Our eyes met, and she started laughing. We both knew that would never happen. I had to swallow roughly for a second because, at times like this, I felt like I was keeping a huge secret from Joss. I'd never told her about the Buchanan curse. Because if I told her that …
There was a knock on the door before Connor walked in, trailed by his fiancée.
Nero lifted his head, and his tall, stick-straight ears and bright amber eyes trained in their direction made Connor pause. "Why does your dog always look like he wants to eat me?"
Joss scratched under Nero's chin. "This little marshmallow?"
Connor grimaced. Sylvia rolled her eyes, tucking her arm around my brother's waist.
Because it was impossible not to mess with him, I patted Nero's rump. "Smile, Nero."
He bared his big, sharp, white teeth in a terrifying doggy grin, and Connor blanched.
Joss stifled a laugh, leaning down to drop a kiss on the end of Nero's shiny black nose.
Edging around the couch like Nero might lunge at him, Connor took a seat in the recliner opposite the couch and patted his lap for Sylvia to join him. She settled in, tossing her legs over his lap and giving him a quick kiss before facing us again.
"So it went well today?" Sylvia asked Joss.
She nodded. "Yeah. My co-worker was a little … extroverted, but she was nice. Customers were fine. I got to try one of their recipes. I'm more excited about that part than the people-ing."
We all laughed.
"My grumpy little introvert," I teased. "We're so fortunate you don't hate people-ing around us."
Joss glared at me, but it wasn't serious. "People-ing only counts as people-ing when it's someone new, or you're trying to impress them, or they're trying to get to know you or something."
We all knew what she meant. Joss was comfortable with us. We weren't strangers who were going to approach her and ask her right off the bat why she was in a wheelchair—which happened all the time—or force her into small talk that I knew was painful for her.
But what made me swallow around the sticky sand in my throat was the tossed-out reminder that she lumped me into the same category as my brother and his fiancée.
"I get it," Sylvia said, unaware that behind her, Connor gave me a sympathetic smile because he knew. I kept my eyes away from him. "This will be a big week for you then. Don't you start with your new PT tomorrow?"
My head snapped in her direction. "You're starting with a new therapist?"
She had the decency to grimace. "Did I not mention that?"
"How come? What happened to Denise?"
Joss sighed, and I felt a momentary twinge of guilt for making it sound like an inquisition.
"They have this new guy starting, and I guess working with people like me, it's kind of his specialty."
I nodded slowly. "You're still favoring your left when you're in the walker, aren't you?"
"Ugh, yes. I've been using my chair more than normal." She rubbed at her right thigh, like she could magically heal the decaying muscles there. Joss's arms and core were toned and strong, and even so many years later, I knew she still struggled with looking down at her thin legs.
"Want me to come with you to your appointment?" I asked.
From my peripheral, I could feel my brother's eyes boring a hole in my head.
"It's okay," Joss said. "You'll just glare at them if they're not doing the exercises you think I should be doing, Mr. I have a master’s in sports medicine."
"I didn't glare at her," I muttered. I'd absolutely glared at her. "Denise just didn't push you hard enough. You can do so much more than she asked of you."
Joss gave me a tiny smile.
"You guys." Sylvia sighed. "You're so cute."
My eyes snapped in her direction.
Joss scoffed. "We're friends, Sylvia."
My future sister-in-law rolled her eyes. "I know, I know, so you've said. At least tell me you'll go to our wedding with Levi. That way you get to sit at the head table and will be in all our pictures, instead of some rando girl."
Connor was trying to pinch Sylvia's side, but she swatted his hand away. Clearly, they'd had this discussion already.
Joss glanced over at me and laughed. "Yeah, right. Levi probably already has some co-ed on the hook who'll show up in a little black dress that barely covers her hooha."
"Hey," I said, only slightly affronted. "That only happened one time, and I had no idea she would flash the entire restaurant. You can't blame me for a blind date's inappropriate dress choice."
