6. A Big Deal
6
A BIG DEAL
Mara
Rain pounded the pavement, an unwelcome constant these past few weeks. The dismal weather had tanked my store’s revenue, and I felt the sting in my gut as I settled behind the counter.
I knew I should be using my downtime more productively than sulking, like tackling the depressing balance sheet. With the store’s sales slipping, I needed to find a way to turn things around, or risk becoming another failed-business statistic. Perhaps another Magic the Gathering event at Dante and Conner’s restaurant would do the trick.
The chime of the front door interrupted my thoughts, and a glimmer of hope flickered within me. Maybe a customer had finally decided to buy out my entire inventory. It wasn’t entirely impossible.
But the person who stepped through the door wasn’t a customer. Courtney breezed in, looking as crisp as ever in a tailored suit and polka-dot rain boots, like the rain hadn't dared touch her.”
“Welcome, chica ,” I said, springing up from my stool to give her a hug. I relieved her of her wet umbrella and placed it in the stand. “You don’t come to my store as often as you used to.”
“I know, sorry about that. Now that I’m the lead researcher for my team, I don’t have much free time.”
“Damn, Courtney. You’ll cure cancer by next Thursday at this rate.”
Courtney smiled. “Wouldn’t that be amazing? In the meantime, I’ll read that graphic novel for this month’s book club.”
“ Watchmen !” I exclaimed, excitedly leading her through the rows of shelves. “It’s still pretty popular, even though it came out back in the eighties.” I handed her a copy. “It’s a classic.”
“It looks interesting,” Courtney said, examining the cover. “It’s one I’ve been meaning to read.”
I guided her back to the front of the store and positioned myself behind the counter. “You won’t be disappointed.” I glanced at the clock. “You’re usually at work this time of day. What brings you around?”
“I had my monthly lunch with Kincaid at In Vino Veritas, so I thought I’d stop by before heading back to work.”
“How’s he doing?” I inquired.
“You know my brother. Busy, busy. He says he met with that movie director you mentioned, Ford Ross—“ Courtney paused, watching me closely as if to gauge my reaction. “—and the guy hired him to do some painting and minor repairs to a house he owns here in town.”
“For realz? Good for your bro. His construction biz is really kickin’ it.” Butterflies took off in my stomach at the mention of Ford Ross staying in Sewickley, though I tried to suppress my curiosity. After all, Hollywood guys didn’t stick around small towns, right? “How long do you think Ford Ross plans to stick around?”
Courtney’s lips curled into a satisfied smile. “Hard to say. According to Kincaid, Ford usually rents out his house, but it’s empty right now. Apparently, he plans to live there for the next few weeks instead of with his family. I feel sorry for the guy. Can you imagine having to live in your sister’s guest room?”
I cringed at the thought. “There’s no way I could ever live with anyone in my family again. I’d rather sleep in my car. Dad would drive me right over the edge with his constant sniping.”
“I need my own space where I can unwind at the end of a long day.” Courtney placed her copy of Watchmen on the countertop.
I scanned the barcode. “By the way, book club members get a ten percent discount.”
“Thanks, Mara, but you don’t have to do that.” Courtney waved away my offer, using a Jedi mind trick like Obi-Wan-Kenobi.
“What’s the point of owning a store if you can’t help out your peeps?” I put her purchase in a bag since it was still pouring outside.
“Thanks,” Courtney said, grabbing her umbrella from the stand. “I gotta bounce. I have a meeting in half an hour.”
Back at my computer, I once again stared at my balance sheet, but I wasn’t in the mood to deal with it right now.
Giving in to a moment of weakness, I clicked away from my spreadsheet and opened my browser. One quick search, and there it was— Here’s the Scoop , Rose’s favorite trash rag, gleaming with pictures of Ford and an array of stunning women on his arm.
Rose was right. In every single photo, Ford stood arm-in-arm with a different stunning woman. The two things all his dates had in common were their extreme beauty and their gorgeous dresses.
Oh... and Ford. Make that three things.
I felt like the website had just taken a wiki-leak all over me.
My phone rang, pulling me from my downward spiral. Dad. Of course. The dollop of poo icing on this perfectly craptastic day.
“Hi, Dad. What’s up?” I said cheerfully. Might as well start out that way, because we’d only go downhill from here.
The door chime jingled as the mail carrier pushed inside. She handed me a rubber-banded bundle and then picked up the outgoing mail before leaving with a distracted wave.
