by Jessa Chase
He was devastatingly smart, and surprisingly well read. She suspected that he’d borrowed and read every book in the town library, at least once. Although he was quiet, when he did speak up, he made her laugh with quick-witted comments about their science teacher, their classmates, and sometimes about the town itself.
The summer following 6th grade, Claire sought Daniel out outside of the school walls. Instead of attending piano like her parents believed her to be, she skipped rocks at the pond and teetered along the high railroad tracks with Daniel.
Surprisingly she never got caught that summer, but over the years they became more and more bold, until a few nosy townspeople began to tattle on her with her parents.
They forbid her from seeing “that McAllister boy” except when required to in school, and even then she suspected that they’d spoken with her teachers because they were never partnered up again.
The separation, fueled by a fresh wave of pubescent hormones, only encouraged them to seek each other out in a more clandestine manner.
They exchanged notes while walking the hallways, they snuck out of their houses in the dead of night, and on one crisp Fall day, Claire got her very first kiss, snuck behind the school between classes.
She was in love, or at least her teen heart very much believed her to be in love, with a rebel who lacked a cause. She pictured a life outside of Madelia with him, where they would travel the world, she would dance for world leaders and he would hold her every night before bed.
Her parents were often preoccupied by their own lives, but even they couldn’t miss the change in their daughter. She was a terribly liar, so when she confessed that she’d been seeing Daniel McAllister against their wishes, they pulled up all their roots in Madelia and moved as far away as they could manage.
She graduated high school through an online class and received her diploma in the mail in what she considered to be the most depressing manner possible. She went on to study dance in New York and did manage to achieve her dream of dancing for world leaders, but without Daniel by her side as she’d always imagined he would be.
Until recently she wasn’t sure what had become of Daniel but upon moving back to Madelia, she learned that he’d gone into the military to pay for his schooling, and he’d become quite well travelled himself. She imagined him to be quite happy with his lot in life, even if it wasn’t remotely what they’d dreamed of in the throws of their high school romance.
And now, hearing that he’d been injured and faced an amputation broke Claire’s heart. She pictured him, in a hospital bed, struggling to maintain the carefree, tough attitude that had got him through school in Madelia. She pictured him, alone, and felt like she was going to cry.
“Are you okay, sweetheart?” Daisy had approached, coffee in hand to refill her cup, and a worried look on her face.
“I’m okay, I’m sorry, Daisy,” she replied, discreetly dabbing at the edges of her eyelids. “I just heard some not great news, but I really shouldn’t be taking up your booth and crying like a baby.”
“Oh hun,” Daisy laid a hand on her shoulder like she was 10 years older than Claire, when the opposite was nearly true. “Talk to me, I’m a pretty great shoulder to cry on.”
“I might take you up on that soon, but I think I really should be going. Thank you for breakfast, it was wonderful as always.”
She pushed out from the booth and stood, when Daisy wrapped her in a big hug that Claire found herself instantly very thankful for.
“Come back anytime now, okay?”
Claire nodded into Daisy’s blouse.
Chapter 2
CLAIRE
“Now, ya’ll sit down please, we can get this thing started.” Stacy Johanson, the Mayor of Madelia, waved her hands while she stood at the front of the school cafeteria. She motioned for those townspeople who were still milling around the room to have a seat in the fold out chairs that had been assembled facing her. As people began to follow her directions and head for the seats, she continued to speak.
“First thing I’d like to talk about, I’m sure ya’ll want to talk about, is the Lavender Day parade. This thing has gotten pretty big over the years, to the point that we get a fair bit of traffic from nearby towns. So we want to go a little extra mile this year, really shown them what Madelia has to offer. Maybe drum up a little traffic for the rest of the year too.”
“Hear, hear,” Mrs. Shuster spoke up from the front row. “Lord knows we could use a little more travelling money around here. And I do love to cook for people just in town for a visit.”
