Heather

by Chris Keniston

“How much is he drinking? Is he always thirsty?”

  “Diabetes,” Cindy offered.

  “What does that have to do with coughing?” Poppy shifted to sit cross legged, tucking her skirt carefully over her knees.

  “It doesn’t,” Lily added. “What are you really worried about?”

  “Heart disease.”

  The glow of the fire highlighted the concern etched on all the women’s faces. Even thin lipped and frowning, there wasn’t an ugly one in the bunch. Now that he thought about it, all of the cousins were knockouts as teens. He suspected even the cousins like Heather, who he hadn’t seen in years, were probably still turning heads.

  “I’ll keep an extra eye on him too,” Jake tossed in. “I have to come back tomorrow. I can ask him to help me.”

  “The General?” Heather asked wide-eyed. “The man is allergic to tools. He had an entire Marine Corps at his disposal for that sort of thing.”

  “And now he has George,” Cindy added.

  “But he likes to oversee. The last few weeks, whenever I deliver supplies for his daughter’s current remodel—”

  “That would be my mother.” Heather raised her hand and waved a finger.

  Jake nodded. “Without fail, if the General wasn’t standing over us double checking the deliveries, he wasn’t far away watching. My mom’s dad was a Commander in the Navy. He had his favorite stories. One he often retold included an aircraft carrier, a special forces team, a brawl, and the Marines’ commanding officer—old Eagle Eye Hart. It was years later before I figured out Eagle Eye and your grandfather were one and the same. ” Jake smiled at Heather. “Give me a list of things to look for.

  Heather nodded and he thought he saw some of the tension ease from her shoulders. He really did want to help.

  “Now that we have a plan for the General,” Lily rubbed her hands together, “I want to hear everything I’ve missed the last few months.”

  Heather shrugged.

  “There must be something fun in your life. Handsome doctors? Quiet dinners in dimly lit restaurants?”

  “What are you, a baker or a romance author?” Heather looked at her cousin as though she’d sprouted a third boob.

  “Do we have to drag information out of you like when we were ten?” Callie laughed.

  “Oh, yes.” Jake chuckled. “Truth or dare.” From what he remembered from his summer shenanigans on the Point with the Hart granddaughters, from a very early age, Heather was the serious one who on the odd occasion they could convince her to join them always, always chose truth. Unlike him, who would rather do a dare any day of the week.

  Heather rolled her eyes. “Oh, for land sakes. We don’t need to play games. I haven’t been on a date in years. Unless you count coffee in the cafeteria with a near retiring anesthesiologist with grandchildren a date, I don’t have a clue what romance is. Even if Prince Charming pulled up on his white steed to whisk me away, I’d probably have to say no because I need to be at the hospital at five in the morning to prep for surgery.”

  This time the other cousins groaned and Lily leaned back laughing. “Don’t we make for boring gossip?”

  None of this was boring for Jake; he was thoroughly enjoying himself. Watching the girls interact. Watching Heather. From all he’d seen and heard tonight, the young bookworm had turned into one incredible butterfly. Of course, after this little impromptu lakeside visit, he probably wouldn’t see her again for another decade or so. And wasn’t that a shame.

  Chapter Four

  “Uh oh.” Staring down at the pile of goods in front of him, Tom followed his words with a tsk-tsk sound.

  Jake didn’t bother to look up. Once the usual morning rush of contractors had come and gone, he’d needed to finish off some accounting and receiving records before heading out to do a few odd jobs. The problem was his ins and outs were jumbling up with his credits and debits and he didn’t want to even think about what he’d done with shipping and receiving. The only clear thing in his mind was Heather. Heather dripping wet, Heather barely dry, Heather blushing at his accidental double entendre and Heather in the glow of the firelight.

  “Since this isn’t in the shipping area, am I correct that this is more pro bono work?”

