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Tracy continues, “I think Jonas just has his own life. He worked hard to get out from under the shadow of his daddy, and he was always super picky with the women he let into his life. It was like he lived his life a certain way, and he didn’t want anyone mucking that up. Personally, I think he was just waiting for the right girl to come along.”
My face warms at the mention of me being the ‘right girl’ for Jonas.
She laughs, “Look at you! You’re so smitten with him!”
I giggle. “You all have your own language down here. Do you know that?”
She nods. “You better get used to it. Lesson number one: it’s ‘y’all’ not ‘you all.’”
Our laughs now fill the diner, and we get a couple of nasty stares.
I lean in closer. “Aren’t you worried to be seen with me?” I ask. “Won’t hanging out with the outsider get you in trouble with everyone here?”
She shakes her head. “Nah. Besides, I’m not all that close with anyone. Not anymore.”
I’m about to ask what she means, but she keeps talking. “Everyone in this town will get over it. Keep in mind that nothing ever happens around here, so when a whole new person moves into town, it’s like Brad and Jen getting divorced all over again. They’ll eventually find something new to balk at.”
“Hopefully, it’s sooner rather than later,” I mutter.
She waves her hand. “Don’t pay any of them a moment of your time. Just enjoy time with that man of yours.”
“What about you, Tracy? Any hunky men on the horizon?”
She snorts and almost spits out her tea all over the table. “Hunky? No. Definitely not. That guy I mentioned earlier that lived in Forton? He and I were hot and heavy for a while, but he got way too controlling. Let’s just say it ended badly. All the men I am drawn to have serious emotional issues or mommy issues or can’t get it up. I’m just attracted to all the weirdos, I guess.”
I furrow my brow and ask, “How many weirdos? And how weird are we talking?”
She thinks for a moment. “You ever seen that show Sex and the City? My love life is kind of like that…minus the sex part. Normally, I figure out they’re weirdos pretty quick and run the other way before they get anywhere near my undergarments.”
We are both laughing uncontrollably again. I like Tracy. She’s so petite and cute, yet she has more sass than I’ve ever seen. Once you get her going, her personality is like a bomb waiting to explode.
“How long have you lived here in Grady?” I ask, trying to get to know her better.
“My whole life. I had this big plan about how I was going to move out of this dump the moment I turned eighteen, but we all see how that turned out.” She’s fiddling with her napkin as she talks. “Sometimes, life just throws you curveballs, and you can either stand still and get hit, or you can swing and hit it out of the park.”
“What about running away altogether? That’s what I did,” I say.
She thinks for a moment and then shrugs. “I think that if you’re no good at baseball, running away is the only thing that makes sense.”
I chuckle. “I might be better at baseball than I was at marriage.”
“Is that what you were running from? A crappy marriage?” She asks.
“Sort of the end of a crappy marriage,” I begin. I tell her the abridged version of my story, figuring now, everyone in my life who I even remotely talk to will know, so I won’t have to hash it out again.
“What an asshole,” she says when I have finished. “But you know what, Andi? I believe in fate, and I believe that things happen for a reason. All of this happened the way it did, so you would move here to our Podunk little town and find the man of your dreams.”
She’s saying the same things I was thinking the other day.
I reply, “You don’t think he and I might be moving too fast?”
I don’t know why I’m asking her. Yes, she and I seem to be comfortable around each other, but I’m sure she doesn’t give two shits about my love life.
“Do you like him?” She asks. “Does he make you happy?”
I nod.
“Does he ever make you feel uncomfortable with how fast things are moving, or are you just worrying about how thingsshouldbe moving?”