Connor and Sylvia laughed. Joss grinned in my direction, and I gave her a tiny wink.
I had no intention of taking anyone to that wedding, not unless it was her.
I just had to figure out how to ask her in a way so she knew exactly what it would mean to have her there by my side.
Chapter 4
Jocelyn
"Do you want me to drive you to work?"
I jumped in my chair, hand flying to my chest when my mom's voice came from behind me as I was pouring myself a cup of coffee.
"Sorry," she said, settling her hand on my shoulder for a brief touch as she passed behind me.
"I didn't expect you to be awake." I added some cream and stirred it into the steaming hot liquid.
She sat at the small dining room table; the same one my grandma had used when she lived in the house before she passed. It was probably the same table my mom had eaten at as a small girl, though it was hard for me to imagine it.
We hadn't brought much with us when we moved here after my grandma's lawyers informed my mom that upon her death—peaceful and in the middle of the night as she slept—my mom had inherited the house that we now lived in. A Godsend at the time when my mom was drowning, quite literally, in hospital and therapy bills after I'd gotten sick. Neither of us cared too much that the décor appeared untouched since the early nineties. It was paid off, and it was hours away from the place that now reminded us both of the immediate aftermaths of my sickness.
Working third shift labor and delivery at the Eastern Tennessee Children's Hospital, my mom had slowly chipped away at the medical debt, keeping her head down, and her eyes hyper-focused on that and only that.
Now that she could breathe again, I'd realized that for the past two years, she turned that focus to me, like she was trying to make up for the fact that I'd adjusted to life in Green Valley completely without her help.
"I probably should be sleeping," she admitted, watching me push my wheelchair with one hand as I carried my coffee mug in the other. "I could've grabbed that, you know."
"I know," I said lightly.
It had taken me a couple of years to realize that my mother defied my neatly separated little categories.
She was a Blinder. But not really. Nothing intentional or born from malice or insensitivity.
I'd realized long ago that something was ingrained in us Abernathys, something that kept our eyes down and focused on the immediate problem, and we didn't waste time dwelling on the things we couldn't change. It was why my grandma had accepted it quietly when my mom moved to Georgia just after high school. Why my mom never came to visit but didn't complain about the fact we weren't asked.
When I ended up in my wheelchair, it was much the same. Even though Mom was a damn good nurse, she couldn’t protect me from a simple virus that attacked my nervous system. Complaining about it and letting it eat her alive would do no good. But she also didn't really understand my life because of her instinct to focus on what she could control.
She was also a Pitier. But not because she thought I wasn't capable of doing things.
Helping me, doing things for me when she was around, made things easier. In her mind, at least. My insistence to do them myself did not seem easier, and it was something she'd never understood.
"Do you want me to drive you to work?"
The coffee was scalding as I took my first sip, and I hissed when I set the mug down on the table. "I've got my car. I'll be fine."
We'd taken G
randma's vehicle, since that had been left to us too, to Knoxville not long after we moved here to have it modified and the hand controls added.
"I guess I didn't need to get up, after all," she said quietly. "You've got it all under control."
I watched her stand from the table and make her way back down the hallway to her bedroom. Between us, there was no chitchat about my new job because she didn't understand why I wanted one anyway. If we'd had a different relationship, maybe I would've asked her why she became a nurse. How she decided what she wanted to do with her life and what kind of classes I should take to try to map out a course for my life when I couldn't see my future very clearly.
I might have told her about Cupcake Guy, and how I was supposed to navigate dating and guys and my chair when I'd never thought about it before.
Instead, I sat there and sipped my coffee, took a deep breath, and got ready for work.
By the time I got the bakery, it didn't take long for me to realize two things that were generally accepted as normal within those walls.
Joy was the actual happiest person in Green Valley.
And she was in love with Cletus Winston.
