Surveying the devastation she’d wreaked, she felt, for the first time, some small measure of peace. She tossed the ax into the pile of wood and without a backward glance, walked back through the gaping hole in the hedge, through the empty house her grandparents had sold, locked the door on her childhood dreams, and got into the waiting cab.
***
Nicole’s head bumped the bus window as the vehicle ran over another pot hole, jerking her awake. She rubbed her sore head and winced; that wasn’t the first time that had happened. She blinked a few times to clear the fog in her brain and gazed out the dirty window towards the mountains in the distance. She could just make out snow covering the peaks. They had to be close to her destination. She’d been traveling for more than two weeks. Why couldn’t her finger have landed on one of the closer of the forty-eight states?
Every mile that she traveled away from her old life in the town she used to call home brought her new life in Alaska into focus. Little pieces of Nicole fell away with each twist and turn in the many roads they’d been on. Around the time the bus had passed into Canada she’d promised herself never to think about Will again. That had been a hard decision to make because he’d been such a big part of her life. She didn’t know how to ‘be’ without Will. Thinking about him and wondering about what had gone wrong only made her sink deeper into depression. It wasn’t healthy to dwell on what ifs. It was perfectly obvious. Will had never loved or cared for her because if he had, he never would have done this to her. She was past the mopey-, crying-, regretful-stage of healing and she’d moved to downright angry at him.
Just like her mood had changed, the scenery out her window had too. She’d watched it all, spellbound at its magnificence as the landscaped changed so vividly the closer they came to the Alaskan border. Even though the trip had been a hard one, she was glad she hadn’t flown. It would have wiped her money out for one thing, and she would have missed seeing so much. She’d led a sheltered life, and to be out in the world on her own, knowing that not a living soul really cared where she was or if she was safe terrified her. So many times she’d been tempted to turn back, but then she remembered she had nothing or no one to go back to.
Her traveling companions had changed many times over, but she’d sat in the back and never offered more than a yes or no to any questions asked. Eventually they got the message and left her alone until they got off at their destination or she changed buses.
The sound of the bus’s engine geared down. Nicole cleaned a spot on the window and could only see trees and a dirt road. Looking out the window on the opposite side of the bus, she saw the exact same thing. The bus slowed and finally came to a stop.
“Dirty Ankle!” the bus driver called out, as he opened the door.
No one but Nicole stood up. She grabbed her bag and made her way off the bus on unsteady legs. Stepping from the bus, the first thing she noticed was the cold. She’d need to buy a coat from her almost depleted funds. She had her plans. A job would be the first thing she’d look for, right after a room at a cheap motel and as big of a meal as five dollars could buy.
If she lived frugally she could get by until her first paycheck came in. Those were her plans until the bus pulled away in a cloud of dust and all that was left was a lot of nothing. Nicole spun around slowly in a circle, and no matter which way she looked, there was nothing but dirt and trees and a sign that said: Welcome to Dirty Ankle, Alaska Population 324.
“Three hundred and twenty-four,” Nicole read. What should she do? Obviously the town had left because it wasn’t anywhere to be found. She stood on her toes, but there was no sign of the bus. The first little pin pricks of panic began to form under her skin. It would be dark soon and she was already cold. Where could she go? Should she walk the way the bus went? She remembered reading if you were lost to stay in one place till somebody found you. Tears began to roll down Nicole’s face. Nobody knew she was lost, and even if they did, they wouldn’t care. She was truly on her own. If she died in the middle of the night, it would be because she was too inept to pick a town that had a population of more than three hundred and twenty-four. “Args!” she screamed at the top of her lungs.
Nicole sat down on her suitcase by the side of the dirt road and was too busy feeling sorry for herself to notice the beat-up, red pick-up truck that pulled up and stopped.
“Well, my goodness! What’s a pretty little thing like you doing out here in the middle of nowhere? Did that no good bus driver let you off here, honey? My name’s Babs and I’ll be happy to get ya where you’re going.”
