One Woman’s Treasure

by Jean Copeland

  Daphne stuffed the last piece of shrimp tempura into her mouth and gathered up the empty containers. “Thank you.”

  “It’s nothing,” Nina said. “I was dying for sushi.”

  “I didn’t mean for lunch.”

  Nina smiled. “Is it safe to friend-hug again?”

  Daphne giggled. “Yes. I think we’re copacetic.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  After they’d finished their work at the shop, Nina invited Daphne out to dinner to celebrate. They’d each gone home, showered, then met again at an expensive restaurant in New Haven, a favorite of Nina’s since moving from Fairfield County. Daphne would pitch a fit when Nina grabbed the check at the end, but it would be easy enough to put out that fire.

  “Have you ordered the signage for above the door yet?” Nina said as she glanced at the specials.

  Daphne shook her head. “That’s one of the items I’ll need the loan to buy.”

  “Do you plan to use the exact logo from your website for it?”

  “I probably should, huh? I do love it.”

  Nina nodded. “You’re getting steady website traffic now, so I’d stick with it. You know, brand recognition.”

  “I have a brand?”

  Nina laughed. Daphne’s sweet naïveté only seemed more endearing the more she witnessed it. “Wait till you have an actual store people can walk into.”

  Daphne smiled as she sliced into her caprese salad.

  “How about the interior design?” Nina said. “You’re not going to leave it the way it is?”

  “No. I’ve been messing around on the computer on one of those virtual-design websites. I think I’ve come up with an awesome layout.”

  “Oh, I can’t wait to see it. Can you send me the link?”

  Daphne seemed reluctant. “I wanted to get it done and have everyone see it for the first time at the grand opening.”

  “Even me?” Nina batted her eyelashes. “Surely your bestie gets the privilege of a sneak preview.”

  “I suppose I should show you, in case it’s utter trash. But that’s another thing I can’t start without the loan. Do you think Rikki can refer me to contractors in the meantime?”

  “Absolutely. She deals with only the best.” Nina smiled. She made a mental note to give her friend Rikki a call to ensure she was looking out for Daphne.

  Daphne smiled. “You’ve done so much for me; I might as well put your name on the business.”

  Nina sipped her cabernet and picked at her Caesar salad. “All I’ve been doing is offering business advice and sharing my contacts. That’s not such a big deal between friends.”

  “Don’t minimize your contributions, Nina.” Daphne beamed with appreciation. “I don’t just mean about the business stuff. I could spend the rest of my life thanking you and never feel like it’s enough.”

  “Daphne, effusive thanks are not necessary. Look, I’m all about women helping women. Sadly, it doesn’t happen enough in this world. You know that mentor program for college girls I started?”

  Daphne nodded.

  “That’s been the best part of working as an executive for Global Health.” Nina tore a piece of bread in half and dipped it in olive oil.

  “You should become a college business professor,” Daphne said casually.

  Nina looked up, about to chuckle at the suggestion, but something halted her reaction.

  “Have you ever thought about it?”

  “Never.”

  Daphne smiled. “I don’t know where you could possibly fit it into your schedule, but you’d make an amazing teacher.”

  Nina pondered the idea briefly. “I don’t know if that would be a good fit for me, but thank you. It’s a nice compliment.” Nina felt her phone vibrate and assumed it was Lacey. She took a quick glance and saw a text from Noah. “Excuse me. Let me reply to my son. He just texted to say he loves me.” She felt her smile spread across her face. “At least someone’s texting me that.”

  “You haven’t heard from Lacey?”

  Nina shook her head. “Not since first thing this morning. I texted her over two hours ago.”

  “She’s probably just wrapped up in family stuff.”

  She appreciated Daphne’s clichéd attempt to downplay the implications, so she gave a confident nod. The whole situation with Lacey bothered her, but surprisingly, she wasn’t missing her like she’d thought she would. Lacey had been right. They needed some time apart after a period of too much, too soon.

  When their entrees arrived, Nina’s heart smiled as she watched Daphne dive into her house-made gnocchi with marinara. How was a woman with such a ravenous appetite able to stay so slender? The answer was simple. She worried the calories off each day.

