Chapter 14
Word seemed to spread that the bookmobile was open for business, the influx of people streaming in the afternoon almost doubling what the morning had brought.
Most of the people Levi had never seen before, which wasn’t much of a surprise.
Besides Jack MacDonald, who made a nuisance of himself to anyone within a drivable radius, and Deborah Smith, the retired doctor who Jack had dragged into Levi’s house last winter when he’d been sick with COVID, Levi didn’t really know many of his neighbors.
He recognized a few faces here and there—the owner of the Chevy Silverado that he’d replaced brake pads on two weeks ago, for instance—but he couldn’t put any names to those faces.
What he also couldn’t do was fool himself into thinking he was going to get any work done. Not at the service station, anyway. Which meant he might as well go home and start chipping away at some of the things he needed to get done there.
He didn’t exactly want to walk into the bay, not when there were—he peeked through the office blinds and counted—six people waiting to become new members of the Polk County library system, but he also didn’t want to leave without letting Hayley know where he was in case she needed him for some reason.
Bracing himself, he opened the door and stepped out of his little sanctuary and into the fray. If he was lucky, he could catch Hayley for a quick word before anyone else stopped him to chitchat.
He’d only managed to take a few steps before Jack turned and noticed him. The other man’s eye lit, and a smile bloomed on the lower half of his face like it had been planted in Miracle-Gro.
Levi frowned. Why was Jack even still here? How could the man stay in business if he wasn’t behind the cash register of the General Store?
“It’s good to see you come out of hiding, my friend.” Jack grinned.
“I wasn’t hiding,” Levi grumbled.
“Sure, sure.” Jack turned and moved so that he blocked Levi’s path.
“Hey, now that I have you here, I wanted to invite you to a meeting the other small business owners are hosting next week. We’re getting together to discuss ways to bring in more revenue.
I don’t know how it is with your service station, but a lot of us are struggling to keep our doors open. ”
“Hmm,” Levi replied noncommittally.
Jack chuckled. “As eloquent as ever, I see.” He let some of his jovial attitude slip.
“Look, I get that you like to be left alone and all, but we need to band together if we’re going to survive in this economy.
How do you stay afloat? There aren’t exactly a lot of us who need your services very often. ”
Levi glanced at the vintage sports car up on the lift. “Supplemental income.”
Jack scratched his chin. “That’s not a bad idea.” He clapped Levi on the shoulder. “See, we need your wisdom at that meeting.”
“I’ll think about it,” Levi said. He had no inclination to give the gathering a second of consideration, but Jack would continue to hound him if he didn’t at least promise to think about it.
“Good man.” He wagged a finger at Levi, his grin firmly back in place. “You’re a hard nut, but one of these days I’m going to crack you.”
“Okay.” Levi walked around Jack with a determined stride. The faster he got to Hayley, the sooner he could get out of there.
As if sensing him before he fully approached, Hayley turned from her spot at the open side door of the bookmobile, her soft smile in place. “Hey there, big guy.”
Tension drained from Levi’s shoulders. Just seeing her sweet smile and hearing the melodic cadence of her voice worked a small and immediate transformation in him. “Hi.”
“Your ears must have been burning because I was just talking about you to Robin here.” Hayley turned her attention to the woman in front of her.
Levi recognized her. She drove a Honda Odyssey that she brought in for regular maintenance. The engine was still running well with almost three hundred thousand miles on it.
Levi tipped his head. “Ma’am.”
“Thank you for opening the service station in this capacity, Mr. Redding. I’m an avid reader and already access the library through their lending apps, but nothing beats a physical copy in your hands, am I right?”
“Like having a friend right beside you,” Hayley concurred. “If you could see all the books on Levi’s own shelves, Robin, you’d know that he agrees with you.” She smirked at him as if they shared a secret.
“I thought I recognized a kindred spirit in you.” Robin turned her open, welcoming face to him.
Levi cleared his throat as he split his attention between Robin and Hayley. He didn’t want to be rude, but he was also itching to get away.
“Is there something you wanted to talk to me about?” Hayley asked, coming to his rescue.
Levi exhaled in relief. “I’m heading to the house. If you need me, that’s where I’ll be.”
“Thanks for letting me know. Do you want me to lock up here when I’m done?”
He pulled out his keys and showed her which one would lock the office. “There’s a padlock for the bay door as well.” The alarm system he could turn on from the app on his phone.
He managed to make it out of the garage with a few dips of his head in acknowledgement to people but fortunately wasn’t engaged in anymore conversation.
As much as he hated to admit it, his conscience pricked as he walked up the narrow trail to his house.
Maybe he should put in a little more effort at being friendly.
A smile wouldn’t kill him. A few nice words here and there with people was well within the bounds of things he could handle.
