Chapter 24 Maisey #2
“Something on your mind?” Grandma asks.
You could say that…
Executive decision—Grandmas don’t count.
That, and it’s better to ask for forgiveness than permission. Right? Right. Ewan will understand. Especially since my seeking forgiveness will involve whatever the female equivalent of rather respectable wienering is.
“I am happy,” I tell her, not bothering to hide my smile. “I did find my way, because what I didn’t realize was that drum was leading me back here. That…”
I sigh, sitting back in the chair and slouching down. I wait for her to correct me—tell me that’s not how a lady sits—but she doesn’t. Simply lets me loaf here with bad posture.
“That its matching beat was here the whole time, waiting for me.”
“But…”
“How do you know there’s a but?” I challenge.
“Maisey, you’re not sitting in that cheap folding chair like a discarded sock without there being a but.”
Fair point.
I sit up, straightening myself out, not liking the discarded sock comparison one bit. That was a little too vivid.
“Have you ever had to make an impossible choice? One that you somehow know that no matter which option you choose, you’re always going to wonder what if?”
The corner of my grandmother’s mouth lifts, her expression softening as she thinks. “At the time I thought so. Although looking back…”
She shrugs, her contentment still clear.
“What happened? How did you choose?”
“Life kind of chose for me. Made it clear which path I was supposed to take. Turns out, there wasn’t as much wondering as I expected. Almost none, actually. Looking back on it now, I can’t even imagine having chosen the other option.”
I nod, letting her answer settle inside me as more people pour into the tent, the noise level kicking up a notch. Pretty soon we’ll be interrupted, people wanting an audience with the guest of honor.
“I’d really like some of that kind of clarity right about now,” I tell her.
“You’ll find it. When and where you least expect it. The universe has a weird way of gifting those kinds of things to us.” Reaching over, she takes my hands, squeezing them. “Know what I would like?”
“What?”
“That drink we were promised. I wasn’t kidding about being parched.”
I sputter out a laugh. Totally fair. We did lose Ewan somewhere along the way.
Yes, the tent has filled up exponentially since we arrived—and it’s not like we were even close to the first ones here—but that doesn’t mean it should have taken him this long to have grabbed a couple of sweet teas.
I’ve got ten bucks that says one of his brothers roped him into some stupid conversation and he needs rescuing.
Or worse, he’s at the mercy of Aunt Hattie who put him to work.
“Let me go figure out where Ewan got to.”
“Thank you, dear.”
Pushing to my feet, I lean down, kissing her cheek. I’m no closer to an answer, but somehow, I am more at ease. At least a little bit. There’s still a chance I’ll choose wrong—but there’s more of a chance that I’ll make a choice that simply shapes the way my life goes. Or so I hope.
Then again, I thought that the last time. My decision then had shaped how my life was going. All my years traveling and seeing the world. Missing out on what was happening here. Missing Ewan.
Who is just as much of a consideration. Because it’s not just my life I’m shaping. It’s his. It’s ours. I don’t care how much he says we'll make it work, this is an us decision. And just how does he think we’re going to make it all work?
Okay, I take it back. I’m not at all at ease. I am still very wound up. And not in a good way.
Bam!
I slam into something solid, the sudden stop sending me backward, trying to catch my balance. Shit, I should have been watching where I was going. A pair of hands grabs my shoulders, steadying me, and I blink, still trying to regain my composure.
“Oh, shit, Maisey, are you okay?”
I nod, my wits back about me, my eyes settling on Seth Jennings, the town plumber.
Average height, sandy-colored hair, and brown eyes, he’s the kind of guy that would probably get lost in the crowd if you weren’t looking for him, but always nice enough, going out of his way to help me whenever I needed it back in high school.
Including driving all the way to Tifton to get supplies the night before our physics group project was due because I accidentally knocked it over and we had to start from scratch.
Ewan used to tease me that Seth was only that nice to me because he had a crush on me, despite my protests that he was wrong.
At least up until Seth asked me to prom, and then I didn’t hear the end of it.
I bet the second Ewan sees Seth talking to me, he brings it up again…
“Hi, Seth. I’m fine. I didn’t mean to plow into you like that.”
“Don’t worry about me.” He laughs, dismissing my apology. He doesn’t let go of me but instead gives me a long once-over, dragging his eyes up and down my body, checking to make sure I’m steady. “I’m more worried about you.”
Stepping back, I remove myself from his hold. “No need. Just stuck in my own head. Should have watched where I was going.”
“I’m glad I ran into you. Literally.” He laughs at his own pun. I force a smile, not wanting to be rude. “Your father mentioned you’d moved back and were working as an EMT for the town—”
“When did you talk to my dad?”
The question fires out of me like a bullet from a gun.