  “Crap,” Daphne muttered as she dabbed at a blob of sauce on her shirt with a cloth napkin, smearing the red splotch.

  “This must be why I never see you wearing white,” Nina said, trying not to laugh.

  Daphne rolled her eyes at herself. “I think I stopped right around the time I became too big for bibs.”

  Nina was struggling to appear sympathetic. “That job might be too big for just a napkin.”

  “I’ll be right back,” Daphne said and headed toward the restrooms.

  Nina watched her sleek, angular shape until she disappeared around the corner. Daphne. She was klutzy, insecure, awkward, and shy. In some circles she’d be known as a complete mess. Yet she brought a glow to Nina’s heart every single time they were together. She was also smart, funny, and had the most compassionate soul of anyone she’d ever met. Despite her painful lack of confidence, she subtly exuded the brightest, most hopeful aura.

  As Daphne came back around the corner and headed to the table, Nina perceived her moving in slow motion, her legs in those tight black jeans taking long strides as she curled one side of her sandy blond hair behind her ear. Nina winced when she actually heard herself sigh out loud. She began emitting short spurts of breath as she realized what was happening to her.

  Currently, at that very moment, she was crushing on Daphne. Hard.

  * * *

  On her drive home from the restaurant, Nina wondered how she could’ve been so stupid. She hadn’t become such fast friends with Daphne for no reason. They’d made out hot and heavy in the storeroom, for God’s sake. Not exactly the appropriate way friends celebrate one friend’s success. She’d felt a connection to Daphne from the start and had been slowly falling in love with her. To her credit, she’d had the good sense to say no to Daphne’s suggestion of drinks back at her house, even though it was still relatively early, and Daphne lived only fifteen minutes outside downtown New Haven. Who knew what could’ve resulted?

  She turned up the radio as her thoughts came on fast and furious, racing through her mind at a pace that made them almost indecipherable. Now what? She groaned out loud and kept driving.

  Minutes later, a call from Lacey came up on her car’s Bluetooth, scaring the crap out of her. “Hey, babe,” she said out of habit.

  “Sorry I didn’t get back to you sooner, babe,” Lacey said.” The service up here is terrible. Your text finally came in when I got back to my parents’ house.”

  That was a rather elaborate explanation. “Where were you all day?”

  “I spent the day hanging with my old friends. We hit a few breweries.”

  “Nice. Was Barb there?” For some reason, Nina found it necessary to bring up Lacey’s first girlfriend ever, who she was with some twenty years ago. Jealousy seemed like an odd emotion to crop up then.

  “Yeah. Our whole crew was there,” Lacey said, sounding snotty. “Why ask about her specifically?”

  “Wasn’t she your first girlfriend?”

  Lacey laughed mirthlessly. “How about ‘I miss you’ or ‘come home’ or ‘I wish you were here’ instead of lame questions about a relationship I had a lifetime ago?”

  “How about I stop asking lame questions and you lose the attitude?”

  “Nina,” Lacey said softly. “What are we
doing?”

  “What do you mean?” Nina still felt attacked.

  “I haven’t seen you in a week. We’ve barely spoken, and I’m a hundred miles away. We finally have each other on the phone, and this is the best we can do?”

  Out of nowhere, Nina burst into tears as she was driving down the interstate, silently at first, but then she broke into loud sobs.

  “Nina? Are you okay? What’s the matter?”

  “I don’t want to fight with you, Lacey, especially while you’re so far away.”

  “Okay, baby. Let’s not fight. I’ll be home Wednesday, and we’ll talk it out then.”

  “Wednesday? I thought this was just a weekend getaway.”

  “It was originally, but it’s hard to get in quality time with family and friends in two days. Are you out with Noah now?”

  “He’s with Zack. I’m driving home now from dinner with Daphne.”

  “Oh. What did you do today?”

  “I had a remote conference, and then I helped Daphne at her shop.”

  “Hmm. That’s a lot of Daphne.”

