Chapter 9
“So did you sign up for anything?” Wesley asked with the wicked glint in his eye that told her he remembered their conversation when she had told him that her gram had a tendency to sign up for everything.
“I’m sure Gram will take care of it. I told her just one thing though.” Birdie’s lips pulled back a bit, and she lifted her brows. “You?”
“I figured your grandma would take care of me too. So I didn’t need to. Although I was asked if I would be interested in joining the men’s sailing club.”
“I didn’t know there was a sailing club.” She hadn’t heard mention of that, and a quick glance at the list hanging on the bulletin board as she exited the church had not divulged any kind of sailing club.
“They’re just starting it. They wanted to know if I would be the chairman.”
“Really?” she asked, and then she tilted her head. “Do you know how to sail?”
He snorted. “I’ve never been on a boat in my life before.”
They laughed together. That was so typical of churches. At least in her experience, if you weren’t dead, they’d recruit you for something, and it didn’t matter if you were good at it.
“Well, maybe that’s what Gram will sign you up for. And you’ll get an education this summer.”
“I think I’ll probably be the only chairperson of a sailing club that got their sailing education from the internet. ”
“Oh, I think we’d be surprised,” she said, figuring that there were plenty of people in positions who didn’t know what they were doing. And relied on the internet to teach them.
“At least we can cheat in our day and age,” she said, although she wasn’t sure that using the internet was cheating. It was basically taking someone else’s expertise and learning from it. Although, reading about something was a lot different than actually doing it. Especially in the case of something like sailing.
“3D printers are going to have to start printing out lakes and boats if I’m going to be totally self-taught.”
“I’m hungry,” Gramps said as he joined them.
“I know lunch will be on the table just minutes after we get in the house, but sometimes getting Gram away from church is a little bit difficult. We’re often the last people out of the parking lot.”
“We should have invited them over to our house today,” Gramps said as an aside to Wesley, who immediately shook his head quickly.
“We don’t want to kill our neighbors. We like them, remember?”
“But I’m hungry!”
“We will get far better food, far faster, if we just relax and be patient. Neither one of us can cook worth anything.”
“I wonder if Gram gives cooking lessons,” Gramps said, looking around to see if he could try to find her.
“I’m sure she would love to give you cooking lessons. Maybe in exchange for fixing our windows and roof.”
“Which, I’d forgotten to say, the materials should be arriving tomorrow. We can get that roof on if it’s okay with you guys?”
“Any time is fine with us,” Birdie said, and most of her thought that was true. There was one small part of her that was concerned that her grandma was going to sign them up for so many things that she wouldn’t have a free moment from now until she left the beach cottage.
She didn’t voice that thought out loud. There was no point in borrowing trouble. Perhaps Gram had gotten a little bit more restraint since last time they’d been in church together. Doubtful, but she was holding on to hope .
“Well, son. How about you and I go home and we can get our clothes changed. I think the ladies will be fine if we don’t wear a suit and tie to Sunday dinner.”
“This lady will be relieved if you don’t dress up for dinner,” Birdie said. “If you come in a suit and tie, I’m going to have to wear this dress, and I would prefer to change into something a little bit more comfortable.”
Wesley snorted, and Gramps gave him a look.
Wesley held his hands up. “She looks good in whatever. I didn’t say anything.”
“We’ll see you in a bit,” Gramps said as Wesley lifted a hand to wave, still smiling, which she returned. Both the grin and the wave.
She looked around the churchyard and still didn’t see her gram, but she saw a young girl standing off by herself, and something drew her toward her. There seemed to be something tragic about her stance, and she just seemed...sad, almost. Or maybe just very alone amongst a whole group of people. Sometimes a person could be standing and not saying anything, and feel like they were part of the group, but this girl just seemed like she was floating on the outer edge.
Birdie wasn’t really looking for friends or anyone to talk to, but she found herself walking to the young woman, who must have been in her early or mid-twenties she figured as she got closer to her.
“It’s such a beautiful day,” she said by way of greeting. Hoping that the girl wasn’t into pop music. She felt like her “disguise” had been effective, but she didn’t want to get cocky.
At the same time, she couldn’t not walk over to this girl and try to engage her in conversation.
“I can’t imagine not living beside the lake,” she said, pulling her gaze from the lake long enough to smile and hold her hand out. “I’m Becky. I don’t recognize you, but I haven’t been here very long.”
“I’m Birdie, and this is my first Sunday here, so it’s no wonder you don’t recognize me.”
