5. Ansley One Little Sentence
ansley: one little sentence
THE SUMMER BEFORE COLLEGE—MY SECOND summer with Jack—he decided to teach me how to sail in his little Sunfish.
I thought it was going to be so romantic.
Calm. Easy. Dry. I was wrong. I learned quickly that, like most sports, either one had a natural aptitude or one did not.
I decidedly did not. Even still, I persevered through capsizing, getting hit on the head with the boom, enduring the truly terrible feeling of pruning feet inside wet sailing booties.
Because it meant proximity to Jack. It meant sharing his interest. Until the evening that he thought I was doing so well that he decided we should sail from the marina where his boat was stored to the public beach downtown and walk to dinner. It sounded so fun. And now I was a pro.
I curled my hair and took extra time applying my mascara and picked out my favorite summer dress. And when he saw me, I could tell Jack thought the time had been worth it. He kissed me and held me close and said, “I’m so proud of you. I can’t wait for you to sail me to dinner.”
I could tell he was proud. And so was I.
It was a particularly windy night, which made me nervous, but things started off well.
As we made our way toward downtown, a huge gust of wind came up and, before I knew what was happening—before Jack could right things, the boat toppled over, and I found myself completely submerged, new strappy sandals and all.
I was visibly annoyed when I popped back up out of the water, but Jack was laughing.
He swam over to me, wrapped me in his arms, and kissed me, his lips salty and warm.
“Ans,” he said. “I lost you to the summer wind.”
I couldn’t help but laugh too. It’s funny how, at the moment, I was annoyed about my smeared mascara, and my dripping hair and drenched linen dress. But now, in retrospect, the memory seems sweet and charming, an example of how Jack could always, no matter what, right the ship for me.
I thought the Peachtree Bluff summer wind could be strong.
But there was a reason they called Chicago “the Windy City.” It was living up to its nickname today.
My stomach was in knots thinking about Jack’s meetings that were taking place right this minute.
He had been a little vague about what exactly they entailed.
Or maybe it was more accurate to say that I just hadn’t asked as much as I probably should have because if I didn’t know all the details, I could pretend it wasn’t real.
Fortunately, I had a great distraction. Wes, Caroline’s on-again, off-again Peachtree flame and our new business partner who was helping us franchise Sloane Emerson, had a great lead in Chicago, and I figured if I was coming anyway, we might as well check it out.
Wes and I walked down the Magnificent Mile, surrounded by soaring buildings, and I marveled that this would potentially be our fourth franchise.
I felt like I was getting the hang of this whole big-business thing now.
As the wind swirled around me, I realized that what I wasn’t getting the hang of was Wes wanting to spend our entire day talking about non-business items. Namely, my daughter.
“I mean, I know she has a lot on her plate with the New York store and the kids, but I just feel like she doesn’t have that much time to talk on the phone. ”
“Well,” I said, blowing out my breath, frankly tired of Wes not getting the picture that he and Caroline were likely not going to end in the wedded bliss he was foreseeing, “Caroline hates to talk on the phone. Really hates it.”
“But she talks to you every day.”
“I’m her mother.”
He stuffed his hands in his pants pockets and said, “Yeah, but I’m her boyfriend.”
Oh, goodness. Here we go again. I felt like Caroline had been pretty clear with Wes that she wasn’t looking for anything serious, that she didn’t need that right now, that they could see each other in Peachtree but they weren’t exclusive.
I didn’t feel like it was my place to point that out, but I also didn’t want to let him be led on either.
“Have you two had that talk? I mean, have you put a label on things? Because I was under the impression that Caroline wasn’t looking for a serious relationship. ”
“Well, right. She has said that. But we’ve been doing this long-distance, see-each-other-sometimes thing for a while now, and I know I’m ready to take that to the next level, figure out how to spend more time together, make this thing really work.”
Should I have to tell a thirty-eight-year-old man that my daughter wasn’t in love with him?
That she liked him but didn’t see a real future?
I felt like I shouldn’t have to say all these things.
But I did worry about how this business relationship was going to go once she sat him down to have the talk.
