First and Again

by Jana Richards

  “No, wait,” Celia said over her shoulder as she worked on Tina’s hair. “I’m almost done with Tina and then I’ve got some time until my next appointment.”

  “Well, okay then. If you’ve got a little time, I’ll stay.”

  She closed the door and met Tina’s eyes in the mirror.

  “How are you, Tina?” she asked politely. She’d be damned if she’d let her see how hard it was for her to just be in the same room.

  “I’m fine, thank you.” Her polite reply sounded just as forced as Bridget’s question.

  “Tina is on her way to Bismarck,” Celia said as she liberally applied hairspray to her client’s hair. “So she’s not able to join us for coffee.”

  Tina looked for a moment like she would argue the point, but in the end she nodded.

  “Yes, I’ve got a job interview. I hate the idea of commuting, especially with winter coming soon, but I need a job.”

  “A lot of people commute to the city from here,” Celia said. “Maybe you could carpool with someone.”

  “Maybe.” She didn’t sound hopeful.

  Celia removed the plastic cape from around Tina’s shoulders and offered her a mirror to inspect her new do from all angles.

  “Wonderful job as always,” Tina said with a smile. Celia lowered the chair and she stepped out and made her way to the till. She paid Celia in cash and then retrieved her jacket from the coatrack.

  “Good luck with your interview, Tina,” Celia said.

  “Yes, good luck,” Bridget added. Maybe if she worked in the city she wouldn’t run into her in Paradise too often.

  She pushed her arms through her jacket. “Thanks. It’s not exactly my dream job but until something better falls out of the sky, I guess this will have to do. Thanks again, Celia.”

  The little bell over the door tinkled as she left. Celia stared thoughtfully at the closed door. “I hope her interview goes well. She really needs the money.”

  “Why? Is she in some kind of financial trouble?” Bridget drew perverse pleasure from the notion, and then chastised herself for her unkind thoughts.

  “Tina and Jerry have had a hard time of it the last couple of years. Jerry lost a leg in a farm accident and hasn’t been able to work, at least not heavy farm labor. She was working at the Harvest Moon until it went up in smoke so she’s been unemployed for a few months now. They’re renting out their land, and Tina works for Mom at the bar occasionally, but it’s not bringing in a whole lot of money.”

  “My God. I had no idea,” Bridget said, feeling petty for her previous malicious thoughts. She could identify with needing a job and money. She could also see that Tina might be resentful toward her for taking work away from her at the bar. But that didn’t mean that she and Tina would become best friends anytime soon.

  “Enough gloom and doom,” Celia said as she handed her a broom. “Here, you can sweep up Tina’s hair while I make a fresh pot of coffee.”

  “Great.” She took the broom from her sister. Even when Tina wasn’t around she managed to annoy her.

  In a few minutes both tasks were accomplished and she and Celia sat on the small sofa in the waiting area drinking coffee.

  “So what brings you my way again today, aside from my sparkling company?” Celia asked.

  “Our mother,” Bridget said in exasperation. “How have you lived so close to her all these years without ripping your hair out?” She quickly filled her in on the incident with the new commercial oven. “She so obviously wants me to take over the restaurant, even though she denies it. She knows I can’t let her run it herself. It’s too much for her. So if she reopens it I’ll have to step in and help her, whether I like it or not.”

  “Maybe she really does have someone else in mind to run the restaurant,” Celia said. “Mom’s no slouch when it comes to business, and it makes very good business sense to reopen the restaurant. I know she’s wanted to do it for a long time, even before the Harvest Moon burned down.”

  Bridget had to admit Celia was right. Aside from a couple of fast food restaurants, there wasn’t any real competition in town. The restaurant would have good local support. And being at the junction of two busy highways, it would attract plenty of out of town business.

  “I hate that she’s trying to manipulate me.”

  “When you both calm down, why don’t you ask her what her plans are?”

  “We’ll see. Talking calmly together has never been one of our strong suits. She’s too pigheaded.”

  Celia started to laugh. “That’s really funny, considering that a couple of days ago Mom sat exactly where you’re sitting now and said precisely the same thing about you.”

  “That figures.” She shook her head. “Our problem is that we’re just too different.”

  “Are you kidding me?” Celia rolled her eyes. “The problem with you two is that you’re too much alike.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. It’s you and Mom who are alike. You look alike, you talk alike, you even have the same walk!”

  “I agree that physically Mom and I are very similar. But when it comes to temperament, determination and just plain stubbornness you and our mother are exactly alike. Why do you think you clash so much?”

  Celia didn’t know what she was talking about. “Oh, come on. That’s not true at all.”

  “Oh really? How stubborn are you and Mom? Remember when you were sixteen and you wanted to go to a rock concert in the city and Mom wouldn’t let you? You refused to eat for three days, but she still wouldn’t let you go. She was worried sick, but there was no way she’d give in. You only started eating again when the concert was over and there wasn’t any point anymore.”

  “Okay, I admit there was that one time—”

  “One time? What about the dress you wanted to wear to your high school graduation?”

  “Oh, that.”

  “Yes, that. You wanted the green chiffon thing with the neckline down to your navel and she refused to consider it. So what did you do?”