There’s no stopping it. Nor is there any stopping the creeped-out shiver that runs down my spine at the thought of Seth Jennings—a guy I haven’t seen or spoken to since high school—talking to my dad about me.
Not that I blame Dad—I can promise he didn’t think twice about it.
Especially if he was talking about me joining his team at the fire department as an EMT.
I know how excited and proud he’s been. If the text I get at the start of every shift telling me so wasn’t enough of a giveaway, the way Mama gushes about how he “talks about it nonstop” is.
None of that explains why the town plumber was asking though.
“He mentioned it at one of the council meetings.”
Council meetings? As in the town council? I take a moment to rack my brain. I know that both my parents mentioned that Ellen Potter, the longtime at-large member passed away a couple of years ago, but they didn’t tell me that Seth replaced her. And really, Seth?
“I didn’t realize you were on the town council now,” I verbally tap dance, trying to keep my face in check. Which is becoming harder and harder the longer this conversation goes on.
“I am.” He beams, prouder than a peacock. Oh boy… “Anyway, I realized I don’t have your number, so I dropped by the station a couple of times and you’ve either been out on a call or not on shift…”
I shift my weight awkwardly from foot to foot, pulse kicking up a notch and my skin starting to prickle as my nerves take over.
I already know where this is heading. He has the same sheepish look on his face from senior year, hand anxiously rubbing the back of his neck, as he talks in circles.
At least this time he’s able to make eye contact with me.
“I saw you briefly at Reel Madness, and was gonna come say hi, but then you disappeared…”
“Well, we did have a medical emergency that we had to tend to,” I say, trying to shift the conversation. “And it was a busy day all around.”
“Absolutely.” He nods, rubbing his neck again. “But, now that I’ve got you, I was wondering…”
Please, Seth, no…
Not at my grandmother’s birthday party. Actually, not at all.
I didn’t say yes to you then, and my answer isn’t going to be different now.
Past that, there is no way that the news of Ewan and me hasn’t reached him.
Especially if he’s been talking to my father.
Pretty sure Daddy’s not been shy with that factoid either.
Sometimes I think Aunt Hattie rubbed off on him more than he realized.
“…grab dinner with me?”
Well, sir…I’ll give you this, you’re shooting your shot. Good for you. Here’s hoping you accept rejection gracefully.
I muster up my best nurse smile, the one I use when I know that I am going to have to use all my defense. “Thank you, Seth, but I’m with Ewan. He’s actually why I came back to Hickory Hills.”
There, nice and easy. Plus, it’s the truth. Hard to argue with that.
Seth’s face morphs into something unreadable. In a split second he went from average, everyday affable, rural, small-town, blue-collar guy to something harder. Grittier. Like someone ripped off a piece of him and left the rough edge.
“Even though he’s leaving?”
Leaving? Excuse you?
“Leaving?” I laugh nervously “Ewan’s not leaving.”
Seth nods, his face still hard as stone. “Yeah, he is. Selling the store and going…somewhere. Which pisses me off since he bought it off my grandfather and gave it that obnoxious name, to now just turn around and do this.”
My jaw goes slack, my brain trying to catch up with what Seth is saying.
I don’t bother correcting him—letting him in on the fact The Booby Trap was my idea and that obnoxious name, as he put it, was a nod to a joke I made.
That’s a different conversation. Right now I’m too focused on why he would think Ewan was selling the store.
That’s the last thing Ewan would do. His sole proprietorship of The Booby Trap is one of the things he’s most proud of. Something he’s fought with Gus over for years. There’s no way he would simply up and sell.
“Seth, I think you’re mistaken.”
“No. I overheard him talking to Gus yesterday about selling the store. I was at Pour Decisions fixing a toilet and they were holding a secret little meeting over there so no one would know about it.”
And yet here you are talkin’ about it… Fucking small towns…
“He was adamant too. Told Gus to draw up the paperwork.”
The earth shifts underneath me. Suddenly, I feel even more unsteady than when I tried to steamroll Seth a moment ago. Although, right now I’m starting to wish I had knocked him on his ass and kept moving.
This doesn’t make sense. He had to have misheard them. Of all the things on this earth that the oldest and youngest Hayes brothers were not discussing secretly in a bar on a Friday morning, it was that.
Unless…
We'll make it work.
Those four words echo in my brain, ricocheting off every corner like a wild cue ball on the billiards table.
With each new bounce they get louder, more piercing, until they are so sharp that everything else ceases to exist. I’m no longer standing under this tent surrounded by more than a hundred people on a bright, sunshiny, spring afternoon.
Instead, I’m completely surrounded by a weird multicolored palette of four words that suddenly make even less sense than before.
He can’t do this.
I can’t let him do this.