Chapter 12
Elias
Corbin: Not a doctor, man, but I’m sure it’s fine.
Igrunt as I read my little brother’s text.
Frodo hollers at me for not getting his millet to him fast enough.
Grumbling at the impatient bird, I stuff my phone in my pocket long enough for me to finish up my aviary chores.
Once I’ve finished for the day, I step out of the small building and reply to Corbin.
Me: You’re a firefighter. You should know this.
Corbin: Take her to the doctor for a tetanus shot if you’re worried. Or do like Grandma Dot used to. Slap a Band-Aid on it and hope for the best.
I fight a grin because Grandma Dot nearly caused Corbin to lose his finger by doing just that.
Turns out, he needed stitches and reconstructive surgery on his pinky when he accidentally almost cleaved it clear off while horsing around at The Budgie Café one summer.
Mom was not happy that he’d been wrapped with gauze and told to “get out of the kitchen and go play.” She found us trying to scrape barnacles off the hull of a boat with sticks.
Corbin’s gauze was soaked in blood and staining the dock.
Ahh, good times in Budgie Bay.
Me: Thanks for nothing.
Corbin: Glad to be of service.
I tuck my phone away and release a sigh. Nora snatched up the metal shaving before I could warn her and sliced the tip of her finger. I’m annoyed at how my stomach clenched with worry.
Why is that anyway?
You don’t like her, man.
I’m still debating that fact. Just when I feel convicted on one way, I end up going the other. It’s exhausting to be honest.
I head inside my place and hunt down Nora. She’s in the guest room, sitting on the bed, and looking at Goldie’s laptop. Her pretty face is twisted into one of despair. My heart rate quickens and I enter the room.
“Knock-knock,” I say in way of greeting. “Creeper alert.”
She softens and smirks at me. “Thanks for the warning.”
“You ready to head next door?”
“Not really.” She deflates and gestures to the screen. “Can’t I just sit here and read through all her lifestyle column articles? There’s one about hydrangeas blooming, The Nest Box Inn, and even some on BudgieFest. Where should we start?”
Someone’s procrastinating the inevitable.
“Those articles will be here when you get back,” I say as I reach for the laptop and gently shut it. “We have a ta-da list to get through.”
Her face brightens and she flashes me a wide grin. “You said it.”
“Ta-da,” I mutter in my grouchiest voice ever. I toss the laptop on the bed beside her. “We’re burning daylight, Everhart.”
Fifteen minutes later and we’re staring at the cluttered living room in her grandma’s hot house. Nora was smart to wear shorts and a tank top today. I’m in my usual—jeans, boots, and a plain black T-shirt—which means I’m sweating everywhere.
Dad and his great ideas.
“I’m going to tackle a lot of this trash that’s piled up everywhere,” I say motioning to the kitchen area where brown paper grocery bags are piled haphazardly on every surface. Not sure why an old woman would need a thousand of them, but here we are.
“I’ll, uh, work on stuff in the back,” Nora says, shoulders hunched.
I have the sudden urge to take her by the hand and guide her back to my house where she can avoid the pain. But isn’t that what she already did once this past week by missing Goldie’s funeral? I’ll be an enabler at that point, and I refuse to be that person.
“Open the windows wherever you go,” I instruct, voice firm and authoritative. “Can’t have you passing out on me.”
She shoots me a withering glare which I view as progress from the mounting despair moments prior.
After she hightails it to the back, I dive in on all the garbage that I can safely dispose of without having to actually involve Nora.
If I thought I was sweating fifteen minutes in, I’m about to stroke out two hours in.
I swipe the dripping sweat off my brow by raising my shoulder and using my shirtsleeve.
Time for a break. I saunter through the house until I find Nora.
She’s on the other side of Goldie’s bed, near the window, sitting on the floor with pictures, newspaper clippings, letters, and postcards all strewn about.
“Come on,” I tell her. “Break time.”
“I’m busy,” she says absently as she stares at the piles around her.
The material of her tank top on the back is soaked right through with sweat. Neither of us will make it very far if we don’t cool off and hydrate.
“Bring them with you. You’re melting.”
I snatch a laundry basket out of the other room and return with it for her to load up her things. Once she’s piled them into the basket, I carry it for her out of the house. As soon as we walk onto the porch, a breeze dances over my slick skin, and I nearly groan with relief.
We head inside my house, and I’ve never been more thankful for air conditioning in my entire life.
I set the basket on the bar in the kitchen.
Nora disappears to her bedroom. While she’s gone, I make us a couple of glasses of iced tea.
She returns not too long after, wearing fresh, clean clothes, and Clo sitting on her shoulder.
“Here,” I say with a grunt and thrust her a glass.
She takes the glass and chugs a quarter of it. Then, she cries out in disgust. “Where’s the sugar?”
Just like her grandma. Sheesh.
I snatch a small mason jar from the cabinet, dump in some sugar and some water, and then microwave for a bit until it starts melting. After giving it a stir, I cook it for just a few more seconds.
“You could have just dumped some in my glass,” she says, voice softer this time. “Seems extra.”
“Goldie used to say it blended better with the tea this way.”
She sets her glass down on the counter and watches me intensely as I scrape some sugar sauce into her tea. I add a bit more tea and then give it a stir.
“Now try it,” I instruct.
Her bright blue eyes lock onto mine as she sips the tea. Then, she grins. “Ohhh. This is really good. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” I say begrudgingly since apparently I’m grumpy and mean and don’t know how to take a compliment.