“Hey, pumpkin,” Dad’s voice boomed. “How are things?”
Maybe Dad would be nice for a change—I could hope.
While I was at it, I might as well buy a lottery ticket and dream big.
“Things are good. The store is quiet right now since it’s raining, but I’ll have to ring off if someone shows up.”
The stack of bills and junk mail included a larger envelope hand-addressed to me—Marilyn Stellar.
Curious, I ripped it open and upended it, spilling the contents on the counter, and a glossy magazine with a yellow post-it note on the cover slid out.
“I’m sure your customers could manage without having you breathing down their necks.”
I bit off the retort that sprang to my lips as I flattened my palm against the magazine.
Don’t react. Dad’s trying to get under your skin. Don’t react. Don’t react.
Oh, what the hell.
React.
“Seriously, Dad? Are you suggesting that I should ignore my customers? Is that what you do when your patients come to your office? Ignore them?”
“It’s hardly the same thing. I’m a doctor. My patients come to see me. Your customers come to see your stock. You’re entirely replaceable.”
Replaceable, huh? Funny how I’d managed to run this place just fine without his sage wisdom. I looked around my pristine, well-organized shop showcasing comic books and graphic novels. My favorite Wonder Woman poster with its “be the hero of your own life” quote hung on the wall, and the remaining limited-edition figurines were proudly displayed in the small but alluring window exhibit. Rage coursed through me. “Thanks for the vote of confidence. I was foolish to think I brought anything distinctive to this place. You’re brutally honest, I’ll give you that.”
“Sorry, pumpkin, but I’m just telling it like it is.”
“There’s a difference between being truthful and being mean. Chance and I always dreamed of opening this store together. I wish you’d stop trashing it.”
“That shop was your brother’s dream, not yours.”
Dad’s comment hit like a physical slap to the face. I closed my eyes as I caught my breath.“You know that’s not true. Chance and I were working together to open this store.” Though in truth, my role was limited to behind-the-scenes tasks such as orders and taxes, while Chance planned to oversee the day-to-day operations.
When I opened my eyes and looked down at my countertop, the face on the magazine cover in front of me finally registered. I stopped breathing. I knew those brown eyes. That dark skin and broad, endearing smile. I peeled the post-it off the photo to reveal Destiny, my former roommate and business partner, smiling at me from the cover of Boston Business like she had the world by the tail.
Destiny Woodworth in negotiations to sell Stel-Wood Game Studios.
I inhaled sharply. She’d actually done it. She’d become the hero of her own life. Something inside my chest seemed to deflate, like a flattened whoopee cushion that had just farted, a mix of pride and jealousy bubbling up in equal measure. Destiny had made it. Without me.
“What about the career you invested in?” Dad asked. “The one making video games? How could you let yourself get sidetracked? Seriously, Mara. You need to stop being so stubborn. I might not play video games, but even I could recognize the creativity of the game you and Destiny were developing. I can’t believe you gave up on your own company for Chance’s half-baked idea.”
My heart clenched, and I suddenly had trouble breathing. Here it was... proof that I was a screw up, just like Dad always said. Was his timing impeccable, or what? Did he already know Destiny was working on a deal to sell Stel-Wood? But no. Definitely not. He would have led with that rather than dancing around it.
What would my life have been like if I hadn’t turned my back on everything Destiny and I had built? Would we even be considering selling our nascent company? I paused for an instant. Stel-Wood wasn’t our baby anymore. When a personal crisis had hit, I had abandoned it.
Nothing about our company had turned out the way we’d planned. Certainly not for me. Not for Destiny either, I was sure of it since she was about to sell. But what other decision could I have made? “I didn’t have the heart for it anymore. Not after…”
Dad only let the silence linger for an instant. “After Chance was killed?” His bald statement sliced into me.
Even a year later, those words still hit with the force of a physical blow. Right now, I just wanted to hurl the phone across the room to silence him. I tightened my grip as I resisted the impulse. “Exactly. I know you didn’t approve of his career choices, but you could have been more supportive when he was still here. Hell, you could have?—”
“He was my son, Mara,” Dad interrupted, his tone harsh. “I know he was your twin. I know you were close. But sometimes you act like you’re the only person in this family grieving.”
There it was. According to him, I was wrong, and he was right... again. The last thing I wanted to do was listen to my father wrap himself in some contrived shroud of grief when no one understood what losing Chance meant more than I did. What the world had lost without him in it.
