“Okay, so no cash,” Rohan said. “But you’ll accept contributions in the form of manual labor? Or brainpower? I have a friend in marketing at the Art Institute of Chicago. I could pick her brain on how best to publicize the show.”
“That would be amazing. I think with Holden in the cast, I should be marketing further afield than I usually do. I just haven’t had time to think about it.”
“Luckily for you, I have nothing but time. Let’s make a plan, and I’ll get to work.”
She pulled out her phone to check the time. “I hate to say it, but can we talk more later? I’m supposed to meet Holden for dinner.”
Ro whistled. “Look at you. Lured a genuine celebrity to town.”
She did a silly little victory dance to make him laugh.
“I gotta go, too. I told Mom and Dad I’d be home by six for dinner.” He laughed. “I had this romantic idea of ‘coming home’ to clear my head, but I forgot how much they’re all over me when I’m here. I hope I can deflect all their questions about work and not give off a weird vibe.”
“Have you seen the accounting software Dad got last winter? Ask him about that. He can talk for days about it.”
They started to part ways, but suddenly he was back, pulling her into a hug. She and her brother generally expressed affection by harassing each other. But she went with it. Hugged him back tightly and said, “I’m so glad you came home.”
An hour later, showered and made up, she was unlocking the door to her apartment and ushering Holden freaking Hampshire in. “So here we are.” She gestured at the space as if it were a room at the Ritz.
And honestly, it might as well have been, considering the transformation it had undergone.
Her crappy furniture had been moved out, replaced with a selection of antiques curated by Jake’s stepmom. As Nora had envisioned, they’d juxtaposed the old-fashioned furniture with modern art, the pièce de résistance of which was a giant canvas she’d once used as a prop hanging on the apartment’s exposed brick wall. It was a Banksy knockoff, a graffiti-style portrait of a little girl holding a bouquet of flowers, but in such a way that she looked like she was about to throw it like a grenade.
Maya had switched things around, making her old sleeping area, which was an alcove off the main room, into a sitting area with a TV. She’d signed up for free trials of all the streaming services. The main space she’d left to be dominated by an obnoxiously-over-the-top-but-in-a-good-way king-size bed—like a hotel room. She had chucked her old double and ordered one of those inexpensive mattress-in-a-box things, and Jake had built her a bed frame.
Even the kitchen had undergone a makeover thanks to Richard’s set-design skills, boasting freshly painted cabinets and a new backsplash—and if the latter was peel-and-stick tile instead of the real thing, no one need know. And if Richard didn’t realize that he was decorating an apartment to save his job, that was also fine.
She—and her community—had worked so hard. Her chest swelled with pride and gratitude. Which was a nice change from her chest sparking with annoyance or seizing with fear as it had done this afternoon at the dunk tank.
Holden barely seemed to look at anything as he dragged a suitcase into the space while looking at his phone. She followed with a duffel bag she’d offered to carry, and since he was absorbed in his phone, she took the opportunity to examine him.
He managed to look like his old Two Squared self yet entirely different. The sweet, boyish blue eyes and dimple were still there, but they were set in an older, more angular face, one with fine lines around the eyes—kind of like Benjamin’s. It was like Holden had kept all the best parts of the boy face but added in all the best stuff that happened to men’s faces as they aged.
He was so pretty. It wasn’t fair.
Also: Holden freaking Hampshire was here!
But okay. She could be cool. It wasn’t like a Spice Girl was here. She needed to stop thinking of him as Holden freaking Hampshire. He was just a person. She cleared her throat. He didn’t look up from his phone. “Everything seem okay?”
He looked around absently, his eyes snagging on the bed. “Do you have a lighter duvet? I run hot.”
“Sure. I’ll—” What? What would she do? She would run across the street and raid the Mermaid Inn, that was what she would do. “I’ll have one sent over. Anything else?”
“Wi-Fi password?”
