Hard to Get (Big Love from Galway #3)

Chapter 1

Andi

It takes a village to keep this place afloat. Thank heavens Galway’s a good one. July, donating leftover food from the restaurant. Rose, always managing to find funds from somewhere in emergencies. Tisha at the high school, and all our dedicated staff and volunteers, with their hard work and community contacts. Me, juggling spreadsheets and grant applications and worry.

It’s going to take a village, four mules and a wagon to drag me out of my head tonight.

But it’s almost five and I’ve been here since six this morning when I came to survey the storm damage and I’ve at least got to get out of here .

A few songs from my pep-talk playlist and maybe I’ll have my shit together enough to walk out of this office and head for home without eagle-eye Pattie at the front desk asking if I’m okay.

I’ll be okay. I am an island.

I’m the one who’s always okay.

And anyway, if today showed me anything, it’s that I’m not really as alone as I sometimes feel. Between Bett at Bett’s Coffee coming around the counter to give me a hug along with my daily Tall, Dark and Deadly order—Bett had loved Gram too—and Pattie having a vase of bright zinnias from her garden on my desk when I got to work, and July and Rose showing up with breakfast and Angus in tow so he could take stock of the damage last night’s storm did to the shelter’s backyard play-area fence, I’ve been surrounded by kindness all day.

Doesn’t make me forget that I’ve got one former resident in the hospital and another who seems likely to go back to her husband. Doesn’t make me forget this anniversary, either.

I jam in my earbuds and tip my head to the back of my chair. The low, rumbling buzz of The Chicks’ “Sin Wagon” rolls through my ears straight into my brain, and I turn up the music without taking my feet off my desk. Without even opening my eyes. Just crank it up and let it pour in to fill my aching soul.

I am in desperate need of a stress outlet, and for the life of me I can’t come up with one. My gym’s closed indefinitely—two trees came down on it in the storm—so I can’t go kickbox the shit out of anything. Can’t pump my weight in iron. Can’t even do a yoga class.

Softball season’s over, so no pounding things with a bat, either.

It’s ninety-eight degrees and wicked humid, so if I go out for a run before dark, I’m likely to die.

Tension boils like magma in me, but The Chicks pierce my thoughts with fiddle and banjo and the defiant snarl of a woman absolutely sick of a bad man’s shit.

I don’t know if The Chicks invented the term mattress dancing , but they’ve certainly brought it to my attention with this song. Sex—hot, energetic sex—now there’s a stress outlet.

I could go out tonight—maybe down to Greenville… It’s across the state line in South Carolina but not a bad drive—and find me a nice guy with good hands and a big, hard—

The image of my grandma rolling over in her grave interrupts that thought. As always.

God, I miss Gram.

Miss her crack of laughter in the evenings as we swapped the stories of our day. Her thoughtful pauses and slow, careful questions as she’d try to see a clear path for us through the tangle of life. I even miss her piercing see-every-damn-thing eyes.

Two years and one day ago, I’d have been calling her at the end of a day like this to ask if she wants me to build something new on the patio this weekend. She’d come up with some backbreaking project, and I’d lift and haul and sweat the stress out. And then later we’d have something nice to show for it. That’s how we got the patio in the first place. And the low wall edging the ravine, and the firepit.

But today I can’t think of anything new to build and Gram won’t be around to enjoy it with me anyway, or to cook up a feast to give me energy, or to gripe at me to peel my filthy body off the patio pavers and go take a shower before my muscles “lock that way.”

She loved to squeeze my biceps in passing. To settle beside me at the dining table and knock on my quads with her bony little knuckles. “That’s my girl,” she’d say, all smug. She took my ability to build stuff as assurance that I’d never need a man.

But tonight, despite all the times I’ve agreed with her pronouncements that “Salazar women are cursed—we’re better off on our own,” I’m starting to wonder.

This is the fault of my sickeningly-happy-with-their-new-partners friends.

I was definitely a fifth wheel last night at the roadhouse. Used to be I could count on July to be up for a spontaneous adventure at times like this, but now most days you can’t get a piece of paper between her and Joe. And Rose has been with Angus ever since I first met her. With those two couples, every smile and every touch is foreplay. I don’t want to think about it…but I can’t look away.

