Chapter 6
Alex
~ Deck the Halls
The bell above the salon door jingles. The hum of blow dryers and indistinct chatter fills the air. Over it all drifts the rasped whispers of gossip meant to appear discreet while spreading the juiciest news.
“That new officer had dinner with Jesse Heinz,” someone stage-whispers, just loud enough to carry.
Another woman adds, “At his house, nonetheless.”
“I don’t think he’s had a woman over in years,” a third person says. Her wide eyes meet mine and the rest of her sentence dies on her lips. “Not unless you count his mom …”
I freeze mid-step. I’m pretty sure all eyes are on me. So much for blending in.
Laura glances up at me from her station and shouts, “Alex!” as if she didn’t just hear my name being dragged through the local mud. We both know she did.
I need a haircut—just a trim to clean up the fraying edges. I was in too much of a hurry packing to get to the salon before I left, so I was grateful Laura offered to see me.
“Adding that to my list,” I mutter, walking toward her chair.
“Your list?” she asks quietly.
“Of things I miss about New York.” Instantly, I feel lousy for saying that.
“Are you having a hard time settling in?” she asks in an equally conspiratorial tone.
The salon has gone eerily quiet since my arrival.
I shake my head. “Actually, no. It’s an adjustment, of course. But mostly good.”
“What’s the new item on your list?” she asks.
“Anonymity.” I smile at her. “In the city you can blend in. No one watches where you go or with whom.”
“Yeah. There’s exactly no hiding around here.” Laura’s tone isn’t annoyed. If anything, there's a note of affection to her words. “Secrets are kept between you and two thousand of your closest friends and relatives.”
I laugh. Then I turn toward the room of eyes staring at me. “I ate dinner at Jesse’s. We were on shift together. He had lasagna leftovers. He’s quite a cook. Any questions?”
Laura’s pinching her lips together to keep her laugh from bursting free.
“No one?” I ask, prodding the group of onlookers.
“He’s a good man,” one woman who must be in her sixties says. A few others nod.
“He’s my coworker,” I say, hopefully nipping any gossip about me and Jesse that’s not work related. My tone isn’t defensive, but I can’t help the straightforwardness. Where I’m from, we say what we mean and we mean what we say.
I smile at the women, making eye contact with each one. If I’m going to be here for any length of time, I don’t need to be making enemies.
A voice cuts through the chatter—sharp, familiar, and full of mischief. “I’m assuming you’ve all been gossiping up a blue streak. And if I know you—which I do—you’ve been talking about my granddaughter.”
Her granddaughter. Not by blood, but she’s claimed me since the day we met.
I turn toward the doorway. Memaw.
“Alex!” she says with a smile that reaches straight to my heart and embraces me like the best of hugs.
“Memaw!” I shoot off Laura’s chair, rushing across the colorful room into her arms.
“My, my,” Memaw says, stepping back and bracing me, her hands on my arms. “Don’t you look as beautiful as ever.”
“You do too.”
“Oh psh. Don’t start in with your flattery. We all know I look like a crumpled piece of paper these days. I stopped counting wrinkles a while ago. Now I just live with them like an old friend.”
“You look beautiful,” I repeat.
“You hear that, Mabel?” Memaw shouts back toward the dryers. “Alex thinks I look beautiful.”
“Well, I say we keep her,” Mabel answers.
“Fine by me,” Memaw answers her. “What do you say, Alex?”
“I’m warming up to the idea,” I admit.
Memaw links our arms and pulls me over to Laura’s station.
I spend the next hour getting a trim. At one point, Shannon comes in and starts giving manicures at a little desk set up as a nail station.
Laura insists on giving me a blowout. By the time she’s done, I’ve learned the names of each woman in the room, and I’ve been privy to more stories than I can count.
It feels like a sort of initiation—an unofficial rite of passage.
I’ve been officially welcomed amidst hairspray and laughter.
I walk out of the Dippity-Do looking more date-ready than like a woman heading to her second day on the job.
Jesse and I start cruising town a half hour after I arrive at the station. He keeps glancing over at me.
“Do I have something in my teeth?” I flip the visor down, catching my reflection and a flicker of nerves.
“No. Your teeth are fine,” he says. “You just look …” He trails off, words snagging somewhere between duty and a line he obviously doesn’t want to cross.
“Oh. My hair? I went to Laura before work.”
“Nice. She did a good job.”
“You think?” I take my hand and make a show of fluffing under my hair with it.
“I do. Really nice.” He clears his throat, glances at me quickly and then returns his eyes to the road as if something extremely interesting just darted out into the intersection. A flush of color rises up his neck.