  “Yes.” Jake pushed away from his desk before he made a bigger mess of the paperwork. Tom had been right about Mrs. Norton. Some of the wood siding was in desperate need of replacing before winter set in. It wouldn’t take Jake very long to make the repairs and then he could head over to the General’s to fix the shower handle. Not that Mike the plumber wouldn’t have been willing to help the General out in George’s absence the same as he was, but he liked having a good reason to spend a little more time with the Harts. Especially the one stuck in his mind.

  “You do know that the main purpose of a store is to sell.” Tom helped him carry the cement siding to the back of the delivery truck.

  “Do unto others…” Jake added screws and caulk to the pile. Tom was just as likely to help out as he was. After all, it was Tom who suggested Jake take a closer look at the Norton place.

  Chuckling under his breath, Tom shook his head. “Need help?”

  No surprise that Tom had come around to volunteering. “Not this time. Thanks.”

  “Anyone home?” a voice called out from the front of the shop.

  Jake recognized the voice and straightening, slapped Tom on the back. “Load the rest of this stuff, please. I’ll take care of the customer.”

  “There you are,” the General enunciated loud and clear as though addressing one of his underlings.

  “Twice in one week,” Jake teased. He couldn’t remember, before this week, the last time the General had wandered through the store.

  “Dropped my Fiona off at the Hilltop Inn for one of those ladies art league lunches she so loves. Thought I’d come by and thank you again for helping out last night.”

  “Of course. Glad I was there.” Though, he’d had enough conversation with the General over construction supplies and remodels to know darn well that the old guy could turn a shut off valve.

  “Probably should take one of your homeowner classes in case anything like this happens again.”

  “Oh, if you want to, sure.” At this stage of life if the old man wanted to learn how to wield the new wrench he’d bought, who was Jake to argue. “I’ll let you know when the next plumbing class is scheduled.”

  “Very well.” The General clicked his heels and stepped back. “I’m heading across the street for a bite to eat. Care to join me?”

  All set to say thanks but he had a few things to do before heading to Hart House to work on the shower, Jake remembered his promise to Heather. How better to get info out of the old man than over a leisurely lunch. “Sounds great.”

  The door chimed and a windswept Heather stormed into the store. Her timing worthy of a well-scripted movie. Determination oozing from every pore, the woman was definitely on a mission. Quickly scanning the front of the store, her gaze landed on her grandfather. “Mrs. Franklin said I’d find you here.”

  The General frowned. “And why, may I ask, are you looking for me?”

  “You agreed you’d call Dr. Wilkins this morning. By the time I came downstairs from showering and dressing, you were gone.”

  And wasn’t that an image Jake didn’t need added to his playlist.

  “I had to drive your grandmother into town.”

  “Yes, that’s what Lucy said.”

  “Then why are you talking with that old busy body Mrs. Franklin?”

  Heather’s back teeth clenched tight before she blew out a short breath and slowly enunciated. “Because you weren’t at the barber shop, or the cigar shop—”

  “Gave those up.”

  Heather frowned, missing a beat. “When was that?”

  “Don’t remember,” the General shrugged.

  The way Heather stared him down before saying another word told Jake she didn’t believe he’d forgotten any more than Jake did. Anyone who could keep track
of cards dealt and discarded with the precision the General did, would know exactly when he’d given up cigars.

  “Anyhow,” Heather continued, “I would like it if you would please call to authorize—”

  “Not now. Jake and I are just heading across the street for a bite to eat. Since you’re here you can join us.”

  “But Doc Wilkins is…”

  There was no point in finishing the sentence. The General was halfway out the door.

  “Well, you wanted to keep an eye on him.” Jake waved an arm toward the front door. “Here’s our chance.”

  “Yes. Isn’t it.” Through a plastic smile, Heather sucked in a long deep breath and blew it out slowly on her first brisk step forward. “Just peachy keen.”

  Jake had to laugh to himself. Apparently Dr. Heather Preston had a thing or two to learn about going with the flow. As for himself, he was really starting to like the way things were flowing around here. Yes, sir. Just peachy keen.