“You do look a little familiar, but I am originally from Strawberry Sands, so maybe I met you down there.”
Birdie didn’t want to have the girl trying to figure out why she looked familiar, so she just lifted a shoulder as though agreeing that it was possible, when she had never been to Strawberry Sands and knew it wasn’t .
“So are you a shop owner?” Birdie asked, taking a wild stab in the dark, just trying to make conversation and figure out if there was something that she could say or do that would take away the melancholy look from the girl.
“Not really. I’m renting the farm down the road a piece and am hoping to rent horses for tourists to ride on the beach.”
“I love horses, but I’ve never really gotten to ride.” It was one of the things that she had always hoped to do but just never had time for. Her career didn’t exactly lend itself to long rides on horses. “I think riding a horse on the beach would be a lot of fun.”
“That’s what I’m counting on. People thinking it’s fun and being willing to pay for it. It’s hard to make a living at it, but if I do a little bit of something else on the side, I might be able to at least have the horses pay for their own feed and care.”
“You sound like you’re rather knowledgeable about this. Are horses something you grew up doing?”
“Not really. But I’ve done a lot with horses in the last five or ten years. I... This is my first time starting out on my own though.”
Maybe that was her trouble. The weight of owning her own business felt heavy even though she had experience and had been doing it for years. Of course, now, she had plenty of people hired to help her, but she had to manage it, or she couldn’t expect it to thrive. No one cared about her business the way she did. To everyone else, it was just a job.
“You have someone helping you?” she asked, her tone gentle.
“No. I’m in it myself. But that’s kind of the way I like it. I—” She started to say something, and her voice broke off abruptly.
Birdie waited, just in case she was going to finish her thought or change it, but she just went silent.
“It makes it extra hard when you’re alone. And there aren’t a whole lot of tourists in Raspberry Ridge right now. But I heard some whispers about a restaurant.” That was something that Olive had told her might be coming. “And the fact that the church is opening up, and people are getting married... It’s definitely a growing town. And you can get in on the property values before they go up.”
“I don’t have quite enough to put in a down payment to buy the farm, and I feel like I might need that as capital to run my business until it takes off.”
“I think that’s smart. Renting is not ideal, but some people have it as their business model.” She pushed a strand of hair back away from her face. “What are you thinking about doing on the side? You said the horses would pay for themselves and their feed. What about the rent for the property?”
“I’ve been writing some articles online. I’m making a little bit of money. But with AI, I’m afraid that little bit of money is probably going to dry up.”
Birdie had been concerned about the same thing with her songwriting. She wrote all of her own songs, but it took her months, sometimes years, to get an album’s worth of songs. AI could do it in a matter of seconds. And they weren’t terrible. It stood to reason that the improvements that would come along in the next several months, maybe even a year, would possibly put songwriters out of business.
“The thing that AI can’t do is it can’t be human.”
“It makes a pretty good imitation of it though,” Becky said, tilting her head like there was nothing she could do about it.
“Do you have a backup plan?”
“I started to get my nursing degree. But I’d rather do horses than nursing, and I can’t imagine being stuck in a hospital day in and day out, so... I quit after two years.”
“So you think you might go back?”
“Maybe. I probably should do it before I’m so strapped that I don’t have any choices and can’t afford to. But that’s just not where my heart is, you know?”
“You could go to school to be a vet?”
“That’s six more years. I don’t think I can stand it.” She shuddered.
“Vet tech?”
“Yeah. I thought of that.”
They were silent for a bit. As Birdie looked around, she noticed the parking lot had thinned out, but there was still no sign of Gram.
“So what are you in town for? Are you a store owner?” Becky asked, echoing her earlier question.
“I’m not. I’m just a tourist, enjoying the peaceful serenity for the summer. Before I have to go back to my real life, which is not nursing, thankfully.”
“Nurses have a hard job. It must be exhausting, although veterinarians work hard too. I guess that’s why we call work a job.”
“Yeah. I think we all want to find jobs where we really don’t have to put too much effort into it and get paid a lot. ”
“I don’t think I’d be happy with something like that. I want to work hard. I love the idea of building something, but unfortunately, sometimes when you’re building, you’re not making money, and that’s important too.”
“I agree,” Birdie said simply. There were a lot of times when she had first started singing that she didn’t have money to eat. If it hadn’t been for her gram, she might have had to quit and do something else. And then the stratospheric career that she’d been able to have wouldn’t have been possible. She owed her gram an awful lot.
