon herself to call me and tell me to get my ass on a plane pronto and go get my woman.
Well, Raven didn't use quite those terms. Closer than I expected of her, but not quite.
Now here I am, nervously fingering the ring box in my pocket while I stare at the front door of the little book store like there's a dragon behind it.
Maybe this is a knight in armor move after all?
Thing is, I happen to know there are no dragons behind that door. Just one hopeless romantic 18 year old, a dozen nosy book club ladies, and the woman I hope to convince to marry me.
And the ghost of her late husband.
Apparently that's what's standing between me and my bride.
So maybe there is a dragon after all.
From what Raven understood of her call from Bethany, Tiffany's been feeling guilty about getting remarried.
Based on the calls I missed from Tiffany while I was in the air, I'm hoping that means that what I'm about to do isn't going to end in disaster.
Taking a deep breath, I square my shoulders and walk through the door.
Inside, there's a counter with a cash register on my right. An opening in the wall behind the counter leads to a hallway that I'm guessing is where the storage room and Tiffany's office is, based on her description of the place.
The main store is one big room filled with rows of free standing book shelves. All the walls are lined with floor to ceiling shelves. There are books everywhere.
Books on the shelves. Books stacked on top of the shelves. Stacks of books in the aisles between the shelves. Books on carts, books on the counter, books in boxes on the floor.
Directly ahead of me, at the far end of the building, are 2 doorways. Both open. One looks like it leads to a store room and probably to more parking behind the building. The door to the other room is about half way open. I can see that the room behind it has nice carpeting and a painting on the wall...and is filled with little table and chair sets with several women sitting at them.
The women don't seem to notice the sound of the bells that ann
ounce someone walking through the front door, their attention is turned toward a speaker that's hidden behind the semi-closed door.
I recognize her voice immediately. I hear the dullness in it and all the little "ums, and ahs" between her words that tell me she has her mind on something besides what ever she's talking about to the ladies in the book club.
The bells on the door break into another round of soft jingling as Helen comes in behind me.
A young girl peeks out from around the edge of the door way where all the women are seated. Her face breaks into an enthusiastic grin when she sees me standing here and before I can make my way any further into the store, the grinning young girl quickly says something to the speaker and then comes running toward me.
Tiffany
I hear the door open out front but Beth is already on her way toward the front so I don't have an excuse to make an escape.
The book was actually quite good and a few weeks ago I was dying to get a chance to sit in with the book club ladies so I could give them my thoughts and make the recommendation for their list.
Unfortunately, today is the day the ladies are here, but today is also the day that I realized that I want Nathan back.
Today is also the day that I have to come to terms with the fact that I fucked everything up.
So sitting in the reading room with a cup of tea and a copy of a mystery that I read over a month ago, trying to give a review that's likely to convince them to order 30 copies of a book I can only get new, is not going well today.
Especially trying to do it all while not breaking down in tears.
So I stammer through my review, stopping to sip from my tea cup whenever I feel like I might start crying.
I think the ladies are onto me though.
There was no way I could keep my impending engagement a secret and at the time, I didn't want to. They've been mostly quiet about it since I finally gave Beth permission to let them know I'd called it off.
Right now I can see Letty and Elizabeth exchanging a glance and I'm pretty sure it's about me.
"So anyway, um, it was a good book," I turn the paperback over in my hands and hold it up so everyone can get a look at the cover, "so, um, if you want me to order copies for everyone just, um, let me know, OK? Great!" I finish my speech quickly and jump up, hoping to get out before anyone decides to ask me if I'm OK.
A Sensible Arrangement: A Modern Match-Maker Romance Page 9