“In here.” She pointed at a cute little welcome binder she’d made and left on the kitchen counter.
“Great.”
“So, in terms of dinner, there’s a great little diner called Sadie’s. Or…wood-fired pizza across the street at Lawson’s Lager House.” Surely she could be seen eating Benjamin’s pizza with Holden Hampshire. “Or there’s a fantastic place in the next town up the lake.”
She would be thrilled with whatever he chose. It had been so long since she’d eaten out. She wouldn’t splurge on a restaurant meal on her own, but if she was “forced” to take her star out for a welcome-to-town dinner, she was going to enjoy the heck out of it. She had even paid Jordan to bring her car back from the dead. “I was thinking we could chat a bit about the play. I’m doing a few things with the staging that may be a bit unexpected, though they apply more to the Hero-and-Claudio storyline than to ours.” She was playing Beatrice to his Benedick rather than cast someone else. She’d never had the chance to play that role, and it was one of the greats. Also, she wasn’t paying herself, so she was a bargain.
“I’d love to do dinner, but I’m beat,” he said absently, finally actually looking at the apartment. “I think I’ll call it a night. Rain check?”
“Oh, okay.” That was disappointing. But whatever, the man didn’t want to go to dinner. It wasn’t the end of the world. “Jenna’s downstairs is open until eight if you’re in the market for any snacks or need any toiletries or anything.”
So she found herself back out on the street unexpectedly early. Also hungry: she had skipped lunch in anticipation of a big dinner with Holden. She dug in her purse and extracted a fortune cookie and broke it open.
Don’t confuse recklessness with confidence.
That was…not a great one. She popped the cookie in her mouth and texted her brother as her stomach growled. Are you guys still eating? I got jilted by the pop star, so I thought maybe I’d come by and join you.
Rohan: Nope. En route to the store. Dad wants to show me the accounting software. Good call on that one!
She let herself into the closed store to wait for them. The shop was so familiar. Like her parents’ house, it held a lot of good childhood memories. Helping her dad load the refrigerators when a delivery came. Pitching in on full-moon nights. That hilarious night Eve had gotten locked in the cooler and Sawyer had rescued her.
Just the smell, that wall of green that hit your nose the moment you walked in the door. That was the smell of the end of the school day, the smell of summer. The smell of family.
The bells on the door drew her from her memories. “How was Holden?” her mother, first through the door, asked.
Boring. “Great!”
“Did you eat?”
“He was tired, so no. But I’ll get something on my way back to the inn.” Or, more accurately, she’d have some granola bars in her room.
Soon she and her brother were manufacturing enthusiasm over the new software. Or at least she was. Ro’s actually seemed genuine.
“This is a huge improvement, Dad,” he said. “And if you have bigger orders where the payments are being spread out, you can set this up to automatically generate the invoices.”
“Oh, I didn’t realize that. I don’t think I’m going to bother learning a new system at this point, though.”
“Right. Of course.”
“Hey, you said you had an agent coming in to look at the building,” Maya said. “Will the new owner keep the store open?”
“I told the agent I’m happy to sell all the contents if by chance the buyer is interested in the store, too. But it’s
unlikely.”
“But what about the wishing flowers?” Rohan said.
“I’ve thought of that,” her dad said. “Maya’s idea for Ben Lawson to start selling a few flowers at the bar actually made me think about why I personally was deriving all the profits from the wishing flowers. I definitely don’t want the town to lose the tradition. What if all the businesses in town—or all who wanted to—sold flowers? I’m planning to talk to the town council about it.”
“That’s an interesting idea,” Rohan said, and Maya could see his entrepreneurial brain firing up as he and their dad chatted. She listened to them for a while, letting the familiar strains of their voices wash over her. It was nice to all be together for a while.
But her happiness was tempered with uncertainty. Maybe she should just call it on the theater. What were the chances she was going to get that grant? What were the chances Holden was going to be the magic bullet she was hoping for?