“When you open your stable, I’d love to be the first customer.” She loved horses and always wanted to ride. Why not start by being Becky’s first customer?
“Really?” Becky’s eyes lit up, and she looked years younger.
“Yes.”
“I have the horses now, but I need to get another saddle. Maybe next week?”
“I think you should take advantage of the summer weather. You probably won’t have much business in the winter.”
“I have Gypsy Vanner horses. They’re great saddle horses, but they also will pull a wagon or sleigh. They’re beautiful, too.”
“Ah. That’s smart.” Although she just wasn’t sure if there weren’t that many tourists in the summer, would there be enough in the winter? But maybe Becky had it figured out, or maybe she would.
She found herself rooting for the girl. There was something about her that reminded her of her grandma. Like Becky was what her grandma would have been when her gram was that age. Feisty, determined, and not allowing anything to stand in her way. Of course, her gram was a lot more of a people person, and Becky seemed a little bit more standoffish, even saying that she wanted to do things herself.
After a couple of minutes of careful consideration, she said, “How about I give you my number. You can call me when they’re ready.” She hesitated for just a moment as Becky pulled up her phone. “I live in one of the cottages on the north side of town, right down by the lake. You’re welcome to visit anytime. If you come around lunchtime, my grandma would love to feed you.”
She paused as Becky looked up at her. “And that includes today. Show up anytime.”
“All right. Thanks. Maybe I will,” Becky said, and then Birdie rattled off a number while Becky programmed it into her phone .
“I love riding bareback, but if you haven’t ridden a lot, it’s probably not the best way to start, although my horses are very gentle. I’ll let you know when I have a saddle.”
“All right. And I’ll look for you around mealtimes. They’re typical times, and if you come between mealtimes, Gram almost always has some kind of dessert sitting around that she loves to feed visitors. I’m serious. You will make Gram’s day if you show up and she gets to feed you.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” Becky said, sending a text and then tucking her phone back in her pocket.
Birdie pulled up her phone and said, “Got it.” She typed Becky’s name into the contact info before shoving her own phone back in her pocket.
“So are you hanging around waiting for someone?” Becky finally asked.
“I live with my gram. And she has a bit of an addiction to volunteering, especially at churches. Or maybe she just has a fear of having one second that isn’t scheduled during her day. I’m not sure.”
Becky laughed. “Someone who likes to be busy and productive?”
“Yeah. And she really does mean well. I’m not complaining at all, because she is an awesome gram, I don’t know what I would have done without her, literally, but I’ve got a feeling she’s probably signed me up for at least one volunteer position that I really don’t want.”
“At least you have someone who cares about you. That’s something to be thankful for, right?”
“Right.”
“Well, I suppose I’ll walk on home. I try to take Sundays off and not work. So I was kind of hanging around the church, because once I go home and sit down, I’ll look around and see all the things that I should be doing or that need to be done, and I will want to get up and start doing something, telling myself that it’s not really work if I enjoy it, right?”
“Well, good for you for taking some time off. I think it’s important. Although, I suspect that most people nowadays take more than one day a week off and are more about taking time off than they are about working.”
“Not me,” Becky said, and there was still a bit of a sadness around her mouth, almost as though she were pushing the memories that she didn’t want to think about away and not allowing them to crowd into her mind .
It was hard to take control of a person’s thoughts, to make them go the way they wanted them to go or the way they needed to go. There was something rather fun about being morose and gloomy, in a weird kind of way. If a person wasn’t careful, they could end up spiraling down without even realizing it, just because they were enjoying their gloomy thoughts.
Birdie had done that more than once in her life, and it was hard to climb back out of that kind of pit.
“Birdie!” Gram called, erupting from the church doors and blinking in the bright sunlight. “I thought you might have gotten impatient and driven away,” she said, laughing.
“No such luck, Gram. You’re stuck with me,” she said, a little bit of dread in her stomach. It had been a long time, and Gram would have had time to sign up for pretty much everything the church wanted her to do.
“I thought maybe you’d be out here talking to Gramps and that nice Wesley boy,” Gram said, bounding down the steps and hurrying across the parking lot to where Birdie stood alongside. The car wasn’t far away; it was one of three cars left in the lot. She assumed one car was for the pastor, and one car had either broken down and was parked there, or there was a person who was more zealous than her gram, which was kind of hard to imagine.
“They were going home to change their clothes. I figured since they live beside us, they won’t have a problem figuring out when we get home.”
“Well, what are we waiting on? Let’s go.”