High Stick

by Alicia Hunter Pace

  “All right.” She led him over to the display and picked up a little stick with a metal tip. “This is a seal stamp. See the design?” She held it out.

  “A bumblebee.”

  “I think it’s a honeybee, but you get the idea.”

  “I like a girl who knows her bees.”

  She shook her head and picked up a piece of blue wax. “You light the wick, let the wax drip, and then press the stamp into the soft wax. When it cools, you lift up the stamp, and you have a seal.”

  “But then you’d have a blue bee. You wouldn’t want that.”

  “It wouldn’t have to be blue. I just happened to pick up the blue wax. You could have yellow. Or gold.”

  “That would make more sense. But what’s the purpose?”

  She looked flustered. “Seal an envelope with it. In times past, that’s how they closed envelopes. Nobles had signet rings with their coats of arms that they pressed into the wax.”

  She sure knew a lot about wax and envelopes.

  “But envelopes have glue on them now. Besides, I pay all my bills online.”

  “It’s decorative, for special correspondence. You know. Christmas cards.” Yeah. Maybe you can put those on our Christmas cards next year. “Or wedding invitations.” Even better. “Some people use them to decorate their bullet journals or scrapbooks. You could use them to decorate wrapped packages.”

  He looked around. “You people sure worry a lot about wrapping presents.”

  “We are a paper store.”

  “What if you don’t want a bumblebee? Or a honeybee?”

  “There are hearts, roses, stars, initials—almost anything you can think of.”

  He was going to have to buy some of this stuff. Judging from Hard Sale Sally’s behavior, they probably worked on commission. At this point, he’d taken up so much of her time that it would be almost unethical not to buy. Besides, he’d like to show Hard Sale Sally that he was interested in this wax—even if he wasn’t, not really.

  “How about a hockey puck? Do you have a hockey puck stamper?”

  Merry’s eyes glazed over. “Wouldn’t that just be a circle?”

  She had a point. “Anything hockey related? Sticks? A skate?”

  She still didn’t look convinced that he was doing to buy anything. “I think we have a skate.” She ran her finger over the row of stamps. “Yes. Here you go.”

  “Let me see.” He took it from her. “No. That’s a figure skate.” He handed it back.

  She looked at it and frowned. “How can you tell?”

  “It has a toe pick. Hockey skates don’t have toe picks.”

  “Why not?”

  What kind of question was that? “Toe picks are for doing tricks. We don’t do tricks. Can’t you skate?”

  “I can roller skate.”

  “But not ice skate?”

  “Of course not. Where would I have learned to ice skate? I grew up in small Southern towns. There were no rinks in any of the places I ever lived. And our ponds don’t freeze.”

  “Hmm. Interesting. I don’t think I’ve ever known anyone before who couldn’t skate.”

  She smiled. The smile might or might not have been flirtatious. Hard to tell. “You still don’t. You don’t know me.”

  Yeah, well. We’ll rectify that. And the not knowing how to skate. We need to be able to skate together. He still remembered how his dad’s hands had felt on his shoulders as his mother skated backward in front of them and Lea skated in circles around them. “You’re doing great, pal,” his dad had said. “Skate to Mama, baby.” She had held out her hands to catch him as if his dad would ever let him fall. That was going to be him.

  He handed the figure skate stamp back to Merry. “I can’t seal my envelopes with a figure skate. So no hockey skates? Or any other kind of hockey stamp?”

  “I don’t remember seeing any.” She scanned the display. “No. I don’t see any hockey motifs.”

  “I feel discriminated against.”

  She turned and met his eyes. “I’m sure hockey stamps exist; everything else does. But, Jarrett”—his stomach turned over when she said his name—“you don’t want wax seals.”

  “I do. I swear I do.”

  “Really? What are you going to seal?” She looked amused.

  “Stuff. Valentines. That’s coming up. I send Valentines to my mother, grandmother, sister, and little niece.” He added that in case she thought he had a girlfriend. “Anyway, what is this? A British drugstore where you have to prove you need what you’re buying?” He’d been down that road and it was annoying.

  But she finally laughed out loud. Go figure. He wasn’t even trying that time.