  “She had a lot to do. The space was vacant for a while. And I don’t think dinner afterward is so unusual.”

  “I have an idea,” Lacey said. “Why don’t you come up here with me until Wednesday? I’d love for my family to meet you…unless you feel that’s trampling over more boundaries.”

  “I’d like to meet them, too, Lace, but this week isn’t good. I have to go to New York for a meeting of international execs on Monday.”

  “I don’t suppose it can be rescheduled?”

  “Absolutely not. Executives are flying in from Germany and the UK tomorrow. The only acceptable reason for rescheduling international exec meetings is death, and by death, I mean one of ours.”

  “I get it, Nina,” Lacey said, slipping into droning indifference. “No problem. We’ll do it some other time.”

  Nina bit her tongue, choking back the hundreds of snide quips she could’ve uttered in response to Lacey’s unreasonable attitude. Instead, she went with, “Enjoy the rest of your stay, and we’ll talk when you get home, okay?”

  “Okay. I love you, Nina.”

  “I love you, too.” Nina ended the call and negotiated the exit ramp, trying to negotiate the confusion in her head. Although they were experiencing a bump in their relationship, Nina loved Lacey. She’d never doubted that. But was it possible, dare she use the word normal, to be in love with one woman while extreme friend-crushing on another?

  She wanted a nice, smooth “yes” to that query, but her business savvy told her that was one negotiation she wouldn’t win.

  * * *

  The next morning Daphne woke feeling restless, unsettled. Her life was on a fast track to change, and she felt like she was running alongside the club car trying to keep up. Over the last couple of years, when anything bothered her or she just felt like venting about life, she’d pop over to Sophie’s to hang out in her nurturing company. They’d drink and laugh, and inevitably, Sophie would feed her something delicious and pile the rest in a container for her to take home. Now, without warning, that consolation was over.

  As she headed down the nursing home corridor to Sophie’s room, she realized that spending almost all day and night with Nina only reinforced the fact that she was falling more in love with her each time they were together. At first it had been a lark, some innocent bit of intrigue her life sorely needed, but now it wasn’t so much fun anymore to be near to her, smell her enticing perfume and scented lotion, or watch her luscious lips move when she talked, laughed, or sipped a drink.

  Worst of all, she clearly couldn’t trust herself to manage her impulses when she got too close to Nina. She shook her head. How long would it take to get over the embarrassment of that incident?

  She tapped on Sophie’s open door and walked in. After showing her a cactus inside a ceramic cat, she placed it on the TV stand.

  “Hi, Soph.” She gave her a kiss on her cheek and a gentle hug.

  “Hi, Daphne,” Sophie said slowly, her face working on a smile.

  Daphne dragged a chair next to hers, and they looked out the window onto the courtyard. “How are they treating you? They taking good care of you?”

  Sophie nodded. “Hard work.”

  “They’re working you hard, huh? Well, that’s how you’ll get better.”

  “Bullshit,” Sophie replied. “I’m old.”

  Although it was sometimes difficult to read Sophie’s facial expressions since the stroke, Daphne recognized her playful curmudgeon temperament when she heard it.

  “Is your therapist a hot guy at least?”

  “Girl. Hot girl.” She shrugged and smiled.

  Daphne laughed. “What time is your next therapy session? I’ll hang around.”

  “Your girlfriend. How is she?”

  “I don’t have a—oh, right. You mean girlfriend in the way little old straight ladies mean it. My friend, Nina, is fine.” She paused, nostalgic for the times around Sophie’s kitchen table with coffee or Manhattans or wine. Even with their generation gap times two, Sophie always covered her with the sense that everything would work out in the end. “Actually, I kind of wanted your advice on that, if you don’t mind me bugging you about it.”

  Sophie bobbed her head once.

  “I’m gonna go ahead and take that as a green light,” Daphne said. “So, Nina. You once told me that she and I should date, and then I said ‘oh, no, Soph, we’re just friends. We don’t like each other like that.’ Well, now I do like her like that. In fact, I like her so much that it’s starting to feel weird sometimes hanging out with her doing simple, innocent things like going shopping or Taco Tuesday or—”

  “You’re in love?”

