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Yes, this could work. But would Will be on board with this big of a change?
Only one way to find out.
He dialed his best friend, invited him over for pizza, and hurried to prepare the sales pitch of his life.
Chapter Nineteen
Delaney breathed asigh of relief as the last act of the Bourbon Falls Talent Show got underway. It’d been a long and crazy day, hers starting many, many hours before the first spectators arrived, but it’d also been filled with much joy and laughter. All of their participants had done a phenomenal job preparing their acts and keeping them kid-friendly. To her knowledge, there’d only been one accidental f-bomb and that’d been from her sister Mia after stubbing her toe behind the sound system table.
Thankfully, that’d been before their spectators had arrived as well. Brooklyn, however, had been present and had spent the day teasing her mother about it.
“Even moms slip up now and again, you know,” Mia had conceded shortly after intermission.
“Even amazing moms like yours.” Del had given her sister a hug, then dug out a twenty and handed it to Brooklyn. “Now stop harassing her and go get me something tasty from the food trucks. I’m starving.”
She checked the time on her phone. Goodness, two hours had passed since Brooklyn had brought her a grilled cheese sent straight from heaven. Judging by the lines forming around the food trucks and tents, their audience was getting hungry again.
“Eat, my pretties,” she whispered. “Eat all you want. We’ve got a roof to pay for.”
“What are you over here mumbling about?”
She turned to find Margaret, Barbara, and Nan approaching, each with a partially consumed adult beverage in hand. And, knowing them, not their first of the day, either.
“Just quietly encouraging people to keep buying food and drinks.” She tipped her head toward their cups. “Thank you for your patronage.”
“It’s not like we had much of a choice, with as hot as it turned out to be today,” Margaret said, fanning herself. “You’d think the talent show had fallen in the middle of July, not early October.”
“It did turn out to be a hot one today,” Del agreed. “Still better than thunder and lightning.”
From the sound booth, Mia raised a red card in the air.
“Sorry, ladies, that’s my cue. Time to thank our contestants and tell everyone to go and vote for their favorites.”
Brooklyn’s idea had been genius, creating a simple app to collect votes so the crowd could choose today’s winners. A few dozen of her marching band buddies had even volunteered to help collect votes from people in the audience who didn’t have app capabilities. Spectators would be helping choose winners in three age categories and then one act to accept their grand prize of two thousand dollars.
“Yep, you just get up on that stage and take care of business,” Margaret said, shooing her.
“Oh, I will,” Del said with a laugh. Heck, the hard part of the day was done for her. No more struggling with names as she introduced performers. Even with a serious case of early jitters, she was proud to not have even needed her secret stash of Scope today.
The Scope she hadn’t needed since—
Nope, not gonna go there. Yes, she still missed Isaac terribly, and yes, she’d scanned the audience for him throughout the day, holding out hope that maybe he’d had a change of heart and would come back to see the show. But, of course, he wasn’t here. After two weeks of her not texting, why should she expect anything different?
All that would change tomorrow, however. She’d put a lot of thought into what she would say to him, what compromise she might be able to offer. No, a long-distance relationship wasn’t ideal, but she was willing to give it a try. Besides, her business slowed to almost nothing over the winter every year. Maybe she could start spending winters on the East Coast.
Unless, of course, he’d already written her off.
Would he take her call? Accept her offer? She didn’t know. But until this fundraiser was complete, that answer was going to have to wait. She owed it to her hometown to stay focused on the task at hand.
Del waited for the final group—ten college coeds dressed in glittery chicken costumes—to vacate the stage, then made her ascent once more.
“Let’s give another round of applause for the Dancing Cluckers, shall we?”
She turned off her microphone to clap along, her gaze scanning the crowd to take it in once more. Before her were people of all shapes, colors, and ages, their blankets and folding chairs making the grounds beside the historic train depot look like a giant patchwork quilt. Judging by the smiles and cheering, this event had been a rousing success for her hometown. Now, all she could hope was that it’d be enough to save their beloved bookstore as well.
As the cheering tapered off, she turned her microphone back on. “Okay, I know you’re all probably eager to get home, but we’re not quite finished with you yet. As we mentioned earlier, the outcome of today’s event depends on your participation. This was created to be a community event, and we want the community to vote on their favorite acts from today.”
A fresh round of applause erupted.
