In For a Pound

by Joselyn Vaughn

  Aunt Penny was silent for a few moments, long enough for Joshua to contemplate unmuting the television. She was probably planning her next line of attack. He wondered which direction it would come from.

  “So the house on Cedar Street… How much work does it need?”

  “It’s not horrible. It’s live-able. Needs a lot of TLC. The floors need to be sanded and finished and the walls repainted. Nothing major structurally though.”

  “Do you plan to live there?’

  “When it’s ready, yeah. I’ll probably be calling it home base.” And maybe he’d be there with Sidney. Eventually. After all the major life events had receded. Next summer, he could think about it. Maybe April. Spring, that was a time for new beginnings. All the dreams he’d had while touring the house could come true.

  “How will it work with your job? The next disaster usually has you heading out of town.”

  “Headquarters has been after me for the last couple years to take on a more administrative role in the disaster relief. Coordinating the arrival of volunteers and supplies and prepping for the event as much as possible rather than working on distribution at the disaster site during the aftermath. They seem to think my experience will help with the preparation work. I’ve resisted it for a while.”

  “You’d have to give up your travel trailer.”

  “Not entirely, but I will be chained to a desk and meetings and conference calls. I won’t be able to see the country and experience the cultures and meet the people.”

  He loved helping people, and being a disaster relief worker allowed him to travel the country too. He’d been in Florida after Charley and Nashville during the flooding there. It gave him a chance to see the places without the crowds of tourists and get to know the people who lived there.

  It was ironic that seeing places at their worst let him understand the culture and community better. As they struggled with the effects of the natural disaster, he learned how the people related to the land. It wasn’t something he would discover by popping in for a week and checking out the latest tourist attractions. That was one of the reasons he was attracted to Sidney. He couldn’t imagine going through many worse scenarios, but she had responded to each one with resiliency and determination.

  “Don’t tell me you’re thinking about settling down.” Aunt Penny’s voice was optimistic. How quickly would she have a list of women showing up on his doorstep? There was only one he wanted there.

  “The last few weeks haven’t been as stir-crazy as I expected. I think it’ll be good to be around Dad more. We don’t have much family, so we need to stick together.”

  “We always were a wandering family. I used to bug Mama about whether we were gypsies.”

  Aunt Penny settled back into her chair. Joshua threw one last furtive glance at the baseball score. When Aunt Penny got comfortable before she talked, she wasn’t likely to finish her piece before his dad’s treatment was done.

  “I loved traveling,” she said when she was ready. “The feel of the road under your tires, the sights and smells through the car window. Seeing new country, new people, having new experiences. A month or two here, three or four there. It never took much longer for me to seek someplace new. A new city, a new job, a new state, a new boyfriend.”

  Joshua had only been listening with half an ear until that last statement. He hadn’t considered Aunt Penny’s love life. She was always his single aunt, and she seemed content. Had she fallen in love? Had love driven her wanderings? Surely, he was about to find out.

  “I know what you are thinking.” She wagged her finger at him. “I didn’t have a man in every city. Oh, I did meet men.” Her face took on a dreamy, nostalgic look. “Went on dates, too, but not one of them eased the restlessness. I always had to move on.”

  “Then how did you end up here?”

  Penny sighed. “It was after your mom died. Buck needed my help.” She reached over and patted Joshua’s hand. “You were such a little woofer then. Buck would never say he needed help. You just had to come and give it. Like you did with his cancer.”

  Joshua nodded, remembering the little bits of his mother, but more often Aunt Penny filled the motherly role as he got older. Now some of her awkwardness made sense, especially her take on swimming lessons. She had less experience with a small boy than his dad did.

  “Do you ever regret leaving the road behind?”

  Aunt Penny didn’t respond right away, and Joshua thought he had his answer. He would regret buying the house, no matter how much Aunt Penny urged him to stay or what happened with Sidney. He couldn’t depend on one person to quiet his spirit.