Dad’s disdain for Chance’s hopes and dreams had wounded him. Dad knew precisely how to undermine a person. He’d applied his well-chosen words with surgical precision, and he’d readily sliced into both me and Chance—into my other siblings too, but not as often.
Dad may be on board with my video game company now, but that wasn’t always the case. He used to mock my career choices when Destiny and I were struggling to find investors for our game, yet he berated me for selling it to open Ghost of a Chance. No matter what I did, it was always wrong in his eyes.
“You should have been a supportive father while Chance was still alive?—”
“Do we have to go through this again?” Dad snapped. “I thought an art degree was a waste of money. I wanted him to choose a career where he could support himself. Is that a crime?”
“Seems like you’ve changed your mind since then. You didn’t mind sending Rachael and Aubrey off to chase their dreams on stage,” I said, frustrated at the unfairness of it all. He hadn’t stood in the way of my younger sisters when they pursued careers in acting and dance. That still bothered me. I didn’t resent them, I just wished Dad had been more supportive much sooner. “You’re a hypocrite.”
“I may be old and stubborn, but I can learn from my mistakes. Besides, your sisters are extremely talented.”
“ Chance was extremely talented!” I shouted back at him. “Are you saying he wasn’t?” Did my father purposely try to infuriate me this way? Because he was damn good at it. “Never mind. Forget I asked. I don’t want to hear your answer. At least you’re finally admitting you treated him badly.”
“I admit to treating each of my children exactly the way I think they need to be treated. Sometimes one of them needs a kick in the pants,” he said, clearly irritated. I could hear that sentence echoing in my head as I curled up, despising how my father’s words could still make me feel like I wasn’t good enough, as though I wasn’t trying hard enough. At least I’d managed to strike back this time. I just wished I could do it more often. “I still think he needed to be pushed. Your brother always performed better when he faced a challenge.”
Typical. Dad always thrived on making each of us kids do whatever it was he wanted us to, even if it meant manipulating us. Like that time he’d had me transferred into a different classroom in fifth grade “for my own good.” I found out later he’d wanted to separate me from my best friend Tina, who he’d deemed a distraction. Then, there was that time when I was a junior in high school and Dad called the police on my eighteen-year-old boyfriend when we crossed the state border to attend a concert. The guy had broken up with me over that fiasco. He’d said I “wasn’t worth the potential jail time.” Not that I blamed him. At least Dad had dropped the charges after that.
I dropped my head onto my folded arms. I was tired. So tired. Tired of fighting with Dad. Tired of trying to make this store a success. But mostly, I was tired of missing Chance.
Couldn’t life be easier? If only a little bit? Maybe this was my fault, too. Did I really need to argue with my father every single time we talked? Chance had always been the one to go toe-to-toe with him, often defending me. Without him around, I was forced to take care of myself. I had to admit, it was my own fault as much as Dad’s when we got into it. I should know better than to confront him. The man almost never backed down.
Trying to lighten the mood, I forced myself to sound cheerful. “Or maybe Rachael and Aubrey finally wore you down. I’ve heard the youngest kids have an advantage. By the time they come along, the parents have already been broken in.”
“You and your brothers certainly did a number on me,” he replied, his voice laced with irritation. A long silence followed before he spoke again. “You know, Marilyn, it’s not too late for you to reconnect with Destiny and ask her to take you back. You could follow your own dreams instead of Chance’s. Your mom and I would be happy to offer whatever financial support you need to buy back into Stel-Wood.”
It was like a gut punch. My breath caught, and tears stung my eyes. A hollow feeling settled in my stomach. He had never made such a generous offer before. Why now? And why did he have to pair any kindness with a subtle insult?
I stashed Boston Business underneath a pile of comic books on the countertop as quickly as I pushed aside my father’s alluring suggestion, then I stilled. “Is that why you called today? To convince me I gave up on my own dreams? That ship has sailed. I own Ghost of a Chance now. I’m happy. You need to let it go.” I could never forgive myself if I let this store die. Why couldn’t Dad understand that? Why didn’t he ever actually listen to me?
“Don’t turn me down immediately. Think about it for a while and we can revisit it. You might believe you’re content owning that store, but I know better. You’re unhappy. Listen, I’m pulling into the hospital parking garage, so I’ll lose the cell signal. I’ll call you later so we can discuss this further, pumpkin. Maybe you can?—”
The call disconnected.
I groaned in frustration and stuffed my phone into the back pocket of my jeans. Dad drove me insane.
