—23— Wyatt
Wyatt
Maybe I was too harsh.
I stare at the coffeemaker as it bubbles, grumbles, and pops.
Maybe I wasn’t harsh enough.
I turn the empty mug around and around in my hand, waiting on coffee, waiting on answers, waiting on thoughts to come.
We’re not boyfriends. The words I slung at him keep haunting me. I hated how they felt. I hated losing my cool so much. I hated that I had to yell at the one person in this town who might actually be seeing what I go through every day.
I like being generous. Kind. Making others smile.
I never once considered my kindness had any toll.
What if others are taking advantage of me? What if the gift of Mr. Bellamy’s greed is simply that he’s more upfront about it?
Fuck. Am I actually agreeing with Diego now?
I’ve taken my mug of coffee to a table I never sit at, right by a front window, tiny little thing, still covered in a few of my mom’s arts and crafts stuff, skinny window that looks out onto the street.
I don’t know if Diego works today. Some Saturdays he does.
Others he doesn’t. I only take Sundays and Mondays off, and even those, I spend making plans, organizing, checking my babies here at home in my greenhouse, or sometimes just going into the shop anyway to prepare for the week.
I suddenly find myself envying Mr. Bellamy’s assistants.
Brighthouse’s staff of countless employees.
The owners of such business who can issue orders, work their reasonable amount, and actually have time to breathe and enjoy the pleasures of living a life that isn’t rooted in constant work.
Stopping on paths to smell the flowers, so to speak.
Forgive the pun.
After I finish my coffee, I’m at the sink with my mug, staring down at it, and suddenly I can’t believe I had a lapse in judgment, envying someone as greedy and cold-hearted as Grant.
I love my life the way it is. The old ladies whose porch bulbs I change. The relationships I’ve nurtured. The smiles around town.
Isn’t all of that exactly what keeps me going?
Isn’t all of that enough?
I’m changed and ready for work when a knock at the door stops me cold.
I stare at my front door, keys in hand, trapped by the knock.
Because now, for the first time, I’m wondering what Diego’s night was like.
Did I go too far? Maybe he couldn’t sleep at all.
He’s here now on my front doorstep with a mountain of thoughts he’s about to dump all over me.
Or apologies I don’t deserve. Or maybe he’s holding his orchid and wants a refund on it, finished with me.
Or the house sold and he’ll be gone by tomorrow.
My heart drops.
I keep forgetting that terrifying fact.
Diego Valdez is only here for now.
He’s not my neighbor.
He’s a passing guest.
I regret everything at once. Raising my tone. Blaming him. All I want to do is forgive him and ask if he wants to come inside. If he wants to have some coffee before work. Talk things over. Eat some burnt toast and overdone eggs. I’ll do it all with him.
I rush to the front door and pull it open.
It’s … not Diego.
“What took you so long, little bro?” asks Connie, annoyed.
In a purple tank top with a giant pink flower on the front and curlicue letters that spell: Too Cute To Care.
Light blue jeans.
Same figure she had in high school and college.
Thanks to her longtime Pilates instructor slash ex-boyfriend I am convinced is gay and a strict diet she has adhered to since her twenty-fourth birthday when a doctor told her to lose five pounds.
“What?” She frowns. “Not gonna let me in? Got a guy over?” She peeks around me, adopting a playful look. “Hi, mystery guy! I’m your hook-up’s sister! I’m here to ruin your morning!”
She only gets out about half those words before I tug her into the house and out of earshot of everyone in Spruce.
That’s when I notice the rolling suitcase on the porch.
“Had some PTO that was about to expire,” she explains, “so I thought what better way to use them than come home and harass my cute brother?”
I’m trying to switch my brain into greeting mode.
It just won’t happen.
“You don’t really have a guy here, right?” she asks.
I shake my head. “No. I was … I was just on my way to … to the shop, actually, because—”
“Oh, you work weekends? That’s fine. Haven’t seen it in years.
I’ll come with.” She grabs her luggage off the porch, kicks it inside the house leaving it rolling halfway across the kitchen—it bumps against the cabinet and comes to a stop—then she stops in front of me.
“Is there still that tiny icky closet of a bathroom at the shop? Gotta run next door to the Crafty Carson if you really gotta go? I downed a whole Route 44 on the way here. Y’know what?
I’ll just pee here before we head out, then give you a hug.
No hugging while I gotta go this bad. Can’t have you squeezin’ any outta me. ”
She whirlwinds her way down the hall toward the bedroom bathroom rather than the guest one, but stops at the door. “By the way: checkmate.” She laughs and disappears into the bathroom.