When I met Jennifer Winston that second day, her vivid purple eyes smiling at me as she talked about what she wanted us to bake that morning (pecan rolls and banana cake), she made a casual mention of something Cletus did for her, and Joy melted like a stick of butter.
"That's so romantic," she breathed.
Jennifer smiled sweetly, tucking a piece of brown hair behind her ear. "Replacing the brake pads on my car?"
Joy nodded, her eyes wide and serious. I rolled my lips between my teeth to keep from laughing at her.
"I don't have anyone who can do that for me," she said. "And without needing to be asked, too? He just knew it was something you needed, and he took care of it."
"Yes," Jennifer said, voice sincere, "he does recognize the importance of working brake pads in my life."
"So romantic," Joy repeated, pushing a flour-coated wooden rolling pin over the pecan roll dough until it was sufficiently smooth.
I couldn't help the chuckle that escaped under my breath. Jennifer gave me a tiny wink.
"Anyone special in your life to replace your brake pads, Jocelyn?" Jennifer asked, leaning her elbows on the counter while we worked.
Laughter burst out of me before I could stop it. "Not in the way you're talking. I have to pay someone like the rest of us."
They both giggled.
Joy nudged me with her elbow. "Oh, come on now. She had a customer buy her a cupcake yesterday just because she said she'd never tried the dill pickle, and he was ten kinds of handsome."
"He was just being nice because it was my first day," I interjected, desperate to change the subject. "The cupcake was delicious, by the way."
Jennifer and Joy shared a look, which made me roll my eyes.
"And," Joy continued, "when her shift was over, another man picked her up, and he was just as handsome as Cupcake Guy."
I scrunched my nose up. "That was just Levi."
"Just Levi?" Jennifer asked.
"Levi Buchanan," Joy supplied helpfully, which made Jennifer nod in recognition.
I waved a hand. "He's my best friend."
Jennifer raised an eyebrow, and I didn't like the gleam in her eyes.
"Listen, when you're sitting on the kind of throne I'm sitting on, men falling over themselves to date you is not a common occurrence. Even if I had any desire to date, the thought of having to one, explain the chair so they're mentally prepared for it, and two, have to sit there and wait for them to ask whether I can have sex is not an evening I really look forward to."
"You're so beautiful, though," Joy said, almost sadly. "And funny. You're so funny, Joss. You should have men falling over themselves to date you."
I smiled down at my lap. The downturn in her voice was also something I was used to. It was the recognition that my being in the chair came before any other possible first impression I could make. Heidi Klum could be sitting where I was, and if you came across her at the grocery store, you'd notice her chair first. You'd judge her on that without even meaning to. I didn't hold that against anyone because before I got sick, I probably would've done the same thing.
"Thank you, Joy," I told her.
Jennifer clapped her hands. "Well, you ladies have this under control. I'll let you get back to work since I've got payroll to do. Holler if you need anything, okay?"
I nodded, giving her a grateful smile at the subject change.
We got back to work, assembling the pecan rolls, then mixing the batter for the banana cake until it was ready to go in the waiting ovens. I didn't need to do much talking because Joy took care of that for me. She told me all about her years at the bakery. That she started in high school, working Saturday mornings, and now that she was taking some business classes at the community college, she hoped one day Jennifer would make her assistant manager or something.
She knew almost every customer as they walked in, and they all greeted her by name when they saw her smiling face. A couple of minutes later, she was mid-pecan sprinkle when her hand froze.
"What?" I asked.
"He's back," she whispered excitedly.
I wiped my flour-covered hands on the front of my apron. "Who is?"
"Cupcake Guy," Joy hissed, her cheeks instantly red and flushed. "Go out there and help him!"
"No way," I said firmly. "They don't need my help up there, and you know it."
Joy's face morphed.
Gone was the sweet, ebullient young woman who'd been my co-worker for the past couple of hours.
Gone was the happiest person in the world.
