13. Sophie
SOPHIE
Ibarely slept. If I managed to sleep for ten minutes, I’d consider that a win.
I was exhausted, but my brain, that cruel little beast, decided it was the perfect time to host a seminar on Every Possible Way the Festival Could End in Public Humiliation.
Attendance was excellent.
Last night, I dragged myself back to my room at the Hartwell Inn, kicked off my shoes somewhere near the door, face-planted onto the mattress, and waited for unconsciousness.
It never arrived.
Instead, my mind clocked in for a full overnight shift.
Did we have enough volunteers? What if the food trucks lost power? What if it rained? What if somebody parked in the emergency lane? What if Bandit escaped? What if Sheriff Walker showed up and discovered I’d accidentally violated seventeen municipal bylaws before breakfast? What if Helen fired me?
Around three thirty, I accepted that sleep had become more of a philosophical concept than an actual biological function.
So when my alarm went off at five thirty, I was already awake, staring at the ceiling like a sleep-deprived zombie.
I hauled myself into the bathroom and stared at my reflection.
“Oof. Now, that’s horrifying.” My eyes had developed impressive dark circles underneath them, my hair appeared to have formed its own nest above my head, and every muscle in my body hurt worse than yesterday. How was that even possible?
The shower helped loosen some of my muscle pain. But not much.
“Ow.” Pain flared as I turned my neck to the right. Super. My neck was stiff. That’s all I needed.
So what’s a girl to do when she’s suffering from a stiff neck and needs to shower?
She showers at a forty-five-degree angle.
And I did, washing only the body parts I could actually see without moving my neck.
Good enough.
If I dropped the soap, I was fucked.
Fortunately, I didn’t.
Unfortunately, the last time my neck was this stiff was when Henry, the douchebag ex, had dumped me over a text.
You’re too much. Life’s too short.
I hated that I couldn’t get those two stupid sentences out of my head.
He hadn’t responded to my last drunken text.
Maybe tonight I’d send him another. You know. Just for shits and giggles.
By the time I pulled on black pants, a fitted black shirt, and comfortable sneakers followed by tying my hair into a ponytail that could generously be described as “functional,” I looked almost like someone who knew what she was doing. If you stood far enough away. And squinted.
Next, I picked up my phone, tapped the diary app and wrote:
Day 3:
Didn’t quit.
Goat still won.
Sheriff remains impossible to read.
Festival starts today.
I considered adding still employed but decided not to tempt fate. Instead, I grabbed Helen’s binder and then paused.
Sheriff Walker’s business card was still tucked safely inside the front pocket. Slightly wrinkled and partially chewed but still perfectly readable despite Bandit’s best efforts to eat it.
I smiled before I could stop myself. Then frowned. “Damn. I’m in serious trouble.” I closed the binder with considerably more determination than necessary. “We are not smiling at business cards.”
That was a slippery slope. Next thing you knew I’d be framing the thing. Or laminating it. Or casually mentioning I happened to know the sheriff whenever anyone asked for directions.
Absolutely not. I still had standards. They might’ve been wobbling a little, but they were technically still standing.
Resolute, I headed downstairs. The inn was quiet, but Dottie was already in the kitchen, by the sound of clanging pots. The smell drifted through the hallway, followed closely by fresh coffee, and suddenly the world seemed marginally less hostile.
“I made breakfast,” she called, marching out of the kitchen barefoot before I even reached one of the tables in the dining room. She somehow balanced a coffee pot in one hand and a loaded breakfast plate in the other with the confidence of a woman who’d been defying gravity since the seventies.
I lowered myself gently into the chair without moving my neck. “I could kiss you.”
Dottie beamed. “I know.”
“I won’t.”
“I know that too,” said Dottie, looking not remotely disappointed.
I flipped a coffee mug onto the table and watched as Dottie poured it full of delicious brown liquid heaven. The white apron across her middle today read: BUTTER FIXES MOST THINGS.
For me, right now, that was coffee.
I winced as I reached out for the mug. Even lifting my arm tugged at the knot in my neck. Great. I grabbed the mug, took a sip, and moaned. “This is so, so good.”
Dottie gave me a knowing smile. “I know that too.” She watched me for a moment. “What’s wrong with you? You look… off.”
I swallowed. “Stiff neck.”
“Ah.” She looked me over. “That’s called stress.”
“No shit.”
Her eyes widened. “You know. I’ve got just the stuff to make that go away.”
“You do—ow.” Pain flared in my neck as I’d twisted it to look at her.
“In fact, I just finished a batch last night,” she said happily. “A little goose fat, crushed garlic, cayenne pepper, pine tar, and just a sprinkle of well-aged horse manure. Nature’s anti-inflammatory.”
