Alice
After my shift, I head next door to Maggie’s shop. I find her outside, decorating the Texas redbud that grows between The Buttermilk Cafe and Pardon My Garden. Right now, it’s glossy green, but soon the leaves will morph into vibrant shades of orange and yellow.
But the real showstopper is in the spring, when magenta flowers erupt from the branches.
Maggie is currently standing on a ladder, wearing a white sundress and grappling with a faux pumpkin, which dangles by an invisible string. As I watch, she tosses the pumpkin over a lower limb. It catches, and she proceeds to tie the string off.
She’s owned Pardon My Garden for five years, carrying on the previous owner’s tradition to decorate this tree with each passing holiday and season.
When I first returned to Holly River, I’d made a point to drive by on my way into town and was delighted to find inflated beach balls and hot pink flamingos hanging from the branches.
The tree was also wrapped in pink twinkling lights—every last branch—and inspired June to open an (adult) pink lemonade pop-up on Friday afternoons.
Which is how June and I met: over margarita glasses and beneath plastic flamingos.
To avoid startling Maggie, I make a wide circle and wave both arms. When she spots me, she yanks her headphones down around her neck. Even several feet away, I can hear the classical music blasting—something frantic and violin-heavy.
She climbs down the ladder. “Hey there, Forrest Gump. You run from any other men today?”
“Not today.” I follow her toward the shop doors. “But there’s still time yet.”
A spool of fishing wire is working its way out of her back pocket, so I grab it as we make our way inside.
“Watch it.” She halts, shooting me a look over her shoulder. “Don’t make any moves you won’t follow through on.”
I laugh and shake my head as she drops three pumpkins onto her counter with a clatter. “I’ve only got…” She silently counts the dozen or so pumpkins in the immediate vicinity. “Thirty thousand more to go.”
I flop down in the rolling chair behind the counter. The scent of lilies and damp moss hits me, a welcome relief from the smell of frying oil. Maggie picks up a pair of rose strippers and starts attacking stems like they owe her money.
“So,” she says without looking up, “he’s back.”
"He’s back," I echo, heaving a sigh.
“And you ran from him.”
I nod. “That I did.”
“You say you wrote him letters for how many years?” Maggie looks at me with those sharp green eyes, softened by freckles that appear hand-placed in their beauty. Her appearance straddles the line between seraphic and sultry, but right now, I can’t even meet her gaze.
“The whole time he was gone.”
Maggie stops stripping and glances in my direction. “Which was…?”
“Eight years?” I say in a question, even though it’s a hard fact.
“Damn, girl.” Maggie resumes her work. “You thirsty.”
I collapse forward onto the counter. “I wasn’t thirsty. He was my… friend.”
Maggie points at me with a freshly shorn rose. “He was your brother’s friend.” She tosses the rose onto the counter in front of me, and I roll the stem between my fingers.
“He felt like a brother to me,” I admit quietly. “I missed him when he was gone.”
To this, Maggie doesn’t reply. When she speaks again, her voice is softer. “When did he stop responding?”
I blow air out from between pursed lips. “Years ago. When I was in college.”
Maggie nods and then gets up to mess with the speaker on a high shelf.
Soon, the sound of calming strings fills the air.
“I liked him in school. I told you we were in the same grade. Maybe liked is a strong word. We ran in different circles, but he seemed nice enough. Your brother, on the other hand, was and is a moron.” Maggie hops up on the counter. “No offense.”
“None taken. He once put his mouth over a lit sparkler on the Fourth of July.” I place the rose stem between my teeth like they do in the movies.
Maggie’s face opens in alarm, and she yanks it from my mouth. “Oof. Don’t do that. If you’re going to serenade me, do it without swallowing pesticides.” She tosses the rose in with the others, then she looks at me, her mouth pulling into a smirk.
“He looked hot last night, huh?” Maggie raises her eyebrows.
I smile and shrug.
