I hooked a left at Main Street and basked in the pre-storm breeze. Judging by the clouds and gentle rumble of thunder, rain was imminent. With any luck, I’d get some fantastic shots of a country rainbow after the storm. I loved the rain, but I suspected the group of Little Leaguers gathered on our elementary school ballfield didn’t share the sentiment tonight. A flash of lightning drew the ballers’ attention. They raised leather mitts to their foreheads, searching the sky for what would end their fun. Moms sprang to life, flattening popup chairs and sprinting to their minivans, handbags and paperbacks at the ready for use as makeshift umbrellas.
I unpacked my camera and snapped a few shots of the scampering women in yoga pants and mom jeans. Tiny ballers framed the backdrop. Sometimes, the local paper paid for amateur shots. I’d made two hundred dollars last summer photographing historic Mail Pouch Tobacco barns after Heidi and I joined her mom on a mission to collect barn siding for her store. Apparently, reclaimed wood was all the rage for the over-thirty-with-money crowd. I’d eventually made enough cash to buy all my school supplies, plus a few new outfits from the thrift store.
Thunder rolled again, a little louder this time, and I picked up my pace.
Woodsfield was a stereotypical rural Ohio town, complete with clichéd street fairs and communal hayrides. At the moment, strawberries were blooming and preparations were underway for the annual festival and parade. I didn’t hate it. It was the kind of place exhausted people dreamed of visiting and, in my opinion, the true inspiration for half of Stephen King’s novels. Unlike the books, nothing monumental ever happened in Woodsfield. Definitely nothing sinister. We still had a fancy blue sign on the main drag claiming Home of Miss America 2008. Also known as the last newsworthy thing that had happened here.
I ignored the occasional raindrop, still too insignificant to deter my plan, and scouted for potential money shots. Aside from the fleeing moms, everything was the same, and the storm was more threat than action. Firemen played cards underneath the station’s red awning. Families pitched horseshoes on oversized lawns. Couples held hands on front porch swings. I rested one shoulder against an ancient oak and caught an elderly couple in my camera lens as he pressed his lips to her forehead. The shutter blinked. I checked the little screen for quality and composition. I could do better.
“There you are!” Mrs. Baxter, my grandma’s best friend and my surrogate family, speed-walked up the sidewalk in my direction, waving a handkerchief at the couple I’d photographed. Her teal blouse and white pedal pushers were the epitome of vintage chic.
“Hi, Mrs. B.” I lowered my camera, unsure what she’d think of me taking what must’ve looked like surveillance photos. “I couldn’t help myself. They look so happy.”
“They are. They’ve been happy for nearly fifty years now.” A sweet smile crinkled the skin around her eyes. “I’m sure they’d be honored to know you thought they were worth the time. Have you given any thought to the brochure for my butterfly garden?”
“Yes.” I dug into my bag for a set of sketches I’d drawn up. “I made this. It’s a mockup of the kinds of shots I want to look for. I’m not a very good artist, so Heidi helped. It’s really rough. The gist, really.”
She examined my wrinkled sketches as if they held the winning lottery numbers. “Don’t be so coy. You’ve obviously given this a lot of time and thought. I appreciate that. Anyone would.” Her sharp blue eyes widened and narrowed as she took in the numerous notes and doodles. She’d given the same look to every report card I’d brought home since Grandma died. The harder I’d tried to withdraw during those dark days in second grade, the tighter she’d held my hand. Mrs. B had lost her closest friend, and that had given us a bond. A broken-hearts bond. “This is very nice work. How’d you decide what sorts of images to include? I thought artists waited for their muse.”
My cheeks burned at her liberal use of “artist.” Heidi was an artist. Heidi’s mother was an artist. I took pictures. The camera did all my work. I was basically a scam. I folded the paper and stuffed it back into my bag. “I like to research, and I think a project like this is too important to wait for a muse. If you’re designing a single piece of literature meant to advertise to everyone, we have to be prepared. I needed to know what works on these types of pamphlets, so I read everything I could on the topic.”