I grabbed the Boston Business magazine back out from under the stack of comics. A small rectangle of paper came out with it and fluttered to the floor.
I picked it up.
Ford’s business card. I’d placed it here the other night after book club, and I must have put that stack of comics on top of it. Great—yet another unresolved issue. I didn’t want Ford to distract me, so I set his card on the counter.
I returned to the magazine and flipped to the article about Destiny. According to it, two major video game companies were competing to acquire Stel-Wood Game Studios, which was precisely what she and I had always envisioned. I sometimes missed those days of cranking out new code and guzzling coffee while trying to meet a deadline. It had been intense work, but I had found my niche in the world. I had adored my work. Our goal had been to release our kickass creation and use the revenue to develop our next fantastic game. Then... well, after that, the sky was the limit. At present, my sky felt like a suffocating bubble determined to suffocate me and quash every dream I had ever had. I feared that my brother’s dream would be the ultimate casualty.
Befuddled and frustrated, I let out a heavy sigh. In my present sour mood, I might as well go back to figuring out how to rescue my store. I inserted Ford’s business card inside Destiny’s magazine to keep my place and put it aside. Back at my computer, those images of Ford and his slew of actresses confronted me. The man was dangerously alluring, and the women he dated were stunning. Scratch that—they were smokin’ hot. My gaze drifted to the magazine, only to have my eye snag on Ford’s business card protruding from the top.
Ford. I couldn’t get away from him today. My chest tightened as I recalled his smile. The way it lit up his entire face did something to my insides—as did his amazing body. A wave of heat ran through me, heading directly to my sexy parts.
Shut that down, girl.
Ford might be sex on a stick, but getting involved with him was a terrible idea. He didn’t plan to stay in town for long, and I wasn’t interested in a casual relationship.
I glanced at that Wonder Woman poster behind my register. Ford had said I resembled her. A smile tugged at the corners of my mouth, then I read the caption again about being the hero of your own life. My smile fell, and I looked away. I should play it safe. Be smart. That fiasco with Doug had sent me scampering far from the dating scene. If I decided to try going out again—a big if—it certainly wouldn’t be with a player like Ford—plus he wasn’t planning to stay.
I didn’t need another relationship filled with potholes in my life. I already got enough turmoil from Dad, thank you very much.
My self-confidence had been shattered. Would I ever regain it?
Could Dad be right?
That thought brought me up short. Dad’s not-so-subtle digs were insidious. Doug’s had been too. I needed to figure out how to protect myself from his negativity without Chance’s help because I was failing at it.
I chucked Boston Business and the makeshift bookmark of Ford’s business card in the trashcan under my counter. But I couldn’t throw away the article about Destiny and Stel-Wood. I was proud of what we’d accomplished, even if that pride was tinged with regret.
I pulled the magazine from the waste bin. A piece of chewing gum stuck to Destiny’s smooth, brown forehead, and I used a tissue to gently peel it away.
I couldn’t trash the magazine, but I didn’t want to obsess over it either.
With determination, I strode into my storage room and headed for a high shelf where I’d placed a box of comic-book-related mementos. I had to take out my stair-stepper to reach it. Being short was frustrating. Chase wouldn’t have had this problem. I missed him being so tall and reaching the upper shelf in a cabinet.
I opened the box, ready to slip the magazine inside, and my gaze lingered on the stack of early panels Chance had inked for Ghost before switching to digital tools. I paused, feeling a little unsteady on the stair climber.
Tears pricked the backs of my eyes, and my heart pounded too hard. I touched the plastic sleeves protecting the panels, but then snatched my hand away as though I’d been burned.
I needed to keep a lid on that chapter of my life, or my grief and regret would overwhelm me. Sometimes, I felt as though I was holding onto this new life I’d forced into existence by a thin thread that could break at any moment. Where would I end up if I fell?
I placed the magazine in the box and snapped the lid shut.
As I settled back at my computer at the front of the store, I turned the screen back on and was immediately confronted by photos of Ford from “Here’s the Scoop.” There was something about his eyes that I couldn’t seem to ignore. Even now, when I looked at them, I felt that snap of connection.
Rain pattered against the sidewalk outside, but the shop was silent, a vast change from two days ago when Ford had ducked in here. I hadn’t had such a great conversation with anyone but him in ages. I hadn’t felt this kind of connection with anyone in ages. But was it even real, or just another storm waiting to roll in?