by Jeff Shelby
“Just fine.” Running the popcorn machine had turned out to be remarkably easy.
She nodded, her smile still in place. “Good, good. I just want to thank you again for all of your hard work on this, Rainy! We couldn’t have pulled this event off without volunteers like you!” She turned her attention to Mikey, a quizzical expression on her face. “Are you a volunteer?”
Mikey took a step back and pointed at himself. “Who, me?”
She thrust her clipboard at him. “Just jot down your name and email and we’ll be sure to give you a call to help out with next year’s festivities. We’re always looking for more good people. You’re a good person, aren’t you?”
I bit back a smile as Mikey blushed and stammered and finally resigned himself to providing the information Savannah was requesting.
Once she had him, she turned her attention back to me. “The Dorothy contest is starting in just a few minutes! You are coming to watch, right? Your help distributing the flyers is what made this contest possible, you know.”
I glanced down at the grass, feeling a little guilty. The distribution of the flyers had taken a back seat while I was trying to clear my name, so they hadn’t been up in Latney and the neighboring towns for very long. I was sincerely hoping enough people saw them so there would actually be a contest.
“Well,” she said expectantly. “What are we waiting for?” She tapped Mikey on the shoulder. “Here, you can start volunteering right now!”
He stared at her, horrified. “What?”
She tugged on his sleeve, guiding him behind the popcorn machine. “You can run this while Rainy is gone.”
“But—”
She looked at him with sad eyes. “Don’t you want her to be able to see the Dorothy contest? After all the time she spent promoting it…well, it sure would be a shame if she missed it because there wasn’t anyone around to cover her station for fifteen minutes.”
Mikey didn’t say anything. But he picked up the metal scoop inside the machine and began filling bags.
Savannah smiled triumphantly. “Come on,” she said to me. “It starts in just a few minutes.”
I gave Mikey an apologetic look and followed Savannah along the sidewalk that wound to the other side of the park, directly opposite from the pavilion where we’d met for the first volunteer meeting. There were booths lining both sides of the walkway and people milled about, chatting and laughing and eating. Under the pavilion, a dozen quilts were on display, hanging majestically from the wooden rafters. Greta’s quilt had a large blue ribbon attached to it, and I smiled. She’d won that ribbon fair and square, I thought. It wasn’t an honorary ribbon, or a posthumous prize: it was the sole blue ribbon that had been awarded, and she deserved it. I’d spent a good twenty minutes perusing the quilts before my shift at the popcorn machine started, and even my novice eye could tell that her skills were far superior to anyone else’s who’d entered. Even Lila Bartholomew’s.
Heidi was under the pavilion, sitting at a table with information about each of the quilts. Our eyes met and she nodded and waved. I was glad she was there, and happy that she had the satisfaction of seeing her mother win the best in show.
A woman manning the face-painting booth called for Savannah and she stopped. “You go on ahead,” she urged. “Don’t wait for me.”
“Are you sure?” I asked. “Don’t you want to watch?”
She patted one of her braids. “As a former winner of the Dorothy for a Day contest, I know exactly what will happen so if I miss it, it isn’t the end of the world. This is your moment, Rainy. Don’t miss it!” With that, she hurried away.
I didn’t know how the contest was my moment, but she was already gone and her answer wasn’t important.
I continued toward the stage set up in the middle of a large, grassy area. Three judges sat in directors’ chairs on the right hand side of the stage, waiting for the contest to begin.
I joined the crowd of people waiting and spied Declan near the stage. I caught his eye and we waved. I took a step toward him, thinking it would be nice to watch the contest unfold with a friend, when someone reached out and touched my elbow.
I turned and came face to face with Gunnar.
“Long time no see,” he said, his tone light.
I felt the color burst on my cheeks. “Hi.” I swallowed. “It really has been a while, hasn’t it?”
He nodded. “I can tell you how many days.”
My cheeks felt like they were on fire. “I’ve been super busy with the festival. You know, volunteering and stuff.”
“Hmm.” His hazel eyes looked at me knowingly. “I thought maybe you’d just been super busy avoiding me.”
“Avoiding you? Why would I be avoiding you?”
The minute I asked, I regretted it.
“Because we kissed,” he said bluntly.
My eyes shifted away from him and back to the stage. And my mouth dropped open.
There were three contestants lined up on the stage, a mixture of different sizes of Dorothys: a young one, no older than ten, a teenage one, and a woman probably in her thirties. They were all wearing a white and blue-checker dresses and red shoes, their black hair—real or wigs, I couldn’t tell—braided.
But another Dorothy was struggling toward the stairs, a Dorothy I couldn’t take my eyes off of. This Dorothy was older, much older than the others, and she was a little wobbly in her sturdy red heels. Without a word to Gunnar, I took off toward her.
Calvin flashed a grin as soon as I got to his side.
“Do you need help?” I asked.
He was the oldest Dorothy I’d ever seen. Somehow, he’d managed to squeeze himself into an oversize version of Dorothy’s signature dress, and he’d found red sparkly shoes to fit his oversized feet. He’d applied make-up—some blush and lipstick, along with eyeliner that didn’t quite follow his waterline or his upper lid.