Nicole wiped her eyes and nose on the sleeve of her once white shirt and kept her eyes trained on the woman, Babs, as she rounded the front of the truck. At this point, she wasn’t really sure the lady was real. She had on denim blue leggings and a black and pink flannel shirt that was pulled up and tied under her very ample breasts. Her red hair wasn’t a deep auburn color like Nicole’s. This lady’s hair was red. Like the color in a crayon box. It poofed really high on her head and then was pulled into a bun at the nape of her neck. As Babs cleared the truck, Nicole’s eyes went down to her knee-high fur boots.
“That Bert. He can’t be bothered to drive the five miles on into town and drop folks off there. He says it adds fifteen minutes to his route and that legally this is the bus stop. That’s not enough to spit at if you ask me. He’s just lazy is all it is.”
Nicole looked up at the woman from her perch on her suitcase. She should say something, but she couldn’t get her mouth to connect to her brain. Whether it was from exhaustion or the phenomenon in the form of a fairy-looking lady she didn’t know.
“Come on, honey. Let’s get you into town. You look like you’ve been rode hard and put up wet. Where you staying? I didn’t know anybody was expecting visitors. You know, this being a small town, everybody is in everybody else’s business. We don’t mean nothin’ by it. It just gives us something to do.”
Babs herded Nicole into the passenger’s seat of her truck and tossed her suitcase in the back. When they were rumbling down the dirt road, all Nicole could think of was that she’d just gotten into a vehicle with a stranger and she hadn’t said a single word.
“There it is. I knew I could get a smile out of you. A pretty thing like you should smile plenty. Now, where do you want me to let you off?”
Where did she want to go? Home? No, she didn’t have one. “H…hotel, please.”
Nicole jumped when Babs laughed.
“Honey, there ain’t no hotel in Dirty Ankle. Who you visiting, and I’ll just drop you off there.”
Nicole turned her head slowly towards Babs, surely she heard her wrong. “There’s no hotel?” Her eyes began to water again. What would she do? Where would she go?
“Why would we need one, Honey. There’s nothing here to visit, and everybody that lives here already has a place to stay.”
“I’m not visiting anyone.” Nicole just realized how stupid she would sound if she told Bab’s she was moving to a town she knew nothing about.
“I tell ya what. I own the diner in town and I have a room above it that I use for mostly storage, but there’s a rollaway bed in there too. Sometimes if the weather’s bad, I just sleep over. I’ll let you stay there tonight, and then tomorrow you can figure out what you want to do. How does that sound, honey?”
What choice did she have? Nicole had to accept Babs’ offer. “Thank you. That’s most generous of you. I’ll pay you, of course.”
“No, I won’t hear of it. Dinner and a bed are on the house. Consider it a welcome to Dirty Ankle. We don’t get many new faces around here.”
“Thank you.” Nicole fidgeted with the strap of her handbag.
“What’s your name, Honey? If ya don’t mind me askin’”
Nicole tilted her head and remembered another time she’d been asked that question.
What’s your name, girl?”
“I don’t know if it is proper to be on a first- name basis with someon
e I just met.”
“I’m William Marcus Harrison, but everybody calls me Will. So, now we’ve been introduced, and you can tell me your name.”
“It is a pleasure to meet you, William. My name is Nicolette Mary-Margaret Montgomery.”
Nicole shook her head and closed her eyes to clear her thoughts before she answered. “Nicole. My name’s Nicole.”
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Nicole. Here we are. Now let’s get you something warm in that belly, and then I’ll help you fix up the rollaway. A good night’s sleep will make everything look different in the morning.”
Babs stopped her truck in front of the Dirty Ankle Café, a building that back home would have been considered a storage barn, except it had a big window in the front. The lights were off inside, and Nicole had to do a double take when Babs opened the door, walked right in and turned on the bright overhead lights. The door hadn’t been locked?
“Make yourself at home, and I’ll grab us some grub. The bathroom is down that hallway. Ya can’t miss it. I’m sure you could use a wash up.”
