by Rachel Hanna
"Understandable. I just wasn't expecting that answer. Was your husband in one of the buildings?" Rebecca nodded.
"Yes. He was an investment banker. We had this amazing life going with our two-year-old son, living right there in the heart of Manhattan. And it all fell to pieces because of the terrible acts of a few people on one day."
"I can't even imagine what it was like to go through that." Jackson didn't really know what to say, and he was afraid to express sorrow after what she just said.
"It's funny the things you remember when you go through a tragedy like that. That morning, I didn't get to tell my husband goodbye. He got up earlier because he had a meeting and he needed to prepare for it. He didn't want to wake me apparently, so he just left me a note. It was just a simple note that said I love you and see you at dinner. I've looked at that note a million times since that day, and every time I try to read through the lines. I try to see if there was another message in that note so I can hang onto it, but there never is. He had no idea that he wouldn't come home for dinner. None of us did. And then I was left with a toddler who was asking for his daddy every day for months. How do you explain that to a two-year-old?" She was staring out into the ocean, her eyes full of tears as Jackson watched Leo sit down just outside of the surf and stare into the ocean too.
"I have no idea how you would explain that to a child so young."
"I don't know if I did it right. He never seemed to totally understand it. And now he's become such an angry kid because he's growing up without a father. And apparently I failed him too."
"Rebecca, you can't say that about yourself. No parent is perfect. He's just a teenage boy who needs some direction now."
"And how do you know so much about kids? I mean you don't even have any of your own."
"Because I helped to raise all of my siblings. My father died when I was very young, and I became the stand in father for all of them. That's why stayed in January Cove until I was almost thirty years old. I had to help my mother finish raising them."
"Wow. That explains it then. They all look at you like some authority figure, and I couldn't figure it out," she said with a wry smile.
"Thanks for telling me what happened to your husband. I'm honored that you shared that with me." Their eyes met briefly, and the silence was deafening even with the waves crashing to shore.
"I know it seems silly that I kept it a secret, but I was trying to start over. Give us both a fresh start. I'm not sure why he overreacted that way back there. He's never said anything much about his father before."
"Maybe that's the problem. Maybe he feels like you won't talk about your husband because it's so upsetting. But maybe he needs to talk about it."
"I think you might be in the wrong career field. Maybe you need to be a psychologist," she said nudging him with her shoulder. A bolt of electricity moved through his body when she touched him. She was petite in frame, but he felt immense power coming from her, and he wasn't sure what to do with it.
"Nah, I think I'll stick with real estate. Why don't you go talk to Leo, and I'll give you guys some privacy?" he said standing up. She stood up with him, and brushed off her clothes.
"Thank you. You're not such a jackass after all," she said smiling.
"You thought I was a jackass?" he said.
"Well, that's the only word I can say in polite company." With that, she smiled at him and turned around and started walking towards her son. And Jackson had a really bad feeling that he was about to get caught up in the whirlwind that was Rebecca Evans.
***
After the embarrassing episode on Thanksgiving, Rebecca tried to avoid any of the Parker family. She even sent Adele Parker an apology note for ruining her Thanksgiving dinner. Even though she had talked to Leo on the beach that afternoon, it didn't heal any of the rifts between them. Hell, she didn't even really know what the rifts were.
Thankfully, Leo was back at school and she could get back to the business of running her coffee shop to take her mind off her troubles. The truth was she was getting really tired of going to bed alone every night. Twelve years had been long enough, but she didn't know how to get back into the dating scene. She felt like she would compare every man to Tom.
He had been her perfect match. Smart, sexy and successful, and he made her feel safe. Until the day that he was no longer there to make her feel safe. But she was tired of bearing the responsibility of life all by herself. She had no one to lean on, no soft place to fall after a long hard day.
And she had to admit that Jackson Parker would be a worthy dating partner if only he lived in January Cove. And if he was interested in her at all. It had been so long since she had dated anyone that she couldn't tell the signals anymore. Things had changed a lot on the dating scene, and she didn't want to assume that someone was flirting with her or was interested in her if they weren't. She didn't need an embarrassing episode on top of everything else she had going on in her life.
It was early morning, and she started scrubbing the milk nozzle on the cappuccino machine when she heard the doorbell chime as the first customer of the day came in.
"Welcome to Jolt," she said as she turned around. Then she saw him. "Jackson."
"Good morning, Rebecca," he said with a smile. It was certainly a different face than he had the other day when he came into her coffee shop the first time.
"What are you doing here?" There was something about Jackson Parker that did something to her. She felt the nervousness rising from the core of her being, and she wasn't sure why. He was plenty handsome, for sure, but she'd been around handsome men in her life before.
