by Jeff Shelby
“One hundred,” I said again. And then I added, “The one with the barn. And five acres.”
“Well, that could be any of them,” she said.
“Laura.”
“I go by Lori,” she said icily. “How many times do I have to tell you that?”
“Well, I named you Laura, so that's what I'm going to call you.”
Laura had some...misgivings about her name. Especially since her brother's name was Luke. Being a latch-key kid who spent afternoons watching soap operas, in particular General Hospital, had sort of influenced me in the names department. Laura had taken issue with this as soon as she realized the connection. And her friends started asking her if she was in love with her brother.
Marcia cleared her throat and I glanced at her. She tapped at the face of the thin watch attached to her wrist. I nodded.
“Look, honey, I’m going to need to catch up with you later. We still have a couple more properties to see and it’s getting late.” I had no idea what time it was, but judging from Marcia’s expression and gesture, I could make an educated guess.
Laura sighed. “Fine.”
But I knew it wasn’t fine. Laura was lots of things—smart, successful, a great elementary school teacher, a dedicated girlfriend—but she was not good at hiding her emotions.
She might have gotten that from me.
“Call me when you’re done,” she ordered. “As soon as you’re done.”
“I will,” I told her.
“And call me if you make a decision. Like, first thing. Before you sign any papers.”
“Uh huh,” I mumbled, saying a quick goodbye before she could badger me any more.
I knew what my eldest child was doing: inserting herself into my life. Making sure I didn’t make any rash decisions. Intervening in the hopes of saving me from myself.
Lucas had been fine when I told him I’d quit my job and sold the house. I’d expected that. Nothing ruffled his feathers; he was like his father that way. Of course, it probably helped that he lived three thousand miles away, surrounded by the Pacific Ocean and hip coffeehouses and music venues that he toured with his band. My life and the decisions I made were about as far removed from his daily life as if I’d been in a colony on the moon. Or in a different galaxy.
Laura was a different story. She’d only moved out two years ago, after she’d finished her student teaching and landed a job at Vickers Elementary in Falls Church, just a few miles up the road from the school where she’d graduated fifth grade. She was the one who called almost daily, who insisted on Sunday dinners together, who always had an opinion on every aspect of my life.
She might have gotten that last little bit from me.
So when I’d told her I was ditching the city and moving to the country, she had not been on board. At all.
What would I do for money, she wanted to know. (I was fine. I had an inheritance she conveniently liked to forget about).
What would I do with all my time if I quit my job? (Duh. Relax for the first time in twenty-plus years.)
What did I know about farm life? (Nothing. But I was going to learn.)
Why did I want to move away from her? (I had no answer for this.)
“Rainy?” Marcia said my name again.
I glanced up at her.
She smiled, her magenta lips the same color as the blazer she wore. “Did you want to see the rest of the property?” She glanced at her watch again. “We still have a couple more homes to see, and we’re running short on time.”
This was one hundred percent my fault. Marcia had suggested we only schedule three tours, but I was insistent on more. There had been at least a dozen that had caught my eye in the searches she’d sent me, and I wanted to see them all. Even I wasn’t naïve enough to think we could cram in a dozen, but I’d gotten her to reluctantly schedule six showings. Unfortunately, our pace was positively turtle-like and I knew we’d be hard-pressed to get to the other ones before I headed back to DC.
“I’d like to take a quick peek,” I said, referencing the outbuildings. “There’s a barn on this one, right?” It was tucked behind a thatch of sturdy oaks, but I thought I remembered seeing the red roof as we drove up the driveway.
She nodded. “Yes. A guesthouse, too. Small, just one bedroom, but perfect for guests who come for an extended period of time, or if the extra rooms in the main house are already spoken for.”
I made a mental note that having a guesthouse would be a good thing. I could stick Laura out there when she came to visit.
“There are a couple of other buildings, too,” Marcia continued. She tucked a stray blonde lock behind her ear and fiddled with the enormous gold knot earring that covered almost her entire lobe. “A bungalow—not sure what that looks like inside—and a couple of smaller sheds. A boathouse by the pond. Rustic, by the looks of it.” She held up a sheet containing photos of various buildings, but she wasn’t standing close enough and all I could see were rectangular shapes nestled among grass and water. “But we can certainly drive out there to take a quick peek. If you want.”
I did want.
I wanted a fresh start. I wanted to kiss the city goodbye, to wake up every morning and not think about the next client who would walk into Capitol Cases, to sleep in and have the time to read books and cook meals and learn how to knit and grow vegetables and raise chickens and maybe own a horse or two. Well, maybe not the horses. But everything else? I was all in.
I’d done my time. Raised my kids. Endured a loveless marriage for twenty years. Paid my dues as the office manager extraordinaire for Mack Mercy, the sole proprietor of Capitol Cases, a small investigative firm just inside the Beltway.
I needed me time.
I was entitled to it.
And starting fresh—a hundred miles away, chucking everything familiar for a new house, a new life, and new experiences—was exactly the way I was going to do it.
I followed Marcia out of the house and back into the late afternoon sunshine. It was March and the sun was bright but weak, like a diesel engine slowly warming up. The trees were budding, the grass a soft green, the daffodils planted in the flowerbeds like kids hiding at a surprise party, ready to burst.