So yeah, I am 100 percent sure a decent man and some mattress dancing are exactly what I need tonight. What else am I going to do…jump rope on the patio until I’m dehydrated? Drift around inside the cottage, drinking tea out of Gram’s mug and staring at the empty chair that still holds the shape of her little butt? I’d lose my mind.

Now that the idea has occurred to me, I cannot stop imagining a nice guy with good hands and a big, hard—

My phone vibrates in my pocket.

I hit Pause on my fantasy and on the music.

“Andi. How you doin’?” From Lenny’s voice and his occupation, you’d expect him to be a three-pack-a-day, whiskey-chugging guy but no, he has an occasional beer and a whole lot of sweet tea. Doesn’t smoke at all. Trying, like me, not to reenact family mistakes.

“So-so, Lenny. How ’bout you?”

“Rashad ate bad shrimp and Chris has laryngitis or some such shit.” Lenny’s playing soft chords as he talks. Dude can’t stay away from a keyboard for more than a few minutes without getting twitchy. “I’ll be doin’ a lot better if you can help us out this evenin.’”

Hmm. Singing beats the hell out of sitting in the cottage talking to Gram’s empty chair. “You’re in luck, Len. I am free as a bird. Lindon’s?”

“Yes, ma’am. Thank god. Practice with us at six thirty?”

“I’ll be there. Thanks, Lenny.” Hallelujah. Band gigs offer a different kind of release than sex, but I love it and I’ll take it.

Six-thirty practice leaves me just enough time to pick up dinner at July’s and doll myself up.

I tell Pattie goodbye. “Tell everybody to be careful this weekend, okay?”

She nods. “You too. You’re not going running tonight, are you?”

I shake my head. “Nah, too hot.”

“Good. You should find somewhere better to do it anyway. It’s not safe to run those roads up near your place.” Pattie mothers me whenever she can.

I check the cameras at her desk to make sure there’s no one suspicious in the parking lot. Make sure the latch clicks behind me as I leave the building. Walk quickly to my car, head high. Check under the car as I approach, and the back seat before I get in.

It’s my routine, a really sucky routine, similar to the routines women all over the world develop for themselves just to try to be safe in a world that views us as prey or appropriate targets for rage.

Thank heavens for Lenny’s call. I don’t know why the hell I considered, even for a moment, trying to find a man for the night.

***

Kevin

“You gotta hold your end up higher or it’ll spill! No, up! Up! ” CeCe’s voice is full of urgency.

I’m doing my best but I’m new to these controls, and then a cloud of gnats or mosquitoes or whatever these critters are rises up around me and I can’t see what I’m doing. I lose control of the pipeline and it crashes down on us, spewing thick, shiny oil everywhere.

CeCe sighs. “You really suck at this, Uncle Kev. You just destroyed an entire ecosystem.”

I rein in my laugh. I do hate letting her down, really. “It was my first time, CeCe. Besides, this is a really terrible game. Who needs this pressure?”

“ You’re the one who told me about it!” She’s faking her outrage. She likes teasing me as much as I like giving her a hard time.

“Oh. Right. Why’d I do that, again?”

“Because you said our shooter games make you ‘queasy.’” I can hear the air quotes in her voice. She sighs again, deeper, with the disgust only a fourteen-year-old can muster. “Face it, Uncle K—you’re a bigger wuss than Great-Grandma. You’re even a bigger wuss than Great-Grandpa .”

“Oooh, low blow.” Great-Grandpa has the softest heart in the Midwest. “Hey, that boy in soccer camp still bothering you?”

“Nope. I did what you said. S-I-N-G. He hasn’t messed with me or anybody else since. Thanks!”

Excellent. “Thank Miss Congeniality .” And my unrequited crush on Sandra Bullock.

In the background I hear my brother. “C’mon, CeCe. Time to go. What’re you doing in there?”

“Losing another game with Uncle Kevin. He’s what the French would call les incompétents. ”

She gets bonus points for the Home Alone reference. At least she didn’t call me a filthy animal this time.

“Hey, Kev!” Pete hollers. “Too bad you can’t come to Mom and Dad’s with us for dinner. It’s steak night.”

