31. Clark
Chapter thirty-one
Clark
I ’ve been practicing my speech on Chase, but I look up to see Clara standing on the other side of the glass door, staring at me. Her hands are ridiculously full, and she startles when I make eye contact with her. Thankfully, she doesn’t drop anything as a result.
I see her raise her leg like she’s going to open the sliding door with her foot, but I jump forward to open it first. “It’s okay to ask for help, Clara,” I bemuse.
“Hi, kettle. I’m pot,” she sarcastically quips back. “I mean, pot as in a kitchen pot. That’s black. Not pot like, pot pot,” she adds quickly.
“And here I thought things were about to get really interesting,” I say with a twinkle in my eye. I take the plates and glasses from her hands, then mentally scold myself. Stay focused. Don’t get distracted by her wit or eyes or smile or adorable punny shirts .
“P.S.: your fiddle leaf fig in the sunroom looks sickly,” I observe, distracting my train of thought.
“Does it?” Clara asks, retreating inside for a moment before coming back out. “Shoot, it does. I asked Syd to come over and water them when I was gone so long.”
“You asked Syd to take care of your plants?!” I exclaim. “Well, there’s a sure-fire way to kill them off.”
“Hey!” Clara laughs. “She was doing me a favor!”
“Do your plants a favor and let me take care of them next time you need help. Syd has the blackest thumb I’ve ever seen. Pretty sure she could kill an artificial plant. She probably set a reminder to water them every few days without even bothering to check the soil,” I explain.
“She didn’t!” Clara gasps. “That would explain the yellow leaves on more than one plant.” She sighs. “Wait, how do you know this much about plants?”
I shrug a shoulder. “When I took care of your Tineke, I did a little research.” Clara eyes me. “Okay, I did a lot of research. I went down the black hole of Instagram and blog posts by the plant lady who makes that fertilizer.”
There’s a tangle of emotions in Clara’s eyes as she regards me. Those deep blues are sucking me in, tugging me closer. I change the subject.
“I didn’t know what kind of pizza you prefer, so I ordered their best seller. It’s a three-meat pizza,” I say, opening the lid of the box.
“As long as there are no black olives, I’ll eat pretty much any pizza,” Clara replies.
“Ugh, who likes that dirt fruit garbage anyway?” I respond with disgust.
“Right?! Only psychopaths think olives taste good,” Clara says as she pulls a slice of pizza onto her plate.
“Just don’t let Syd hear you talk that way,” I tell her, taking a slice for myself.
“Nooo!” Clara groans. “Don’t tell me Syd is on the dark side.”
“I won’t say anything then,” I respond, unable to hold back a smile any longer.
Chase is sitting right next to Clara’s chair, ears perked, lip tucked behind his bottom tooth. His best puppy eyes are plastered on her. He knows better than to beg me for people food. I’m determined to keep Chase alive longer than any dog has ever lived, so I’m strict about his diet and exercise.
Clara coos at him before handing him a meatball from her pizza. All of my friends know better than to feed Chase scraps from their plate. But I can’t bring myself to stop Clara.
Chase is going to be even more obsessed with her than we already were. I mean, he . Than he already was.
“Sooo,” Clara draws out, eyebrow arched. “You wanted to talk?”
I chew and swallow my bite of pizza, setting my plate down beside me. “Um, yeah,” I begin, clearing my throat. “I wanted to talk to you—or, really, I guess I wanted to ask you . . . I just mean, I needed to say . . .”
The more I stumble over my words, the wider her eyes grow. I don’t know what thoughts are running through that beautiful mind of hers. If they’re as conflicted as mine, I need to spit this out and clear up any potential confusion.
“I need to talk to you about the Christmas festival idea.”
Her eyes flash with the tiniest moment of disappointment before lighting up like a Christmas tree.
“Precisely what about the Christmas festival do you want to talk about?” she asks coyly, head tilted.
“I think I’ve decided that it could be a good idea for the town. For morale, for the economy, for resident retention. I’m ready to explore the possibility,” I state as unemotionally as possible.
“What was that?” she asks, setting aside her plate. Chase eyes her half-eaten pizza, but stays obediently in place. “I’m not sure I heard you correctly.”
I sigh. “The Christmas festival might be a good idea. To bring in some tourists. I’m thinking we should do it.”
“And I play into this conversation how, exactly?” Clara asks.
This woman. She’s really going to make me spell it out.
“I’m asking for your help to plan a Christmas festival, Clara. Please?” I acquiesce.
She’s now the spitting image of the Cheshire Cat. But her smile is so intoxicating, I can’t even be annoyed.
She sits forward and literally claps her hands like an excited child. “Finally! You won’t regret this, Clark. We can make it beautiful and classy and magical—it doesn’t have to be gimmicky at all, I promise. I mean, maybe a teensy bit gimmicky. But not over the top. Let me get some paper, and we can brainstorm,” she says, standing up.
“Wait,” I say as I grab hold of her wrist, urging her to sit back down. My hand is now on fire after touching her smooth skin. I picture a fire extinguisher shooting through my veins before I continue.
“Why don’t we use these ideas as a starting point?” I ask, reaching into my back pocket to pull out a folded piece of notebook paper. A crumpled, folded piece of notebook paper.
Clara’s eyes double in size, and she gasps. It’s the most attractive intake of breath I’ve ever heard. She stares at the paper in my hand, then looks up into my eyes.
“My ideas,” she whispers. “You . . . you saved them?”
I nod.
“But you crumpled them up. You threw them in the trashcan,” she says, still breathless.
“And then I took them out of the trashcan,” I reply, unfolding the page. “I didn’t read them until recently. But I kept them.”
Moisture pools in Clara’s eyes, and she blinks rapidly to clear them. Crying has always made me uncomfortable, but I resist the urge to retreat. I clear my throat again and motion to the list.
“Some of these ideas I’m going to veto—no changing the town name to No-el, no fake snow machines, no mistletoe kissing booth,” I say.
“But—” Clara starts to interject.
“No. Kissing. Booth,” I state firmly. Clara huffs but nods. “There are a lot of reasonable ideas here. I think we should call a town meeting and present this list. Give everyone a chance to vote on it.”
“I have an even better thought,” Clara says, eyes twinkling. “If the town is on board with the festival idea, we should have a Christmas in July Heartmark movie marathon and let everyone brainstorm ideas together. Give people more ownership of the plan.”
I nod. “That’s not a bad idea.”
“Of course, it’s not a bad idea. When have you known me to have bad ideas?” Clara quips. I tilt my head with a deadpan expression in my eyes. “Hey, you just admitted to my festival idea being good . So none of the sarcasm leaking out of your eyeballs shall be directed my way from now on,” she says, looking infinitely pleased with herself.
“Fine.”
“How soon can you pull together a town meeting to vote on the festival?” Clara asks, sitting back and taking another bite of pizza.
I sit back in my chair as well. “That’s the great thing about small towns. Doesn’t take much notice to pull everyone together. I’ll put out the call to gather early Monday morning.”
“Can I stay for the meeting?” Clara asks quietly, twirling the ring on her finger and not making eye contact with me.
I lean forward to force Clara to look into my eyes. “This was your idea, Clara. Of course, you can come.”
The corners of her mouth turn up slowly, pulling on the string knotted around my heart.
“The town has to be able to blame the right person if this goes sideways,” I joke, trying to relieve the tension in my chest.
“Har har,” Clara scoffs. “I’ll be sure to share credit with Noel’s finest mayor when this turns out to be the best thing that ever happened to this town.”
The jury is still out on the Christmas festival, but I’m trying to ignore the persistent feeling that Clara might just be the best thing to ever happen to this town.