I surveyed the scene around me. The white farmhouse with its stately columns and cheery green roof and shutters. The paved driveway that led further into the property, turning to a dusty gravel road that just begged for long walks. The trees that lined the drive and the fields that lay just beyond, fertile soil just waiting for my tomatoes and beans and pumpkins and watermelon. The pond that I knew was at the end of that gravel drive, stocked with fish and visited, no doubt, by frogs and turtles and dragonflies every summer, all summer long.
Marcia was walking slowly, waiting for me to catch up as I looked longingly back at the house we were leaving.
“Actually, I changed my mind.”
She looked at me, a slight frown creasing her forehead. “Oh? You don’t want to see the rest of the property?”
“No,” I told her. I thought about Laura for one second before firmly pushing her out of my mind. “I don’t want to see the other properties. Because I want this one.”
TWO
A sea of boxes surrounded me.
On the floor, covering the countertops, scattered on the stairs—there was no escaping them.It had been two days. Two days since the keys to the farm had been handed to me, and two days since the moving truck had deposited all of my belongings in the farmhouse I was now calling home.
It had also been two days since Laura had touched base, which was about as rare as seeing a shark walking upright down the street. To say that she was shocked and upset by the fact that I was actually going through with the move was a massive understatement. When talking me out of it didn’t work—something she’d been trying to do for the last four weeks—she’d switched to the silent treatment.
We were going into day three with no contact. No visits to the row house on the day the truck arrived. No phone calls. And no texts.
It was as if I didn’t exist.
Which, I had to admit, was feeling a little nice.
I loved my kid, but her overbearingness sometimes drove me nuts. So not having to answer continuous texts and phone calls was a dream come true during the drive down to Latney and the hours spent supervising the movers.
But I had to admit the silence was now starting to eat at me a little. I knew she was upset about my move, knew she wanted me to stay put, knew she would like for life to stay exactly as it was, no changes allowed, but I didn’t think she’d resort to cutting off all communication with me.
I actually didn’t think she was capable of it. We’d never gone more than a few hours without texting or talking. We were at 48 and counting.
I pushed it out of my mind. I had other things to think about.
Like the hundreds of boxes that were still strewn all over the house, waiting to be unpacked. Like the list of essential repairs the home inspector had handed me, a massive spiral-bound report whose thickness resembled the anthology book I’d needed for my Intro to Lit class at George Mason twenty-some years ago.
Soon. I’d get to those soon.
Because right now, I had all the time in the world. Nothing was tugging at me, demanding my attention. No boss, no clients, and, seemingly, no children.
Just my boxes that needed to be unpacked and my house that needed a few repairs.
All the time in the world.
I’d managed to get the kitchen and living rooms mostly put together, and the movers—a couple of burly college students from UVA—had kindly assembled my bed so I would have a place to sleep. But I still hadn’t found the sheets, and I’d been too wound up to grab any significant shut-eye. Wine would probably help in that department. I made a mental note to look for the box filled with my ample collection of merlots from Virginia wineries I’d visited over the past couple of years.
I sighed and attacked the box in front of me with much less gusto than I would have liked. It was filled with picture frames, each piece carefully wrapped in brown paper. I knew what was in each frame: pictures of the kids growing up, our vacations together—the images with their dad in them carefully tucked away in photo albums rather than on display—and various milestones: proms, high school and college graduations. The timeline of important events in our life as a family. And I knew why I was loath to unwrap them: because I’d think of the kid of mine who was irrationally angry with me for moving.
I abandoned that box and looked for another. There was a smaller one with my writing in thick black marker: DVDs. Those would be easy; I could just shove them in their drawer in the entertainment center that was already positioned in the living room. I liked those kinds of boxes.
I was just sliding the box cutter through the tape when there was a knock at the door.
I frowned, straightened, and crossed the room. My footsteps were surprisingly silent on the wood floor and the man standing on the front porch jumped when I flung it open.
“He…hello,” he stammered.
The first thing I thought was, I don’t know him. And then, Of course I don’t know him. I just moved here!
I pasted on a smile. “Hi.”
The man towered over me, which was easy considering 5’4” was my self-proclaimed height and never what the doctor’s office measured, and he was built like a lumberjack. Not that I’d ever met one, but his red-checked shirt and well-worn jeans sort of lent themselves well to that description. He was holding a small, flimsy basket with a red piece of cloth covering whatever was inside.
“So, you’re the one who bought the Konrath place,” he said.
Now that he wasn’t stammering, I could hear his slight southern drawl. It wasn’t deep, but there was a twang, a slowness and smoothness to his words that sounded a little like brandy felt going down my throat.
“Yes,” I said, nodding. I smoothed my hair off my forehead, hoping my ponytail wasn’t a mess. I already knew I had no make-up on, and I was wearing a ratty GMU T-shirt and a pair of paint-stained gray sweats. Not exactly great first impression material.
He shifted so the basket was in his left hand and thrust his right in my direction. “Name’s Gunnar. Gunnar Forsythe.”
