Chapter 22 #2
But even as she spoke, Rascal was discovering yet another treasure—this time a catnip-filled banana-shaped toy that had her on her back, kicking it up into the air and purring madly.
The kitten was clearly having the time of her life, but Mabel was beginning to feel like she was losing control of her own store.
Elaine gathered up her grandson with good-natured understanding. “I think we’ll try again tomorrow, dear. You have your hands full today.”
As soon as the door closed behind them, Mabel turned to Vanessa, who was standing behind the counter with an expression that looked like she was trying very hard not to laugh.
“Do you have any idea what’s going on?” Mabel demanded, and Vanessa shook her head, pressing one hand to her mouth as her mouth twitched with that barely controlled laughter.
“No,” she promised. “But I feel like George might have something to do with it.”
Mabel narrowed her eyes, looking around the shop and taking note of the strategically placed toys, the way they seemed to be hidden in spots that Rascal would gravitate toward. Behind the board games, under the counter, tucked among the stuffed animals—it was all too deliberate to be coincidence.
“That sneaky, scheming…” Mabel started, but she found herself smiling instead of finishing the accusation.
She knelt down and began investigating, finding toy after toy hidden throughout the store.
Another catnip mouse behind the register.
A set of crinkly balls near the window display.
A small pizza-shaped squeaking toy. In the back corner, she found some sort of electronic toy that looked like it would move on its own once activated.
Mabel picked it up and shook her head in amazement. George had really gone all out.
“He pranked me,” she said aloud, and then she started to laugh. Really laugh, the kind of full-bodied laughter that came from genuine surprise and delight. “George Lowery actually pranked me.” She shook her head. “I can’t believe it. I always prank first.”
“From the look on your face, I’d say it was a pretty successful prank,” Vanessa observed, pressing her lips together against a grin. “You should definitely go yell at him about it.”
Mabel scooped up Rascal, who was now thoroughly exhausted from her toy-fueled adventure, and cradled the kitten against her chest. “Oh, it was more than successful. It was perfect.”
She handed the drowsy kitten to Vanessa and grabbed her coat. “Can you watch the store for a few more minutes? I need to go thank someone for his generosity.”
Vanessa took the kitten, her shoulders shaking with laughter. “Absolutely.”
Mabel drove straight to the Christmas tree farm with single-minded purpose.
She wasn’t even the slightest bit angry.
In fact, what she felt was even more than just surprise and delight.
It was affection too, and something that felt dangerously stronger than that, something that made her want to see George Lowery, right that minute, more than anything else in the world.
George had pranked her. Grumpy, practical, methodical George Lowery had bought an entire arsenal of cat toys and hidden them throughout her store just to make her laugh.
She found him putting the finishing touches on the gazebo he’d been building, hammering a sign at the very top of it.
“George Lowery,” she called out, putting her hands on her hips in mock indignation. “What exactly did you think you were doing?”
He turned around on the short ladder, leaning against it as he looked at her. “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he said, but there was a telltale twitch at the corner of his mouth that gave him away.
“Oh, really?” Mabel stepped closer, enjoying the way his eyes crinkled slightly when he was trying not to smile.
“So you know nothing about the sudden appearance of approximately fifteen cat toys in my store? Nothing about the fact that Rascal just single-handedly destroyed my professional composure in front of Elaine Adams?”
“Fifteen?” George looked genuinely surprised. “I didn’t think I bought that many.”
“Aha!” Mabel pointed an accusatory finger at him. “So you admit it!”
George’s mouth twitched again, and he started to laugh—that rusty, unused sound that she’d only just realized she was beginning to love. “Alright, you got me. I may have gone a little overboard with the cat toys.”
“A little overboard?” Mabel shook her head, but she was grinning now. “George, you turned my respectable toy store into a feline amusement park. Poor Rascal didn’t know which toy to attack first.”
He chuckled. “So she liked them?”
“She loved them,” Mabel assured him. “Almost as much as I love the fact that you did this.”
George eyed her, one thick gray eyebrow rising. “You know, you look far too pleased for someone who’s just been pranked. That’s not how this is supposed to work.”
“Well, that’s where you’re wrong,” Mabel said, stepping closer to him. The gazebo created an intimate little space just behind them, bracketing the pair and glowing softly with twinkling white lights. “I am pleased. More than pleased, actually. I’m delighted.”
“You are?” As he said it, Mabel thought that she heard a hint of vulnerability… something she’d never expected to hear from George Lowery.
She reached out and flicked a piece of sawdust from his flannel shirt. “I am,” she confirmed. “Because it means you’ve learned to have fun, George. You’ve taken me completely by surprise, and I didn’t think that was possible anymore.”
His eyes twinkled warmly, and he stepped down fully from the stepladder, right in front of her as he reached down to take her hands in his. “I’m glad I could manage to do that.”
The sound of spitting gravel from a customer arriving could be heard behind them, but neither of them moved. Mabel felt, for the first time in years, as if it were a little hard to breathe, this close to George, with him looking at her like that.
“Mabel,” George said finally, his voice lower and more serious than she’d ever heard it. “I’d like to try take you by surprise a second time.”
She swallowed hard, realizing that she felt nervous. Another feeling that she hadn’t had in years. “I’m listening.”
“Would you be my date for the town Christmas party?”
The question hung in the air between them, simple and direct and absolutely perfect. Mabel felt a smile spread across her face, bright as Christmas lights.
“George Lowery,” she said softly, “I thought you’d never ask.”
He frowned at her. “Is that a yes?”
He’d never been good with words, so she decided to take a page from his book, and try a different sort of answer.
Mabel rose up on her tiptoes and kissed him, one hand wrapping around the back of his neck before she dropped back down and smirked at him.
“Yes, you idiot. In case you were still wondering.”
George chuckled. “Good,” was his only answer, before he pulled her in for another kiss, there under the twinkling Christmas lights.