"What am I doing here? In a coffee shop?" He raised his eyebrow at her and smiled.
"Of course. Of course. What can I get for you?" she said nervously trying to figure out what to do with her hands. She finally settled on grabbing a dish towel and wiping up invisible liquid on the counter.
"Just black coffee." She nodded and walked away to pour the coffee while Jackson stood at the counter. She could feel his eyes staring at the back of her head, and the little hairs on her neck went up. Why was he looking at her like that?
"Here you go. Anything else?" she asked. He looked at her for a moment and then looked down at his coffee before finally speaking.
"Yeah. Actually, I wanted to ask you a question." Now she was really getting nervous. Was he about to ask her out on a date? She steeled herself, unsure of what her answer would be if he did.
"Okay, ask away," she said feeling a little like a schoolgirl again.
"Does your son like to play football?" he asked. Inside, she felt her heart sink. What did she expect him to ask her? And why did she feel so disappointed all of a sudden?
"Um, I think he does. I've seen him throw the football around with his friends back home before. He really doesn't know many people here, though. And his grades aren't good enough to try out for the high school football team this year." She shrugged her shoulders and sighed. Leo’s problems seemed to take up every waking moment of her life now. She never would've expected that out of him. He'd been such a good kid and so close to her. They were all each other had for so many years, but now she could feel him pulling away and she didn't know what to do about it.
"Well, then, maybe I can stop by sometime and take him to throw the ball around for a while. I used to play for JCHS when I was his age." Jackson had been a pretty good player at January Cove High School back in his day.
She cocked her head and looked at him confused. "I thought you were going back to Atlanta."
"Well, I might make some changes in my schedule. I haven't taken time off in years, and January Cove has a lot more interesting things going on these days than I thought it would." He slid the money across the counter and picked up his cup of coffee, took a sip and winked. "See you around, Rebecca," he said before walking out the door. Rebecca literally had to fan herself as the door closed behind him. Yep, that Jackson Parker had something going on and she needed to stay as far away from it as poss
ible or risk having her heart broken all over again.
Chapter 7
Kyle Parker was nervous, probably more nervous than he'd ever been in his entire life. He and Jenna had been together most of the time they were growing up, and back together for a few months now. They lived together and raised her daughter together, but the thought of proposing to her was making him sick. He knew it was the right thing to do because he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her, but he wanted to make sure that the proposal was perfect and it was causing anxieties to crop up that he didn't know he had.
"Okay, so do you think that releasing doves would be too much?" he asked Jackson across the table. They had met up for lunch, and Jackson was just digging into his roast beef sandwich when Kyle had broached the subject of planning the engagement.
"Doves?" he said almost choking on his sandwich.
"What's wrong with doves? They're nice-looking birds…" Kyle said throwing his hands up as he looked down at his list he'd made of all the things he wanted to do.
"Don’t you think you should leave something for the wedding itself? I mean doves?" Jackson said laughing. "We have a million seagulls flying around out there, and you want to add doves? What if they don't get along? You don't want to be responsible for the great Dove War, do you?"
Kyle shoved Jackson's shoulder across the table causing him to drop half of his sandwich on the floor. "I just want to make this as special as possible for her. It's been a rough few years for Jenna." Jackson stared at his lost sandwich for a moment before looking back at Kyle.
"Look, man, she just wants to marry you. For whatever reason, the woman is in love with you. I don't think the engagement moment will matter nearly as much as you think it will."
"See? This is why you don't have a woman. The engagement is hugely important to women. That right there shows you just don't understand how women work. I've got to get this thing just right so she has this wonderful memory for the rest of her life. I read it in all of the magazines." Kyle looked down at his paper and Jackson started snickering to himself.
"You've been reading women's magazines? What is wrong with you?" he asked shoving his brother's shoulder across the table in retaliation.
"When you fall in love, for real, you'll understand. I would do anything for Jenna even if it means having to buy women's magazines two counties over," Kyle said starting to laugh himself. "I know I'm going overboard, but I just want to make it special for her."
"Then stop thinking with your head, brother. Think with your heart. You know her better than anyone else on earth. I think you can come up with something that would mean the world to her."
Kyle nodded and closed up his notebook. "So what's going on with you? Anything new on the love front?"
"Of course not. I'm here visiting you losers. I have to go back to Atlanta to find women," Jackson said with a smile.
"You can't fool me. You might be my older brother, but you've got a terrible poker face. I think you have a little bit of interest in someone right here in January Cove," Kyle said finally taking a bite of his sandwich.
"Oh really? And who would that be?"
