22. Crew
T urns out sleeping on the floor was a giant mistake. But I meant it with every part of my being when I said I wasn’t going to sleep in a bed where she and some asshole did who knew what.
During dinner at ‘Riley’s Diner’, which was less of a diner and much more of a sports bar that so happened to have tables and served bacon cheese fries, Winnie gave me her personal run down of the town. With each old couple, or group of highschoolers, or random farmer coming in to grab their dinner to go she introduced me to who they were, who they’ve been, and who they’re married to, dating, or fooling around with.
She wasn’t kidding about everyone knowing everyone. If Winnie sneezed then half of the restaurant shouted bless you, it’s like they all listened in on each other and everyone knew it so what’s the point in hiding it?
It was especially evident when I realized it wasn’t the standard southern hospitality for every person who walked in there to introduce themself to me.
Bo, Bob, Bill, Beau (who let me know specifically it was spelled with an e,a,u), Brandon, Bentley, and at least ten other ‘b’ names had stopped by our table to say hello before our appetizers even came out.
“You…have a lot of admirers.” I pointed out.
“Oh, that’s not for me.” Winnie sipped on her diet coke. “They’re all trying to decide if they like you or not.”
“Oh.” I craned my neck around the restaurant- where bras were hanging from the ceiling and a giant plaque rested above the wooden bar saying, ‘HOMETOWN OF FAMOUS COUNTRY SINGER: LEDGER CALLAHAN.’ I wasn’t a big country music guy myself, but the name sounded familiar. Surrounding the bar were men swamped in Carhartt attire and boots that were far dirtier than mine. The older ones glanced from me to the bar and back a multitude of times, their faces entirely neutral.
“What do you think?” I directed my attention to Win. “Do they?”
She smiled at me, glancing to the bar and back. “Who wouldn’t?”
We ate dinner at a slow pace, watching the people of Oak Ridge filter in and out, while she told me of the details of the town itself. No big grocery stores within forty minutes either way, if you wanted anything in particular that was beyond simple groceries you would have to order it online. She warned me of the towns obsession with groundhogs- and not in a cute way. In a ‘cussing mad’ way that she said had the very small population all in an uproar on their local what’s happening in oak ridge Facebook page. Apparently they dig too many holes, causing ruts and water build up in yards, and eat at garage doors. Who would’ve known?
We stayed until they closed at eleven o’clock, Winnie telling me everything she loved, and occasionally despised, about her hometown. When Riley herself, the owner of the diner, all but swept us out of the door, we decided to go home.
Sneaking into the main house: aka bumping around in the dark and trying to hide our far-too-loud fits of laughter when Winnie ran straight into a side table and almost knocked over a lamp was possibly my favorite part of the night.
But then when it came time for us to actually fall asleep, both exhausted from the plane ride and socializing with half of the town, Winnie climbed right onto her fortress of pillow and snuggled under three layers of warm blankets.
“I’ve got to change,” I whispered loud enough to reach her.
Eyes wide open she stared across at me. “What’s stopping you?”
“Your sneaky little eyes.”
“Does it help if I cover them?”
“No, because I know you’re peeking behind it.”
She shrugged in the dark. “Fair.”
Winnie rolled to the other side and I quickly stripped of my shirt and jeans, sliding on clean boxers and black gym shorts. “Alright, I’m done.”
I turned to face Winnie but she was still turned to the window. Tiptoeing around the frame, I took one glance and smiled. She was completely passed out.
My hands reached around her, taking one of the many pillows she could spare, and a throw blanket on the foot of the bed. I made a little pallet and did my best to fall asleep as well. Though it was much more difficult the more her sweet bunny sniffles turned into full on brown bear snores. Seriously, the girl had a problem.
The next morning I woke up with an extremely stiff neck and sore back and just as Winnie sat up in her fluffy bed I had plans to share how little sleep I got. But then she looked over at me, with the sunlight of the window beaming against her auburn hair, a halo wrapped around her and I just…forgot.