I shook. “Rainy. Rainy Day.”
His eyes—hazel, with flecks of gold—widened and his bushy eyebrows shot to his hairline, a salty, sandy windblown mess. Like me, he was probably in his mid-forties. “Excuse me?”
I chuckled. “My name is Raina, but everyone calls me Rainy. And the last name is just an unfortunate coincidence.”
He smiled and dimples sprouted on his cheeks. I noticed the quick glance at my naked left hand before he said, “Your parents must have had a good sense of humor.”
“Actually, it was me,” I admitted. “Because I went ahead and married my now-ex-husband even though I knew my legal name would be a constant topic of conversation.”
His dimples deepened, carving even sharper lines, and he held out the basket in his hand. “Brought you a housewarming gift. Thought you should get a warm welcome to Latney, especially considering I’m your closest neighbor.”
I took the basket from him. It was surprisingly heavy. I folded back the red fabric and a dozen rainbow eggs greeted me. Greens and browns, all muted, earthy colors, and even a couple of rosy ones, too.
I might have gasped out loud, because Gunnar’s smile morphed into a frown. “You allergic?”
I shook my head. “No, no. They’re just so…beautiful.” They looked like Easter eggs; ones that Mother Nature would color, not the gaudy ones dyed with the neon tablets.
“Gunnar Forsythe and beautiful are two words that do not go together,” a female voice announced from the steps.
A woman—someone else I didn’t know—appeared on my porch, a white Tupperware container in her hands. She was probably ten years younger than me, with shoulder-length blonde hair and a perfectly made-up face. Even though it was only April, she sported a stunning tan under her pink flowered sundress.
“Welcome to Latney,” she announced, her accent as thick as honey. “I'm Sophia. Sophia Rey, member and treasurer of the Latney Ladies Society. I brought you a little something to welcome you to town.”
“Morning, Sophie,” Gunnar said, grinning. “This here is Rainy. Rainy Day.”
She responded with a frosty smile and I didn’t know if it was in response to my name or the person who was delivering the information. Turning to me, she rearranged her features into an expression of placid hospitality. She inclined her blonde head, and I glanced at the container in her hand. “Lemon poppy seed bread and cranberry scones. Just a few of my specialties.”
I’d been living on ramen and cereal and canned soup, so the bounty of fresh eggs and baked goods pretty much felt like manna from heaven.
“Thank you,” I said, my heart bursting with appreciation. I could get used to small town hospitality. “I haven’t had anything homemade since getting here. Been too busy unpacking.”
Sophia poked her head through the door and looked around. Her nose wrinkled a little as her eyes drifted over the endless sea of boxes. “Well, hopefully you’ll be able to finish up soon. Don’t you have anyone helping you?”
I knew what the real question was: where’s your husband?
“Nope,” I said cheerfully. “It’s just me.”
Her eyebrows lifted. “Just you in this big ‘ole house, all by your lonesome?” She made a tsking sound.
“I have kids,” I assured her. Gunnar turned around, perhaps scouting the porch for toddlers ready to jump out from behind the railing. “Older kids,” I clarified. “And maybe grandkids soon.”
But then I realized that might make me sound far older than I really was so I hastily added, “I mean, not soon soon. But soon…ish.”
They both just stared at me and I felt the heat rise up my neck and wash into my cheeks.
Sophia cleared her throat. “Well.” She nodded her head at me and smiled. “It is nice to meet you, Rainy. Enjoy yo
ur bread and scones, and cook those eggs well.” She narrowed her eyes. “Never know what kind of filth might be lurking on the farms around here.”
I didn’t know why, but I felt the need to defend Gunnar and his colorful eggs. “I’m sure they’ll be delicious,” I told her, smiling at Gunnar. “In fact, I’m sort of hoping to raise some chickens myself once I’m settled.”
He regarded me with interest. “Yeah?”
I nodded.
He shoved his hands in his pockets and puffed out his chest a little. “Well, I can help get you started with that, if you like. Nothin’ to it, really. Just need a coop and a little run for them. Easy as pie.”
Sophia sniffed. “Well, I’ll leave the two of you to your…farm talk.” She said this as if they were dirty words. “Welcome to Latney, Rainy Day.”
She turned on her heel and I noticed for the first time that she was wearing red stilettos that matched the color of her dress. She navigated the porch steps gracefully and marched to a convertible red BMW parked in my driveway.
“That there is Mrs. Sophia Rey. Easy on the eyes but hard on the spirits,” Gunnar said.
I snorted. “Is she always so color coordinated?”
He let out a loud guffaw and winked at me, and I was sort of taken aback by just how handsome this lumberjack-farmer with a basket of dirty eggs was.
“Miss Rainy Day,” he said, still chuckling, “I think you and I are gonna get along just fine.”
THREE
Laura broke her silence the next morning.
Because I caved and called her.
“Laura, honey, “ I said when she answered. There was no hello, no nothing. “Please don’t be mad at me.”
“Who is this?”
“Oh, stop it. You know very well who this is.”
“No, really, I don’t. The line is full of static.”
“Laura.” My voice was sharper. “You have Caller ID. You know who this is.”