“You love to cook for everybody and you know it,” Kate teased the older woman. “You just love taking care of people.”
“True, true. But it’s always a lot of fun taking care of a bunch of new people too.”
“Sounds like we’re all pretty much agreed on that point, then,” Mayor Johanson said. “So what kind of ideas do you guys have for making this extra spectacular this year?”
Claire piped up. “Well, I was going to volunteer our Marmot Scout troop to decorate the float, and I was thinking they could maybe do a little dance at some point when the parade holds still for a few minutes. Every child who is in the troop is also in my ballet class, so it would be very easy to organize.”
“That sounds like a wonderful idea! Claire, if you find you need anybody’s help, please speak up. I’m sure plenty of your Marmot Scout moms would lend a hand with decorations and costumes.”
“Definitely. And maybe a few Marmot Scout dads might help with the construction as well.”
“I volunteer Logan!” Kate raised her hand quickly and waved it in the air. “When he gets back, anyway. I think it’d be a good project for him and Daniel to work on.”
Claire glanced over at Kate with a question in her eyes, but she was unable to speak privately with Kate in the suddenly boisterous room.
Moving onto other topics, the group managed to agree on getting together to pay for new street lamps down Main Street, and agreed to disagree on whether they needed a new snow plow when the old one was on its last leg but still functional.
The following evening, Claire found herself walking to the diner after-hours. The kitchen was still lit up, and she could see Daisy walking quickly between the back room and the seating area.
She knocked on the front door, and was almost immediately greeted by Mason, Daisy's solemn-looking child.
"Hi," he said with all the gravity a four-year-old could afford. "Momma's in the kitchen getting everything out."
"Nice to see you, Mason," Claire said as she stepped into the diner. It smelled like everything she loved to eat, all rolled up into one big delicious scent. "You are getting so tall!"
The little boy cracked a smile. "Momma says I'm going to be taller than her, but I don't think that's much of a 'chievement."
"Hey now," Daisy said as she headed their way, wiping her hands with a dishrag. "No fair picking on the short lady." She ruffled her son's hair affectionately.
"Thanks for having us, Daisy."
"Hey, I should be thanking you for including me. I could always use a little lady's night out, even if it's more like a lady's night in the kitchen."
"If it helps, I brought some ridiculously good chocolates," Claire hoisted the bag in her hands, showing Daisy the contents and eliciting a happy squeal from her in response.
As they headed back toward the kitchen, they heard another soft knock on the door, followed by Mason's yelp of "I got it! I got it!" and the slap of little tennis shoes on the tile as he raced for the entrance.
"Doctor Katie!" He shouted happily before wrapping his skinny arms around Kate's hips. She laughed and patted him on the head.
"Not a lot of kids I know are so excited to see their doctor," Kate said with a laugh.
"I think he wants to be like you when he grows up," Daisy replied, peeling Mason off of Kate. "Now, you go work on your coloring for a little bit while us girls talk, okay little man?"
"Which reminds me, Claire was
a little light on the details over the phone, so what exactly are we doing here tonight?"
"Oh! Right!" Daisy lit up with excitement, clapping her hands like a child. "Okay, so Claire mentioned to me that you were missing your hunky husband's cooking, and I know he'll be home soon, but you'll have that baby before you know it, and with poor Daniel coming back too, well-"
"Spit it out already, Daisy!"
"Right! Anyway, Claire and I wanted to put together a whole bunch of frozen meals that would be super easy to cook up whenever you wanted them." Daisy looked from Claire to Kate. "And we wanted your input, since you'll be eating them and all."
Kate looked like she might tear up. "Damn these pregnancy hormones. You two are so sweet to think this up. Just so dang sweet. Thank you."
"Well, let's get the girly hugs and cry-fest over now so we can get cooking!" Daisy discreetly wiped at the corners of her eyes before grabbing Claire and Kate for a three-way hug.