In her place was determined, scheming Joy. She narrowed her eyes, and I actually sat back in my chair from the force of it.
"Mikey, can I get your help back here?" she yelled to the person who was working the register. "Joss will be right up to cover you."
I gasped. "I'm not ready to work the register by myself."
"Get up there right now, young lady."
Gawking at her for a second, I only started moving when she pointed a finger at the front. "Git," she said firmly.
"Geez, fine," I muttered, wheeling past Mikey, a sweet kid from Green Valley High School who nodded as I begrudgingly took his place behind the counter.
Brad/Chris hadn't seen me yet since he was peering behind the glass case at the daily offerings. No dill pickle and fortunately for me, there was nothing in that case that I hadn't tried yet. Casual as can be, I got behind the register and made a show of straightening the pens and the tip jar, none of which needed to be straightened. Over my shoulder, I looked into the kitchen and saw Joy peeking around the corner.
I really, really wanted to flip her my middle finger, but I was afraid I'd crush some piece of her effervescent soul if I did.
Brad/Chris straightened, and my stomach did an actual backflip when his handsome face transformed from polite interest to a pleased smile.
Oh my Lord, was this what it felt like to have a crush based on little to no information?
He could be a serial killer. He could kick puppies. Maybe he had bad breath or watched True Housewives of Backwoods Kentucky.
But when he smiled at me like that, I imagined all the perfect life choices he must make on a daily basis. The charities he must give all his money to. The little old lady he probably helped across the street. The healthy food he ate, and the exercise he must do to maintain that body.
It was awful.
My fingers twitched, and I dropped the can of pens. Mortification made my face hot at the sound of them clattering to the floor.
"Morning," he said with a smile.
"Wh-what can I get for you?"
He leaned over the counter at the mess of pens, and I caught a brief whiff of him. It wasn't strong enough to be cologne, but I caught it all the same. Just as I had the day before with the scent of the bakery, I filled my lungs with it.
"Unfortun
ate demise for those pens," he said casually. "And all they did was innocently sit in the jar."
A laugh bubbled up my throat, but I swallowed it down. "They sucked anyway, trust me. Donner Bakery can do better than a basic ballpoint."
His grin widened, and I saw a dimple pop to the left of his lips. Shit, now I was cataloging his facial features, for crying out loud.
"How was the cupcake?" he asked, tucking a hand into the front of his jeans. Again, his forearms were out on display for the entire world to see. A man should be careful when showing those off.
Great, now he had me swooning over his arm porn. I wouldn't be able to look myself in the mirror after this.
"G-good," I stammered, tucking an errant curl behind my ear. "Better than I thought it would be."
"Same. I didn't dare eat in front of you two yesterday in case I needed to spit it out."
"An unforgivable sin in the bakery world," I said gravely.
He tsked. "I never would've been able to show my face here again."
Oh my word, I was flirting with him. And he was flirting right back.
Brad/Chris glanced behind him to make sure there was no one in line, then smiled at me again. "You know, I realized after I left that I didn't catch your name."
I cleared my throat. "Joss."
Just as the realization hit me, that I introduced myself using my nickname, something I never, ever did, I heard the bell over the door ding as someone walked in.
Levi sauntered through the door, grinning widely at me. Internally, I groaned. Sure, that was perfect. My very first real attempt at flirting with a freaking hot guy who was flirting back, and my overprotective but equally handsome best friend had to walk in.
"I'm Andy," he said, oblivious to my mental freak-out.
"Nice to meet you, Andy," I said as quickly as I could before Levi got to the counter. "What can I get for you?"
Levi winked at me, that happy smile still pasted on his face. Andy must have sensed someone behind him because he looked over his shoulder. "Ah, right, I shouldn't hold up the line."
I smiled politely. "It's okay."
Andy rubbed at his jaw. "Well, since you're a seasoned employee now, is there anything you'd recommend on day two?"
Carpentry and Cocktails Page 4