After he’d moved away from home, he was self-aware enough to realize he’d swung to the other extreme side of the social pendulum.
Living the way he did, alone and shutting everyone out, made his life easier.
But easier wasn’t necessarily better. Maybe it was time to explore where a happy medium was. Where his true boundaries lay.
Once home, he beelined straight to his bedroom.
The weather would hold for a little longer, but cooler nights were around the corner, and he needed to make headway on his winter supply of firewood.
The house had central heat, but he used the fireplace for warmth and to cut down the cost of his electric bill.
He’d already downed a few trees on his property and used the chainsaw to cut them, but the wooden stumps were still waiting to be chopped with an ax and stacked inside the woodshed.
Which meant he needed to get out of his coveralls and into his well-worn pair of denim jeans and a breathable T-shirt.
He opened the door to his bedroom and walked in, stopping when his shoe made a weird crinkle sound that didn’t belong to the wood floors.
Looking down, he spotted a folded piece of paper peeking out from under his sole.
He bent down and picked it up, his pulse doing a little skip before settling again.
Papers didn’t grow legs and walk to their destinations, and there hadn’t been any memos or notes he’d left lying around that would have fallen on the floor.
Which meant Hayley must have slipped a letter under his door this morning before she’d left the house.
He unfolded the paper, the looping cursive handwriting causing him to smile. Her handwriting was a bit like her personality, unreserved and cheerful. Sitting heavily on the edge of his bed, he settled in to read, a bubble of hopeful anticipation inside his chest.
Dear Levi,
Do you know that your letter is the first I’ve ever received? I mean, I get the ones addressed to Ms. Holt that go on to congratulate me on being preapproved for their credit card, but those don’t count.
Levi chuckled even as his heart swelled.
Illogical pride pumped in his bloodstream at being a first in Hayley’s life.
A first for anything—even something as simple as a personally penned letter—felt intimate somehow.
Like it connected them in a way that was unique.
She could never have that with another human being.
It was something that now belonged only to him.
It probably sounds silly, but I always wanted a pen pal.
My obsession with the idea of writing letters more than likely started after I read Daddy-Long-Legs by Jean Webster during one of my hospital stays.
I wish I could say it was only the thought of having a special friendship at the other end of a postage stamp that intrigued me, but I refuse to be embarrassed to admit that I spent quite a bit of time daydreaming about my nonexistent pen pal falling hopelessly in love with me through our letter exchange.
Levi looked up from her hypnotizing handwriting and focused on the blank white wall in front of him, processing what he’d just read.
His brain tripped over a phrase she’d so easily written, as if something so defining were as effortlessly communicated as sharing a favorite color or admitting you’d never tried guacamole.
One of my hospital stays. Just how many times had Hayley been admitted to the hospital in her life? What had caused her to be admitted? Was the medical condition no longer an issue, or was it something she still struggled with in adulthood?
His gaze whipped to the window as if he could see down to the garage and Hayley there.
A protective surge rose within him, but he forced himself to stay where he was.
His barreling in and acting like a brute wouldn’t serve any purpose besides assuaging his own concerns.
Hayley certainly wouldn’t thank him for it.
You just saw her and she was fine, he reminded himself instead.
But what if she needs a hospital again? With the roads closed, there’s no way to get her to a doctor, his unhelpful brain picked at him.
He clenched his teeth. If it came to that, he’d move every single one of those boulders with his own bare hands.
He unlocked his jaw and forced his gaze back to the letter.
She’d had a girlish fantasy about falling in love through written words exchanged with a stranger.
He wasn’t a wealthy philanthropist fourteen years her senior paying for her college education, nor was she an orphan whose name had been chosen for her from a gravestone, but they were near-strangers and he was more than capable of fulfilling a long-held desire of receiving letters.
He shouldn’t do it, try to make her fall in love with him. It would be like catching a butterfly and keeping it in a glass jar when it was made to fly and share its beauty with the rest of the world. It would be selfish of him, wanting to keep her all to himself.
But how could he let her go when she was the only one who had ever silenced the noise in his head?
When she seemed to be able to read him as easily as her favorite book while everyone else had only ever looked at him like he’d been written in a language they couldn’t decipher?
It would be selfish, but he was okay with a little villainy if it meant he wouldn’t have to say good-bye.
Levi read the rest of Hayley’s letter. She went on to talk about how her love of books sparked in her the desire to become a librarian, especially once her parents had told her they could no longer afford to constantly buy her new books.
After that, she’d walk to the library at least once a week on her way home from school, collecting book boyfriends like Jesse Tuck, Gilbert Blythe, and Prince Kai.
Levi wasn’t sure how he could compete with those fictional heroes, but he could find pen and paper and craft letters that he hoped would start to make the earth beneath her feet crumble until she found herself falling as hard and as fast as he was.