My cheeks heat reflexively. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” His eyes stay on the road and his head bobs once in a curt nod. Professional. He’s being professional.
Thankfully, the crackle of the police radio followed by Jeanie’s voice slices through the awkwardness. “Well, maybe the second time’s a charm,” she says, vaguely.
“What’s up, Jeanie?” Jesse asks.
There’s an easy brightness in him today, like someone flipped the lights back on behind his eyes. I’d love to know the source of his happiness.
“Mr. Dobbs is accusing Mrs. Hawthorne of cutting his light cords.”
“Welp,” Jesse says with a half-grin, “It wouldn’t be Christmas without a little décor war, now would it?”
Jeanie’s laugh carries through the radio. “No. I guess it wouldn’t.”
Jesse and I stop at the Dobbs/Hawthorne houses. The cord looks chewed, not cut. We suspect either raccoons or mice.
“Doesn’t look clean enough to have been shears or scissors, Stuart.” Jesse says, crouching to inspect the cord.
“I told you I didn’t cut it!” Mrs. Hawthorne shouts. “If I wanted to sabotage you, I wouldn’t hide the fact.”
Mr. Dobbs makes a V of his pointer and middle fingers and moves it between his eyes and Mrs. Hawthorne. “I’ve got my eye on you, Grace.”
“You need a hobby,” she huffs.
The radio on Jesse’s belt crackles. He pushes the call button. “Hang on, Jeanie. We’re still here with Stuart and Grace. We’ll call you as soon as we’re in the patrol car.”
He turns to the two neighbors. “Are we good here?”
“Yes,” Mrs. Hawthorne says, her tone as petulant as a scolded child.
Stuart nods.
Jesse and I climb back into the cruiser and he calls Jeanie. “What’s going on?”
“Well, you won’t believe this, but we’ve got some more decorations up and vanishing. A wreath at the Oaklands’ and strings of lights from the Shmuckers’. Also, a snowman statue from out front of Mad River Burgers.
“Huh,” Jesse says, looking at me with a stumped expression. “We’ll make the rounds to follow up.”
We go to the two addresses, asking the residents to describe the lost items and when they went missing. Then we circle around to the burger place.
We’re driving past a cocoa stand some kids have set up in the town square when I spot Cooter.
Jesse’s driving at his usual snail’s pace.
Cooter ambles up to the cocoa stand, waits until the girls are occupied with a customer, grabs a cup of cocoa and slips away in the other direction.
One of the girls turns and sees him. She frowns, whispers to the other girl.
She shakes her head and then they both go back to serving the people lined up in front of them.
“Did you see that?” I ask Jesse.
“Cooter?”
“Yes. He stole a cup of cocoa. And the girls saw him. Should we stop him?”
Jesse sighs. “Cooter’s half town mascot, half walking cautionary tale. Everyone knows he’s mostly harmless. If he’s borrowing cocoa from a stand, we’ll probably let it slide.”
My mouth pops open.
“What?” Jesse asks.
He’s got a dimple. It’s distracting. I’ve got a thing for a man with dimples. His smile deepens, and the dimple has friends, those lines that bracket a man’s grin—I’m not sure what they're called. Dimplines? Whatever they are, Jesse’s got them and I’m having a hard time looking away.
“Alex?”
“Huh?”
“What is that look?”
“Oh. Uh. I can’t believe you’re letting this slide. You—Mister Misdemeanor. Letting Cooter steal cocoa in broad daylight slide.”
“I know. I know,” he shakes his head, still smiling. “But where certain people are concerned, I guess I have a soft spot.”
“And Cooter’s one of those people?”
“Yeah.” His face is etched with tenderness—a compassion that seems to almost embarrass him. “I guess he is.”
I don’t know why my ex comes to mind. No one got to slide with him. Marco wasn’t a villain. Just not soft-hearted—at all. Who knew how much it would touch me to see a man show mercy to the town drunk.
“You’re a good man, Jesse.” The words slip out before I can weigh them—but I want him to hear it, to believe it.
“I do my best,” he says, eyes fixed on the road, as if looking at me might make the words too real.
The car is quiet except for the hum of the heater, the low strains of Silent Night—and the roar of my thoughts which feel loud enough to be heard by both of us.
I didn’t come here to find a man attractive.
Or to be intrigued by his tender heart. I’m here to join a police force—to make my way as a woman in a male-dominated field.
When I look over at Jesse, humming along to the Christmas carol, his eyes soft and his grip on the steering wheel solid, something in me shifts—and I don’t quite know what it means.