Chapter 8
CAL
The past three weeks have been amazing. That's how long Hazel and I have been officially, no-question-about-it together, and I still catch myself grinning like an idiot every time I think about it, which apparently is often enough that Deacon's started ribbing me about it at the station.
"You've got the look again," he says, sliding into the passenger seat of the cruiser as we head out for shift. We’re riding together today, and I kind of wish I was by myself if he’s going to be an asshole. "The dopey one."
"I don't have a look."
"You absolutely have a look. Marcy in dispatch started a pool on how long it'd take you to propose. I got twenty bucks riding on six months."
"That's insane. We've been together for three weeks."
"Didn't say I was betting on it happening reasonable-like."
I roll my eyes and pull out of the lot, but I can't argue with him too hard, because he's not wrong that something in me has shifted these past few weeks.
I sleep better. I show up to work without that low simmering dread that used to sit in my gut, wondering what today's post in Spotted in Whispering Pines was going to say about me.
I still see the notifications pop up now and then, but they don't hit the same. Hazel did that. Somehow, in the middle of everything, she went and fixed something in me I wasn’t sure would ever be fixed.
She’s helped me change how I feel about myself.
Around lunchtime, I swing the cruiser toward Main Street, telling myself it's just because the route takes me past there anyway, though we both know that's not really true.
Butter My Biscuit smells like cinnamon and warm bread the second I walk through the door, and Hazel's behind the counter, flour dusted along one forearm, laughing at something Tiffany said.
Her whole face lights up when she spots me, same as it does every time, and I don't think that particular feeling is ever going to get old.
Deacon’s over at the gas station, so I take all the time I want.
"Well, if it isn't Officer Sutton," she says, leaning against the counter. "Here to arrest anybody today?"
"Depends. You got any butter you're planning on stealing?"
"Not this week." She grins, and I lean over the counter to kiss her, quick but not so quick that Tiffany doesn't make a small gagging noise behind the register.
"You two are disgusting," Tiffany says, though she's smiling when she says it.
"You're just jealous," Hazel fires back, not even looking away from me.
"Extremely."
I settle onto one of the stools at the counter while Hazel finishes boxing up an order for a woman waiting by the door, and once she's got a minute, she comes back around, wiping her hands on her apron.
"Have you eaten yet?" she asks.
"Was gonna grab something from the gas station before my shift really kicks off."
She makes a face like I've personally offended her. "Absolutely not. Sit there and don't argue with me."
"I wasn't planning to."
She disappears into the kitchen, and I can hear her moving around back there, the soft thud of the cutting board, the fridge door opening and closing.
Tiffany rings up another customer, throws me a look like she's sizing me up all over again, same as she probably did that first day I walked in here to apologize.
"You're good for her, you know," she says, once the shop's empty for a second. "She's been happier the last few weeks than I've seen her in a long time."
"She's good for me too." I don't know how else to say it, so I don't try to make it any heavier than that.
Hazel comes back out a few minutes later with a sandwich piled high on thick homemade bread, tomato and turkey and some kind of herb spread that smells incredible, cut diagonal and plated like she'd serve it to a paying customer instead of just the boyfriend loitering at her counter on his lunch break.
"You didn't have to do all that."
"I wanted to." She sets it down in front of me, then leans over the counter and presses a kiss to my temple before going back to work on the next order. "Now please, eat. You know this type of shit is my love language. You've got a long shift ahead of you."
I don't think much of it in the moment, just dig into the sandwich, which is somehow the best thing I've had all week, and talk with her in between customers until my radio crackles and I've got to get back out on patrol.
I kiss her goodbye at the counter, same as I did coming in, and head back out into the afternoon heat without a second thought.
It isn't until later that night, scrolling through my phone before bed, that I see it.
Marjorie Teal: Stopped by Butter My Biscuit for lunch today and caught the sweetest thing. Deputy Sutton in there getting spoiled by Hazel, she made him a sandwich and everything, and the way that man looked at her, y'all. My heart.
There's a photo attached, a little grainy, clearly taken from a phone held low near the register, but it's unmistakably us, me hunched over the counter with the sandwich in front of me, Hazel leaning across to kiss my temple.
It's not a bad picture. If anything, it's sweet, the kind of thing you'd frame if it were anybody else's relationship.