  “How about my number? 91?” He said that in case she didn’t know.

  “It would have to be two stamps—a 9 and a 1.”

  “Great. I’ll take them.”

  She hesitated. “I’m not sure it’s ethical to sell you this.”

  Ethical! One of his favorite words. And she’d used it.

  “Wouldn’t it be unethical not to?”

  “I don’t think ethics play into it.” But she turned and retrieved one of the stamps.

  “You just said it did.” Her hand was warm when she put the number stamps in his palm. He wanted to feel it again. “I’ll take some of those wax sticks, too. Purple. And silver. Do you have silver?”

  “We have every color.” She gave him one of each, but this time their hands didn’t make contact. That was no good.

  “Purple and silver are the Sound colors.” Again, he said that just in case she didn’t know.

  “I know,” she said. “Will there be anything else?”

  “I’ll take some more of this wax. Maybe ten of each color.”

  “Really?” She put a hand on her hip, akimbo. “Do you know how many seals one stick will make?”

  “No. Do you think I need more?”

  “I don’t think you need any, but that’s beside the point. You can get about ten seals from each stick.”

  “So I will be able to make a hundred 91s. It would be two hundred if my number were a single digit.”

  “You have mad math skills.”

  No he didn’t. He had barely gotten through college calculus. Good thing you didn’t need calculus to play hockey.

  “You just add a zero. Don’t you know that trick?” He thought everyone knew that trick.

  “I was being sarcastic.”

  “I’m not good at that. Luckily I have a good slap shot.”

  She counted out the sticks of wax and held them up. “Last chance. Are you sure you want all of this?”

  “Positive. Now that I know I can seal my letters with my number, I can’t live without it.”

  She moved to the counter and scanned the items.

  “I really came here to see you today,” he said.

  “You don’t say?” She began to wrap his purchases in the fanciest tissue paper he’d ever seen. “$68.33.”

  Wow. He must be paying for the tissue paper, too. “Here you go.” He handed over his credit card. “I have something else for you.”

  She laughed. “Else?” She held up the platinum card. “Else would imply that you have two things for me. Does that mean I get to keep this?”

  You bet, sweetheart. What’s mine is yours.

  “I hope you’ll like this better.” He pulled the ticket Packi had gotten for him from his wallet and laid it on the counter.”

  “What’s that?” she asked in a distracted way as she ran his credit card.

  “A ticket to my game tonight. We play the Kings. I want you to come.” She looked up surprised.

  “Sign here.” She slid his card and the slip across the counter.

  What? She wasn’t supposed to say “sign here.” She was supposed to say, “Yes. I would be so pleased to come to the game. And what a good seat you got me.”

  “And I’d like for you to come out with me after to The Big Skate.” She still said nothing—just looked at him wide-eyed. He began to ba
bble like an eighth grade girl asking a boy she wasn’t sure of to the Sadie Hawkins dance. “The Big Skate is where the team hangs out. It’s in Sound Town.” Still nothing from her. “Not far from here. Across from the Starbucks. They have my jersey on the wall—and pictures. Of me. The rest of the team, too, but there are plenty of me.” He said that just in case she didn’t know he was one of the stars.

  She finally spoke. “I know what The Big Skate is.”

  “So you’ll come?”

  “No.” She shook her head. “But yes. Yes and no.”

  He’d never understood women, but this was a whole new level.

  “Which is it?”

  “Yes, I’ll be at the game. No, I don’t need your ticket. And no, I can’t go out with you after.”

  Can’t. She’d said can’t. That didn’t mean she didn’t want to. At least, not necessarily.

  “Why can’t you?”

  “Because I’ll be working. I won’t be off in time.”

  Now he was really confused. “The game is at seven o’clock tonight. Doesn’t this place close at five? Besides, you said you were going to the game.”

  “No. I said I’ll be at the game. I’ll be working there. At Bridgestone.”

  He remembered now that she’d said she had two jobs—three if you counted that bartending job at Emile’s wedding.

  “So your second job is at Bridgestone? What do you do?”

