by Amy E. Lilly
D. and I ran into each other in the supermarket the other day. He asked for my number and a few days later, voila! We had dinner then went to the theater. It was comfortable. Like your favorite pair of jeans that fit just right even on your most bloated days.
So, dear readers, if you’re looking for romance, don’t go spend money on an online profile or dare to speed date with your local parolees. Pick a produce aisle and cruise. Lettuce all look for the one who makes us bananas next to the fresh tomatoes.
Signing off to enjoy some sweet dreams about D. McDreamy. Good night, dear readers, and good luck.
Comments:
IndigoRainbowUnicorn: I take it the date went well?
QuinnieBee: It was awesome sauce!
Dreambuilder: The problem with old jeans is that they are too comfortable. A little spark. A little pizazz. That’s what I want in a girl.
QuinnieBee: Who asked you, anyway? Spark, shmark. I just want a nice guy who doesn’t empty my bank account.
Dreambuilder: Comfortable jeans wear out and then what do you have? Holey pants.
QuinnieBee: Grrr…
Chapter Eighteen
Quinn sprang out of bed the next morning. She should have been exhausted given the late night, but she felt strangely exhilarated. She, Quinn Daniels, went on a date with a guy who had a real job and was normal. Better yet, Doug asked her to go to a movie on her next day off. Quinn practically pirouetted into her kitchen to start her coffee. “Good morning, Fat Panther,” she sang as she gave him an extra spoonful of his favorite canned food.
The day flew by at the restaurant. She made a simple peach pie with a side of homemade vanilla ice cream and a more elegant crème brulee for the second dessert choice. Her uncle had asked her opinion on the evening’s menu choices and incorporated her idea for a simple roasted root vegetables as an accompaniment to his main dish.
“I’m still thinking about culinary school,” Quinn told him.
“You have time. The next semester of classes doesn’t start for a few months, but you don’t want to wait too long. If you decide to go, we’ll need to get your application in and your spot reserved. Fortunately for you, I happen to know someone at the school.” Uncle Pat winked at her.
“I want to go, but I still have bills to pay. I’m not moving back in with Mom and Dad.”
“Let me worry about that. I have a few tricks up my sleeve yet.”
“I don’t want to take money from you. Tuition is a big enough gift. I can’t ask you to do anything else.”
“It’s not a gift, QuinnieBee. You will be my indentured servant for at least a year afterwards which guarantees me a successful restaurant with you on my staff.”
“Hmm…I don’t know about all of that. I got lucky with a reviewer who liked my cake. It doesn’t make me a chef.”
“Don’t sell yourself short. There’s more to you than meets the eye. Hanrahan blood runs through your veins. Hanrahans are fighters and survivors. Look at Ma and all she went through with Da,” Patrick said.
“All she went through?” Quinn was confused. Her Grandma Rose had nothing but the highest praise for Quinn’s grandfather. Although she didn’t remember him, Quinn could picture him in her mind from all of the stories she’d been told growing up in her grandmother’s kitchen.
“Ma lived through some hard scrabble years. We all did. Why do you think your mother’s such a pain in the…well, so uptight? We lived off free cheese and baloney many a night while Da was out of work.”
“I thought Grandpa worked on the railroads and made good money.”
“He did when we were older, but when we were little, he worked as a bartender and musician. Ma used to take in ironing and clean other ladies’ houses in order to make ends meet. Your mother wore hand me downs from some of her classmates. Clothes given to Ma when she cleaned houses. Your grandmother never complained, but I remember her sitting up at night sewing in her favorite chair. She would try to alter the clothes for your mother so the other girls wouldn’t know they were hand me downs.”
“I never knew,” Quinn said softly. Her grandmother had never said one unkind word about her husband.
“Well, now you do. We Hanrahans come from the best Irish stock. We’re strong and smart. We don’t always start out okay, but in the end, we always survive. A little battle scarred and tired but that’s part of life.”
Quinn thought about what her uncle had told her as she boarded the bus for home. She decided to hop off the bus and take a detour to visit Grandma Rose.