“And now you know what works?”
I shrugged. “I know what the Internet says works.”
She rubbed my forearm with a soft, warm hand. “Well done.” Her contagious laugh lifted my spirits. “You always were wise beyond your years. How’s everything else going?”
“Okay. Everything’s good.”
She pursed her lips and waited.
I averted my eyes. No one needed details on what it was like to be me. I was fine. Life was grand. Move on. “I should go. I’ll call soon and schedule a time to take the photographs.”
“Come anytime you want.” Lines raced across her brow. “Katy?”
“Hmm?” If my smile looked as bizarre as it felt, she probably wanted to ask about my mental health.
“If you ever need anything, anything at all, you can ask me. You know that, right?”
I nodded my head. “Sure.”
“Are you doing something marvelous for your birthday?”
Mrs. B never forgot my birthday, unlike another adult I knew. “No, ma’am.”
She clucked her tongue. “Well, it’s settled then. Come to my place for lunch. Nothing fancy, just a little girl time. We can catch up on things.”
“Okay.” The way she said things bothered me.
“You look more like your mother every day.”
A lump formed in my throat. Why was I still standing here? “Thank you.” I forced myself not to ask the questions always on my mind. What would my mom be like today? Would she like me when we met in heaven, or wherever we went after this life? Would I like her? Mrs. B couldn’t answer those questions, but maybe at lunch, we could talk about Mom and Grandma. She had hundreds of stories I never tired of hearing. I was in a few of them, though I was young, and I’d heard them so often, I wasn’t sure if I truly remembered the moment or just the stories. Hopefully the first one.
A band of children squealed down the sidewalk, swinging sparklers and hopping over cracks. I snapped a shot of their backs as they sprang across the town square. A pair of women bounded along behind them, yelling about the proximity of sparklers to heads, hair, and eyes.
I checked the tiny window on my camera. Chased by a worried mother. What must that be like?
Thunder rolled, and Mrs. B adjusted her salt-and-pepper ponytail. “I’d better let you get back to your walk before we’re caught in a downpour. I’m going to invite those women and children to see the butterflies. Let me know when you’re available for lunch.” She squeezed my hand and smiled. “Tell your grandfather I said hello and let him know about our plan. Maybe he’d like to join us.”
“Sure.” I bit back an argument. She’d been in my life from the beginning and taken over when Grandma’s cancer came back, but Mark didn’t seem to like her much more than he liked me. Surely she knew he’d never join us for lunch.
Dark clouds sped across the sky, devouring the sun and casting shadows over my feet.
I took a right onto Home Avenue, determined to make it to the library before getting wet. Tonight, I wanted shots of the local ducks outside our public library. The cobblestone footpath around the perimeter was polka-dotted with bushes and flowering trees. I loved the area deeply, and so did the ducks. I hoisted my camera to one cheek as the little oasis came into view. An obstinate ray of orange and amber light shone between bullying clouds and illuminated the area like a campfire. “This one’s for the blog.”
“You always talk to yourself?” A jovial tenor scissored through my concentration.
I froze as the voice registered. I hadn’t heard it in almost a year, but I could effortlessly picture the sexy smile that went with it. I squelched the
urge to flee and turned on my toes toward the beautiful sound.
Dean Wells leaned on a shovel handle, amidst a pile of fresh mulch. “Storm’s coming. Shouldn’t you tuck that away?” His shirtless torso was completely unfair and broader than last summer. His shoulders and biceps glistened with evidence of a long day’s work. Those were the kind of muscles that impressed the pants off girls. Frequently, I imagined.
“Uh.” I couldn’t tear my eyes off his lips, jaw, neck…shoulders. I jerked my attention upward. Tuck what away, cowboy? My camera or my lolling tongue? “Uhm.” My traitorous gaze drifted to the luckiest belt buckle ever made.
“Eyes up here, Reese.” His jibe startled me into silence, but at least I stopped making that stupid noise and hawking his crotch.
I snapped my mouth shut. “I was just…”
Frustratingly, he waited for me to finish the impossible sentence.