  Oh, God, don’t let her be an ice girl. She was certainly pretty enough to be a Sound cheerleader, but there was a strict rule about ice girls fraternizing with players. It happened other places, but not here. Pickens Davenport did not put up with foolishness. And Jarrett thought it was a good rule. It was always the ice girl who got in trouble, not the player, and that wasn’t fair. Besides, he didn’t like the idea of Merry running around half naked and shaking pom-poms and dancing—not to mention clearing the shavings off the ice between periods.

  So if Merry Sweet was an ice girl, there were three options:

  1. She would have to stop being an ice girl.

  2. He would have to stop being a hockey player.

  3. There could be no fraternizing.

  Since he had every intention of fraternizing all over the place and he couldn’t stop being a hockey player, that only left one thing. How open would she be to turning in her little shorts, sparkly pom-poms, and snow shovel?

  “I’m an ice suite attendant.”

  That was a relief, but only to a point. That was hard work, doing the biding of people who could afford $8,000 to watch a hockey game. That was for a whole gaggle of people—maybe twenty or so, but still.

  “Ice suite attendant? Like fetch popcorn for people?”

  “Well, more like beer, wine, and more substantial food. But yes. I also check credentials and keep things tidy.”

  “And you have to run back and forth to the snack bar and get that stuff?”

  She rolled her eyes. He had the feeling she’d been wanting to do that ever since he’d come in the door today. “You don’t know a thing about where you hang your hat do you?”

  “Huh? Hang my hat? I don’t—”

  “Where you work. It’s an expression. But no. I don’t go to the vendors and get pretzels and candy bars—though I guess I would if they wanted it. Catering delivers the food. There are snacks like popcorn and chips, and hot food like pulled pork sliders and lobster macaroni and cheese. That’s all in chafing dishes. I serve the food and refill drinks throughout the game. If I run out of something or a guest wants something special, I call down to catering and they bring it.”

  Like a waitress at a fancy party where people didn’t know her name. He didn’t like people not knowing her name, but it was better than them seeing her cleavage, bare midriff, and legs up to her ass. While he had never fraternized with an ice girl, he had observed the uniform and what it didn’t cover.

  She went on, “And when the game is over, I break down and clean up. I wouldn’t get finished in time to go to The Big Skate.”

  Right. The matter at hand. He’d gotten distracted by the thought of her carrying around trays and kowtowing to drunks. Did they even tip her?

  “But you would? Go to The Big Skate? If you could?”

  She screwed up her face. “Maybe. I don’t know. But it doesn’t matter. I can’t.”

  He didn’t like that answer. “Because you’ll be waiting on people who don’t appreciate you.”

  Oh, hell. That was the wrong thing to say. Her eyes went all mad.

  “It’s honest work and I’m good at it. Besides, it’s no different from you making drinks and waiting on people at that supper club.”

  The Shooting Star, Merry. She didn’t remember the name. He wanted her to remember everything he’d said to her.

  “It is different. My family owns The Shooting Star.”

  “Well, I’m very sorry that my family doesn’t own the Bridgestone Arena so that my lowly position doesn’t come up to your very exacting standards.”

  “That wasn’t what I meant.” And it wasn’t, not at all.

  She set her mouth. “Don’t forget your credit card, sir.” Then she looked over his shoulder and smiled. “Mrs. Mallory! Did you find some things? Here, let me take that . . . ”

  Damn. That hadn’t gone at all like he’d thought.

  He was halfway down the street before he remembered he’d left his $68.33 worth of nothing.

  Chapter Five

  “You’ve got the Purple and Silver suite, Merry.” Carmen, Merry’s team leader, handed her a printout. “Here’s your paperwork for tonight.”

  “Wow.” This had never happened before. The Purple and Silver Suite was reserved for special guests of the Sound organization and was as VIP as it got. Merry usually tended the suite that belonged to one of the big banks. They were slobs—always left a huge mess, probably because they drank a lot. You’d have thought bankers would have been neater and more sober, but they tipped well and kept their hands to themselves, so she was okay with them.

  But this was nice. It meant they trusted her completely. “Where’s Felicity tonight?” Felicity was the most senior suite attendant who usually took care of the Purple and Silver suite.