Together the three woman managed to make enough frozen meals to fill a good sized deep freezer, surprising even Daisy who had designed the meals and laid out all the ingredients herself. They had a good variety, from meatloaf to casserole dishes, and even some frozen blueberry waffles for Kate specifically.
"I can't guarantee those won't get eaten pre-baby," she joked as they closed up the last bag of waffles. "They sure hit the spot right now."
"Hey, if you eat them all before your little girl comes, well, we can just make some more!"
"Little girl?" Claire raised an eyebrow at Kate. "I didn't know you were having a girl."
"And Daisy doesn't know either, she's just guessing."
"Guessing my butt. Women in my family have a pretty strong track record of knowing these things. Mark my word, that kiddo is all girl."
"I know it's so cliché to say, but as long as he or she is healthy, I really don't care." Kate stopped, and Claire correctly guessed what she might be thinking about.
"I'm sorry for getting weepy again," Kate said, swiping at her eyes. "But all these hormones, plus thinking about the baby...well it's got me thinking about Daniel and his situation again and...Well the fountains just turn right on again."
Claire moved to hug Kate. "I heard you mention before at the town hall that Logan is bringing Daniel back here, right?"
"Right."
"Well, he'll have time to rest and recover here. It should be good for him. And being around Logan again, well I'm betting he'll love that."
"He will. And it will be good to have him with us. I'm hoping he doesn't mind being in the smaller guest room. We've already converted the biggest one into a nursery."
"Unless he's changed a lot in the last few years, I'm pretty sure Daniel would gladly give up the bigger room for the newest little McAllister. Those boys loved each other dearly and I'm sure he's going to be excited to be an uncle soon."
Kate nodded. "It's nice being able to talk about this stuff with someone who knew Daniel before."
"Oooh, I feel like I'm missing out on some prime gossip here," Daisy said. "Tell, tell."
Claire laughed. "It's nothing so exiting, Daisy. High school stuff. Let's get this place cleaned up so we're not taking up your whole night."
Daisy would not be dissuaded, however. She stood with her hands on her hips. “Spill. If not you, Claire, then you, Kate!”
“They were an item in high school,” Kate said, gleefully ignoring a death glare from Claire. “Claire’s parents were against it, of course.”
“Ooh, so a star-crossed love! Those are my favorite kinds.”
Claire chuckled. “Nothing so dramatic. We kept it a secret, or we thought we did, but we got found out in the end. My parents used it as a reason to get a change of scenery. We moved out of Madelia my senior year. I haven’t seen Daniel since.”
“Well,” Daisy said after a moment. “Well that’s just...the saddest thing. Just imagine everything you could have done together if they hadn’t kept you apart! We’re definitely going to have to sew you two back together then.”
“Daisy, you are a hopeless romantic.”
“Absolutely, no argument from me there. I’ve read every romance novel in the Madelia library, and a whole bunch more online. I know everything there is to know about romance, in the book form anyway.” She grabbed her dishtowel from her front pocket and swiped it across a few tables absent-mindedly. “Real life romance? I know less than nothing. But what you and Daniel have, what you could have had, well that sounds to me exactly like the stuff of romance novels. Definitely.”
“We’ll see, Daisy,” Claire said. “Right now we don’t have anything except some nice memories. He and I have both been through a lot on our own. We’re not two lovey-dovey teenagers anymore.”
Daisy winked. “I have a good feeling about both of you. Just you wait and see.”
Chapter 3
DANIEL
The drive from the airport was pretty uneventful, but that didn’t surprise Daniel one bit. Nothing in his life had been eventful for the last few weeks. It was all just a damn blur of hospital rooms, operating rooms, masked doctors and pitying nurses.
He’d gotten pretty sick and tired of staring at the ceiling in his room, and had at first looked forward to seeing his big brother Logan when he heard that he was coming to see him. He didn’t realize at the time that the reason he was coming was because the doctors were preparing to cut his leg off.