“Good morning,” she stretched until her arms and legs shook away.
“Morning.” I smiled, running a hand through my rogue hair.
“Mmm I smell bacon.”
All I could smell was warm vanilla and toasted coconut, the smell I had been wrapped up in all night. The same smell I wanted to pack in my bag and take to Philly with me.
Winnie stood up, rounding the bad to where I was laying, stepped over my half-limp body, and began rifling through her suitcase.
“I was thinking,” she started as sweaters came flying out one by one.
“Uh oh,” a sweater with very heavy buttons fell right on my nose.
“Woops.”
“Alright, go ahead. You were thinking…”
“Maybe this morning, after breakfast, we could go on a tour of the farm? I bet one of the ATV’s is open.”
I sat up fully, a little too quick because my head began to spin, before answering back. “That sounds perfect.”
Thankfully, breakfast wasn’t the large audience of people I expected. Besides Winnie and I, there was Lottie, who reminded me so much of Rachel that I knew as soon as we were done I needed to text her and let her know I found her twin. Then there were Lottie’s parents whose names entirely slipped from me. Winnie’s grandparents were there as well, her Papa patting a heavy hand on my back and her Nana doing her best to throw more bacon on my plate when I wasn’t looking. Halfway through us eating, a tall blonde man covered in dirt with a handful of baby ducks strolled in. Lottie’s mom yelled at him for tracking in red clay and he shrugged it off before setting the ducklings down in a small decorative box in the living room. I swore I heard him whisper ‘daddy will be right back’ before grabbing a handful of bacon and eating above the sink.
With greasy hands after eating, the man I came to find out was Knox, another cousin, came to Winnie and gave her a hug so tight she coughed, then proceeded to do the same with me, nearly knocking the breath out of me.
Each family member took their turns asking Winnie about her life updates, what she’s been doing, how the truck is, her love life (coming from her nana whilst staring at me).
They loved her. Each and every one of them loved her so much that I couldn’t help but dwell on the fact that I hadn’t missed a single text from my siblings other than one in the group chat where Nathan told me to fly safe and bring him back some deer jerky. To which Calla replied gross, don’t kiss me with deer breath. Which lead to an entire conversation of all of my siblings and their spouses arguing over what meat was superior or the least likely to cause foul breath.
After breakfast Winnie snuck us out of the front door, away from her very chatty cousins and baby ducks and led us straight to the far right of the property, where a giant hanger sat loaded with ATV’s, four wheelers, and farm equipment that looked equally cool and terrifying at once.
We stole one of the ATVs. Well, she stole it. I just happened to be along for the ride, and there wasn’t a part of me that was going to stop her. Plus, is it technically stealing when your family owned them? The sun was inching higher in the sky, throwing a golden haze over the leaves changing colors around us. Winnie slid into gear and drove us down the dirt path like she knew every inch of this land by heart—because, clearly, she did.
First, we passed through the strawberry fields. She said they were best in June, though right now they looked more like rows of sleepy green plants, waiting for their time to shine. Then came the cattle and horses in the far back by the creek, grazing lazily in the distance, their silhouettes peaceful against the horizon. She waved a hand to each worker we passed by. We also took a temporary stop by the house next to the creek- apparently where Felicity and Knox lives. Winnie insisted on telling Felicity that Knox had stolen the ducks again to shadow him, I assumed that was a regular occurrence. She kept going, showing me every corner of her world, like she was letting me in on all of her past secrets. Her past haunts. Past loves. And as much as I hated the thought that I wasn’t the only guy she had brought here, I loved the thought of a young Winnifred bouncing around in an ATV having no idea I was back in Philly waiting for someone just like her.
We passed a chapel, quaint but proud, sitting in the middle of nowhere like it was waiting for love stories to unfold. “They do a lot of weddings here,” she told me with a grin. Weddings were apparently a regular thing around here, most of the town got married here and there were anniversary vows renewed, engagement parties, etc. hosted here all the time.
