“Well, don’t try too hard because I’d really like that,” he declares, making me laugh.
I love how confident he is, how easy everything is between us. “Oh, don’t worry, I plan to,” I promise. “And that offer goes both ways.”
“I’ll definitely take you up on that,” he says, somehow making my smile grow even more. My face hurts from all this smiling.
I obviously haven’t been able to stop thinking about it, and I love that we’ll have the picture to look back on such a perfect day. “I can’t wait to see the final shots.”
“Me too. I bet we go viral,” he teases, obviously joking around.
The waitress comes back and sets our drinks down in front of us. “Are you ready to order?”
“Haven’t even looked at the menu,” I tell her.
“No rush, I’ll be back in a bit,” she says, walking away, but instead of looking at the menu, I look at Eli.
“Iwouldlike to know more about you, Eli. You said you’re new in town? Where are you from?”
He sits up a little straighter, as though his whole body is shifting to take this conversation more seriously even though his easy smile doesn’t falter. “Yeah, I’ve only been here for about a month now. I’m from Florida, lived there my entire life, and haven’t even really traveled much. But I’ve always loved the idea of packing up everything and moving somewhere totally new one day.”
“Wow, that’s brave to move so far north all on your own.”
“I think it was good for me. The last of my high school friends who was still in town got married about eight months ago, and a couple of months later, I was getting ready for work in the same apartment I’d lived in for years, about to go to another shift at the same job I’d had since I started my career. I realized I was really bored with my life and that I’d probably be doing the same thing in another ten years if I didn’t do something about it. So I spent all my downtime over the next few weeks looking for fire departments that were hiring and researching those towns. This one seemed as good a place as any. I’ve always wanted to live somewhere that gets snow, so here I am.”
“Well, I’m glad you picked here. And you’ll definitely get your fair share of snow in the winter. I’ve lived here my whole life, too, but I definitely wouldn’t say it’s boring,” I say with a chuckle, thinking about how busy my life has been lately.
“Me too. So what do you do?” he asks, then takes a sip of his drink.
“I guess I’m the owner of the hardware store.”
“You guess?”
“I am, it’s just still so weird to say that,” I admit. “I’ve worked there for as long as I can remember, my cousins and brother too. It’s been in my family for generations. But it was always my grandpa’s store.” My throat is too tight, but I push through it because I want to share things with Eli, to get to know each other. Our physical connection is obvious, but the fact that he agreed to come here with me instead of suggesting we immediately go somewhere more private has me hopeful that he wants this to be more than a one day thing, too.
“Oh,” Eli says openly, waiting for me to continue.
“He was actually more like a dad to me,” I share. It’s rare that I talk about my parents, especially with strangers I don’t really know. But Eli doesn’t feel like a stranger even though I just met him today. “My parents… they died in a car accident when I was young. My grandpa ended up taking me in.” My lip trembles as I try to fight back the tears that are threatening to spill over.
“That must’ve been so hard. I’m glad you had your grandpa. It sounds like you were really close.”
“We were, and I feel so lucky to have had him,” I say, thinking back about all the good times we had together. “He died last year, but I worked with him every day in that store. I think it’s why he left it to me.”
“I hate that you’ve already experienced so much loss,” Eli says. “Thank you for sharing that with me.”
I nod, and Eli reaches for my hand across the table. I take it, leaning into his touch and wiping my eyes with my other hand. It’s still hard to talk about it and be vulnerable like this in front of someone I’d just met, but as weird as it is to say, I feel like I trust him.
“Some days it feels like this amazing legacy that I’m honored to carry on for him, and other days it feels like I’m pretending to be a business owner and someone is going to come and kick the ladder out from under me and tell me to hand over the keys,” I admit.
“I mean, to be fair, owning a hardware store does sound like it would involve a lot of ladders.” Eli grins, lip quirking up.
A quiet laugh slips out of me at this humor. “So many ladders. So much liability.”
His mouth tips up in response. “I like your laugh.”
Heat crawls up my neck at the compliment. I squeeze his fingers in my hands. “What about you?” I ask, needing the focus off me. “Any tragic backstory I should know about? Or are you one of those well-adjusted people with no trauma I keep hearing rumors about?”
He laughs at that, but he doesn’t drop my hand. “Only sort of. Mostly just work-related stuff that keeps me up at night.”
“I’m sure you’ve seen some hard things too,” I say.