  Her eyes took on a faraway look. “Sometimes when I’m driving through town, I’ll look at the highway and think I could go and never look back.” Her focus returned to Joshua. “I have traveled a time or two, but it’s different. After a week somewhere, I don’t want to go someplace new. I want to come back here. I like being by my brother and my friends, Sidney’s parents and the girls. I like coming home.”

  Home. He’d always considered his travel trailer home, his home base. It had all his stuff in it. Over the last few weeks, he’d come to learn that people meant more than two by fours and drywall when they described a home. They included family and relationships and a place of refuge when times were tough. Staying here meant accepting that and risking— “Didn’t it feel like a risk after being free of all these messy entanglements?”

  “Sure. It’s always dangerous when you make your heart available to someone. They could reject it. They could keep it and not give it back.” A sly smile crept over her countenance. “But they could accept it and nurture it. That’s pretty special.”

  Did he have something significant with Sidney? His gut wobbled, but then they weren’t anything outside his head. If they were something more, could they have a love of a lifetime?

  It sounded tempting, but Penny’s single status spoke to its resistibility.

  “You’re thinking ‘what does the old lady know?’ She’s never been in love. And you’re right. Not romantic love, anyway… But I saw how your parents looked at each other. If there was a way to pluck a star from the sky, Buck would have done it for your mom. I haven’t found it yet. But someday, I hope.”

  He’d known Penny was a romantic, but still holding out for the one at her age? She was a die-hard. Joshua had considered pushing forty too old for romantic notions, but maybe not. And plucking a star from the night sky, if Sidney asked, he’d do it. If she asked, he’d navigate a small craft over open water.

  “Since you’re going to settle down here, you better get to know the community.”

  The jump in conversation caught him by surprise.

  “What?”

  “You’re searching for reasons, I can tell. That’s what this whole conversation had been about. Well, I’m going to give you some more.”

  “It doesn’t involve swimming, does it?” Aunt Penny’s suggestions usually involved traumatizing experiences with his deepest fears. Water and love, being top on the list.

  “Not unless you’re planning to get snockered and jump in the fountain. There’s a community ice cream social put on by the chamber of commerce tomorrow evening. It’d be a great way to network with some of the business owners in the area.”

  The idea had merit. An evening to be normal sounded wonderful. Pretending he had nothing to worry about beyond Disaster Rebound’s need for sponsors and volunteers. With Aunt Penny, it wasn’t that simple. If he didn’t figure out her ulterior motive, he would be caught whiffing a curve ball. “What time does it start?”

  “Six-thirty. It’s in the park across from downtown.” Aunt Penny paused, pretending to consider something. “I’m sure Sidney will be there.”

  She slipped it in so easily. He didn’t see her wind up until the ball thwapped the catcher’s mitt.

  Chapter Twenty

  Joshua slapped the name tag on his golf shirt and braved the crowd milling around the fountain at the center of the park. He
recognized a few of his dad’s friends slurping ice cream out of plastic dishes, but most of the faces were unfamiliar. Well, he was here to get to know people.

  He found the line for the ice cream and tucked himself in the back, too late recognizing Missy directly in front of him. Too late because she identified him before he could duck out of the line.

  Hazards of living in a small town, he guessed. Whether he liked it or not, he wouldn’t be able to avoid Missy or Colin. Best to keep it amicable now and hope future meetings would be less tense.

  She gave him an appraising look through narrowed eyes. “Funny meeting you here.”

  “Yeah. I had to watch out for a mine field outside Dad’s door.” Joshua grinned with satisfaction as Missy’s complexion blanched. So his friendly approach needed some work.

  “I have no idea what you mean. Aren’t you heading out of town as soon as Buck recovers?” she snipped. “No need to hobnob with the locals.”

  “Maybe I just like free ice cream.” Missy didn’t deserve a hint of his plans. He wished the lady in front of Missy would hurry up with her sundae. The ice cream would still taste good if the sprinkles weren’t perfectly arranged. She shook a couple sprinkles into her bowl then stopped to admire the effect. The ice cream would be soup before she finished her masterpiece.