Then there was the new “bloom barn”—a massive flower field, stretching on and on in rows of pink, yellow, and orange, with a big white barn at the end. Winnie said it was one of the most popular spots around and I could easily see why. Even in its ‘off-season’, there was something enchanting about it. Like it had been pulled straight out of a postcard.
We greeted her cousins and the seasonal workers along the way, a small wave here, a nod there. She watched my reactions to everything, her eyes flickering with something soft, something kind, but questioning. Wondering if I liked it here. Wondering if I understood why she left?
Pulling into the front gate, right by the bake house, she pushed the gear into park and elbowed me. “You fit in here, you know. Like, really fit in.”
It caught me off guard enough to cause my chin to pull back, eyes assessing her. “You think?”
“Mhmm,” she nodded. “Very well.”
“Maybe you can take me back next time.”
She didn’t respond but she smiled back at me, slow and soft. Enough for now. Maybe making future plans was pushing it, considering neither of us had a clue what was happening here. But there was something bouncing around, I couldn’t be the only one to notice.
Winnie kept talking as we bumped along the rest of the dirt roads, but her words drifted off into her own thoughts. There was a quiet understanding there, one she didn’t share out loud—that she used to want to escape this place, but now? Seeing the smile on her face? The way she blends in so perfectly here, how all of the stuff back home: the competition, the apartment seemed to just melt away from her. This place filed all of that stuff down to the core of who she was. And if I had a crush on the girl before, it had nothing on what I was feeling for her now.
“Wait, we can take this thing on actual roads?” I asked, motioning to the ATV as she turned down to main road.
She just laughed in response, pressing her foot into the gas pedal and taking us down the paved road into ‘downtown’. Which was pushing it for a two stoplight town. But there was a towns square and a strip of different stores and restaurants around it that had a fair amount of families and couples, young and old, trailing in and out of them.
She decided to first show me the small coffee shop/bookstore on the corner, the one where she used to work before she moved to Philly. She told me stories of her making croissants at the bakehouse in the early morning hours before the sun had raised, getting them ready for the patrons here.
“A friend from high school still works here,” she pulled into an open spot and parked, ignoring looks from anyone nearby.
“Does she know you’re coming?”
“Probably not,” she shrugged. “I haven’t talked to anyone much other than Lottie and occasionally some people who message me happy birthday on Facebook and stuff.”
I nodded. Winnie had this line that was dangerous to cross, one where I knew there was something else behind it. And yet when I pushed for more, she just receded. So, when it came to things like the story of her parents, or more details on this Marshall guy, I had to do the one thing I hated the most: be patient. I wasn’t a patient man, never had been, but when it came to her I was going to be. Well, as best as I could anyway.
I followed behind Winnie as she lead me into the coffee shop, very much enjoying those flared jeans that fell around her boots but tightened up against her backside.
What the cafe lacked in size, it made up for in its design. Exposed, vintage and cracked brick walls and the various art pieces strung about done by local artists.
It was almost like a touch of Philly, something more modern but still towing the line of vintage with the added detail they threw in there. For a second, it made me miss home. So, I took out my phone and grabbed a couple pictures to text in the family group chat.
Instantly Rachel replied back with you’re taking me with you next time, right?
Ahead of me, Winnie was already at the counter talking to a woman around our age with lavender hair and a bright smile. I couldn’t make out what they were saying but she was smiling bag, big and proud and in those flared jeans and her tiny sweater and those adorable boots she looked like she just found the last missing puzzle piece. She looked like she was an entirely different person from the girl I knew in Philly. One that I was desperate to learn more about. Craved more of.
The girl across the counter must have made a joke because Winnie’s head tilted back in laughter, her auburn waves bouncing in the movement and she looked like…sunshine poured into a bottle I wanted to carry with me everywhere.