But maybe that was okay. Maybe we had franchised enough, and if Wes couldn’t separate our business relationship from his personal one with Caroline, so be it.
She was the motivated mogul of the family, so I was going to leave that up to her.
Because it was becoming clear that while Caroline could keep it casual with Wes, it was a one-way street. I inwardly groaned.
“Are we getting close?” I practically shouted. “I might get swept away!”
Wes pointed ahead of him and, fortunately, didn’t ask me any more questions about Caroline.
It was cold in Chicago, but not freezing, which was nice.
I had on a light jacket and could really enjoy this lovely city.
I would be glad to go back and forth a few times to help get this franchise set up—if it worked out, that is.
But I wanted to make it really clear to the universe: back-and-forth was all I wanted.
Wes opened the door, and I stepped into a large retail space. A woman who looked to be in her early forties with a polished, classic look walked over to me in the empty room. She put her hand out. “Cynthia Carrick. Pleased to meet you.”
“Ansley Murphy,” I said back, liking her instantly.
That was an important part of the process because, even though we were essentially selling them the franchise and letting them do with it what they wanted, there was a lot of communication during those few months when we were getting things set up, orders placed, point of sale systems organized.
If Cynthia ended up being a franchisee, we would be in contact often.
Or, well, she would be in contact with Sloane often, anyway, who was really more in charge of franchisee relations.
“Oh, I know,” she said. “I’ve followed Caroline and Emerson on Instagram for years.
I couldn’t believe my luck when I saw you were franchising.
I had just started thinking about making this dream of being a store owner come true, and I couldn’t think of a better way to do it than with such an established brand. ”
“And this is the space?” I asked dumbly. Of course it was the space.
She nodded. “I’d love to show you around.”
That was also dumb, as there was nothing to show. It was a shell. She laughed nervously. “Sorry. Obviously, you can see for yourself that we would need to upfit it.”
“We have floor plans for that, which should make things quite a bit easier.”
“Yes. Wes told me that. It gave me a lot of confidence.”
I looked at Wes. This was really his deal.
I was just the face of the company. He was the negotiator.
So why wasn’t he saying anything? He was looking out toward the street, thinking of my daughter, no doubt.
Poor Wes. But, then again, maybe I was wrong.
Maybe Caroline did want to get more serious with him and she just hadn’t told me yet. That was possible.
Wes smiled, mentally coming back to the room with us and reaching into his bag.
He pulled out a manila envelope and said, “I brought all the information for you to look over with your attorneys. If you have any questions at all, we are happy to answer them. But we have set this up for your success. If you do well, we do well, and we want that for all of us.”
She smiled brightly. “I actually haven’t hired an attorney. So I’ll just look over this tonight, and hopefully we can get it done.”
I knew the agreement was fair. We had done a couple already. Even still, I wanted to say, When you’re entering into a huge business deal, have your own attorney! Of course, this would save me a lot of time and money, so I shouldn’t be upset. But still. It seemed pretty obvious.
I handed her one of the thick cream-and-gold business cards Caroline had had printed for me. “If you have any questions, feel free to give me a call. More about the ins and outs of the store and that type of thing.”
She smiled. She seemed so excited. “I just want to say that this would be a dream for me. I have always wanted to have my own shop filled with beautiful things. Something to call my very own.”
I understood that. I loved having that myself.
But I couldn’t stop myself from saying, “Oh, it is a wonderful career, but don’t let it fool you.
There are staffing issues and back orders and fulfillment problems and complaining customers.
It’s a great job, but it’s a real job too.
I just don’t want to delude you into thinking it isn’t work. ”
Her face fell a little as she said, “Right. Of course. Absolutely.”
Back on the street, Wes scolded me: “Ansley, why do you always do that? We have someone dying to buy a franchise and you’re in there trying to talk her out of it.”
“I’m not trying to talk her out of it. I just want to be honest with her. It isn’t all sunshine and roses.”
“Well, no business is. Surely she knows that. And if she doesn’t, she’ll learn the same way you did.”