This seems to delight her even further because she winks at me.
Why oh why does my chest tighten at the gesture?
“I’m going to change,” I grumble and make my escape once my tea is gone. “Clo can have some fruit.”
After changing into some basketball shorts, tennis shoes, and a new T-shirt, I return to the kitchen to find Clo going to town on a portion of an apple slice in the palm of Nora’s hand.
She watches him with unmasked wonder. I’m so used to the budgies, especially Clo, that maybe I take them for granted.
They really are special little creatures.
Clo finishes up his apple pieces, but then I demolish the rest of the slices since he doesn’t need to eat the whole thing. Nora slides onto a stool at the bar and pulls her stacks out to look through.
“I never saw all this stuff,” Nora says absently as she looks at a picture of Goldie and a tiny blonde toddler in a stroller on the boardwalk. “It makes me sad. Mom should be here.”
The picture in her hand must be Nora’s mother based on the age of Goldie and the dated clothes they’re wearing. Goldie stares out over the bay, one hand on the stroller and the other one shading her eyes.
“She never stopped looking for Amos,” I tell her. “Never.”
Nora chews on her bottom lip like she’s trying hard not to cry and nods. “I felt that from her, but she put most of her focus on having fun on my visits. We did a lot of shopping and eating and riding our bikes.”
She carefully sets the picture down and pulls out a yellowed, tattered and torn postcard. “If you ever need easiness in a hard, hard world, come to Budgie Bay. - H. Whitaker.” Nora glances up at me. “Who’s that? An old boyfriend?”
I smirk and shake my head. “Nah, that’s Helen. She died about a decade after Goldie moved here. Her family owns the Wing Covert Winery. I went to school with one of her grandkids, Constance, who runs it now.”
“How do you know all this?”
A wave of sadness washes over me. “Goldie told me. She liked telling me stories about the past.”
“Oh.” Nora’s cheeks turn pink and her bottom lip puckers in a slight pout. “She was always asking about me. We didn’t talk much about the past. I came to learn that it was a sore subject for Mom.”
I know all about this too, but I don’t say it. Goldie grappled daily with the fact Sandy resented her for obsessing over Amos’s disappearance, claiming it stole her childhood.
“Look,” Nora says, marveling over a picture of a man with a pipe standing in front of a building on Wing Whirr Way. “That’s my grandpa.” She scrunches her nose and brings the picture closer. “I wonder where this photo was taken. It doesn’t say.”
In this moment, Nora seems young. Like a child looking through her grandmother’s things, unsure what any of it means.
I attempt to see things through her eyes.
She was fourteen the last time she came to visit, and Goldie always flew out to see her and her mother.
I’m sure Goldie spoiled her whenever she went to see her, and I’m certain Goldie would have walked on eggshells around Sandy, careful not to mention anything about Budgie Bay that might be triggering.
No wonder Nora doesn’t know much about this stuff.
With me, a local like Goldie, I could swap stories with her and understand her on a level a tourist or summertime visitor wouldn’t.
When she came to live with me, I had more time to have conversations with her about her past. I realize this was a gift her granddaughter was never given. In a way, I feel guilty about that.
But I could share them with Nora.
Pass on the stories Goldie told me.
I know her grandma would have wanted me to do that.
“Ever been to The Icehouse?” I ask. “I mean, I’m guessing no since it’s a bar and you would have been too young last time you visited.”
She laughs. “You are correct. Grandma didn’t let me visit any bars when I came to stay.”
“Want to go?”
“There’s so much to do next door,” she says, though she literally winces when she says it.
“It’ll be there later when it’s cooler out. The Icehouse lives up to its name. It’s cool inside.”
Her eyes bore into me as though she’s trying to understand if I have an ulterior motive.
I get it. I’m not exactly friendly toward her and can be hot and cold.
However, the more I stand here, watching her stare at the picture of her grandfather, clueless about her heritage, I feel convicted to help her learn more about her family.
“First off,” I say, holding up a finger. Clo chirps at me and cocks his head, equally invested in this conversation as Nora is. “The Icehouse is the best bar in town. Even if you’re not a drinker, Silas will take care of you and make you something good.”
“Like sweet, iced tea?”
“His is even better.” I look down at Clo. “Right, buddy? We like Silas, huh?”
Clo flutters his wings and struts across the countertop, sniffing around for more apple slices.
“Secondly,” I say and give Nora a grin as excitement pulses through me. “You’re going to love your grandma’s spot there.”
She sits ramrod straight and blinks at me. “Grandma has a spot at the bar?”
“Don’t worry. She was there for the tea and the view.”
“What’s the view of?”
“Budgie Bay. She liked to watch the boats come in, always waiting for Amos to arrive.”
Nora flashes me a soft, sweet smile that warms me up inside. “I have to meet the man who’d go through all that trouble for a little old lady.”
“It’s the least he could do,” I murmur, shrugging my shoulders, “since she sold the place to him.”
Her eyes bug out of her head. “Grandma owned a bar? I feel like I know nothing about her.”
“It wasn’t a bar when she owned it,” I say as I hold out my hand for Clo to hop onto my finger. “It used to be Everhart’s Fish and Ice.”
Nora slides off the barstool and beams at me. “Let me grab my purse.”
Clo sings happily to me, and I stroke the top of his head. I’m not cheerful like he is, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t looking forward to showing Nora The Icehouse.
See, I can be pleasant.