  His gaze strayed to the end of the table where Sidney stood wrapped in a chocolate-smeared apron and plastic gloves. Joshua should have known she’d be working at the social, not simply attending. Her hair was tied to the side in a ponytail and a paper hat plopped askew on her head. He itched to push it off her forehead, but his thoughts were arrested by the smear of chocolate on her cheek and the possible ways he could clean it off.

  “Huh. Or you like something else,” Missy snarked, jerking him away from those tantalizing thoughts. He should know better than to let his guard down around her. “I thought there was more to their breakup. What with you being shirtless outside her house and all.” She didn’t even bother to disguise the trap.

  “It’s been a hot summer.” The temperature in the park had notched up about ten degrees in the last five minutes too. He sidestepped the trap and debated about trying to back her into the snapping jaws.

  Missy screwed up her mouth in a pout. While she figured out her next line of attack, he decided to abandon the battle. He slipped around her and snatched a bowl of half-melted, plain vanilla from the table. He was ten feet from the table when he realized he’d forgotten a spoon. He circled back around, happy to discover Missy had taken her networking skills elsewhere. The line had disappeared, so he strode over to Sidney.

  “Hey,” he greeted Sidney as she unwound the apron from her waist and tossed the hat and gloves into the garbage. “You’re ditching the hat?”

  “I didn’t think it was my best look.” The corner of her mouth quirked up. “Thank goodness the board talked Penny out of the Eighties prom dress theme. We would have been pools of cheap taffeta and sweat.”

  “The hat was kind of cute.” He found the spoons and buried one in the ice cream soup in his bowl.

  Sidney laughed and shook her head. “Plain ice cream? When we have all these toppings? There are even a few cherries left.”

  “It’s too hot to stand in the line for long.” And endure Missy’s company, he added to himself. “It’s not bad. Grab a bowl. There’s a table under the shade over there.”

  ****

  “Sounds good.” Sidney grabbed a mostly-solid sundae for herself and a cherry and dropped it on the rapidly sinking hill in his bowl. Joshua followed her as they wove through the crowd toward the shade on the edge of the park. Although she’d greeted most people as they came through the line, a few of the guests were more concerned about their figures than the cooling treat, so they stopped her every few feet to say hello.

  Sidney was caught between being polite to her fellow residents of Pine Bottom and wanting to spend some time with Joshua without the pressures of his dad’s illness or her own tumultuous problems. They had a chance to be normal for a few hours.

  They approached a group of women in designer dresses, more appropriate for the Kentucky Derby than a picnic in Pine Bottom. Sidney quickly recognized several of the women who had requested removal from her newsletter after Colin’s little fiasco.

  “Hello, Mrs. Daniels,” she greeted their ringleader, hoping a little sweet talking here would earn her best customers back and save her business’ reputation. Joshua halted a few feet away. She motioned she would be a second, then focused on Mrs. Daniels. “What a lovely dress.”

  “Sidney,” the woman said in tight, nasal tones that made Sidney feel like an unwanted mole on the end of the woman’s nose. “I heard about your breakup.”

  Sidney would have been surprised if she hadn’t. Mrs. Daniels didn’t live under a rock. Perhaps, the revelation would garner some sympathy in regards to Colin’s antics.

  “It’s been a rough week or so, but I’m getting back on my feet.” Sidney pushed humidity-frazzled strands of hair out of her face. “I hope to see you in the shop again soon.”

  Mrs. Daniels scrutinized Sidney. Sidney was sure she categorized every wrinkle, freckle, and stray hair of her heat-bedraggled appearance. “I do need a dress for the September Under The Stars ball hemmed.”

