One Wish

“Not always foremost.”

“So you love your family, when you don’t hate them?”

“I’m crazy about them all the time—we just get on each other’s nerves. We’re typical, I think. I’ll say this—half the time I want to punch my brother and slap my sister, but if anyone ever laid a hand on either one of them, I’d take ’em out. Really, I don’t know how my folks lived through us. What about your family?” he asked.

She didn’t answer right away. Instead, she got up, took the plate and her bottle to the little kitchen area, retrieved two fresh beers and returned to her corner of the couch. “There’s very little to tell. My father died when I was fourteen and I’m an only child. My grandparents are gone, one set before I was even born and the other set before I was eighteen. There are some very distant relatives, but if I met some of them even once, I don’t remember. I did get a letter from someone who claimed to be a cousin or half cousin or something, but he only wanted a loan.” She laughed. “He apparently didn’t know anything about me.”

“How did you respond?”

She smiled. “I wrote back that it was very kind of him to reach out, but I wasn’t making loans at this time.”

“No one, huh?” he asked. “Your mother?”

“Also gone,” she lied, looking away. She just wasn’t willing to get into all that. Plus, she’d told Iris that she was alone. “There are friends, but probably not as many as you have. The couple who owned the flower shop in Portland where I worked, we’re close and stay in touch. I talk to them every week and visit now and then. They not only trained me in the shop but took me under their wing. Good people. They’re in their sixties and never had children, which probably explains why they think of me as family, though we’re not. And there are a couple of other friends who also stay in touch—Mikhail, to name one, but he travels all the time so I never see him. That might be one of the reasons I became good friends with Iris—we have that absence of family in common. And there’s the fact that I bought her flower shop, of course. Sometimes I look at people like Iris...and...well, you—and I feel a little abnormal, like I should try harder...”

“Iris? And me?”

“You’re both so connected to people. Iris doesn’t have family, but she has more good friends than anyone I know. The whole town loves her. The school definitely leans on her. And your family isn’t around here, but I bet you talk to them every week.”

“Pretty much,” he admitted.

“You’re really involved with people, too. The school, Cooper’s, even Waylan’s. All over town, people yell hello! But the reality is, I was raised an only child, had a very solitary upbringing and I’m probably a little too comfortable being alone.”

“People around here are pretty friendly to you, aren’t they?”

“They are. That’s what I love about this town. But I’m kind of a loner.”

“But you’ve had a lot of boyfriends,” he reminded her.

“This is true. And they’ve all been amazing. I spend time with a guy who actually owns a plantation in South Carolina, a guy with a British title of some kind—viscount I think. There’s Malone—he owns a lobster boat on the East Coast, there’s a bar owner, a guy in the ski patrol, a navy SEAL...very interesting, sexy guys. But I own a flower shop—my time is precious.”

He tilted his head and peered at her. “I think you’re bullshitting me, Grace.”

She got off the couch and went to the wall unit, opening a cupboard under the TV and there, lined up neatly, was a tidy row of books—paperbacks and a few hardcovers. Below the books was a similar collection of DVDs. She left the doors standing open and went back to the couch. She gracefully extended a hand toward the bookcase. “My keeper shelves. From medieval knights to navy SEALs. And there’s Wrath...I’m afraid he’s a vampire, but a very nice and sexy vampire. They’re all mine.”

“Should we have a little talk about your medication, Gracie?”

She smiled. “I know they’re pretend boyfriends, Troy. But they never cheat and I haven’t had to get one single screening for an STD.” Then she giggled. “I don’t have space for a lot of storage and books so I do most of my reading on an e-reader, but I have a special collection there. I can’t be without them. What would I do if my e-reader wasn’t charged or I lost it?”

Troy felt a tug of some kind inside, somewhere in his chest. He knew it was a warning sign—it was too soon to feel affectionate toward her. In fact, he’d prefer to never feel anything but friendly. But he couldn’t deny it felt good to know that Grace wasn’t involved with anyone. Her claim to never having been very involved was unusual for a woman her age and beauty. And he liked it.