“Thank you, Babs.” Nicole sat her suitcase down just inside the door. The inside of the diner looked larger than she’d thought. There were five square tables with four chairs pushed under each on them. Twelve booths lined three walls, and each table had a salt and pepper shaker, a silver box of napkins, and what Nicole assumed were menus propped up between them.
The walls were painted a cheery yellow, and the floor was a checkerboard pattern of black and white linoleum tiles. On the fourth wall was a white Formica counter with built-in stools with red leather tops like you’d see in an old-timey five-and-dime. Behind the counter was a pass-through window to the kitchen and a swinging door Babs had gone through.
Everything was clean and neat but well-worn. Nicole wondered, as she made her way to the bathroom, how long the diner had been there. Once in the bathroom, she closed and locked the door and then almost jumped when she didn’t recognize the person in the mirror. Nothing about the reflection she saw resembled the woman she’d been. Her cheeks were sunken with dark circles under her eyes and her once porcelain skin looked sallow. She’d lost more weight over the past year than she’d realized.
Nicole picked up a lock of her once shiny auburn hair and grimaced at the sticky oily feel of it between her fingers. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d washed it. She frowned at her reflection; she wasn’t ready to deal with that person yet. Soon, but not now, she’d have to face some hard facts about the rest of her life. She turned away from the mirror, washed up, and joined Babs at the counter.
“I made us a hamburger and fries. I hope you aren’t one of those vegetablearians.”
Nicole smiled. “No, I’m not a vegetarian. This looks delicious. Thank you.” She took a bite of her burger and closed her eyes as the flavor burst on her tongue. Through the entire trip she’d lived mostly from vending machine food. Each bite of the hot juicy burger was a little taste of heaven on a bun.
“Why Dirty Ankle?” Nicole mumbled over her full mouth. Her grandmother would be appalled with her manners. She swallowed and tried again. “I mean, why is the town called Dirty Ankle?”
“Well, now that’s a funny story. The original lower-forty-eight settlers thought the native Alaskans were saying Dirty Ankle. Instead they were calling them stupid for building a town in the middle of nowhere. When the townsfolk found out years later, the name had already stuck and they saw no reason to change.”
Babs laughed at her tale, and Nicole smiled as she tried not to yawn. “So that means the town’s name is really…”
“Yep. Stupid, Alaska!” Babs laughed and chewed at the same time. “Goodness! You were hungry, weren’t ya?” Babs held her burger poised at her mouth with only a few bites missing.
Nicole looked back down at her plate and blinked. She’d eaten hers that fast? “I…I guess I was a little hungry.” Nicole picked up her paper napkin and wiped her mouth and hands. She wanted to lick her fingers, but her grandmother’s training was too ingrained for her to do so.
“If ya ask me, you could do with a few more pounds on them bones of yours.”
“I have lost some weight recently.” Nicole waited for the questions to start, and she had no idea what she would tell Babs. The lady was by far one of the nicest people she’d ever met and she didn’t want to lie to her. But she also didn’t want anyone to know what had sent her here. That would defeat the purpose of moving to a new place for a new beginning. She didn’t want any of her past to follow her to Dirty Ankle.
With her belly full, Nicole couldn’t fight the yawn that had been building.
“Come on, honey. Let’s get that bed made up and you tucked in nice and sound before I leave. You’re about to fall asleep on your feet.”
“May I wash the dishes for you?”
“No, no. We’ll just leave ‘um in the sink for Cookie to deal with tomorrow. Now you follow me. I’ll lock the door behind me when I leave. Really, there ain’t no need. But I’m sure a foreigner like you would feel better with the door locked. Only thing is, you might have to let me back in tomorrow if I can’t find the key!”
Nicole grinned when Babs laughed. She’d never experienced anyone like her before. “Thank you. I would appreciate that.”
At the top of a flight of stairs, Babs opened a door, and Nicole followed her in. Metal shelves filled with canned goods and boxes and bags of all types of dry goods lined most of the walls and even a few rows down the middle of the room. A couple of chest-type freezers hummed against the back wall.