Another low blow. Not only do I have to tell my niece goodbye, but I also have to spend the rest of the evening wishing I were there with them all around the big table my folks set up on their screened porch. Or maybe they’ll move it inside, if it’s as hot there as here. Either way, all my favorite people will be there, talking at the same time so you can’t help but follow three conversations at once. It’s a toss-up whether there’ll be more food or more laughter.

It’s hard to be away, even though it means I can sleep in instead of dragging myself up before daylight to help whoever Mom or Dad promised I’d help with some backbreaking task. I mean, not that I mind helping. I’d just like to be asked first.

“See ya, brat. Give everybody a hug from me.”

“Bye, Uncle Kev. Love you. Miss you.”

“Love you too. Miss you too.”

Then she’s gone. I take a deep breath and blow it out.

Galway’s a nice little town, it really is. It’s just that every time I try a new-to-me restaurant or see an interesting shop or catch sight of somebody doing something athletic, the first thing that pops into my mind is, “I’ll have to bring Mom and Grandma here,” or “Pam and Cathy will love this,” or “Dad and Pete could hook them up with better equipment.” And my family lives 1,100 miles away. My whole family. Everybody I know and love.

The realization always sends me into a tailspin. Was this a giant mistake? What was I thinking? I don’t even like change on my good days.

What full-grown man pulls up all his roots and leaves a decent job and everybody he cares about to go someplace he’s never seen, all because he had his feelings hurt?

Okay, true, being dumped by a fiancée counts as more than hurt feelings. It’s more like…an identity fracture. You’re a nice guy, Kev, and I love you, but I’m bored to tears with you. You’re so…vanilla.

All I could think when Cheryl said it was “Vanilla’s a valid flavor.”

But I never saw it coming. And I just don’t understand how niceness could be bad .

It’s hard not to feel like this move was a mistake. Hours and days and evenings and weekends stretch empty in front of me with no end in sight. Trying to pass time, I’ve gotten settled in my apartment and finished my lesson plans for all my classes for the quarter. Yesterday I came in and got my classroom fixed up just the way I want it…bright colors and interesting math facts and trivia and challenges, websites for practice and math games, capsule bios of mathematicians from all over the world. Careers that make use of a strong math background. Today I came in and couldn’t think of a single thing to adjust to make it better, so I sat here for hours making basic workout templates for different fitness goals for students. I haven’t actually met any students yet—not till tomorrow, bright and early—but by god, I’ll be ready.

School doesn’t start until week after next, and except for a few hours I’m expected to work with kids on the fall teams, I’ve got nothing to do between now and then. So it felt like a gift from heaven when my niece called a little while ago. A respite from the loneliness I brought on my own damn self.

I’m a pitiful excuse for a grown-up man.

“Hey, Farm Boy. What you got going on tonight?”

It’s Steve Jackson, lounging in my classroom doorway. Of all my new colleagues, he’s the biggest. Biggest guy, biggest joker, biggest personality.

I roll my eyes because he expects it. “Still not a farmer, dude. Nobody in my family is a farmer.”

He shakes his head, unconvinced as ever. “Don’t know that I believe ya, man. Nebraska sounds mighty farmy to me.”

“I’m from Lincoln. Population almost 300,000. Not as big as Asheville, but many times the size of Galway. And there’s millions of acres of farmland right here in North Carolina.”

Steve drops his bag. “Oooh. Somebody’s been studying.” He saunters into the room and squints at one of my bulletin boards. Absently rubs his right shoulder.

“You betcha. Some body’s gotta know what they’re talking about around here.” I watch his fingers press deep into his skin. “You know I can give you some exercises for that shoulder.”

He shakes his head. “It’s not too bad. Just a little ache. Got plans tonight?”

I wish. “Nope. Please say you’ve got an idea.”

“Always, man. Bunch of us going to dinner and then to Lindon’s for the band. Wanna go?”

“Yep.” I would pay for company tonight.

He tells me to meet them at July’s—“southwest corner of the town square”—at seven to eat and after that we’ll head a few blocks north to the bar. Then he strolls out, scooping up his duffel and waving without turning around.

Hallelujah and thank the Lord for bighearted social science teachers.