Quinn found her grandmother in her small apartment. She was fixing herself a pot of tea and grabbed another cup for Quinn.
“Two visits in less than two weeks! I must be ill or something,” Grandma Rose joked.
“I hope not,” Quinn replied. “Uncle Patrick and I were talking about Grandpa today. How come you never told me how tough it was when you were first married?”
“It wasn’t tough. We had some tight times, but we had each other. We knew that no matter what happened, the two of us would stand together and face whatever troubles came.”
“Uncle Patrick said Grandpa used to play music and tend bar.”
“He did. He played guitar and could sing the pants off an angel,” Grandma Rose said.
“Grandma!” Quinn laughed.
“It’s true,” Grandma said. “He was talented, but not good enough to really do it professionally. I thought it would break his heart to quit playing, but he said as long as he had me and the children, he would always have a song in his heart.”
“Why did he stop playing?” Quinn asked.
“One night he came home from the bar and found me crying. I didn’t have enough money to pay the gas bill and buy food. I couldn’t decide whether to make sure my children weren’t cold or make sure they had food. Your grandpa went the next day and pawned his guitar and applied for a job on the railroad. Anne and Patrick had heat and food that month.”
“Did he ever get his guitar back?”
“Aye, he did. He never knew, but I went and borrowed the money from one of the nice ladies I cleaned houses for. I promised to bake her dessert every week for a month in exchange. I went and got his guitar out of the pawn shop. He didn’t ask where the money came from, and I didn’t tell him.”
“Maybe I shouldn’t have sworn completely off musicians and artists. Grandpa turned out okay.”
“It’s not what they do for a living, dear, that makes the difference. It’s how they do their living that’s important.”
“Huh? I don’t get it.” Quinn’s face screwed up in confusion.
“Your grandpa made home and family the priority. We could have stayed poor as church mice the rest of their lives, but we would have still be happy because we treated each other with respect. It’s when the person you’re with doesn’t value who you are and what you stand for as a person that it falls apart. You could be a Rockefeller with all the money in the world, but if you’re poor in spirit, then you aren’t worth a plug nickel as far as I’m concerned.”
Quinn sat quietly and thought about what her grandmother had said. “I guess you’re right. It wasn’t so much that Johnny was a guitarist that was the problem. My hard work and my time weren’t important to him. My feelings and my time didn’t have value to him. It’s probably why he didn’t think twice about taking my stuff. Thanks, Grandma.”
“You’re welcome. My old bones might not be as tough as they used to be, but I still know a few things.”
Quinn stood up and kissed her grandmother on her cheek. “I think you know a lot of things, Grandma. I’d better get home. The jungle cat I live with will be squalling at the door for his dinner if I’m too late.”
“Come see me again anytime, sweetheart.”
Quinn left and headed towards home. Her head was spinning from the night before and the revelations from her family. She realized life and love weren’t quite as easy as they appeared on the thirty minute sitcoms she’d watched growing up. If she lived to be one hundred,
she might just figure out life and men.
Chapter Nineteen
http://theromancereport.blogathon.com
The Romance Report
A blog dedicated to the pursuit of love and happiness.
Monday, September 23, 3:37 p.m.
Hello, dear readers. No, I haven’t gone on another date. I just wanted to share what I learned from the wisest woman I know, my grandmother. A guy is a keeper if he remembers that you take two spoons of sugar and a little cream in your coffee. A guy is a keeper if he gives you the last bite of his favorite piece of pie. A guy is a keeper if he’ll put your needs in front of his wants. Now notice what I said, dear readers, your needs in front of his wants. That means sacrifice. It’s a hard thing for any person to do sometimes, but if he’s the one, he will be willing to sacrifice. Now this doesn’t mean he’ll give up his existence to make you happy. It also doesn’t mean you don’t have to be willing to do the same for him. Grandma taught me that when you love someone, you make them a priority in your life. I’ve decided to listen to my beautiful Grandma because she is the wisest woman I know. I want to be a priority in someone’s life, not an afterthought. Wish me luck, dear readers, as I look for the guy that thinks I’m number one.
