Whitney’s standing on the front porch of the inn when I pull into the driveway. Her spine is straight and her arms are crossed, and with three sisters and a few exes, I immediately recognize the body language of an annoyed woman.
It’s eight minutes after nine.
By the time I put my truck in park, she’s standing next to the passenger door, waiting for it to unlock. She climbs in without speaking and pulls her seatbelt across her chest, shoving it into the receiver with a little more force than necessary.
“I brought you a coffee for the road,” I say, hoping caffeine will make up for the eight minutes of her life I squandered.
“Thank you.” She picks up the cup on her side of the center console and takes a cautious sip. “It’s perfect, just like yesterday’s. Beth’s been determined to make it just right and she nailed it. Did you just ask for whatever the annoying city girl likes?”
There’s humor in her tone, which is a relief, and I chuckle. “I told her you and I are off to buy the presents and she made them both, no charge.”
“She justgaveyou two free coffees?”
I’m starting to wonder if Whitney’s ever had a role model who led with generosity and compassion because random acts of kindness seem to confuse her. “Everybody gives in different ways. The General Store can’t donate the gifts and Beth can’t close for a day to go shopping, but she can help fuel those who can.”
“That’s so nice.” She takes another sip and smiles. “Speaking of closing for the day, did you put a notice on the Charming Lake Facebook Page forbidding anybody from having an emergency today?”
“First thing this morning. No using stairs or stoves or power tools, and a total ban on driving until I get back. I’m sure it’ll be fine. Most people have Band-Aids and frozen peas, right?”
“Is this your truck?” she asks, looking around the interior. It rarely gets driven, so it’s pretty immaculate—unlike the SUV I usually drive.
“No, I stole it from somebody’s driveway because the fact I’m Fire Chief and my sister’s ex-boyfriend is Charming Lake PD means I can’t get in trouble for anything.”
She almost spits a mouthful of coffee over the dash, which would have been messy, but also a win for me. I love making this woman laugh.
“I’m surprised Charming Lake even needs a police department.”
“Somebody has to go door-to-door in April reminding residents to license their dogs or we’d just have dogs running around without jingling tags, sneaking up on people.” I shrug. “Also, we need blue lights in the parade.”
By the time we reach the highway, she’s relaxed in the seat and her coffee’s almost gone, but she’s being quiet. No humming along with the Christmas songs the radio station is playing. No asking questions about the scenery.
“I don’t understand why we’re doing this,” she says abruptly, as if the words burst out of her. “I have a discretionary credit card from Mr. Wilson, and I could easily handle this online.”
I’m surprised it took her this long to bring it up. “That’s not the point.”
“Buying everything on the list as efficiently as possible—while not wasting gasandboth of our days, I might add—isn’t the point?”
“No.” The word comes out more intensely than I intended, but her thinking this day is a waste of time irks me. “Efficiency isnotthe point.”
“Putting on a Christmas fairisthe point, and we could check off a lot of tasks in the half a day—or more—we’d save if I bought the items we need online.”
“Look, usually when the fire department shows up for our community, it’s because somebody is having a really bad day—maybe the worst day they’ll ever have. And they’re not strangers. When we respond to an emergency, chances are good that somebody is a person we know and care about. We know the people whose house is on fire. We know the driver who hit a patch of ice and wrapped their car around a utility pole. We know the woman having a stroke in the market, and we know the people on their knees in tears next to the man in cardiac arrest because they know we’re too late. So when my firefighters and I get a chance to be a part of agoodday for our community—a day of joy and laughter and celebration—it is absolutelynota waste of our time.”
As soon as I’m done talking, I realize I went too far. I overreacted because thisisjust a job for her—and not a jobshe sought out, but one assigned to her by her boss. I glance sideways at her, about to apologize, but the softness in her face stops me.
“I’m sorry,” she says. “I have a tendency to get hung up on business and data and efficiency, and that was very thoughtless of me.”
“I might have gone a little hard. It’s not fair of me to expect you to have an emotional connection to a community you’ve been in for what…five days?”
She smiles—a real one, even—and then takes another sip of her coffee. “I’m very, very fond of Beth already.”
By the time I pull into the big box store’s parking lot, our cups are empty. We’re caffeinated and ready to shop.
I grab a cart from the corral, and head straight for a display of funny ugly sweaters. I lift one off the rack and turn to show it to Whitney. She’s several feet behind me, arms crossed and head tilted down a different aisle.
“Is there any point in telling you holiday sweaters are not on the list?” she asks. I shake my head, and I can see her struggling to keep a straight face. “Is there any point in trying to move through this store in a logical, efficient way?”
I shake my head again and point to the sweater in my hand. “You can’t expect me to ignore a sweater like this.”