He squinted. “Can’t see a darn thing without my glasses,” he said. He smoothed down his wig, repositioning his braids so they were sitting on either shoulder.
I held out my arm and he took it, wrapping his gnarled fingers around me.
“This is quite the costume,” I told him as I steered him toward the small set of stairs that led up to the stage. “Have…have you participated in the Dorothy contest before?”
He shook his head, and his braids swung back and forth on his shoulders. “This is the first time.”
I nodded, trying to keep a straight face as he teetered along next to me. “And what made you decide to enter this year?”
He smiled, and I resisted the urge to wipe the smudge of lipstick off his front tooth. “It was something I’d never done,” he said simply. “And I’m not getting any younger. Greta’s death reminded me of that, you know?”
I did know. Death tended to do that, to help put things in perspective. I hadn’t realized that winning the Dorothy for a Day contest was on Calvin’s bucket list, but clearly, it was. And he was going for it.
“Besides,” he said, his smile growing. “I have a surefire way to win.”
“Oh?”
Calvin nodded and waved at someone behind me. George appeared, holding a brown wicker basket with Greta sitting inside. He handed it to Calvin and stepped back into the crowd.
“You’re using Greta?” I whispered.
Calvin nodded.
“How did you manage that?” I asked. “I thought you and George weren’t…friends.”
“We weren’t,” he said. He shrugged. “But, like I said, life is too short. For missing out on contests and for not forgiving friends.”
It was my turn to nod.
Calvin leaned down and stroked Greta’s head. She looked nothing like Toto, but Calvin didn’t really look much like Dorothy, so I didn’t think it mattered.
“Come on,” he said to the little dog. “We have a contest to win.”
I helped him up the final steps and watched with a mixture of apprehension and pride as he hobbled across the stage to take his
place next to the other Dorothys. Relieved that he’d made it without falling, the apprehension faded and I beamed at him as he waited for judging to begin.
“Think you can get away from me that easy?” a voice next to me whispered.
I spun to the right. Gunnar was standing next to me, his hands shoved in his pockets, his head cocked in my direction.
“I…I wasn’t trying to get away,” I told him, feeling the blush begin anew. “I…I had to help Calvin. He isn’t wearing his glasses and I didn’t want him tripping up the stairs.”
“Is that so?” he murmured. He moved closer, so close that his arm was now touching mine. “So we can start up where we left off?”
The butterflies began knocking around in my stomach again. “Um, sure.”
His head tilted toward mine, his eyes at half-mast.
My own eyes widened. “Wait. Where do you think we left off?” All I could think was that he was back to that afternoon in my backyard, that moment when we’d kissed. That moment which had caused me to avoid him over the last couple of weeks, because I didn’t know quite where to go.
“You tell me,” he said.
His mouth was just inches from mine.
Calvin’s words came back to me then.
Life is too short.
For him, he’d realized that life was too short to miss out on opportunities he wanted to take. To give up friendships because of disagreements or arguments.
But for me, the words meant something else.
Life was too short.
I’d realized that back in Arlington, when I’d decided to sell the house and move to Latney. It had been one of the reasons I’d taken the plunge, because I didn’t want to live a life of what-ifs, a life of regrets.
I glanced at Gunnar. He was watching me carefully, the ghost of a smile on his face.
“Well?” he murmured. His hand was still on my arm.
I didn’t respond with words.
But I leaned close.
And I answered him a different way instead.
THE END
Keep on reading for a sneak peek at the next book in the Rainy Day series!
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Here's a sneak peek at the fourth book in the Rainy Day series, PLANTING EVIDENCE.
ONE
Something was burning.
Thankfully, it wasn’t another building on my property.
Unfortunately, it was something in my oven. The same something I’d spent forty-five minutes putting together.
I hurried back into the kitchen, my sock-covered feet sliding a little on the floor as I skidded to a stop in front of the oven. With a grimace, I gripped the bar and pulled on the door.
My perfect pie was singed brown on top; at least I thought it was, considering it was barely visible behind the plumes of smoke billowing into the kitchen. I grabbed a potholder and yanked the pie pan out, then set it on the stovetop.
The apples I’d painstakingly sliced. The crust I’d labored over, making the dough and rolling it out and pinching it into place. The brown sugar and butter topping crumbled on top.
All of it, gone.
I stared at the pie and sighed. Two hours worth of work, down the drain. Or, rather, up in smoke.
I tossed the potholder back on the counter and surveyed the kitchen. There was a stack of dishes still waiting in the sink, and a whole basket of apples needing to be turned into…something.
I almost smiled. The apple tree I’d found had been a surprise. Unlike most of the other surprises I’d encountered during my time in Latney, the discovery of the tree had been a good one.