  “I decided not to go.” Jack had been disappointed, especially since he’d come all the way from Texas to see her graduate. She sighed. “I didn’t even like the dress that much. I think maybe I just wanted to shock Mavis.”

  “Why did you try so hard to provoke her?” Celia asked. “Do you think that on some level you’re still trying to get a rise out of her?”

  She didn’t have an answer. She didn’t really understand it herself.

  Celia touched her hair, winding her finger around one of the spiral curls. “On a completely different subject, when are you going to let me cut your hair?”

  She laughed, glad to talk about something else. “You want to cut my hair?”

  “Lord knows someone has to do something with it.” She gave the curl a tug. “It’s getting a little out of hand.”

  “I know.” She could barely get a brush through the mass of curls. “I haven’t had it cut in two years.” When her business went under so did her standing appointment with her expensive hairdresser, the only person she’d found who could beat her unruly mane into submission.

  “I’d love to get in there and have my way with all this hair. How did you manage to get all these curls and I didn’t get so much as a wave?”

  Her curly hair was a legacy from her father, all she had left of him. It was both a blessing and a curse. “Believe me, I’d give you a few dozen curls if I could.”

  Celia jumped to her feet. “We’ve got some time right now. Why don’t you hop into the chair and I’ll sharpen my scissors.”

  “Wait a minute. I have to think about this. I’ve had some very bad hair experiences in the past. What do you plan to do with my hair?”

  She resumed her seat. “Well, I think it’s bushing out so much because the hair is all one length. We need to cut in some layers so that it lays a little closer to your head. And I’d love to put a little color in your hair. Something to bring out the auburn tones.”

  It sounded much like what her expensive hairdresser
in San Francisco used to do. She knew Celia was a talented hairdresser; she’d seen enough of her handiwork around town to be sure of that. She just wasn’t ready to give up control of her hair.

  “Let me think about it.”

  “Don’t think too long or my price will go up from one apple pie to two.” Celia grinned. “I heard on the small-town grapevine that you and Martha Kowalchuk are going to open a pie shop.”

  She laughed. “Oh yeah? Martha and I could never be partners. I wouldn’t be able to keep up with her.”

  “I’ve also heard you’re reopening the restaurant and taking over Gladys Clark’s job.”

  “Apparently I’m going to be very busy. What else have you heard?”

  She pretended to think it over. “Let’s see, what else? Oh yes. You’re having an affair with Jack.”

  Bridget nearly choked on her coffee. She sputtered for a moment before regaining her power of speech. “An affair with Jack? People think I’m having an affair with Jack?”

  “So says the grapevine.”

  “The only affair I’m having with him is a catered one.” She jumped to her feet and started pacing. “Why do people in small towns think they have to know everything about everybody? I can’t do anything without it being misinterpreted. I hate living in a fishbowl.”

  “You have been seeing a lot of Jack since you came back,” Celia said, calmly sipping her coffee.

  “Well sure, because of Rebecca’s riding lessons and this lunch I’m catering. There’s been a lot of planning.”

  “Are those the only reasons?”

  She sat next to Celia on the sofa once more. “Of course they are. What other reason could I have?”

  Celia frowned, worry lines marring her smooth forehead. “You two were very close once.”

  “That was a long time ago. We’re different people now.”

  “I know,” she said gently, “but first love is a very powerful thing. And sometimes things appear a lot rosier when we look at them in hindsight.”

  “I appreciate your concern, but you don’t have to worry. All I want to do is look after my daughter. I have no intention of starting anything with Jack, or anyone else.”

  Celia looked relieved. “That’s good. I wouldn’t want you to get hurt.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Jack’s a great guy, and I love him to pieces, especially since he’s Gavin’s brother. But he’s been known to break a few hearts around here.”

  “Really?”

  “He’s had a few romances the last few years. Whenever something started to get a little more serious, at least on the woman’s end, he broke it off. And you know how it is in Paradise. Everybody knows all the details.”

  Bridget remained silent. Celia’s description didn’t fit with the Jack she’d known. Even the man she was coming to know today, the man who’d promised to let her daughter ride even if she couldn’t cater his luncheon, didn’t strike her as a person who would use a woman so callously.

  At last she sighed. “You don’t have to worry. The last thing I need is another man complicating my life.” Even as she said the words she thought of the way her body stirred to life when she was around him, and wondered if she was being entirely truthful.

  “It’s too bad, really,” Celia said with a sigh. “He’s a great guy and a great friend, but I don’t think he’ll ever be ready for a serious relationship again. Leslie’s mother saw to that.”

  She saw the bitterness on her sister’s face. She wanted to ask Celia about Leslie’s mother and what had happened between her and Jack, but decided against it. Celia might get the impression that she was too interested.

  The walk back to the motel allowed her time to think through some of the things her sister had told her. Was Celia right about her and Mavis sharing the same temperament? She’d always thought her mother stubborn and pigheaded, so sure in her decisions that she was never able to look at anyone else’s point of view. She’d certainly come up against Mavis’s stubbornness on many occasions in her youth. She didn’t like the idea that she was just as implacable.