I haven’t checked my chess app in days.
And therefore don’t connect what she says to what she means for a moment, thinking it could mean so many other things.
Checkmate, I’ve come crashing back into your life at the most inopportune time.
Checkmate, you don’t get to solve your issues with Diego.
Checkmate, a third bossy entity just entered the ring of life.
Connie insists that we walk to the store because she’s been cramped in a car for the last four hours and misses Spruce.
And her commentary is endless: “Oh, Patsy’s still around and baking pies?
Thought she croaked last year.” Then: “Tell me Billy and Tanner are still together. I had this scary dream about them, a totally intense dream, and it did not end well.” Then: “Did you do breakfast? I’m dying for a plate of those legendary crepes from the Loves.
Something about coming home, diet goes out the window.
” Finally: “What the hell’s that big thing? Did Spruce get a gym??”
Then she’s walking into the flower shop. “Oh my God, it’s still so adorable!!”
And when I’m in the back: “You haven’t replaced the counter? Didn’t Mom and Dad wanna do that way back when? Wyatt, why’s a stack of greeting cards here by the register? You sellin’ them?”
Then she’s asking why my receipts aren’t better organized.
Then straightening my shelves and asking why I don’t have any of “those big plump purple things Mom adored that smell like cough medicine”.
Then telling me about a funny encounter she had at a Buc-ee’s just off the highway before hitting the Spruce exit.
Then she’s at my calendar. “You work too many hours! Give yourself three-day weekends like a normal person, I mean, dang it, don’t you ever masturbate?”
I’m rubbing my eyes so hard, they might fall out of my skull after listening to her introducing herself to every customer that comes in.
“Connie. Yep, Connie Callahan, formerly almost Connie Conner, which was in fact not the worst act my almost husband did to me before calling off the wedding last year. No, no ma’am, no wedding for me in the future.
Yep, I’m this one’s big sis. I used to run this place when I lived here.
This shelving arrangement up here? All me.
My idea. You’re probably wondering why my almost husband called off the wedding.
I’ll give you a hint: secretary. It’s always the gosh-danged secretary. Never trust a blonde in heels.”
Funny she says that, not knowing that Mrs. Nadine Strong, a blonde notorious for her heels and hoop earrings, is now Mayor.
It’s noon on the dot that Cash walks in, strolls past my sister thinking she’s a customer, dumps his backpack behind the counter with a thump, and asks me if he should get on misting the roses.
Connie is on him the next instant. “Who’s this doll face? You got yourself a cute little employee?”
“My sister,” I say for an introduction. “This is Cash. He works here once a week.”
“Just one day? What’s even the point? Hi, I’m Connie, former brains of the operation, as is evidenced by the brainlessness of the current operation.
Just joshin’ ya,” she quickly says with way too forceful a nudge into my side, “but seriously, spend a little more to make a little more. Kids need summer allowances. You going off to college, Mr. Cashmere?”
Cash appears entirely in love with and dignified by the lovely moniker. “I don’t think so, ma’am.”
“Don’t you got dreams? What are they? Staying home mowing lawns all year? Nothing wrong with mowing lawns, mind you, it’s honest work, but with a face like yours, I can get you into twelve different PR firms. I have friends.”
“Don’t listen to her,” I beg him.
“Do you do social media? Everything’s social media nowadays. Give me five minutes, I’ll have you job interviews lined up. But you have got to get yourself into higher-level education, my man.” She slaps the counter, waking us both up. “Dream big, Mr. Cashmere.”
Cash nods slowly, mouth slack.
I’m pulling out my hair.
It’s after work—which feels like twelve hours later for some reason I will resist naming—that we walk all the way back to the house, and while she unpacks her things on my bed, she drills me.
“How much do you actually make, babe? How’s the overhead?
I’m not even gonna ask when your last vacation was, because I already know.
I’m honestly stunned you do the deliveries yourself.
I mean, yay for small-town charm, but don’t you ever dream of expanding someday?
” She turns to face me. “Why are you still running that place like the little flower shop Mom and Dad left behind?”
The thing with my sister is, I don’t even have to participate in the conversation. I can just relax against a doorframe, head leaned on it, eyes half open, and let her do the talking for us both.
It’s been like this since we were kids.
And is it the craziest thing that the worst part of my day was Diego not showing up to ruin it?
At this point, he’d be my savior.
I’d welcome a soul-crushing argument with him right now.