“Staring?”
“No.”
He pursed his lips. “Really? Because it seemed like staring.”
A grin wiggled my lips. He got to be gorgeous and adorable. I got to be ridiculous. That seemed on par with my life.
Dean’s face went serious. “Are you nodding in agreement? You were staring?”
“You were staring.” I deftly turned the allegation around, playground style, and checked for witnesses to my personality disorder.
He dragged a gloved hand across his marvelous chest. “I was. I haven’t seen you in forever. How long’s it been? Like three years?”
Eleven months, roughly, but I wasn’t counting, and he probably hadn’t seen me last summer while I ogled him through the safety of my camera’s lens. He didn’t know I anticipated his arrival each summer or that I’d grown up watching him and his friends play ball in the field between our homes. That kind of crazy behavior could get a girl arrested. Besides, he was mostly perfect and I was, well…me. “About that long, yeah. How’s college?”
“Great.” He beamed. “I’m working for Beacon Landscaping this summer. What are you up to? Still taking pictures, I see.”
“Yep.”
“Take any good ones today?” He jammed his shovel into the mulch and moved to my side as if we were old friends and not lifelong neighbors who never spoke. “May I?”
He took the camera from my hands and flipped through the pictures while I gathered my brains. I pressed the heels of my hands against my eyes.
“These are really good. Are you going to school for this?”
I blinked. Was he being polite, or did he really like my shots? Holy hell. Dean Wells is sweating on my camera. More importantly, can I get a shot of this with my phone before he notices? “What?”
“Film school. You can get a degree in photography. Kent State actually has a really good film program.”
“I’ve heard.”
“Is that where you’re going?”
“No.”
“Where are you going? You graduated this year, right?”
“Yeah.” How did he know that? How did he know my name? Sure, his mom checked on Mark and me sometimes, but Dean was never anywhere around. Even when he’d lived in town, he was gone with friends or playing ball. “You’re different than I expected.”
“Really? How?”
“You talk a lot more than I thought.” I did a long blink. Don’t insult the sexy beast, dummy. “Not that it’s bad. I mean, it’s just you’re very…chatty.”
He laughed. “I was going for neighborly, but you’re right. I’m being nosy.” He leaned into my personal space. “I guess pretty girls make me nervous.”
“Uhm.”
A man in cargo shorts and a polo shirt stared at us from beside a large truck and trailer. “Wells! Time to bring it in. Storm’s coming. Flirt later.”
Dean rolled his eyes before returning my camera. He swung one hand overhead and nodded at the man. “Yes, sir!” He went back to his shovel and yanked it free while I remembered how to breathe. “I guess we’re packing it up. Maybe you and I can hang out sometime? I’m home all summer.”
I checked the darkening sky for evidence I’d fallen into an alternate universe. The shaft of orange and amber light was gone. “I’ve got to go.”
I turned on my heels and left the scene at a clip. I’d get sunset pictures of the lake tomorrow. I needed to text Heidi. I stuffed the camera back inside its bag and hurried along the sidewalk toward home. I hovered my thumbs over the screen of my cell phone. My mind reeled with where to begin. Dean freaking Wells thinks I am pretty. Maybe I should start there.
The phone rang and I nearly wet my pants. “Hello?”
“Hey. This is Arnold Switzer.” A deep, angry voice rattled through the line. “You renting this apartment or not? ’Cause I got other takers if you ain’t ready to move on this deal.”
“I am,” I squeaked. I’d found the apartment rental notice on Craigslist last month and made an online deposit without signing anything. I couldn’t legally sign the lease until next week, but the landlord didn’t know that. Honestly, he hadn’t seemed to care once I’d made the deposit. “I want the apartment, but I need a few more days. Only a few, I promise.”
“No can do, lady. You’ve been jerking me around on this too long. I’m going to rent it to the next guy who asks.”
“No!” I covered the phone with my hand and steadied myself before addressing him more confidently. “You can’t. I put money down. I made a deposit.”
“Yeah, but we don’t have a contract.”