  ***

  The neon pink sign flickering open in the window of Mabel’s Diner was almost a town icon. Mabel’s sour cream blueberry pie was the holy grail. Many a tourist made the pilgrimage to see and taste their town treasures, and today was clearly one of those days. The place was packed and it was barely a few minutes past eleven.

  “Sorry.” Martha, Mabel’s eldest daughter, came running up to them. “We had a tour bus come through late. I’ll get you a table for two.”

  “Three,” Jake and Heather echoed. Martha looked over their shoulder.

  “My grandfather.” Heather pointed behind Martha to the General chatting up a table across the way.

  “I don’t have a table for three just yet.” Martha smiled and spun around, scanning the crowded tables from one end of the diner to the other. “It might be a bit. If you’ll have a seat on the bench out—”

  “Tell you what,” Jake waved a hand at Martha and flashed a reassuring grin, “I need to drop something off at Floyd’s. What if I go do that and then we come back?”

  Relief deflated Martha’s lungs in a single whoosh. “Oh, that would be great. Once this bus is gone we’ll have plenty of room.”

  “Sounds like a plan.” Holding the glass door open with an extended arm, Jake ushered Heather out the door. “Looks like we’ve got a few minutes to kill.”

  “What about Floyd’s?”

  “Just an excuse to make Martha feel better. Mabel takes crowds and folks waiting in stride. Not that she doesn’t do her best to accommodate everyone as quickly as possible, but Martha still flusters pretty easy when the place is at capacity.”

  Heather fell into step beside Jake. Walking casually past Betty’s Cut and Set, she had a feeling he’d shortened his stride to match hers. “I thought I remember Grams mentioning Betty sold the salon.”

  “She did.” He smiled. “To Elizabeth Barker. Originally she’d intended to go into business in the suburbs, but when she and her family came to town for vacation and she spotted Betty’s for sale, well,” he shrugged, “she considered it fate.”

  This morning Heather had been in such a rush to find her grandfather and drag him to the doctor, she hadn’t really looked around town. “Things haven’t changed much, have they?”

  “The town is a bit bigger, but for the most part things stay the same around here. It’s one of the things I love about it.”

  “I would think the star of the football team and the guy probably every girl wanted to take her to prom would have been itching to move away. You know, spread your wings in the big city.”

  “Nope.” Jake shook his head. “I might have felt that way in high school, but after giving Uncle Sam six years of my life, a good number of them served in the sand box—”

  “Sand box?”

  “Afghanistan and Iraq, that part of the world. There’s a lot of desert.”

  An article she’d read once about emergency heart surgery in-country before shuttling the patient to Germany came to mind. One of the interviewees had referred to the sand box.

  “Anyhow,” he pointed to the Village Creamery and the bistro tables set up along the narrow sidewalk, “there wasn’t a day when I was away that I didn’t dream of Millie’s homemade butter pecan ice cream with a dollop of hand whipped cream, or Mabel’s blueberry pie, or the occasional single blade hand shave at Floyds, or just about everyone else in this town. Lawford is the only place I ever want to live.”

  For the first time in a long time she took in the length of Main Street. The colorful signs. The mostly shiplap buildings. The few people milling about. The memories from childhood filtering to the front of her thoughts. The Creamery had always been a treat. For her it was Vanilla ice cream with marshmallow topping.

  They strolled past Floyds, the barber shop where her grandfather and his cronies still played checkers a few days a week. For as long as the Harts and the Lawfords had lived on this mountain, the red and white candy-striped pole had spun outside the small storefront. Though unlike Elizabeth who kept the shop’s name because it was a version of her own, Floyd had bought the shop that sported the same name as a TV classic back before her mom and aunts had married, kept the business name and used it as his own.

  “The summer I was in kindergarten,” Heather paused, looking up the old barber post, “my grandfather would bring me with him and let me play checkers on his lap. He’d told me the story of the barber shop and how everyone in town continued to call the new barber Floyd even though that wasn’t his name.”

  “As a kid I’d seen reruns of the Andy Griffith show and assumed all barbers were named Floyd.” Jake chuckled, his gaze following the swirling stripes upward.