I slowly lowered my mug. “Horse manure?”
“Don’t worry. I boiled it first.” She beamed. “I call it Dottie’s Miracle Muscle Melt. It works miracles. Trust me.”
“Okay.” Hell, I was willing to try anything at this point. Looked like that was going to be horse manure. Excellent.
“Be right back!” She spun around, bare feet slapping, and disappeared into the kitchen.
And she’d left with the breakfast plate too.
I let out a breath as I rubbed my neck. Having a stiff neck on the festival’s first day was probably one of the worst things that could happen.
I couldn’t exactly project calm, capable festival coordinator energy if every time someone called my name, I had to rotate my entire body to look at them.
Dottie appeared a moment later with a tiny jar in one hand, and thankfully my breakfast plate in the other. “Here,” she said, holding out the jar. “Rub some on. You should start feeling better in no time. Oh, it might burn a little. Don’t worry. That means it’s working.”
“Right.” I took the jar and twisted the top. Of course I had to smell it. I brought it to my nose and took a sniff. “Dottie.”
“Yes.”
“It smells like manure.”
Dottie gave me a light smack on the back of the head. “Don’t be a baby. Now put some on. It works. I rubbed some on my hands earlier. Nobody’s complained.”
Yet. “Fine.”
I dabbed two fingers into the ointment, trying not to breathe through my nose, and rubbed it onto my neck. The moment it touched my skin, my neck caught fire.
“Sweet mother of…”
The burning faded almost as quickly as it started. I rolled my shoulder. “Oh my god.” I turned my head to the right. “I think it’s actually working.”
“Told you,” said Dottie proudly.
I twisted the lid back onto the jar and set it on the table. I might smell like a stable, but at least I could turn my head again.
“So,” began Dottie, her expression softening. “You ready for today?”
I nodded, not finding the words. Mostly because they’d all been replaced by caffeine and low-grade panic.
Yes. Today was festival day. The real one. No more planning or pretending I still had time. In a few short hours, Maplewood Falls was going to fill with hundreds, possibly thousands of people. Children. Parents. Tourists. Vendors. Musicians. Volunteers.
And today, I’d find out whether forty-eight hours of controlled panic had actually been enough.
Whether every checklist, every frantic note in Helen’s binder, every near-disaster, every conversation with Sheriff Walker, every escaped goat, and every cup of coffee had somehow added up to something resembling competence.
I took one long drink of coffee. “Maybe I should make a run for it.”
Dottie snorted. “You can panic after breakfast. Eat. You’ll feel better. Trust me.” She slid the plate toward me. On it sat a perfectly golden pancake.
My stomach answered with an enthusiastic growl. “Fine. But I also think I might throw up if I eat.”
“Don’t be silly. You’ll be fine.” Dottie propped a hand on her hip, studying me with that look she had, half maternal, half amused, fully unbothered. “You can do this.”
“We’ll see.” I slumped in my chair, my fingers shaking from nerves. Great. Now I had the shakes to go with my not-so-stiff neck.
Dottie made a face. “I just remembered. I think I left my rosemary hair-growth serum warming on the stove again.” She winced. “Last time it dissolved a wooden spoon.”
“Powerful stuff.” I made a mental note to never touch any of Dottie’s hair-growth serums. Not if I didn’t want to end up bald.
Dottie pointed at me. “Eat half. Half the carbs is better than no carbs. You’ll need all the energy you can get today. Trust me.”
I frowned at the emphasis she put on the word trust, like she knew something I didn’t.
I didn’t know why, but at that moment, I flipped open Helen’s binder and pulled out Captain Competent’s card. Even wrinkled and slightly chewed, I could still make out his number.
His number…
Maybe I should call him? Like for a preventative measure thing? Nah. Knowing what I knew of him, he’d probably already be there by the time I arrived. Checking up on me… watching me… staring at my lips…
My brain really needed to stop replaying that moment. It refused to let it go.
Still, I liked it. I liked it a lot.
In a blur, a hand moved in front of me and snatched up the business card.
“Well, well, well, what do we have here?” said a woman’s voice. Only one woman in town who could make eight words sound simultaneously scandalized and delighted.
I turned in my seat to see Lola, dressed in a mini red dress, red pumps, and matching lipstick.
It was still very early in the morning, yet somehow she’d already achieved the level of glamorous most people needed a professional stylist and excellent lighting to accomplish.
I wasn’t convinced she experienced mornings the same way the rest of humanity did.
“It’s just a business card,” I told her, trying to sound matter-of-fact but failing miserably.