  But Mavis was also generous to her friends and a pillar of support in her community. She was quick to help anyone who needed her. As a girl Bridget had resented the time her mother had spent cooking burgers at the skating rink as a volunteer, or driving seniors to appointments in the city, time Bridget felt Mavis owed to her. But now she saw her mother was just being a good friend.

  She’d let her childhood resentments rule her relationship with her mother well into her adulthood. But every time she thought of creating a new grown-up relationship with Mavis, her loyalty to her father rose to the surface, screaming to be heard. Mavis had been the one to leave him. She’d been the one who’d torn the family apart, separating Bridget from the father she’d adored. How did she get past such a thing?

  She entered through the back door of the restaurant. The new stainless steel oven gleamed in the afternoon sunlight. She grinned. What would Uncle Frank have made of this newfangled, high-tech machine in his kitchen? She could almost hear his voice, Damn thing might be pretty, but can it bake a decent loaf of bread? Uncle Frank had been nothing if not practical.

  She missed him so much. When she’d arrived in Paradise at six years of age, not understanding why her mother had taken her away from her father, Frank had been there for her. He’d spent time with her when her mother was busy running the bar and the motel, and Celia was wrapped up in making new friends and a new life.

  She ran her hand over the cool, smooth surface of the new oven and for the first time longed to be working in this kitchen again. Uncle Frank had loved the restaurant and he’d passed that love to her. But did she have the courage to accept what both he and her mother offered her?

  Mavis pushed open the door from the bar and smiled uncertainly.

  “I thought I heard you come in.” She nodded at the oven. “What do you think? I need to get a fitter to hook it up to the gas lines, but it sure is pretty, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, it’s beautiful.” She smiled as she opened the oven door and looked inside. “I was just thinking about Uncle Frank and wondering what his reaction would be.”

  Mavis grimaced. “I’m sure that wherever Frank is, he’s unhappy with me. I didn’t exactly take good care of his beloved restaurant. You know, this restaurant is the whole reason we ended up in Paradise.”

  “Really?” She was intrigued. “What do you mean?”

  “Running the bar and the motel took away time from cooking in the restaurant, which was his real love. So when I showed up, broke and needing a job, we made a deal. If I gave him the time to work solely in the restaurant, I could manage the bar and motel any way I wanted. The arrangement suited us fine for a lot of years.”

  “So that’s how we ended up in Paradise, because he needed you and you needed a job?”

  “Pretty much.”

  She longed to ask her mother where her father fit in the equation. Why had she left him so abruptly? And why had she never allowed her to see him again?

  The words stuck in her throat, unspoken.

  “I’m sorry I sprang the oven on you, Bridge,” Mavis said. “I just thought you might like to practice your pies on it.”

  “It’s a pretty expensive piece of equipment to keep around just for practice,” she replied. “Are you sure there isn’t more to it than that?”

  Mavis looked away. “I have to admit I’ve been wanting to reopen the restaurant for quite some time. And then when you decided to move here I thought it would be a perfect fit for you.”

  “Mom, I told you—”

  “Yes, I know, I know.” She sighed. “I won’t deny that I’d like you and Rebecca to stay here in Paradise, and I’d love for you to open the restaurant. But it has to be your decision, something both of you are happy with.”

  She nodded, not meeting her mother’s eyes.

  “You said you had someone else in mind to run the restaurant. Who is it?”

  “I thought about a
sking Tina Wilson to open the restaurant.”

  Bridget sucked in her breath. The last thing she needed was to be in contact with her nemesis every day.

  “Relax. I don’t think I’m going that route. She has restaurant experience, but not as a manager. I don’t know if she’d be able to handle staff. She has a somewhat acerbic personality.”

  “I’ve noticed.”

  “Besides, the two of you would likely be at each other’s throats within minutes of her starting here. It’s not worth the hassle.”

  She thought about what Celia had told her regarding Tina’s financial situation. It wouldn’t be fair to deny her a job just because the two of them couldn’t get along. Besides, it wouldn’t be like she and Tina would actually be working together, just in the same building. With any luck, they wouldn’t have to see each other.

  “Mom, if you really want to hire Tina, you should do it. It should be a business decision rather than a personal one.”

  “I appreciate you saying that, Bridget, but like I said, Tina’s lack of people skills is working against her. She’s a hard worker, but I think a better role for her would be as second in command. She needs someone to guide her, and I don’t have the time or the energy to watch her that closely.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “I don’t know. Reopening the restaurant is a good business decision. Maybe I’ll have to advertise for a manager and a chef.”

  She felt a twinge of jealousy. It didn’t seem right to have strangers running Uncle Frank’s restaurant. But if no one in the family wanted the job, what else could her mother do?

  Mavis tucked one of Bridget’s wayward curls behind her ear. “You’ve been so upset ever since you got here. I thought, maybe if I bought the oven it would make you happy. You can understand a mother just wanting to make her child happy, can’t you?”

  She lifted her gaze to meet Mavis’s. She’d never heard her speak like this, like one mother to another. “Yes, I can understand that. I’d do anything for Rebecca, anything to make her happy.”