Hope followed Greg back up the dock across her lake frontage over to his. His cottage was a mirror layout to the one she was in. But he’d added new siding, new roof, new landscaping. All of it gave her ideas of what she could do if the next part of her plan worked.
She had a lot to accomplish before then.
Greg led her up into the grassy area of his yard, slightly to the side, where the tree line provided shade.
“Where in the world are you taking me? I do have stuff to do today, you know?”
She said it lightly, though. This season in her life might turn hectic, but she wanted to be a person who appreciated all of it. Even the handsome neighbor with a towel and a goofy secret to share.
They stopped, and he stretched his arm like a Price is Right model. “Look!”
He was pointing to the grass. It took a second to register what she was seeing.
“Morels!”
“Yep, I was getting ready to kill some weeds up by the house and walked out here last night to find this little crop.”
“No one could find any for us when I created the dish for tonight!”
Morels were a delicacy. They were found all over Michigan but unpredictably enough that you had to hunt for them. She had an idea of how to serve them but never had the time to really hunt in the midst of all the other work she’d done.
She chalked it up to another fun thing to find as her restaurant menu evolved.
“Wild foraged morels are hundreds of dollars per jar.”
She bent down and picked one. She ran her finger over the soft ridges.
“I have a basket in the shed. I’ll fill it while you’re getting ready; the first bushel on the house. Sound like a deal?”
“I mean, yes!” It was getting later, and she did have several other stops to make for ingredients before she started prepping for service.
Hope spontaneously wrapped her arm around Greg and kissed him on the cheek. For a moment, he held on, and so did she.
She caught herself. And realized she wasn’t ready for full-on romance yet.
“All this time, all I needed to do to impress girls was find wild fungus. Who knew?”
Hope laughed. The little spark would likely grow between them, but he was sensitive enough to understand and to let her take the lead.
“Thank you, neighbor,” she said.
“You’re welcome, Chef. Now, go get ready. You’re still soaking wet.”
She turned and walked back to the cottage, the word ‘chef,’ music to her ears, and the idea of morels fired up her fevered food imagination.
As mornings went, this one was darn near perfect.
* * *
Her guinea pigs included Jared Pawlak, J.J., Dean, Libby, Keith, Aunt Emma, and Patrick Tate.
They’d helped her recruit Keith’s other son, Cole, Arrow Orwig, who owned the gas station, Clyde Brubaker’s mother, the entire town council of Irish Hills, and Mayor Chet Eastland.
To round it out, Keith and Dean had roped in several members of the Local VFW.
They had two dozen people at the tables.
Hope had really wanted fifty to test their mettle, but two dozen was still a good number for this dress rehearsal.
