Chapter Seventeen
When Mama had said that things happen for a reason, I was too young to know what she was talking about.
Before daylight on Saturday morning, I was so eager to get back to work that what she had said so long ago finally made sense.
I had needed to be away from the Tumbleweed for a few days to realize how much it meant to me.
Had I not practically lost my shirt, then I would have never found my new family.
“Good morning! Are we ready to get back into our routine?” I asked as I poured a cup of coffee.
“Thank you, Jesus!” Rosie said.
“Does that mean yes?”
“Absolutely,” she said. “The café hasn’t been closed this long since I’ve been here. The Good Book talks about everything in life having a time.”
I took a sip of my coffee. “What has all this been a time for?”
Could it be that the same snowstorm could have a different meaning for all of us?
“For me, it’s been a few days of getting to know you better—and realizing that you aren’t only a boss, but a friend.”
I set my mug on the bar and wrapped Rosie up in a fierce hug. “Thank you for that,” I said around the lump in my throat when I took a step back.
“There ain’t no reason to get all mushy,” she muttered.
Scarlett went straight to the coffeepot. “What are we talking about?”
I picked up my coffee and took another sip, but it didn’t completely get rid of the lump. “That basically, everything happens for a reason, and that Rosie just called me her friend.”
“I believe that with my whole heart,” Scarlett said.
“If all that with Billy hadn’t happened then, I wouldn’t be here.
I would have never met Grady and found out that there are good men in the world.
And these past few days when I couldn’t see him, except for his face on the phone screen, have taught me that I want to be with him forever. ”
One blizzard.
Three different meanings.
I wondered what Ada Lou and Nancy’s interpretations would be, and then a picture of Jackson flashed across my mind. Did he believe that things happened for a reason? Or did he think that everything was happenstance?
“Grady asked me to move in with him,” Scarlett blurted out.
“Are you going to?” Rosie asked.
“That would mean that I have to tell him about . . .” She inhaled deeply. “Couples committed enough to live together shouldn’t have secrets.”
“I figured you had done that a long time ago,” Rosie said.
“I tried, but the words wouldn’t come out of my mouth,” Scarlett said.
I slipped an arm around her and gave her a sideways hug. Women empowering women—that was what we were to each other.
“If it is laid on your heart to tell him about your past, then you won’t be happy until you do,” Rosie told her.
“Billy gets out of prison this spring. What if he finds me and hurts Grady?”
“None of us can worry about what-ifs,” Rosie said.
“He got five years for assault?” I asked.
“No, he only got a few months for that, but he got caught drunk driving with cocaine in his truck and an underage girl in the passenger seat,” Scarlett answered. “It wasn’t his first time to stand before the judge for driving under the influence.”
“I don’t mind spending my last days in jail,” Rosie said with enough conviction in her voice to make me shiver.
“What does that mean?”
“Before I would let him hurt you, I would work him over with a ball bat myself,” she answered without blinking an eye. “Ilene sent me the pictures of you in the hospital. God would not lay that sin to my charge.”
“That all happened before you were Scarlett,” I assured her. “Just promise me that if you do move in with Grady that you won’t quit working at the Tumbleweed.”
“I promise. Now, let’s go to work and get our minds on something else.”
I could handle Scarlett moving out of the trailer, but I sure hoped that Rosalie wouldn’t decide to become a nun. Was there such a thing as a part-time holy woman? If she did feel the call from God to join the church in that capacity, could she work at the café and be a nun in the evenings?
Excitement—right along with the aroma of good food—filled the Tumbleweed that morning when the first bus pulled into the parking lot.
The worst lot of tired, frazzled customers we’d had since I arrived at the Tumbleweed straggled through the door.
There were no big smiles about winning money in Vegas.
Even the children were too tired to whine.
“Clara, darlin’, I’m so sorry . . .” a masculine voice that sounded a lot like Frank said.
When I heard my poker name, I came close to dropping the tray of coffee cups I was holding.
I whipped around to find an older couple sitting side by side in a booth.
The woman patted him on the shoulder and said, “It’s all right, Vincent.
A few sore muscles and bones from getting stuck in a bus stop are worth the memories that we made on this trip. ”
I set two cups on the table. “Do I hear a story?”
