Page 8 of Tempted By Her

“I’m not unwilling to compromise.” I just didn’t want to live with someone who I couldn’t get along with. I knew that I’d won the roommate lottery with Joy, and I was unlikely to find someone like her again, but I did have some standards and people just didn’t seem to meet them. There also weren’t lines of people in the small town of Arrowbridge needing roommates, so the pool of applicants was already shallow.

I stabbed at a crouton in my salad with frustration.

“Please let me know if you need help,” Joy said. “I’ve got a little bit of emergency money stashed.”

Joy really was the best, and not just as a roommate. She was a good person, through and through. Sometimes that led her to giving people the benefit of the doubt that they didn’t deserve. That’s where I came in.

“It’ll be fine,” I said, which was something I’d been saying a lot lately. I was sick of the word fine, and I was tired of hearing it from my own mouth.

Joy’s phone went off and she frowned as she looked at it. “It’s Layne. Huh.”

She answered and her eyes went wide. “Holy shit, is there anything we can do?” She listened and nodded. “Yeah, of course, that’s awful. Tell her that whatever she needs, clothes, or anything, we can help. Okay… Okay… Bye.”

Joy hung up and set her phone down. “There was a fire at the chicken house a few hours ago. They don’t know what happened, probably some bad wiring. Lark was at work, thank god, so she’s fine, but just about everything she owned is gone. I can’t imagine what she’s going through right now.”

Lark. I’d tried not to think about her, but I failed just about every time. She’d stayed that night with me, and we’d spent the entire night fucking until the morning when I’d messaged Joy in a panic. She’d called while Lark was still in my bed, but I’d changed my mind about telling her. I wasn’t one to keep secrets from Joy, but I’d sealed my lips on my night with Lark, and had done my best to put her out of my mind. To her credit, she’d kissed me and told me she’d had a good time and that had been that. Seemed like we had both gotten what we’d wanted out of that night. I didn’t even know how she’d gotten her car back, and I hadn’t had her number to ask her.

“Shit, that’s horrible. Does she need anything?” I asked.

“Layne’s going to let me know. She and Honor are with her and I’m sure Mark and Sadie will pitch in. They’ve got extra rooms, too.”

That was true. Mark and Sadie were RICH rich, and Sadie ran a clothing boutique just down the street in downtown Arrowbridge, so Lark was probably covered in funds and clothing for now. I didn’t really have anything I could offer to help that she couldn’t get from someone closer to her. A one-night stand did not a relationship make, and I preferred it that way.

“Poor Lark. I can’t imagine losing all of my stuff,” Joy said, shivering. “Now I have to make sure Ezra has renter’s insurance.”

“I should probably get that,” I said.

“Syd!” Joy said. “You told me you had it!”

“I meant to get it. Does that not count?” I said.

Joy admonished me with a finger. “Syd. Do it right now.” For someone who was the youngest in her family, she really had first-born daughter energy.

“Fine, fine,” I said, abandoning my salad to look for renter’s insurance on my phone.

Joy didn’t let up until I showed her the email with my new policy attached.

“Thank you,” she said.

“You don’t have to take care of me now. Save some of that shit for Ezra,” I said.

At the mention of her girlfriend, Joy sighed happily. “She doesn’t need much taking care of when it comes to most things.”

No, Ezra had her life together, but when it came to love, she needed a lot of help. Joy called Ezra her lone wolf that didn’t know how to behave in her new pack and I had to agree. At least my personal relationships were all super healthy. Well, healthy-ish.

I couldn’t stop thinking about Lark as I reorganized one of the displays in the shop that afternoon. My mother was ensconced in the back creating all the pottery that she then painted, fired, and finished before it was given to my custody to arrange and sell to the best of my abilities.

Bluebird Pottery specialized in all manner of plates, bowls, platters, lamps, jugs, cups, mugs, and ornaments painted with birds, yes, but other Maine scenes like lighthouses, lobsters, and blueberries. I kept trying to convince her to do a potato line, but she shot down that idea as “not on brand.” Funny, because I had literally taught her what “on brand” meant in the first place.

Eileen, my mother, was good at a whole lot of things, but selling the stuff she made wasn’t one of those skills. When I was growing up, she’d basically been a “pay what you can” store in the garage of our home, and she’d even accepted trades. Dad had never been around, and Mom had never been shy about telling me that they’d been a drunken hookup and that she didn’t need or miss him. She’d never really asked me if I’d missed having a dad, and I’d never talked to her about it either.

The door opened and I turned with my best unthreatening, but welcoming, smile.

“Hello,” I said, testing the new customers. They both gave me bland smiles and continued their conversation. I let them do their thing. They smelled like browsers, who were usually just killing time, and it might not be worth it to work my magic on them.

After a few minutes, I checked in and said that they could let me know if they needed any help. I got more polite smiles. Got it. Message received. I went back to what I was doing and moved on to the next area I had on my long list to handle today. Every day I made a list and every day something happened so I couldn’t stick to that list.

There was a loud crash that didn’t make me jump because I was used to a lot of loud crashes.

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