Maybe he wasn’t stupid, just manipulative.
“Maybe if I had a little more incentive,” he continued.
I shoved a hand into the pocket where my entire pay was folded in the fabric of my shorts. I’d cashed the check after breakfast and planned to make the money last until my birthday. “Can we talk about this in person?” I pulled the tie from my hair and ran my fingers through the tangles, hoping I looked old enough to rent his apartment without handing over any more cash. “Are you at Ray’s now?”
“Yeah. I’m here.” He disconnected.
Rain sprinkled the road as I crossed Sycamore Street toward Ray’s Bar and Grill. Thunder clapped and lightning flashed through the sky. The raindrops grew larger, coming faster, until streams formed along the road’s edge and down my legs. I swiped water from my brow and jogged toward my destination with purpose. He couldn’t rent that apartment to someone else. It was the only one in town I had a chance at affording without seven roommates and a meth lab.
I cleared rain from my eyes and tugged the red-vinyl-padded door open. Ray’s was the town eyesore everyone groaned about. Church ladies like Mrs. Wells had petitioned to close it and failed more than once. She had put a stop to the wet T-shirt contests, though. I’d thanked her on behalf of womankind, and she made me a meatloaf. With or without the wet T-shirts, Ray’s was a staple. An ugly, unfortunate staple.
I blinked to adjust my eyes to the dark interior and tried not to choke on the decades of cigarette smoke oozing from the walls, floorboards, and probably both aging men hunched at the bar. The stools were red vinyl like the door and puking out yellowed stuffing. I’d never dreamed I’d set foot inside Ray’s skeevy bar, and here I was desperate to live upstairs.
The mountain man behind the counter finally noticed me. He tossed a filthy rag over one shoulder and sucked his teeth. “You the one about the apartment?” His greasy wife beater and apron had seen better days, like the rest of the place.
I wondered, stupidly, how he knew, but figured he didn’t get a lot of teenage girl traffic. If he did, I was certain I didn’t want to know why.
“Hey. Do you speak?” He slid his icky gaze to my camera bag. “You’re not selling nothing, are you? Cause whatever you’re selling, I ain’t buying.”
The other men turned toward me. Their oil-stained faces and navy pants told me they worked at the plant with Mark. “How old are you?” the closest guy wanted to know. His beard was speckled with gray and remnants of his
dinner. “You got a boyfriend?”
I hadn’t moved beyond the threshold, and suddenly I wanted to flee, go back to Mark’s, and forget this awful place existed.
The notion I’d finally found something more tragic than myself lifted my spirits, until I realized what a horrid person I was for thinking it.
I focused on the man behind the bar and steeled my nerves. “Are you Arnold?” Sure, I wanted to run now, but once I got home and saw Mark’s disappointed face, I’d wish I would have worked this out. Besides, I wouldn’t have to live here long. Maybe Heidi was right. Maybe I could get into school somewhere this fall. After almost ten years alone with Mark, I could make it through one summer in a sketchy apartment over Ray’s. “I’m here about the apartment.”
The barkeep rumbled around the bar and sized me up. “That’s me. What’d you say your name was?”
“Katy Reese.”
“That’s right.” He nodded and shuffled closer. “You’re Mark Reese’s kid.”
“No, sir.” Fear clenched my throat. Would Mark care if he knew I was here? “I’m his granddaughter.”
“Naw. He had a daughter. He used to come in here all the time after his wife died. Mark’s too young to have a grandkid your age, ain’t he?”
“Yes.” The word singed my tongue like acid.
“Does he know you’re here?”
“No.” I stood straighter. “I can give you more money toward the security deposit, but I need you to hold the apartment for me.” I fished in my pocket for cash. So much for working this out another way. “I gave you fifty dollars online and I have another hundred here.”
The patrons murmured.
The man before me didn’t hesitate. He wrapped grubby sausage fingers around my wages and yanked them to his gut. “How’d you get this kind of money? You into something shady?” He raised an unkempt eyebrow.
What She Wanted Page 2