“Yes, you do.” This particular Clara looked up at me with unshed tears in her eyes. “My arthritic knees and back are aching from trying to sleep in a chair. If there had been room on the floor, I would have stretched out there even if it made for a hard bed.”
“But it was wall-to-wall people,” Vincent explained. “The place reminded me of the POW camp in Vietnam. But we survived, and we will be home this afternoon in Pecos. We won’t even unpack until later because our recliners are calling our names.”
“A hot shower and then my recliner,” Clara said. “And our kids and grandchildren that all live in Las Vegas are going to come see us from now on. We won’t be traveling more than a hundred miles in any direction again.”
“I’m so sorry,” I told them. “Can I start you off with a cup of hot coffee? On the house.”
“That would be great,” Vincent said.
“Coming right up—and thank you for your service, sir.”
He smiled and nodded.
I headed for the bar to pick up a full pot of coffee and whispered to Scarlett, “The couple at booth number eight are not paying for their breakfast. Take it out of my tip money or else just tear up the ticket.”
“You act more like Matilda every day you are here,” Scarlett said with a smile. “We’ll tear up the ticket, but why that one?”
“He’s a POW from the Vietnam era, and her name is Clara, and they had to sleep in chairs, and they haven’t even had a shower, and . . .” I paused to catch my breath.
“Enough said. They are eating on the house today,” Scarlett said. “You can tell me later why you reacted to that name—Clara, was it?”
“Yes, and how did you—”
“You turned a little pale. Was that your mother’s name?”
“No, but we’ll talk about that later.” Change was all I’d ever known. Stability was not ever mine to have. But something made me yearn for the past when I heard that name.
I carried the pot over to Clara and Vincent’s table and poured two cups full, took their order, and hung it on the carousel.
Then I made my way back through the rest of the dining room, taking drink orders first. Scarlett finished waiting on the bar and then helped with the booths, running back and forth between her own customers and what was supposed to be mine.
When the bus finally reloaded and pulled away, I could commiserate with Clara when it came to aching bones. Scarlett and I went straight to the kitchen and slumped down into chairs.
Rosie set a plate of hot biscuits in the middle of the table. “Has a couple of days away from work made y’all soft?”
I split a biscuit in half, slathered both sides with butter, and reached for the jar of honey. “Yes, it has, but one or two of these will perk me right up.”
Before I even took a bite, the phone—a landline that hung on the wall across the room—rang, and Rosalie hurried over to answer it. “Tumbleweed,” she said, and listened for a minute, then told whoever was on the other end that Matilda had passed away.
She said yes a couple of times and turned to motion to me. “You are the boss, so you need to talk to Ilene.”
“Who is Ilene?” I asked Scarlett.
“Go talk to her. Someone must be needing help,” she answered.
“He . . . llo?” I answered cautiously when Rosie handed the receiver to me. I hadn’t used a phone like that since my grandparents were alive, and started to walk away before I realized the cord only went so far.
“This is Ilene Wilder,” the woman on the other end of the line said, “and I understand you are the new boss at the Tumbleweed.”
“Yes, ma’am, that’s right,” I answered.
“I supervise several women’s shelters, and I’m the one that helped Rosalie and Scarlett relocate to your area.
I have another young woman in bad need of help, and it is very necessary that she gets far away.
Her name is Tressa. She is twenty-two years old, and she has no job skills to speak of, but she is a fast learner. Are you willing to take her?”
“Can you give me an hour to think about it and then call me back?” I asked. “Before I say yes, I’d like to talk to Rosie and get her advice.”
“Rosalie must respect you if she lets you call her Rosie,” Ilene said. “I will call you tomorrow unless you make up your mind earlier and get in touch with me.” She clicked off.
Before I could say a word, Scarlett squealed and got up so quickly that she knocked her chair over backward.
She raced across the kitchen toward a tall, thin guy standing with his arms open wide.
He picked her up and swung her around a couple of times before bending her over in a true Hollywood kiss.
“What are you doing here?” she panted when he set her down.
“I couldn’t wait until this afternoon to tell you the news.
That house that you have admired in Dell City is going up for sale tomorrow.
I’ll write a check for the down payment if you’ll move in with me.
We can look at it this afternoon when you get off work.
I was so happy that I had to drive down here and tell you.
I’ve got to go”—he gave her another kiss—“but . . .”