  “She’s sick. The bankers aren’t coming tonight, so I had you on the Wives and Girlfriends suite. When Felicity called in, I moved you to Purple and Silver and put Joy with the WAGs.”

  That was a dodged bullet. She’d had WAG duty before, though officially it was called the Player VIP suite. She didn’t mind it. Most of them were really nice. But it was hitting a little too close to home.

  Though not really. She wasn’t Jarrett MacPherson’s girlfriend and she wasn’t going to be—but he had definitely asked her for a date. What’s more, she’d had to admit something when he had walked into Foolscap and Vellum today: she’d been thinking about him too much. It had been harmless, like fantasizing about Jamie Fraser or whoever that guy was who played him. Either way, it didn’t matter, because it wasn’t real, wasn’t possible.

  But when Jarrett had sought her out today—and that’s what he’d done—it’d become real. Only it couldn’t be. She had too much to do—work, study, work some more. Besides, she wasn’t the kind of woman that a man like Jarrett would end up with for the long term.

  It wasn’t a matter of pretty or smart. A calendar said she was pretty, and Vanderbilt School of Law said she was smart—smart enough to know what she lacked: savvy, sophistication, and glamour. A millionaire hockey player, especially a second generation one, wasn’t going to want a woman who had never been north of the Mason-Dixon Line, didn’t know Coco Chanel from a cocoa bean, and was just fine with birthday celebrations at Red Lobster. That she intended to live her life as a public defender wasn’t going to do one thing to make her more interesting. It was hard, often thankless, work that foolish, idealistic people romanticized. She was neither foolish nor romantic, so she wasn’t likely to become disillusioned—she didn’t have any illusions in the first place. In short, she was who she
was and she was all right with that. But he wouldn’t be, not in the long run.

  And the last time she’d tried to run with people out of her league, she’d posed half naked to finance it and look where that had gotten her: working two jobs to keep body and soul together, not to mention piling up student loan debts that would take years to pay off.

  Anderson Howland from her torts class had flirted with her, just like Jarrett. And she’d thought about him a little too much, just like she had about Jarrett. Anderson had asked her to go on that ski trip, and it had seemed important—important enough to pose bare breasted for that calendar, when she knew full well she’d signed a morality clause that meant business. And stupid hadn’t ended there. Oh, no.

  She’d been dense enough to think that Anderson wouldn’t expect to sleep with her that weekend. But he’d not only expected it, he’d been mad when she’d refused and felt led to share some truths: He wanted a good time, sure, but did she actually think he would take some cornpone princess preacher’s kid home to meet his mother? And just who was she, anyway, to fancy that what she had between her legs was special enough to save?

  The whole thing had been a disaster that’d led to an even worse disaster—the loss of her job and scholarship, which had led to a year of lying to her family and missing a whole year of law school.

  At least Anderson had flunked out during that year.

  Jarrett might not be Old Money New England like Anderson Howland, but he had a legacy of his own and it was plenty shiny. One of the articles she’d read had described him as hockey royalty. And then there was that supper club that had been in his family ever since Eve picked the wrong apple. She’d probably made it into a pie at—what was it? Shining Star? Starry Night? She still didn’t have a handle on all that, but he was mighty proud of it.

  It wasn’t the money that separated them—though she had none and Jarrett had more than a sane person could ever spend. No, it was the roots—and she knew something about that. Ministers went where God called them, and Dr. Cyrus Sweet had been called to five churches before Merry’s sophomore year in high school. And with each new place came a new school, new church, new neighborhood. As the new girl, Merry had always attracted attention in the beginning, but when the newness had worn off, everyone had settled back in with the friends they’d been babies and kindergartners with. She’d never had a best friend. It wasn’t that she’d been left completely out in the cold. As the preacher’s kid, Merry had been assured of inclusion in certain social situations, but it’d been hard to tell if she’d been included because she was liked or because she was the pastor’s daughter. She might have been invited to a slumber party, but never to spend the night with one girl. When it’d come to spring trips to the beach and summer weeks at Disney World, she’d never been the special friend who was invited.