Nicole watched as Bab’s rolled a fold-up bed from behind a set of shelves.
“Here we go. This should do just fine.”
Babs unfolded the bed and Nicole rushed to help her make it up with a well-worn set of white sheets and a thick blue blanket.
“Make yourself at home and feel free to use the bathroom downstairs. We’ll be opening up around six in the morning, give or take, so don’t let us scare ya. And don’t you worry none about what’s going to happen tomorrow. We’ll hash it out and come up with a plan.”
With that Babs was gone, and Nicole was thankful she hadn’t had to answer any questions. She’d come up with something to tell Babs tomorrow. She owed her that much for all she’d done for her tonight. Nicole stood in the storage room alone. She’d need to get used to it; being alone was now her new norm.
Noise from downstairs woke her the next morning. At least Nicole thought it was morning. The storage room didn’t have any windows, and other than the light put out by the freezer’s indicator lights, the room was pitch black.
Stumbling from the bed, Nicole made her way to the light switch and turned it on. She blinked from the blaring light until her pupils adjusted to the sudden change. She didn’t waste any time getting dressed and packing her things back in her suitcase. Once that was done she stripped the bed, folded the sheets and blanket back up and replaced them back against the shelves in the corner.
She stopped by the bathroom and did as much as she could to improve her appearance. Then with her suitcase in hand she went to find Babs and thank her before she started looking for a job and a place to live.
The sight that greeted her in the diner took her a minute to process. Every seat in the diner was filled and every single person had their sights set on her. The volume level in the room went from a dull roar to total silence. A loud crash from the kitchen made Nicole jump, and then a string of colorful words erupting made her eyes open wide. She didn’t know if she should retreat back upstairs or go check on Babs.
Another bang from the kitchen made her decision for her. “Babs, are you alright?” Nicole called from the doorway. Babs darted from a huge black stove to a counter where a dozen plates were laid out just waiting for what Nicole assumed was the food cooking on the stove.
“Nicole, get in here. Cookie called in this morning and quit. The dang fool is headed north with the gold fever and left me high and dry. It�
�ll take months to get somebody up here from the lower forty-eight. You needed a job. Can you cook?”
Nicole looked at the eggs and bacon cooking. Pancakes lined up on one side of the grill needed to be flipped. Biscuits waited to go into the oven, and a big pot of something white and gooey bubbled away. All those things she’d made before with Hilda’s help, except for the white bubbly stuff. Dare she do it? What choice did she have? In a town this size, jobs were probably hard to come by.
Her eyes moved back to Babs in front of the stove with a spatula in her hand and steam rising from the food cooking behind her. Before Nicole could lose her nerve, she grabbed the apron hanging on a nail and answered without a moment’s hesitation. “Yes.” At the time Nicole had no idea what that little word would mean.
CHAPTER SEVEN
“Hey, Sugar, make it snappy with that Adam and Eve on toast! Gill’s gettin’ tired of waitin’,” Babs barked through the pick-up window.
“Tell Gill he’ll get it when I’m good and ready and not a second before, or he’ll do without!” Nicole barked back. She smiled at their banter, flipped six pancakes, and then scrambled a dozen eggs with her spatula on the grill. After lifting two heavy presses from the four dozen slices of thick cut bacon, she began to assemble half a dozen plates with the assortment of food, according to the orders pinned to the top of the service window. She sat each plate on a tray above the cooktop, broke open a steaming freshly baked biscuit and slathered everything with sausage gravy before hitting the bell and yelling, “Pick-up!”
Before the last plate had been picked up, Nicole had the next orders ready to plate. Mornings were fast and furious, just the way she liked them. For four solid hours Nicole, or Sugar as she was now known in town, cooked and plated food and couldn’t have been happier.
Nicole laughed thinking about the inedible meals she had produced those first few weeks. Nobody’d complained, but they’d offered suggestions. It had taken several weeks for her to catch on and flourish at the job, a job that let her heal as much as was possible and find some measure of happiness.
You Promised Me Forever (The Dirty Ankle Series Book 1) Page 8