  Heather laughed, wondering what childhood memories this spot brought back for him. No matter how often she’d asked her grandfather about Floyd, to this day, she still didn’t know what the barber’s real name was. “Do you know his real name?”

  “Nope.”

  Looking over her shoulder she caught Floyd’s attention through the picture frame window. His face lit up and a pair of scissors in one hand, he waved at her with the other. At the same moment, seated at the small round table along the wall, checker piece in hand, Ralph glanced up and smiled. For the first time in days, thoughts of Kyle, the hospital, and surgery took a backseat to the peace and tranquility of the lakeside Main Street.

  At her side, Jake waved at both men. “Yep. No place else.” Lacing his hand around her waist, he nudged her to turn in place. “There goes the bus. We can catch up with the General now.”

  The moment they opened the diner door, Martha came running up to them. “Perfect timing. Follow me.” She hurried to a nice booth near the back of the diner and smiled at Heather. “It’s been a while since you’ve been by. It’s really nice to see you.”

  Considering Heather couldn’t remember the last time she’d been here, she wasn’t sure why Martha remembered her at all. “It’s nice to be back.” The truth was, despite the circumstances, it really was nice. In only twenty-four hours, she already felt more relaxed and rested than she has since the summer before med school.

  “Guess it’s hard to get away from the city, you working so hard and all.” Martha handed them each a menu and stepped back. “Mom—I mean Mabel—will be by to take your order shortly.”

  Heather nodded.

  “Ned Baker better get those hearing aids of his checked. Damn hard to keep up a conversation when every other word out of his mouth is whatcha say.” The General slid into the booth beside Heather. “I’m so hungry I could eat a buffalo.”

  “What did you have for breakfast?” Heather asked.

  The General shook his head. “No time.”

  “How long have you been sleeping in?”

  “Oh look.” The General slid out of the seat. “Pete Stephens just came in. I’ve been trying to nail that man down for almost two weeks now. Man wants to spend our tax dollars to install speakers on Main Street. We’ll just see about that.” And he was off.

  “General,” Heather reached for her gra
ndfather, but the man was more slippery than a greased eel.

  Jake kept an eye on the old man’s departing back. “Do you suppose he really cares about speakers on Main Street?”

  “What I think,” Heather twisted around to face Jake, “is that he doesn’t want me peppering him with any more questions.”

  “Still worried?”

  Was she? Lily had been right, since her arrival yesterday she hadn’t heard her grandfather cough once, nor had she seen him lose his balance. “He’s sleeping late.”

  Jake studied her a moment. “Anemia?”

  “Could be, but I’m still thinking cardiac issues. If you’ve got a clogged valve, not enough oxygen is getting to your brain and other organs—”

  “And you get tired and might sleep in. Got it.”

  “Or,” Heather toyed with her fork, “he’s simply taking life easy for once and I’m making a mountain out of the proverbial mole hill.”

  “You didn’t make up the cough or the dizziness.”

  “No, no I didn’t.” And just like that, years of medical training kicked in and took front seat once again in her mind.

  “Well aren’t you a sight for sore eyes.” Mabel leaned over to hug Heather. “As a welcome home and glad to see you, one slice of pie on the house.”

  “Uh hmm,” Jake cleared his throat.

  “Sorry, friend,” Mabel chuckled softly. “You I see all the time.”

  “Can’t blame a man for trying.” He grinned up at her.

  Mabel smiled at him and looked to Heather. “What’ll you have?”

  “I’ll stick with the tried and true. Grilled chicken Caesar salad and a diet pop.”

  “The usual for you?” Mabel asked Jake.

  “Yep.”

  “One swiss bacon and mushroom cheese burger with extra fries and mayo on the side for you, and a grilled chicken sandwich and a side of fruit for the General.”

  “I’m sorry.” Heather set her menu down and stared up at Mabel. “Did you say my grandfather ordered a grilled chicken sandwich?”

  “That’s right. Been his regular order the last few times he’s been in.”