Maggie throws her head back and laughs. “Oh, my god, you want to screw your brother’s best friend.”
“I didn’t say—”
Maggie’s face scrunches up into one of mock disgust. “And you just said Colt was like a brother to you.”
“Maggie!”
“How many times you beat it last night thinking about him?”
I shake my head. “I’m gonna leave.”
Maggie scoffs. “Yeah, right. We’re on your favorite subject. You know, this is because of all those romance books you read. How many have you read this year? All of them?”
I glance out the front window, partially obscured by chalk calligraphy, and catch sight of a mom walking past with her son. The little boy is holding an armful of back-to-school supplies and struggling to keep up. The sight makes me wistful.
“He came by the diner today,” I admit sheepishly, knowing she’ll find out soon anyway. Around here, news travels faster than the weather changes.
Maggie’s eyes practically explode from her head. “He did?”
My face falls. “Yeah. He told me his mom passed away. And that he came back to sell her place.”
“Shit.” Maggie glances at the fall blooms waiting patiently in black buckets, and then at the freezer near the back. Finally, she looks at me. “He had to have known you worked there.”
“I don’t know. Maybe.” I chew my lip. “I invited him to the Hall tomorrow night. Hope that’s okay.”
“Course. Dalton always intrudes anyway. Might as well add another sweaty, disgusting, muscly…chisel-jawed…meat stick to the mix.”
“Meat stick? Really?”
“It’s bullshit he didn’t write you back. What else was he doing?” Maggie does air quotes and makes a dismissive face. “Being at war? Defending our country?”
“Trying to stay alive?” I add, playing along.
Maggie scoffs. “Be a man, am I right? Learn how to multitask.”
I glance down at my hands, thinking about his mom again. What else has happened in his life that I don’t know about? And should I even concern myself if he doesn’t care enough to tell me?
“Hey,” Maggie says, her smile fading. “I don’t forgive him. He’s a dick for not responding.”
I drop my head to the side. “No, he’s not.”
“Yeah, he is.” She gets up and begins dropping pumpkins into a storage bin. “Want to help me decorate the tree?”
I hop up, seizing the opportunity to take my mind off Colt. “Hard yes.”
Maggie tosses me a pumpkin, her eyes darting to the Fall Festival poster plastered above her flower buckets.
"Have you heard anything about the festival?
If we don't get enough tourists, half the shops on this street will be boarded up by Christmas.
The Fourth of July carnival last month? Only a fraction of my usual sales. "
“First meeting’s in a few days,” I remind her. “I’ll be there. I promise.”
Maggie stops and looks at me for a long moment, appearing far more serious than I’ve seen her in the past. “You got a plan to stay here until then?”
My heart clenches. I think about lying to her, because admitting that, yes, I do have a plan…
It feels like committing to it. And commitment comes with an expectation of action.
And results. But Maggie looks at me like she needs a friend just as much as I do, and so I tell her the truth. “I got a plan,” I admit quietly.
Maggie nods. “Good. That’s good. You’re the only person I know who looks at a weed and sees a wildflower, Alice. This town needs that right now. So you take that plan and you make it happen. Understand?”
I make a face that says I’m touched by the sentiment, because I am, and her eyes widen in alarm.
“Don’t even think about it.” Maggie takes an exaggerated backward step.
I catch her by the elbow before she can escape and pull her into a hug, squeezing her as tightly as I can with a plastic pumpkin still wedged under my arm.
“Get off me, hornball,” she groans.
But I hold on for a beat longer, soaking in her encouraging words, letting them seep beneath my skin.
When I release her, she marches straight for the front door, shaking her arms out like she’s dislodging cooties.
I laugh watching her go, but the spark she lit doesn't quite go out.
It stays there, a fragile, glowing coal in the corner of my mind, right next to the image of Colt sitting in Booth Four, looking like a man who finally knows exactly who he is.
I wish I could say the same for myself.