The comments are already piling up by the time I finish reading the post.
Allison McGregor: OKAY this is adorable, I'm SO happy for them.
Karen Davidson: Look how happy she looks. This is the best thing to come out of that whole arrest mess.
Lucille Wagner: Deputy Doody's really turned things around, hasn't he? Good for him.
Even that old nickname doesn't sting quite the way it used to when I read it tonight.
Lucille's not saying it mean, not really, just using the shorthand the whole group settled on a while back, and there's something almost fond in the way she writes it this time, like she's rooting for me instead of laughing at me.
I sit with my phone for a long minute, thumb hovering over the comment box, and for the first time since this whole group turned my life into their favorite topic of conversation, I don't feel that old flare of resentment climbing up my spine.
I feel something else instead. Something closer to gratitude, which catches me off guard enough that I almost put the phone down without typing anything at all.
But then I think about Hazel, sound asleep back at her place after a long day on her feet, and how she never once made me feel small for the mistakes I've made, how she looked past the nickname and the reputation and saw somebody worth giving a second chance to.
And I think maybe it's time I said something honest to this town, instead of just letting them keep guessing at who I am from a handful of grainy videos and secondhand gossip.
So I start typing.
Cal Sutton: Figured it's about time I said something in here myself, instead of just being talked about.
Most of you know me as Deputy Doody, and for a long time, that nickname really got under my skin.
I grew up on the wrong side of the tracks in this town, dad was an alcoholic, mom never did much to stop it, and by the time I was old enough to understand what that meant, I'd already decided the only way to be somebody worth respecting was to never give anybody a reason to talk about me.
So when this group started calling me soft, calling me a joke, saying I let people get away with things because I was too scared to do my job right, it hurt worse than I think any of you realized.
I spent my whole life terrified of being seen as the kid nobody expected much from, and it felt like no matter what I did in this uniform, that's exactly what half this town still thought of me.
That's part of why I arrested Hazel that night.
I'm not proud of it, and I think she knows that.
I let what this group thought of me get in the way of good judgment, and that's on me, not on any of you.
But I want to say thank you, genuinely, because if it hadn't been for all of you and my boss pushing me to make it right, I don't know that I would've found the courage to walk into that bakery and finally say something to a woman I've had feelings for since we were kids in the same school, too scared to ever sit down next to her at lunch.
Hazel Monroe has changed my life these past few weeks.
Not because of anything to do with this group, or my job, or what anybody in Whispering Pines thinks about either one of us.
Just because she's the kind of person who makes you want to be better, and she never once made me feel like I had to earn her patience the way I felt like I had to earn everybody else's around here.
So thank you, genuinely, for pushing me toward something I should've done a long time ago. And for what it's worth, I don't mind the nickname so much these days. Guess I've got a decent life to be Deputy Doody in, if this is where I ended up.
I read it over twice, my thumb hovering over the post button, feeling more exposed than I have in longer than I can remember.
Then I hit post before I can talk myself out of it, set my phone face down on the nightstand, and try to sleep, though I know good and well I'll be checking the responses first thing in the morning.
I don't have to wait that long. Within twenty minutes, my phone's already buzzing against the nightstand, notification after notification stacking up.
Allison McGregor: Cal I'm actually crying, thank you for sharing that. We're all so happy for you and Hazel.
Karen Davidson: This just made my whole night. Proud of you, Deputy Sutton.
Lucille Wagner: Well now I feel bad about the nickname lol. Glad you found somebody who makes you happy, you deserve it.
Marjorie Teal: This whole thing started with an arrest and turned into the sweetest love story this town's seen in years. I'm here for it.
I scroll through them slower than I probably need to, something loosening in my chest with every single one, that old tightness I've carried around for years finally letting up its grip a little. My phone buzzes once more, a text this time, from Hazel.
Hazel: Just read your post. Come over when your shift's done, tomorrow. I want to hold you. By the way, I love you, too.
Me: I do. Love you. It’s hard for me to say it, but I’ll say it to you. Thank you for changing my life.
I smile at the screen, feeling something a whole lot lighter than I have in longer than I care to admit, before finally letting myself drift off, looking forward to morning for the first time in longer than I can remember.