Chapter Sixteen #2
The products your family makes are exceptional. I love using them, and enjoy giving them as gifts. In my opinion, they deserve a better showcase.
I’ve attached my idea for the design of your home page. It’s just the look I envision. This is something you could absolutely do yourself—the photos, the dreamier colors, the clearer font. You’re welcome to take this idea and run with it.
However, what I don’t think you can do is improve the bones of your website, the setup, the speed, the need to have it work smoothly on mobile devices. I can offer you that service, and improve your social media exposure.
I don’t want to overwhelm you, but I’d also suggest a logo design with consistency, that illustrates the creativity and care behind your products.
Please let me know if you have any interest, and I’d be happy to work up a proposal. Take all the time you need to discuss with your family.
Consider the attached a thank-you for introducing me to Bayside Lotions and Potions products.
All the best,
Sonya MacTavish
She sent it off, with attachment, and decided to take her break.
She found Cleo in the kitchen filling her water bottle.
“I’m about to head out. I’m going to stop by Bay Arts, then go over to Gull Lane. I want to do a painting of the old school.”
“Well, that’s a brilliant idea. And maybe include it in your show next month.”
“Maybe, but I think we’re mostly set there.”
“I’m pretty damn excited.”
“So am I. A fun start to autumn for me.” Pausing, she sipped some of her drink. “I’m going to miss packing up my art supplies and going wherever I want to paint any day I want to. Sabbatical’s about over.”
“Cleo, you know if that’s what you want, that’s what you should do.”
“I do know. But I love my day job. In fact, I got two offers. One I’m definitely taking, the other … I think I’m done thinking about it, and want that, too. Maybe.”
“Well, tell.”
“The author of Burt Springer’s granddaughter’s favorite book.”
“Jessie’s Best Day. I remember.”
“I did two others for her, and she wants me for the next. I wouldn’t start for a couple weeks, as she’s still tweaking the text. Obviously, I don’t want anyone else illustrating it.”
“That’s great. What’s the other?”
“Different for me, so I really wanted to think it through. I knew what you’d think.”
Sonya laughed. “Tell me what I’d think.”
“You read Jonah T. Long.”
“I do, as do millions of others. He’s great. Terrifying and great. I’ve never talked you into trying one of his.”
“Because terrifying. He’s doing a YA.”
“Really? Different for him, too.”
“I guess. It’ll be a three-book series. A trilogy. He wants chapter illustrations. Twenty chapters, twenty illustrations, plus an illustrated frontispiece, possibly a The End for Now sort of thing, and a cover design.
“He wants me.”
“Holy crap, Cleopatra! This is huge!” On a squeal, Sonya shot both hands into the air, shook them. “It’s monumental! You have to do it!”
“That’s what I knew you’d say.”
“Because you have to!” Grabbing Cleo’s arms, she bounced. Because Yoda bounced with her, she laughed and let him out.
“Jonah T. Long’s a perennial bestseller for a reason. He’s had his books adapted into acclaimed films for a reason.”
“So you’ve told me. Often. They’re sending me the manuscript.”
“Oh, oh, you have to let me read it. I swear I’ll buy the book, but I have to read it.”
“The thing is, to take the job, do the job, I have to read it. And draw suitably creepy things. Which I’ve never done. For a reason.”
“But you could, and you know it. You’d crush it! Jonah T. Long wants you, Cleopatra Fabares! So obviously, he’s seen and admired your work.”
The enthusiasm was infectious, no question about it. Cleo only worried that infection would turn out to be a debilitating virus.
“My first thought was to have you read it, then tell me what I need to draw.”
“You know it can’t work that way. But I’m reading it!”
“I know it can’t work that way, and hell, I’m taking the job anyway.”
“Yay!” Sonya caught Cleo’s face in her hand, tipped it right and left. “Cleo, you live in a house haunted by many, including the insane. You can’t be scared of a book.”
“Can, too. And you haven’t read one of your horror novels in months.”
“I know. But I’m going to read this one.”
She grabbed Cleo again, hugged her, bounced.
“This is huge for you! It’s going to be amazing.”
“We’ll find out. I have to go and grab what’s left of the summer. And text my agent.”
“Yay!” Sonya said again, then danced around the kitchen when Cleo left.
While Cleo crammed as much summer as possible into the end of smoldering August, Sonya pushed more work into her days to give herself blocks of time for her search. If nothing else came of it, she felt she honored her inheritance, the manor, her father’s family history.
She carved out time to create a design for the Gold Room. Or what would be, when she claimed it, the family and friends gallery.