  “Sophie,” Daphne exclaimed. “No. I’m not in love…” She fixed her attention out the window at the birds and squirrels trotting and scampering across the grounds. She then sighed loudly. “Damn, Soph. Even with half your brain barely functioning, you can still figure me out. Or am I that transparent?”

  Sophie smiled. “You’re in love.”

  Daphne looked down and picked at the threads around a hole in her jeans. “I’m in love. But I don’t know what to do. She’s my best friend—present company excluded—and she’s in a relationship. I don’t want to lose her friendship, but I’m afraid I might, if I can’t contain my secret feelings for her.”

  “Tell her.”

  “How can I tell her? She loves me but just as a friend. She seems crazy about Lacey.” Daphne looked around and lowered her voice as though Nina might be hiding inside a linen cart or something. “Between you and me, I don’t think that relationship is all that solid, but you know, it’s not my place to suggest that to Nina.”

  “Tell her you love her.”

  Daphne was growing frustrated not knowing if Sophie was responding on stroke autopilot or if she truly was trying to drive her point home. “I can’t, Sophie,” she finally blurted. “I’m afraid.”

  Sophie reached across and placed her hand on Daphne’s arm. “Stop being afraid. Own your life. You blink one day and you’re in here.”

  It was the most Sophie had spoken since suffering her stroke. When Daphne cleared the tears from her eyes, she studied the intensity in Sophie’s face, how her glassy eyes conveyed the message with more clarity than her carefully chosen words.

  She was quiet for a while, trying to formulate a response that could come close to matching the poignancy in Sophie’s spot-on assessment. Daphne had finally felt ready to initiate the first steps toward a new career, so what was stopping her from taking the same leap of courage in her romantic life? Duh. Lacey.

  Luckily, the dietary aide rolled in the lunch cart and diverted her thoughts to the aroma of some sort of soup permeating the room. After the aide arranged the table tray in front of Sophie’s chair, the gourmet masterpiece was revealed: lentil soup, mashed potatoes, applesauce, and coffee, a feast fit for a queen—one whose reign had clearly come to an end. Daphne checked he
r gag reflex.

  “Do you need any help eating?”

  Sophie shook her head, laid her napkin across her lap, and picked up the spoon with her fully functional hand. She ate slowly, offering Daphne her applesauce, which she politely declined.

  “It sure as hell isn’t your homemade pierogies and skillet-seared kielbasa, is it?”

  Sophie shook her head in clear disgust. “They say I’ll choke.”

  “Aside from the peculiar food combination, that soup actually smells pretty good.”

  Sophie shrugged as she dipped her spoon in the mashed potatoes.

  “Thank you, Sophie,” Daphne said, suddenly feeling overwhelmed with emotion.

  “For what?”

  “For being my first genuine best friend. If you were forty years younger, I’d probably be in love with you, too.” Daphne served her a goofy smile.

  “Not while I’m eating,” Sophie said, then smiled.

  Daphne laughed. “I’d be the best and worst thing to happen to you. I’d ruin you for other men.”

  Sophie placed her spoon down and carefully raised her middle finger at her.

  “Is that part of your therapy?” Daphne asked.

  They both laughed, and it felt good to hear Sophie make that sound. She must really be getting better, Daphne thought.

  Chapter Nineteen

  After receiving the strange call from a sign-delivery company saying she needed to authorize an installation, Daphne rushed down to the shop, searching for hidden cameras to see if she was indeed being punked, as she’d suspected.

  She pulled in a few spaces away from the truck that had the large outdoor signage swinging from a crane arm and two guys up on ladders ready to install it above the entrance.

  The one operating the crane greeted her as she approached. “Haya doin’? This is the sign you ordered?”

  “It’s the sign I wanted,” she said. “But I didn’t order it.”

  “Are you Daphne…?” He glanced over the paperwork on his clipboard.

  “Carsen. Yes. I’m her.”

  “My paperwork says you ordered it, and you’re signing for it, so just give me the word, and my guys’ll install it, and we can get to our next job.”