Comments:
Sleepingbeautiful89: I know just what you’re talking about, girl. I dated a guy that put his pet ferret before me.
QuinnieBee: Wow! A ferret. Really? At least it’s alive. My last guy put a guitar on my side of the bed because he didn’t want it to get scratched leaning in a corner. I slept on the couch.
Sleepingbeautiful89: Ouch!
Chapter Twenty
Quinn was disappointed that she hadn’t heard from Doug yet. She knew he taught school, but she had to admit that she secretly wished he’d taken a moment and texted her. She sighed and decided a quick bike ride at the park would get her blood flowing and her energy level back so she could start painting her bathroom. She’d chosen a pale dove gray for the walls with pale lavender towels and vanity set to offset the gray. She loved the color combination, but she dreaded taping all of the bathroom fixtures to keep from getting paint on them. It was her least favorite task. Now if she could get a guy to do that for her, she would have it made.
Quinn walked into the backyard to the small shed where she kept her bicycle. It was a turquoise Schwinn with a basket on the front and she had named it Maddie after her favorite doll as a child. Quinn was a firm believer in naming cars and bicycles. She thought it made the car more likely to start and the bicycle less likely to get a flat tire. She wheeled it to the back gate.
“Hey! Quinn! Where are you headed?” Quinn whipped her head around and saw Zach leaning out his apartment window waving to her. “Hold on a second. I’ll be right down.”
Quinn parked her bike and waited until Zach came running through the backyard to where she stood. “What’s going on?” she asked.
“I need the biggest favor in the world. If you do this for me, I’ll owe you for the next year. I’ll wash your windows, fold your laundry, anything.”
“Help me paint my bathroom?”
“If you do this for me, then yes,” Zach said earnestly.
“Oh boy. This must be huge. I won’t help you dispose of a body or anything illegal,” Quinn warned, only half in jest.
“No. Nothing like that. I need you to go with me to a dinner party at my buddy’s house on Wednesday,” Zach said.
“A dinner party? Is that all? Shoot. You could have gotten me to do it with a cheap cup of coffee,” Quinn said with relief. “I thought it was going to be something awful.”
“Well, I haven’t gotten to the favor part. I need you to pretend we’re a little more than neighbors, a little less than girlfriend and boyfriend.” Zach gave her a rueful look. “I begged off another date with Cindy’s friend by telling them that you and I were kind of starting to see each other.”
“You lied,” Quinn said flatly.
“Well, yeah. But this girl was circling me like a shark around chum and I panicked. I told her I was interested in somebody else because I didn’t want to hurt her feelings. She told Cindy, Cindy told Jeff and now I’m toast if I don’t produce a living, breathing female. Please. I’ll paint your kitchen, too.”
Quinn narrowed her eyes. “I want kitchen, bathroom and living room painted or I will throw you under the bus, my friend.”
“Deal. You drive a hard bargain,” Zach held out his hand. Quinn took it and shook. She felt a slight shock when his hand closed around hers. Static electricity, she thought. I need to start using fabric softener on my laundry.
“So how many dates have we gone on?” Quinn asked, crossing her arms and leaning against the fence.
“Only two official dates, but we talk all the time and hang out in each other’s apartment every evening. We went for coffee and then I took you rock climbing,” Zach said.
“Rock climbing? Are you out of your mind? Do I look like I’ve ever gone rock climbing?” Quinn sputtered. She uncrossed her arms and grabbed her bike. “I don’t know if you should take me as your alleged “dating friend” or not. I’m not a very good liar.”
“You won’t be lying.”
“Didn’t you hear what I said. I’ve never climbed a rock in my life. A tree, yes. A cliff, not on your life.” Quinn put her bike helmet on and fastened the clip under her chin.
“Well, it wouldn’t be a lie if you went with me today,” Zach replied. “If you wait ten minutes, I’ll grab my bike and we can ride down to the park. They put in a climbing gym a few blocks away from there, so after we do a few laps through the park, we can go climb a wall.”