“No way, little Red?” A man almost to my height, with curly blonde hair and golfing shirt on tucked into khaki’s approached behind her in line. Directly beside him was a woman with a short blonde bob wearing a jean jacket with a dentist logo on the back.
It couldn’t have been any of her family. She’d already told me what the rest of them looked like, or shown me pictures, and none of them fit this description. And then I saw the way Winnie froze. Her whole body tensed up at the sound of that voice and I didn’t need to be told who he was. The way she shrank back, all the light dimming in her, told me everything. This was Marshall.
No one should ever make this girl cower like that. It was like someone had snuffed out her flame, all that warmth and sunshine she carried around just shriveling up in a cold and dry instant.
The guy—Marshall—almost scoffed, standing there with the woman coming around his side to place a hand on his arm. He looked Winnie up and down like she was an afterthought. Like he pitied her?
“Well, look at you,” he said, turning to the woman beside him. “Babe, this is Winnifred.”
The blonde’s eyes widened, her lips pulling into a pout that looked genuinely like sympathy. “Ooohh, it’s so nice to meet you,” she cooed and stuck a hand out.
Winnie was stuck, caught between them and me, and I could see her struggling. I waited for it. The snappy comeback she had for everything, but right now, nothing was coming out. She was frozen solid, just staring at the blonde’s outreached hand with no way out and I knew this was something I couldn’t let her handle on her own.
I stepped in, sliding her ordered coffee sitting behind her into her hand and wrapping my arm around her waist, pulling her close. “Hey, Winnie girl.”
She looked up at me, relief flashing in her eyes. as her hands curled around the warm paper cup. “Oh, thanks. Uh, Crew, this is Marshall and his wife. And this is Crew, my—”
“Boyfriend,” I finished for her, sticking my hand out toward Marshall. He hesitated, his eyes flicking to mine before shaking it. We stood there, sizing each other up, shaking hands far longer than anyone who I actually cared for would.
He kept staring back at Winnie in belief and if he kept going it wasn’t going to end pretty. “Yeah, I’m not sure how I got this lucky either,” I said with a wolfish smirk, pulling her even closer. My fingers tapped against her waist. It’s okay, I’m here. You can let go of the reigns now. “I feel bad for the guy who let her go.”
Winnie took a deep breath and I could feel her relaxing against me.
“Oh, well, you know Winnie and I used to go out,” Marshall added, trying to reclaim some ground. His back straightened and even so, I squinted down at him.
“No shit? Sorry for the loss, man.”
Marshall narrowed his eyes at me before brushing it off with the shake of his head. Try me, I dare you.
“So, Winnie, how’s your cute little business going? I keep meaning to stop by, but, you know, newlywed life. And ever since the billboard went up, our office has been slammed.”
I could feel my blood boil at the way he said, “cute little business,” like she was some kid with a lemonade stand. As if she hadn’t busted her ass to make it all happen. As if she hadn’t built everything from nothing because that was exactly what he left her with. Nothing but the shell of her old self who she had to build back up piece by piece.
Before Winnie could even respond, I jumped in. “Incredible, actually. I’ve had my truck parked in the same spot for two years, but the night she showed up, she had people lined up so far I had to close early. Literally couldn’t even get out because of her crowd.”
I glanced down at her, smirking. “And she was so sweet about it too, acting like she felt bad for me while taking all the business for herself. She knew she had me in the palm of her hand then.” I said, looking back at Marshall and his wife. “So yeah, nothing cute or little about it. My girl works her ass off and gets results, right, baby?” I nudged her, still going. Winnie just gave me this look, amusement, maybe a tad of confusion, but there was this smile resting in it that told me she was loving this almost as much as I was. And I was enjoying it a lot.
“In fact, ever since we got together, everything’s doubled. Seems like nothing around here’s been cute or…” I let my eyes drop to Marshall’s crotch, just to drive the point home, “little in a long time.”