Not his whole leg, he amended. They said he’d been lucky; that they’d only had to do a “below-the-knee” amputation.
Lucky.
Maybe he was being an ungrateful brat, but Daniel didn’t feel remotely lucky at the moment.
He hadn’t felt lucky when the damned IED had gone off under their moving vehicle, just outside of the supposed green zone. He hadn’t felt lucky when, while trying to pull his Sergeant to safety under a barrage of bullets, the whole damn vehicle had been rocked by a second explosion and flown sideways, landing squarely on his leg.
He’d prayed, for what felt like the first time in his entire life, that they’d get out of their alive, and he guessed that prayer had technically been answered because they’d both made it stateside.
But his Sergeant was back out there now, fighting the good fight, while Daniel was still stuck on his ass in a hospital bed, feeling his leg dying slowly beneath him.
The tissue had been too badly damaged, they’d said. Even with the best medical care that Uncle Sam could offer, they hadn’t been able to restore circulation to the limb. He never could have guessed how much it would hurt, to have your leg die while still attached to you. It was almost unbearable, to the point that he’d considered taking the easy way out more than once.
The pain had improved somewhat with the removal of the dying tissue below his knee, but it wasn’t gone. And he couldn’t let go of the feeling that he was no longer whole. He was no longer the man he’d been before. He’d never be what he’d built his life around.
And now he was headed back to Madelia, the town he’d hated as a kid, the place he had sworn he’d never live in again. Worse yet, he was moving in with his big brother, like some kind of lame college-reject who couldn’t find a job in the real world. He had gone from a soldier with a promising career to an angry, frustrated man who couldn’t even walk, much less provide for himself or anyone around him.
“This place really never changes, does it?” Daniel remarked as the town of Madelia came into view through the windshield.
“You can’t really say that,” Logan replied, glancing at his little brother. “I mean there’s a couple new businesses in town, and not every kid who graduates these days hits the road the same day. People are staying and making Madelia their home.”
They drove down Main Street and even through his cloud of anger, Daniel did take a moment to look around. The town did seem a little brighter than it had when he’d been younger. Maybe a little more energized that it had seemed before.
There was an actual police station, for God’s sake. Still just
the one restaurant, Mrs. Shuster’s diner, but also a little florist’s shop and a...dance studio?
He turned in his seat and looked out the side window as Logan slowed for the one and only stop sign in town. Directly to his right was the dance studio, and through the extra large shop window he saw a beautiful woman directing a group of kids in tutus through some kind of dance routine.
“Holy shit,” Daniel exclaimed.
Logan laughed when he saw what his brother was looking at. Or rather, who his brother was looking at.
“Did I forget to mention that? Claire’s got a nice little studio setup here in town now, she teaches the kids of Madelia how to dance, and even has an early morning ballet class for all the old blue hairs.”
“You definitely forgot to mention that, you ass. How long has she been here?”
“She’s been back a couple of years now actually, which you’d know if you’d ever came back for a visit. She’s made a real place for herself here, and the town loves her.”
“Did...did her parents come back to town too? Or...”
“Nah, they are still wherever they are. Florida I think is what Katie told me once. She’s a grown-ass woman and they don’t control her anymore. Maybe with both of you back here at the same time, you should give it a go between you two again.”
Daniel snorted. “Yeah, I’m sure she’s just itching to get with the mangled up angry one-legged guy.”
“Daniel...”
“Just drive. Please.”
CLAIRE
Even knowing he was coming back, hearing from Kate that Logan was flying back today with him, it was still a sudden shock to the system to see Daniel outside, looking into her dance studio with those big blue puppy dog eyes.
These days, he looked like the puppy dog who got beat one too many times, the puppy who was sick and tired of being abused and was on the edge of biting somebody. He looked so damn sad, so damn haunted, it took her breath away for a moment, in which she forgot everything around her and just stood, staring.