Quinn shook her head. “I don’t know. I’ve never done it before. I’m a little scared of heights.”
“Weren’t you the girl that just underwent Operation Quinnover or Quinn 3.8 or some such thing the other day? You can spread your wings a little more and come climbing with me. If you hate it, I’ll buy you dinner,” Zach offered.
“How about you buy me dinner whether I like it or not?” Quinn shot back. Quinn straightened her shoulders and met his gaze. “The new Quinn wants a little more pampering and a lot less pandering in her life.”
“You really are a tough negotiator, but alright. Give me time to make a quick call to Jeff and Cindy and confirm that we’ll be there and grab my bike. I’ll be back.”
Zach sprinted back inside the brownstone. Quinn couldn’t help but notice his tanned legs and the way the afternoon sun glinted off his hair. She shook her head. “I want a nice, normal guy with a normal job. Plus, what kind of guy climbs rocks for fun?”
Less than ten minutes later, they were biking their way down a side street to the nearby park. Quinn raced ahead of Zach and when she thought she had a solid lead on him, she slowed her pedaling only to have him zip by on his ten-speed.
“Pedal, pedal, as fast you can. You can’t catch me, I’m a ten-speed man!” Zach called over his shoulder.
“My Maddie might be slower, but I can haul a snack in my bike basket. Guess Mr. Ten-Speed Man didn’t count on that!”
Zach skidded to a stop and waited for Quinn to catch up. Once she neared him, she circled his bike around her. “So, Miss Quinn, what kind of snacks did you bring with you to the park?”
“Chocolate chip cookies with cherries. I might have brought an extra one that I’d be willing to share with the right person.”
“Hmm…and what makes this person worthy of said cookie?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Quinn said with a coy smile. “Can you let me look through your telescope one night?”
“Not on a second date! What kind of guy do you think I am?” Zach pretended to be shocked. He gave her a sly look. “Maybe on a third date.”
“I’m counting that dinner party as a third date.”
“Fair enough,” Zach said. “But I’m still not letting you beat me.” He zipped ahead of her again. Quinn laughed and pedaled faster.
They spent the next twenty minutes circling the park. On their fi
nal lap, Zach took a side path and led Quinn to the newly-constructed climbing gym. She took off her helmet and fluffed her flattened hair.
“I must have helmet hair,” she said, running her fingers through her waves again.
“It’s a look. You’re pretty enough to carry it off,” Zach said.
“Ah, thanks. Every girl wants to know she looks gorgeous with hat hair.”
Zach paid their entrance fee and picked out their equipment. He spent several minutes going over safety and showing Quinn how to attach herself to the safety line. The staff person working the wall made sure they were both securely attached.
“You want to look up, not down. If you look down, you’ll get scared and it might make you lose your grip,” Zach explained.
“Keep my eye on the prize,” Quinn nodded. “Got it.”
“I’ll go a little bit ahead of you, so you can see how it’s done.” Zach stepped to the wall and grasped the small handholds jutting from the wall. “I try to look and see what the best direction for my reach and height is. The best way to climb isn’t always straight up. Sometimes you have to make a little side journey.”
“Are we talking about climbing or life?” Quinn called after him. She watched him crabwalk his way to the side and held her breath as he leaped to the left and swung on his rope to reach a handhold.
“Both!” He called down to her. “Okay, now your turn to start.”
“Here goes nothing,” Quinn muttered to herself. She reached out and grabbed a small handhold and pulled herself up. Soon she found her rhythm and started to grasp and pull herself upwards. “I’ve got it!”
“Great job! Now the goal is to reach the top. Then I’ll show you how to get down.”
When Zach said the word “down” Quinn made the mistake of looking down at the ground. She froze. She hadn’t realized how far up she was. The ground seemed to roll and sway underneath her, but she realized it was her head that was swaying back and forth as dizziness took hold. “Zach! I looked down!” Quinn shouted, fright causing her voice to crack. She squeezed her eyes shut.