AllFreeNovel
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Throwing my phone back in my bag and heading home, I quickly changed into a pair of jeans, a fall themed sweatshirt, and threw on my riding boots and a warm coat. Although the leaves are only now starting to change, I knew it was going to get colder by the evening and warmth was a must.
Daisy seemed very happy to be going out as my poor girly had been stuck indoors all afternoon, well at least since the dog walker put her back in. I hated not being home with her all day, but I knew we both needed a little space from each other.
Driving through town was such a lovely experience especially since everyone had started to decorate their homes and shop windows with winter decorations. Many still had their fall decorations up, but it still worked. The town was filled with beautiful shades of blues, oranges, whites, yellows, and obviously, Christmas colors.
During my years away at Boston University, I always missed home. I missed the closeness of everyone knowing one another, that family feeling you had from your neighbors being friendly or when an event went on, you knew it was going to be great fun as everyone would pull together and make it awesome.
Finally, I parked outside The Wooden Spoon, Crystal's swanky café that she had to fight to get. The thousands of outdoor lights she had decorated the rooftop and windows with were almost blinding people as they passed and I had to laugh, she always did things a little extra.
“KIM!” She shouted at me from behind the counter as I opened the front door. “DAISY!” And of course, she appeared to be happier to see the dog than me. “Come here my beautiful, fluffy girly.”
Dressed in what could only be described as eccentric and colorful, Crystal came down to Daisy’s level and gave her the biggest hug a dog could get before finally coming over to give me one.
“It’s so wonderful to see you, girly, are you ok? How was your first day back?”
“First, coffee then questions. Also, when did you cut your hair?”
Crystal used to have beautiful long brown hair, now she had dyed her hair black, and it was sitting just below her ears, in a cute little bob. She spun around and flashed a beautiful smile my way, her gypsy style forest green dress spun around her ankles along with her waterfall sleeved blouse. She was channeling her inner Stevie Nick’s.
“What'd you think? I was feeling my gothic, witchy self.”
“I love it and it definitely fits in with your witchy vibes.”
Taking my usual seat near the left-hand window, Daisy settled on the dog bed that was provided just for her. The Wooden Spoon was, of course, a dog friendly café. However, it was very rare anyone actually brought their dogs in, except for myself and Mrs. Holly, the town's grandma.
Crystal was soon sitting opposite me with a tray of coffee and cake. The café was quiet aside from Gerald, the regular who always sat on the comfortable sofas reading a book. He had been coming here since the day Crystal opened the doors. I had mentioned to her that he clearly fancied her, but nope, Crystal wouldn’t have any of it.
“Say, have you had your cards read, you know, since…”
“No, and I don’t plan to.”
“Alright, still a sore subject I see, sorry.” She sipped her coffee and kept her eyes from me, smiling. “Did you hear who's back in town?”
The best thing about running a café - especially the only one that sold the best Victorian Chocolate Sponge Cake in the whole city - was you got to hear all sorts of gossip and yet, I was pretty sure I knew this piece before Crystal had even heard it.
“Samuel Jones is back in town,” I cut her off.
“How the hell did you know that already!” She asked me, almost slamming her cup down.
“Wouldn’t you like to know,” I winked jokingly. “Nah, actually, he was at the rink this morning, apparently he’s offered to train the kids ice-hockey team for the winter season.”
“Well, that’s not suspicious, wonder what that’s code for.”
“Not code for anything he says. Rachel mentioned he will be gone by the time January rolls around, so I wouldn’t pay too much attention.”
“But Kim, he was like your first love, love of your life kind of thing.”
“No, Luke was the love of my life. Sam was a mistake and something I did during my teens.”
We may have had a history, a very intense passionate history together, but that was all it was. History. We were a junior figure skater and a senior ice-hockey player, but of course we had ended up together, secretly. No one really knew other than Crystal. For the most part of it, Sam had ignored me in the halls of school, but yet kissed me in the locker room away from everyone. He had been ashamed of me, a girl from the poorer part of town, and he was the son of a coach at the time. The coach that had sent many hockey players off on their amazing careers.
We would never have worked and when he had left for college, I went into senior year and that was it. Heck he invited me to prom, then didn’t show up and that broke me. He broke me and it took a long time to pick myself back up. Then entered Luke, who turned my world upside down and we became something special. Marrying right out of university.
“Well, hopefully you guys can work together, and you know, don’t cause a hostile work environment for everyone else.”
“I’m sure we will be fine, don’t worry.”
It was always nice to catch up with Crystal, she was my best friend. Thankfully, she knew to avoid the conversation about dead husbands and just kept it light-hearted. She wouldn’t stop mentioning some new guy from across the street who had opened a bakery and how she’d already been there three times today to ‘scope’ the place out. She hated anything that drove her customers away and if the bakery started selling coffee, I knew she’d be out for blood.