When I moved into the old farmhouse, I knew I was getting five acres of land, filled with pastures and a pond and an awful lot of trees. What I hadn’t anticipated was finding an apple tree tucked away in the back corner of the property. I’d discovered it almost by chance one day while taking an early morning walk. I’d headed down toward the pond, past where the bungalow had stood before the fire burned it to the ground, and had decided to follow the shoreline to see the back part of the lot. There was a small, narrow trail, barely wide enough for a person to navigate, but I somehow managed. Halfway around, I’d found the tree, an old gnarled apple tree loaded with tiny green apples. After discovering it. I’d made a point to check on it weekly, and my anticipation grew along with the apples. I was practically giddy when the time came to harvest the red, ripe fruit. And I was downright ecstatic when I first bit into one, savoring the tart sweetness. I knew they’d be perfect baking apples.
If I could manage to make something without burning it to a crisp.
I picked up my glass of water and brought it to my lips, still glowering at the smoking pie on the stove. I had discovered that the oven was one of the more…unpredictable things in the house. It didn’t always keep the right temperature, and it didn’t always heat thoroughly. It wasn’t the first time I’d had an issue with it. I’d made a mental note a few weeks ago that I would probably need to replace it sooner rather than later, and I was now thinking that the destruction of my apple pie was definitely going to propel me forward in the decision-making process.
There was a knock on the front door and I headed that way, grateful for the distraction from my culinary catastrophe.
Pastor Declan Murphy was on my doorstep, holding a large cardboard box. His face was barely visible behind it, but I could see his reddish-brown hair just above it.
“Rainy?” His voice was muffled behind the cardboard.
I stepped aside and waved him in, even though he couldn’t see me. “Come on in,” I said.
He stumbled forward, almost dropping the box as he crossed the threshold. Carefully, he lowered it to the ground and then straightened.
I peered at the box. “What is all this?”
“Chickens,” he told me.
I raised my eyebrows. “Chickens?” The box was partially closed, but I didn’t hear any chirping or clucking.
He nodded, pushing at his hair. “My sister is making me redecorate.” He pulled one of the flaps open and I saw what was inside: chicken décor. The chicken décor from his kitchen.
“She’s what?” I asked.
“Redecorating,” he repeated. When I gave him a puzzled look, he held up his hand. “Don’t ask. I’ve learned it’s better to just let her do her thing and not ask questions.”
I bit back a smile.
“So,” he said, stuffing his hands in the pockets of his jeans, “I figured I’d bring all this stuff by and see if you wanted it. I know you like chickens, and you seemed to like the decorations when you came over.”
“I did.”
There was a pause, and he must have mistaken my silence for hesitancy. “You don’t have to take it,” he said quickly. “I just thought you might like it, what with having real chickens and all. But I know you have your own stuff that you’re probably attached to. And I mean, who really wants hand-me-down kitchen stuff, anyway?” He stooped down to pick up the box. “I can just take this to the thrift store in Winslow. I’m sure they’ll take it off my hands.”
I reached out and touched his arm. “Declan, stop.” He froze. “I’d love to keep some of this.”
He turned to look at me. “You would?”
I nodded. “Yes. Absolutely. I’ll go through it and whatever I don’t end up keeping, I’ll take up to the thrift store.”
“Well, if you’re sure,” he said slowly, his eyes darting from me to the box. His cheeks were a little pink, but not as red as I’d seen them in the past. He hadn’t gotten too flustered yet, and I wanted to keep it that way.
“I’m sure,” I said. I crouched down by
the box and pulled the flaps completely open so the contents were visible. “Oh,” I said, pulling out the chicken clock that had hung on his kitchen wall. “I remember this. I love it!”
I dug around some more, pulling out kitchen towels that were almost new, and potholders that I was sure had never encountered a dirty dish.
“These are fantastic,” I said as I pulled out a pair of chicken salt and pepper shakers.
“Um, Rainy,” Declan said, chewing his lip. “Do you really want to be going through all of it right now?”
I looked up at him. “Sure. Why wouldn’t I be?”
He pointed to the kitchen. “Because it smells like something might be burning.”
For one brief second, I flashed to the pie in the oven. And, just as quickly, I remembered I’d already pulled it out. Burnt.
I smiled. “Something was burning,” I told him.
“Not a building, I hope?”
My smile widened. “No, not a building.”
“Good.” His hands were still in his pockets and he rocked back and forth on his heels. “So…it’s been a while since I’ve seen you…” His cheeks were definitely turning redder now.
“Yes, it has been a while,” I admitted.
I knew it had been a couple of weeks, if not longer. Ever since the Dorothy Days festival, I’d kept a low profile. I hadn’t been to church, and I’d only gone to town for groceries and quick burger fixes at the Wicked Wich. I hadn’t been trying to avoid Declan, per se, but I hadn’t sought him out as I had before.
Because of Gunnar.
I felt my own cheeks warm as my thoughts drifted to my sexy, handsome next-door neighbor.
“How are…things?” Declan asked.
I cleared my throat. “Things are good.” I didn’t know if he was asking in general, or if he was asking about me and Gunnar. Because even though I’d kept to myself, and even though Gunnar and I had kept our budding almost-relationship confined to our homes, I had a sneaking suspicion that people knew.
Because nothing stayed a secret in Latney for long.