"You know who it is. Rebecca Evans. I saw the way you chased her down after her son said that yesterday. I think you've got the hots for her," Kyle said taking a sip of his sweet tea.
"I do not have the hots for Rebecca Evans. I was simply being nice and trying to help her with a terrible situation. Do you know about her past?" Kyle shook his head.
"I know she moved down here from up north, but that's about it."
"Well, she's a September 11th widow and she's raised Leo by herself. Now he's going through the terrible teens, and he's basically acting out because he didn't have a father figure."
"And you're going to become the father figure?"
"Of course not. I don't even live here. I was just trying to help a woman who was obviously in dire straits yesterday. Any one of us would've done the same, but I run faster." Kyle started laughing.
"Just be careful. Don't get in over your head."
"Okay, Dove Boy. You're giving me advice? I raised four siblings with Mom. I think I can help a woman out with a fourteen-year-old snotty nosed kid."
"I've never seen you quite like this. You normally don't take responsibility for anyone else but yourself. I don't blame you because you spent most of your life raising us, but why this woman?"
"As I said, Kyle, there is nothing going on between me and Rebecca. Strictly a friendship, and a short one at that. I'll be going home soon, and I really won't see her again until Christmas. It's no big deal, so don't go starting rumors."
Kyle could tell Jackson was getting a little bit defensive and uncomfortable, and he knew his brother well enough to know that he should back off.
"So how's business going?" Jackson finally asked after a long, uncomfortable silence.
"Pretty good. I usually buy at least one or two houses every three months. Keeps the bills paid up and allows us to have fun as a family."
"Yeah, my business is booming right now too, but it's a little bit more than I can handle some days."
"Have you ever thought about bringing on a partner?" Kyle asked.
"Not really. At least not seriously."
"Let me ask you something, Jackson. What do you want? I mean what do you see in your future? Family? Being eternally single?"
Jackson sat there for a moment seriously considering his brother's question before answering. "I'd like to have a family someday." In a way, he surprised himself. He almost looked around the room to make sure he was the one speaking.
"You've got to set your life up for it now. You've got to start making some tough decisions about your business because no one is going to want to marry a man who's married to his business. You've got to give up some of that control. You built the company, it's a strong company and you need to start trusting other people to help you run it. You need time off. You used to be this really fun loving guy and now you're nothing but a workaholic. There's no room in your life for a woman, and I think that's why you haven't found one."
"Wow. That was deep, Kyle. Maybe you should get your psychology degree."
"Don't get defensive. You know I'm right. Just think about it." Jackson nodded and the brothers continued eating their lunch before parting ways at the front door.
***
Rebecca stood behind the counter of her coffee shop, staring out the plate glass window at the very few people walking down the street in January Cove. She enjoyed the small town life a lot more than she thought she would when she left New York. There were just too many memories there, too many milestones that had been passed. While being around people who knew her and the places that she and her husband had been should've been a comfort, it was too painful. Even twelve years later, seeing their favorite pizza place or walking past the park bench where he proposed was too much for her.
Still, sometimes in the dead of night when she woke up with nightmares, she wondered if she'd made the right decision for her and her son. She pondered over whether leaving home was the best course of action.
Of course, now it was a little too late to worry about that. She'd set up her life here in the small coastal Georgia town. Jolt was doing well enough, and she was starting to develop a following especially on Friday nights when she had live music in the café. She knew that a new start was what they needed, but it didn't make it any easier to leave everything that she knew behind.
It was getting close to closing time, and she had lots of things to do inside of the coffee shop that evening. For one thing, she wanted to get a head start on the painting. The color in the café was a drab beige color that the previous owner had done. But she wanted the place to be a lot more funky and fun, a lot more beachy. So, her plan was to paint it a pale shade of blue and add all kinds of ocean accents around the room. She had been looking at local thrift stores and garage sales for weeks, finding everything from a big wooden fish to hang on the wall to some old netting used on a fishing boat
that she would tack up across the ceiling. She wanted the place to feel like the coolest little beach coffee shop anyone had ever seen.
As she walked across the room and closed the front door, she looked up and down the street at all the little businesses. Many of them had closed and reopened even since she'd been there, and it often worried her whether or not her coffee shop would make it in the long run.
She locked the door and turned the sign to closed before heading around the back of the counter. Once she had counted up the money for the evening and balanced out the cash drawer, she lowered the lights and went upstairs to change her clothes.
She threw on the cruddiest clothes she could find and asked Leo if he might want to help her with the painting but he said no, of course. He was busy watching some reality show that was coming on TV that night while he was simultaneously playing some game on his iPhone.