“How are you fixed for real dates?” he asked.

“I have a very demanding schedule. When you own your own business every day off is a day without pay. I don’t have much help at the shop. I’ve had a couple of part-timers over the past couple of years, but right now I have no one—the last one had to quit. She wasn’t that much help anyway, but at least she kept the shop open while I delivered flowers. I have to try to figure that out. Like I said, I need a more balanced life.”

“Have you thought about a high school or college student? Or maybe two who could job share, putting together two part-time schedules that equal one full-time employee? There are so many at the high school who don’t want to go to college or who do but have trouble affording tuition.”

“Good idea, but when I advertise for help, hardly anyone answers.”

“You need help advertising in the right place. There’s a work-study program at school. If you can train your student-employee in a trade, they’ll get a credit toward graduation and get a morning or afternoon off to work. Didn’t Iris ever suggest this?”

Grace looked a little excited. “No! Should I ask her to help me with this?”

“Yes,” he said. “Not tonight. Tonight we drink beer and eat something. What’ve you got? I could run out for something...”

“How hungry are you? Because I make some amazing nachos. And since I have some black olives, taco meat left over from taco salad and sour cream...”

“Oh, yeah,” he said.

“Didn’t you have any dinner?”

“I had a couple of Cooper’s mini pizzas...”

“And you say it’s the little brother who eats on the hour?” She went to her tiny kitchen.

“Are you sure you don’t want me to run down the street for something? I hate to ask you to feed me,” he said.

“Don’t go,” she said. “It’s not much trouble and it sounds good.”

She bent over to dig around in her little refrigerator and Troy felt a fever coming on. Those yoga pants had a real nice fit. He had to look away, take a breath. Sometimes, he reminded himself, you don’t notice what’s right in front of you. He’d spent all that time thinking Iris was right for him. Even though she made it clear it was a no-go, he never bothered to get to know any other women and here was Grace, right under his nose. Making him hot.

She was complicated, he knew that. She said her life was boring, not much to tell, solitary...and he knew that was just a cover. And he didn’t mind at all.

“Then let me help,” he said, joining her.

They put together a fabulous plate of nachos, ran out of salsa very quickly since that little fridge couldn’t hold much and cupboard space was at a premium. They spent the next hour talking about the town, the rivers Troy liked to run in the summer, the kids he taught. Every time he asked Grace a question about herself she gave him a brief answer and steered the conversation back to him.

“You know there are dorm rooms bigger than this loft,” he said to her. “You live like a college student.”

“I know. I’m keeping my life simple and my expenses down until the shop does better, and it’s doing better all the time. There aren’t that many weddings in Thunder Point, but I get a lot of weddings out of town. They’re killers but they pay like mad. Where do you live?”

“In a small old apartment on the edge of town that’s decorated with castoffs from my folks. You’re saving for the flower shop and I’m saving for travel.” He noticed her eyes widened and wondered where it came from. Envy? Longing? Surprise? Something else? He told her about the dive trips in summer, ski trips in winter, hunting trips with old Marine Corps buddies here and there.

“Marines?” she asked.

“I did a year of community college, enlisted, went to Iraq and got out. That’s how I finished college—GI Bill. I was a lowly jarhead but I made some excellent friends. There’s good hunting in the mountains not far from here. I’ll take you sometime if you like.”

“Oh, I’ve never touched a gun,” she said. “I couldn’t hunt.”

“Then I’ll take you for the scenery.”

Just then, as they were talking about guns, something that sounded like gunshots punctuated the night. Almost as if choreographed, they both turned to open the shutters behind the couch. In the sky above the bay, fireworks blasted the dark sky, exploding into bright fireballs and falling in sparkling streamers.

“Fireworks,” she said in a breath.

“The wind has been too high in the couple of years I’ve been here,” Troy said. “I think Cliff hires someone to do it. Not bad, for a dumpy little town.”

“This place surprises me all the time.”