Winnie snorted beside me before quickly regaining her posture, and I reveled watching Marshall stiffen. The blonde at his side shifted uncomfortably, taking a step closer to him.
I gave Winnie’s hip a pat. “We should probably head out. Nice seeing you guys.” And with that, I turned us around, slipping my hand into her back pocket and giving her butt a squeeze as we walked out the door. The perfect little period to the end of our point.
Once we were in the ATV, buckled up and ready to go, I glanced over at her. “Are you okay?”
She was quiet, staring straight ahead.
“Did I go too far? I’m sorry, Win. It’s just the way he looked at you, like you were less than them or something, and I just… I don’t know, I saw red.”
Her shoulders started to shake, head dipping to the seat cushion below her and for a second, I thought I’d really messed up. “Win, baby, I’m sorry.”
Then she looked up, and I realized she was laughing. This big laugh that was silent and yet took up residence in my chest as I memorized seeing this look on her.
I was still feeling a little unsure, but then, in a heartbeat, her hands were on me. She wrapped her arms around my neck and pulled me in, her lips crashing against mine. It wasn’t soft or hesitant; it was hungry, like she’d been holding back and suddenly couldn’t anymore.
I froze for just a second, caught off guard by the intensity of it, but then my caveman instinct kicked in quickly. My hands moved to her waist, gripping her like she might slip away if I didn’t hold on tight enough. Her body pressed against mine, as close as I could get her in this thing, and I could feel the heat radiating off her as our lips moved in tandem. Pressing, and pulling, and teasing, and taking our sweet time.
Finally, my chest sang out. I had wondered what kissing this girl would be like for the last three years and now I had her, sitting right in the palm of my hands. It felt like I was holding onto a work of art, something fragile made out of glass that could break any moment and yet was somehow sturdy; pushing me back every bit of what I gave her. Both of us hungry and desperate.
She tasted like the coffee I’d just handed her, sweet with a hint of caramel, and I couldn’t help but lose myself in it. Her fingers tangled in my hair, pulling me even closer, and I let out a small groan, responding by tightening my grip around her waist. With my fingers dipping behind her sweater, I gripped her warm, pale skin and pulled her as close as the space between the seats would allow, wishing there was nothing else between us.
The kiss was slow and fast at the same time, a mix of urgency and tenderness. She kissed me like she needed me, like she was pouring every emotion into it—gratitude, relief, and something more. Something I was dying for more of. I felt her chest rise and fall against mine, her breath quickening, and it drove me wild. I couldn’t think about anything else but the feel of her lips, the way her body fit so perfectly against mine, how this felt like the most right thing in the world.
When she finally pulled back, we were both breathless. Her lips were swollen, her eyes shining with unshed tears as they met mine. For a second, I didn’t want to let her go. I wanted to pull her back in and kiss her until we both forgot what we were doing or where we were. But the smile that crept onto her face, soft and genuine, left me just watching her. Waiting for her. Hanging on her every word.
I sat there, staring at those perfect lips that just left mine, wondering how in the world I hated this woman for so long. Or at least had convinced myself that I had.
“Thank you,” she whispered, her voice barely above a breath. She smiled up at me. “Thank you, thank you, thank you. I don’t think anyone’s ever stood up for me like that.”
I leaned in, brushing my forehead against hers. “That’s because I wasn’t there. You’ve got me now.”
She grinned. “Yeah, I do.”
Winnie turned back forward to put the ATV in reverse, then paused, her eyes sliding back to me. “Did you really insinuate that he had a small—”
“Yup.” I shrugged. She burst out laughing again, and we took off, leaving all of it behind us.
The rest of the day felt like a dream—one of those perfect days where nothing else mattered but being together. And maybe it wasn’t just her that was changing. For the first time, I wasn’t just passing through. This place, this life… it felt like maybe, just maybe, I belonged here too. With her.
Because if she was going somewhere, then I was ready to follow her.