Chapter 51 Hope
hope
I was adding shadows to the mural in the back room of the coffee shop when the black plastic drape covering the doorway moved aside and a female voice squealed, “Oh my gosh—this is amazing!”
I looked up to see Freret standing in the doorway separating the main coffee shop from the new addition, bouncing on her ballet flats.
“Shhh,” Kirsten said. She was standing on a ladder, hanging photos on the opposite wall. “What are you doing back here anyway? You’re not supposed to see it until the surprise party.”
“It’s not my surprise party. It’s Miss Addie’s,” Freret said, walking into the room and staring at the mural. “Which I’m not sure is a good idea anyway, given her age. A surprise like this might kill her.”
I’d worried about the same thing. “I checked with her doctor, and he said she should be perfectly fine,” I said. “Besides, he’ll be here.”
“I want the unveiling to be a surprise for the whole town,” Kirsten said.
“News flash: since the whole town is donating pictures, they already know. Here are mine, by the way.” Freret handed Kirsten a stack of photos and stared at the mural. “Hope, you’ve done an incredible job!”
“Thanks.” I still had some spots to fix, but I was pretty proud of the way it had turned out.
“Hope is astounding. Look at the pen-and-ink of her grandmother’s house she did as a going-away present for Miss Addie.” Kirsten held up a five-by-seven I’d sketched from one of Gran’s photos.
“Oh, that is so gorgeous! I’d love to have one of my parents’ house to give them for their fiftieth wedding anniversary. Could you do that?”
“Sure,” I said. “Just give me a photo of it.”
“Really?” Her face brightened. “You know, I can think of about a dozen people that would pay top dollar for house sketches. You could make a whole career out of doing this. Are you sure you don’t want to change your mind and stay in Wedding Tree?”
“Actually, I’d love to.” The answer surprised me as I heard it come out of my mouth. “I love it here. But this job—well, another one like it is unlikely to come around.”
“Excuse me for saying so, but men like Matt don’t come around every day, either,” Freret said.
The mention of Matt made my heart flutter. “Things aren’t like that between us.”
“I’ve heard reports from Mrs. Ivy that say otherwise,” Freret said.
Kirsten snickered.
“You know what I mean,” I said.
“No,” Kirsten said. “We don’t.”
“It’s a short-term thing. It’s not forever after.”
“If you hung around, it might be,” Freret said.
“Well, I can’t blow off one of the best jobs in the art world for something that may or may not happen with a man who may or may not be over his late wife.”
Freret’s eyebrows rose. “So Christine’s the issue?”
“Not the issue, but I guess she’s an issue,” I said. “The biggest issue is that I have a great new job in Chicago.”
The bell over the front door rang. Kirsten stepped down from the ladder. “Well, my issue right now is tending to the customer who just walked in.”
“And I need to get back to the bank,” Freret said.
“Thanks for dropping off those photos,” Kirsten said.
I drew a breath of relief when they left. But the mention of a future—or was it the lack of one?—with Matt left me restless and unsettled.