Twice she drove to Portland—and indulged herself by taking photos of the Ryder billboards with her design. With Burt Springer, she toured the Ryder building, donned a hard hat to walk through portions still under construction.
It took a week, and Sonya assumed some family wrangling, before Carrie of Bayside Lotions and Potions agreed to a revamped website, brochures, and new business cards.
Sonya considered it a victory for herself, and for young Hogan.
At the end of a workday, Cleo came to the library.
“Son, it’s date night.”
“I know. I’m just finishing up.”
Turning, Cleo studied the mood board for the newest client.
“It’s really pretty. I like the way you’re playing up the natural magic, organic ingredients, family enterprise.”
“Carrie’s on board, but not a hundred percent.”
“She will be by the time you’re finished.”
“That’s the goal. And … Done till Monday.”
She shut down so they walked through the hallway together, cat and dog in tow.
“Dinner at the Lobster Cage, a little local music at the village joint after.”
Cleo paused at her room. “The high life in Poole’s Bay. Ballroom work Saturday, and a Sunday sail.”
“My kind of weekend.”
Sonya continued to her room to find Molly had chosen a blue dress and added a short white jacket, as the nights already tended cooler.
“I like it. It’s been a busy couple of weeks.” She cast her gaze up, thought: And quiet, too. “It’ll be nice to have an evening out.”
She walked to the balcony doors first, threw them open. Looking out at the sea, she considered she’d been here now for six months, double the three-month trial she’d given herself when she’d driven to the manor for the first time.
Over six months since she’d taken that chance—on board, she thought, but not a hundred percent.
Until she’d seen the manor. Met Trey. And ended up losing her heart to both.
“You used to rearrange the bottles on the dresser, Molly. It unnerved me.” She breathed in the sea air. “I want you to pick your favorite. Pick the one you like best, and it’s yours. I want you to take it, have it. Sort of a belated half-year anniversary gift.”
Guns N’ Roses played “Sweet Child o’ Mine.”
“We’re all in this together, Clover. And we’re going to win this together.”
She went in to shower, then spent time trying to duplicate the casual waves the stylist had given her at her last appointment.
Decided, close enough.
When she came out, the blue bottle with its little butterfly cap was missing. Six months before, she thought again as she dressed, that would have unnerved her.
Now it warmed her inside and out.
She took one more look at the sea, then shut the doors before she walked down to Cleo’s room.
Cleo wore sizzling red with her strapped, mile-high heeled sandals.
“We look good,” Cleo decided. “Make that good and hot.”
“Well, really, we can’t help it.”
“So true.”
Cleo picked up her tiny excuse for a purse, they linked arms and started down.
“I gave Molly the blue bottle with the butterfly.”
“Aw.”
“It made me wonder where she’d keep something like that. Or the hair combs you gave her last week. Another timeline? Some tucked-away place?”
“Now, that’s a question.”
“I hope she doesn’t stay in that room. The room where she died. But I guess they don’t stay anywhere really. Part of it, at least part of it’s a loop for them, like it is for Dobbs. And will that loop stop when we break the curse?”
“I hope the sad and painful parts will. And, Son, we’re easing some of that just by being here. We brought life here, and purpose and hope.”
“That’s not just a good way to think of it, it’s the right way.”
Yoda raced to the door, spun a circle, barked.
“I think our dates are here. And the playmates.”
Mookie barreled in, and with Yoda immediately rolled into a mock fight. Jones strutted in, gave them a superior look with his good eye.
“That’s a sight a man’s grateful to see on a Friday night.”
Sonya angled her head. “Playful dogs?”
“Beautiful women.” Trey scooped her up for a kiss.
Cleo pulled Owen to her with a fistful of his shirt. “These two women are ready for a good meal and some potentially above average music to follow.”
“We got Question Mark. That’s the band,” Owen explained. “Question Mark.”
“I’m sure they’ll do.”
“I’m tonight’s DD, so I have to listen to them without the benefit of beer.”
“You’ll get through it.” Amused, Cleo took his hand.
“All right, Jack, you’re in charge.”
Also amused, Trey took Sonya’s. “Really?”
“He’s very responsible,” she said as they walked out to Owen’s truck. She glanced back, saw the shadow move by the library window. “They all are.”
She settled in the back with Trey. “The days are getting shorter, the nights a little cooler. I might be sorry to see summer end, but I’m looking forward to seeing Poole’s Bay in the fall.”
“She puts on a show,” Trey told her.
“I’ll have weekends to paint that,” Cleo put in. “A reward for going back into work mode. And a respite with color and beauty as opposed to the dark and creepy.”
“It’s a terrific book. Scared the crap out of me. And it has a lot of heart.”