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I had to admit, their deck had turned out well. Would it be possible? Or would it be too weird? I mean, we were friends now, so maybe it was fine. “I guess I could ask him.”
Again, they exchanged glances, apparently still amused by my embarrassment. “More wine, anyone?” I asked.
“That means she’s going to ask him,” Tiffany said.
“This is awesome,” Stormi said. “You’ll be thrown together all the time.”
“You ladies should mind your own business,” I said, laughing.
“That’s not how we roll,” Stormi said.
That was the truth.
5
DARBY
Iwrote a B on the top of a student’s paper with my favorite red pen. I did love my red pen, I had to admit. I loved teaching English, too. Basically, it was a way for me to perpetually geek out over great literature. Sometimes, the kids didn’t fully appreciate the talent or skill of Dickens, for example. They said there were too many words.
Dickens might have written for the people and to support his family, but it didn’t mean he wasn’t great. So what if he wrote in extra detail because he was paid by the word? People had a lot less to do back then. There was no TikTok or Snapchat. My students would have been grateful for a long, character-driven story likeGreat Expectationswithout the distraction of their screens 24-7.
I’d saved my best student’s essay for last, knowing it would give me a boost. Some of the others had had the opposite effect. The assignment had been to compare and contrast Dickens’sGreat Expectationswith Kafka’sMetamorphosis. Yes, it was a hard assignment. And no, nobody reads existential literature for the pure joy of it. I felt strongly that this kind of critical thinking was important, especially in today’s world of unreliable news and social media.
Matilda’s essay didn’t disappoint. I gave her an A and stuck her paper on top of the others. She was captain of the cheer team as well as my best literature student. Polite and bubbly, a student like her was a teacher’s dream, but I also enjoyed reaching the kids others had given up on. I could feel them struggling to overcome whatever it was that made them avoid eye contact from the back row.
My second love was carpentry. I’d been able to make a little money building decks or doing light remodel jobs for friends. I’d recently put an ad out in the newspaper offering handyman and carpentry skills with hours in the late afternoon and weekend.
I hoped someone would call sooner rather than later. My car was making a strange noise, and I figured it wasn’t long for this world. I sighed and began straightening up my classroom. Instead of a blackboard, I used a an interactive board while I gave my lectures. After I’d shut it off for the day, I wiped the plastic clean and tucked the whole thing into a corner of the room.
I’d just packed up my leather briefcase, a gift from a professor after I completed my Ph.D., when my cell phone rang. A quick glance told me it was Breck. He probably wanted to get together for a boys’ night of beer and pizza. I hoped so, anyway. I’d barely seen him since he returned from his honeymoon.
I picked it up on the second ring. “Hey, how’s it going?” I asked.
“Good, good. No complaints.” He had a slow way of talking that always made me want to close my eyes and take a nap. This was why he was so good with animals; he lulled them into a state of relaxation. “I have a lead for you on a carpentry job. You have room in your schedule?”
“Sure. As a matter of fact, a gig would come in really handy about now. Who’s it for?” This wasn’t a big town, and highly likely I would know the person in need of a carpenter.
“It’s for Jamie. Out at the inn,” he added, as if I needed more explanation. I was quite familiar with Jamie, I wanted to say but didn’t. Every inch of her. I rubbed my eyes, the image of her wearing nothing but a pair of silky panties played before me. Ever since that night in Cliffside Bay, I hadn’t been able to forget what she looked or felt like. Imagine my surprise when she showed up in Emerson Pass. Once I heard about the old mansion she bought to make into an inn, though, it all made sense. She’d told me about her dream during the night I’d spent with her. The hottest night of my life.
However, she’d made it obvious she wasn’t interested in anything serious, and I’d stayed away from her as much as one could in a town this size. My friends were her friends, and the group had only gotten tighter over the last year. It hadn’t been easy to resist making an embarrassing move on her. I knew where it would lead, however, so I acted cool around her. After what had happened with my girlfriend, right in front of Jamie, no less, I wasn’t about to put myself out there to be publicly humiliated.
I squeezed my eyes shut at the memory of that mortifying night. I’d had a ring ready in the kitchen of the brewery back in Cliffside Bay. They’d had the ring and were going to bring it out buried in the dessert. Sadly, I was dumped before I could propose. Jamie had been waitressing that night, and she saw it all go down. When I ran into her later, we started talking and one thing led to another, as they always do in this kind of situation. We’d agreed to one night only and no contact ever again. What we didn’t know? In six months’ time, we’d both arrive in Emerson Pass.
“Is everything all right out there?” I hoped it wasn’t a leak or electrical issue. She’d had a grand reopening last spring, with an invitation to all her friends, including me, for wine and cheese the night before the opening weekend. She’d wanted to thank everyone for their support. After the fire had demolished her dream, it had been hard to try again. But boy had she. I had to admire her for it, too. She did the proverbial brushing herself off and getting right back to work. A year later, she had a brand-new inn, even better than the one that had burned to the ground. Every time I drove past the pretty white building down on the old river road, I smiled.
“Yes, everything’s good there,” Breck said in answer to my question. “But she needs a gazebo built for a wedding and needs it done yesterday.” I heard Tiffany’s voice in the background. “Right, yeah. Tiff says the woman’s paying for the whole thing plus giving Jamie a chunk of change to get it done in time for her wedding.”
“When’s that?” I asked.
“Three weeks from tomorrow.”
“Oh, that doesn’t give me much time. I mean, if I were to accept the job. Why didn’t she call me herself?”
“Well, um, I thought I’d run it past you first,” Breck said. “In case it felt awkward for you.”
“Nah, we’re good. You saw us the other night.”
“Yeah. I did. Tiff noticed, too,” Breck said.