Maybe she was confusing recklessness and confidence?
Worse, maybe she had been all along?
Maya was going to win the sandcastle competition this year. She was ready.
“Builders, you know the rules,” Pearl, who was head judge this year, called out to the assembled throng. “You’re allowed two buckets and two shovels, and you can use anything you find on the beach. You have two hours. You may begin.”
A couple years ago, Benjamin had trounced her by interpreting “anything you find on the beach” to mean “anything you found on the beach at any time in the past” and had walked away with first place based on a castle decorated with a ton of sea glass he’d collected. Then last year he’d won with a creation that was more driftwood than sand.
No more. She was ready with a back-to-basics strategy that was going to blow whatever he had planned out of the water. Also: there wasn’t a lot of stuff on the beaches of Huron. This wasn’t an ocean beach. No cute starfish or shiny seashells here. Unless he was planning to redo sea glass or driftwood—and a rerun was as good as an admission of defeat—he was out of bells and whistles. And who was the one who had aced set design in school? She cracked her knuckles and unrolled her diagram.
“Is that a blueprint?”
Maya smiled at the approaching Eve. “You’d better believe it.” No more freestyling for her.
“And,” Pearl called, finishing her instructions to the builders, “You’re allowed two helpers. Spectators are welcome but may not participate unless they are designated helpers.”
“Where’s my other helper?” Maya asked, looking around the crowded beach for Nora, but also for Benjamin. Why wasn’t he here yet? Usually Maya and Benjamin were among the first arrivals, and they spent some time trash-talking each other.
“I’m here!” Nora came jogging up—she was pregnant enough now that she was almost at the waddling stage. Jake was with her, which was odd, because usually he helped Benjamin with his castle—which wasn’t fair because Jake was a construction genius. But that was okay, because Maya was ready this year.
“Where’s Benjamin?” she asked, trying to sound casual.
“He was doing sandwiches out front of the bar when we came out of the clinic,” Nora said. “He seemed like he was by himself.”
“Yeah, I hear he’s having trouble with Carter not showing up. Maybe he’s stuck.” Eve elbowed Maya. “In which case, you totally have this in the bag.”
“But…” Winning by default wouldn’t be the same. Winning the sandcastle competition was not the same as beating Benjamin at the sandcastle competition. But she wasn’t going to say that. “Right.”
Jake smirked. “He’ll be here.”
“Oh, are you working for the enemy?” Nora asked. This was her first Raspberry Festival, so she probably didn’t know the extent of her husband’s usual involvement.
“He always does,” Maya said, motioning for Eve and Nora to scooch in. It was kind of funny how her two best friends had hooked up with Benjamin’s two best friends. And not funny ha ha, funny irritating as heck. “Jake, I love you, but I can’t trust you not to sell me out to Benjamin, so I’m gonna need you to skedaddle. No offense.”
Jake chuckled. “None taken.” He looked at Nora. “I’ll catch you later.” It still sort of amazed Maya that quiet, sad Jake was married to Nora. That they were going to have a baby.
Something twinged inside Maya. It was jealousy, but not in the specific sense. She didn’t want a baby, but the way Jake looked at Nora. She just…wanted that, too. Someday.
But whatever. Rome wasn’t built in a day. She had a theater to save first.
You know what was built in a day, though? A winning sandcastle. She could almost feel the heft of the trophy in her hand, returned to its rightful owner after two summers of injustice. She set the girls to doing their jobs—Nora on turrets and Eve on trenches.
When Benjamin finally showed up with Jake and Sawyer in tow—and carrying several buckets of something she couldn’t see—he set up a perimeter around his work space with what looked like those road closure thingies the town used to block off Main Street for the Mermaid Parade.
She craned her neck to try to see what was going on. He must have felt her attention because he paused, standing, holding one of his mystery buckets. “What are you doing?” she yelled, then mouthed, “Sorry” at her neighbor, Dennis Bates, who had been working on a replica of the lift bridge he operated but was now holding his ears.
