“So is the hummus.” Anita chuckled. “I hope you aren’t planning to kiss anyone this afternoon, though. They put tons of garlic in it.”
Hayden’s face appeared in her mind, and Riley’s cheeks flushed. Then again, she had been drawing him for twenty minutes, so thinking of him didn’t necessarily mean she was thinking about kissing him.Liar.
She scratched at her forearm. “You didn’t have to do this,” she said as Harper opened the front door.
“I don’t know about y’all, but I’m starving.” Harper walked inside like she owned the place.
“We better eat before it gets cold.” Olivia smiled at Riley. “It’s nice that you came back to be with Erma. She’s a firecracker, but everyone needs help sometimes.” She followed Harper inside.
“Is it okay that we did this?” Anita asked, her eyes darting to the table and back to Riley. “We saw Erma leaving with Peg and Bea, and then you left by yourself... Well, we didn’t want you to eat lunch alone.”
A lump formed in Riley’s throat. She couldn’t remember the last time someone had been this hospitable to her. Melody, of course, but she and Melody were roommates and good friends. She barely knew these women.
“Yes,” she said, her voice sounding thick. “It’s okay.”
“Good, because Harper ordered enough to feed six people.”
Riley motioned for Anita to go inside, and then followed. Harper and Olivia were in the kitchen, talking as they unpacked the bags. The spicy scent of the Mediterranean food wafted through the house. Riley’s stomach growled.
“Did we interrupt your lunch?” Olivia gestured to the sandwich on the kitchen table.
She paused, then shook her head. The food they brought was way better than ham and cheese any day. “Sorry the house is such a mess.”
Harper raised her flawless eyebrows. “I thought it was a little neater than it was the last time we were here.”
“It is,” Anita added.
Riley was surprised to hear that they had been here before. “When was that?”
“Three months ago, I think.” Olivia opened a plastic container of hummus and set it in the middle of the table. “Erma and Harper’s mom, along with their other friends, were playing bunco, and they invited us to join in.”
“That was a fun night,” Anita said wistfully. “I wish my mother had a group of friends like that.”
“She has the Junior League,” Harper said, rolling her eyes.
“Don’t remind me.”
Feeling at loose ends, Riley went to the cupboard and pulled out plates and glasses, then opened one of the drawers and gathered silverware. It wasn’t long before all four of them were seated at the table, filling their plates with pita triangles, hummus, tabbouleh, rolled grape leaves, spanakopita, and chicken skewers.
The three other women continued chatting, but Riley felt a bit uneasy. She added two grape leaves and a spoonful of tabbouleh to her plate. Ten minutes ago she was lonely and completely alone. Now she wasn’t sure what to do about having company.I’m such a mess.
***
“Girls, I don’t know what to do.” Erma picked at the stack of blueberry buckwheat pancakes in front of her. She loved these pancakes, and The Orange Bluebird’s brunch in general, but her appetite had disappeared. A shame because the restaurant didn’t allow doggie bags.
“About what?” Bea had no problem polishing off her stack and was working on a second, along with three strips of crispy bacon and a tall glass of milk.
“Hayden and Riley.”
Peg’s and Bea’s forks clattered onto their plates.
“What?” Peg said, her hand going to the tacky red bead choker around her neck. Erma loved Peg dearly, but the woman had horrendous taste in jewelry. “There’s something going on between Hayden and Riley?”
“I had no idea.” Bea grinned. “But how wonderful. He’s such a nice young man, and if anyone deserves a nice young man, it’s your Riley.”
“True.” Bea’s words made Erma feel a little better, and she ate a couple bites of her pancakes, then took a sip of her French roast coffee. “Unfortunately I don’t think she believes that, and that’s why I don’t know what to do.” She filled Bea and Peg in on her spur-of-the-moment plan to get Riley and Hayden together. It had formulated the day she asked Hayden to pick Riley up at the airport, and then grew when she came up with the idea for Riley to take her place as assistant coach. What better way for them to be in each other’s company at least two days a week? That backfired when Riley resisted going to practice and then came home so unsettled and told Erma in no uncertain terms that she didn’t want anything to do with coaching or softball. Now Erma was wondering if she’d made a mistake.
“Maybe you should mind your own business,” Bea said before biting into a strip of bacon.