  “I look forward to doing it.” Even if the entire skirt is encrusted with rhinestones and I have to hand-stitch every seam. If it meant Mrs. Daniels and her upper class friends would return their business to Sidney’s shop, the hard labor would be worth it. Mrs. Daniels had always been a pleasant and reasonable customer, one of the few who understood a size two dress could not be altered into a fourteen without significantly changing the look. “Bring it in this week. I’ll have it ready in plenty of time.”

  Mrs. Daniels nodded and turned back to the group. Sidney waved to them, then darted after Joshua, who had secured seats at the shaded table.

  “What was that about?” he asked as she sat down.

  “Another reminder of my misplaced trust in Colin.” She stabbed her spoon into her ice cream. The plastic flexed against the frozen inner portion, so she settled for a slurp of the melted treat.

  Joshua’s forehead wrinkled. “More Rough Diamond stuff?”

  “Has he accosted you too?” She rolled her eyes. “He commandeered my mailing list to send promotional propaganda. Without my permission, of course. As you can expect, some of my customers were less than thrilled about it.”

  “I can imagine. Did it hurt your business?”

  “If these ladies follow through on their promises to return, I’ll be okay.” Mrs. Daniels didn’t mince words. If she said Sidney would hem her ball gown, she would. Her friends would follow her lead.

  Sidney leaned forward and lowered her voice to a whisper. Joshua tilted his head forward as well. She lost her train of thought as she noticed the tiny scar beside his eye. “Besides, I’m the only one who knows Mrs. Daniels’ true size. She has me replace the tags in her dresses and probably wouldn’t risk entrusting such sensitive information with another alterations shop.” Sidney smirked, and Joshua full-out laughed. The sound rolled all the way up from his toes, and she suspected it had been trapped there for some time.

  A smile curved her face, and she could feel it lighting her eyes as well. She couldn’t remember a time—it had certainly been months—when she’d felt this relaxed. Ice cream, sun, friendly faces, a good laugh, and Joshua.

  Joshua.

  Hmm. Could she feel this way about someone so soon after Colin? Wasn’t breaking an engagement supposed to tear one’s heart apart for months, if not years? Once the words were said and her connection to Colin severed, her anxiety had disappeared. She’d been able to limit the damage to her shop, and her reputation was on the mend. She chalked it all up to experience and lessons learned.

  Joshua asked about posters on her bulletin board, and she got caught up explaining her ideas, what new things she wanted to introduce into the store, and how she’d like to someday create a clothing li
ne purely from refashioned garments. Joshua’s eyes never glazed over like Colin’s had while she talked. He asked pertinent questions and sparked new ideas for her projects.

  New ideas, too, about how she felt about him. The attraction and connection were so different than mild admiration she felt for Colin. She was sure she hadn’t loved Colin, but how did she know if these new emotions were love?

  The conversation wandered from her dreams for her shop to Joshua’s job offer with Disaster Rebound and the possibility of him moving to Pine Bottom. It wasn’t a done deal, but could he be staying? She hadn’t considered having him around permanently. One of the barriers she had put to their relationship crumbled. She wasn’t as comfortable with the free movement through that former blockade.

  But what did it mean anyway? She and Joshua had no spoken agreement. Attraction, yes. That weird kiss in the hospital, oh yes; but nothing beyond a tentative hold. She tamped down the mixture of joy and terror that buzzed through her. Her best choice was to take her time, proceed slowly. She listened to him talk about some of the disaster sites he’d worked on, concentrating on the strength and compassion she heard in his voice.

  Somehow from there, the conversation moved to Penny’s instigation of his fear of water.

  They talked and laughed through the evening… while the social was cleaned up, while the coolness of twilight set in, while lightning bugs sparkled around them. Despite her fears at falling in love so quickly, Sidney couldn’t remember a night she had enjoyed more.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Sidney dumped the tray of silverware into the soapy water and rejoiced that the clunking and splashing blocked out Penny’s question. She had been steeling herself for this conversation all evening, but when the questions finally came, she still hadn’t found the easy answers.