“I’m building a sandcastle. What are you doing?” Benjamin shouted back.
“Excuse me!” Maya swiveled her head around. “I need a judge here!”
Eiko, who had been huddled with Art and Pearl, came jogging over. “What’s up, hon?”
“Is that legal?” She pointed to Benjamin’s barricades.
“We were just talking about that. There’s nothing in the rules that prohibits it.”
Maya harrumphed. “It doesn’t seem very in the spirit of a public competition.”
“I don’t disagree,” Eiko said, “and you can expect to see an amendment to the rules for next year.”
“I can just go over there and see what’s happening,” Eve said. “If you stand right next to the barriers, you can see down to what they’re doing.”
It was true. There was a stream of spectators doing just that, so clearly the barriers were meant to block her view specifically. “Nah, it’s okay. It’s not like it actually matters.” She didn’t need to see what Benjamin had up his sleeve. She just needed to keep her eyes on her own paper and crush him.
Two hours later, she was sweaty and had sand in places where sand did not belong. But she was also surveying a huge, precisely designed and constructed classic sandcastle. There was no way he could beat this. It was—
A collective “Ooh” from the crowd drew her attention. The guys were taking their barriers away.
“Uh-oh,” Nora said.
“No way,” Eve said.
Maya followed her friends over there and was struck dumb. He’d made a replica of the Palace of Versailles, which was amazing on its own, but the kicker was that he had used an astounding array of dried seaweed in different colors to create its formal gardens.
It looked amazing.
And there was her answer to what was left to collect on the beach. He had done sea glass and driftwood. Leave it to Benjamin to turn a gross nuisance—seaweed, for heaven’s sake—into a thing of beauty.
He stood up all of a sudden from where he’d been squatting next to his stupid buckets—which had been full of seaweed, no doubt.
Welcome to National See Benjamin’s Chest Day. Except this was the second day running this year.
He made eye contact with her right away and winked and did a stupid little finger-wagging “gotcha” kind of gesture.
He so clearly had, she couldn’t even be mad. Pearl confirmed his victory a moment later, making an announcement and handing him the trophy.
“I gotta get one of those grilled-cheese sandwiches Law is doing,” Eve said as they approached Lawson�
�s Lager House a little later. The girls had gone for a swim after the competition to cool off, so Benjamin was already back at work behind the outdoor bar.
“Mmm,” Nora said as they got in line.
“He’s doing aged cheddar with raspberry-thyme jam and a drizzle of balsamic glaze this year,” Karl said, turning to speak to them from his spot in line.
Hmm.
Lawson’s Lunch sounded like the name of a place that would make good grilled-cheese sandwiches.
Grilled-cheese sandwiches that everyone apparently already loved.
Crap. Benjamin might actually win the grant.
Maya stood in line behind the girls while they ordered sandwiches and drinks—raspberry sangria for Eve and a sparkling raspberry mocktail for Nora—undecided about whether she could order a sandwich. Probably not. Probably the pizza logic applied.
“Next,” Benjamin said, as Eve and Nora cleared out with their purchases. He’d been sliding a sandwich out of a press, but as he looked up and locked eyes with Maya, he burned himself. “Shit.” The sandwich fell to the pavement as he shook out his hand, which caused more cursing.
He glared at her like it was her fault. As if. She glared back, because that was what she was supposed to do. They hadn’t done this for a while, so it felt a little strange, like trying to put on an ill-fitting item of clothing.
Nora stepped in. “Let me see.”
He let her take his hand but kept looking at Maya. “I don’t have your wine out here. My dad’s inside. Tell him your wine is in the small fridge with the Mill Street decal on it.”
“Oh, I’m not—”
“You’d better go in with her,” Nora said. “Put some cool water on this.”
Sandcastle Beach--Includes a Bonus Novella Page 14
