I looked out the window, rethinking my decision to be honest. The last time I had been inside a church was for my parents’ funeral. The idea of walking through those doors again still made me feel sick. A God that would let the best people I’d ever known die was a God I wanted nothing to do with. I decided to dodge the question. “You don’t have to go to church to believe in God, you know.”
“Oh, I do know,” he replied. “But church helps. It’s just tough to do all this alone.” Tuck let a long breath out through his nose, like he was trying to decide what else to say.
“What do you talk about?” I said more quietly. “When you pray, that is.”
He considered before answering. “Whatever’s on my mind. I’m better about bringing up problems, stuff with the business, things with my family, stubborn women.” He looked at me out of the corner of his eye. “But I try to remember to be grateful too. I tend to be a spoiled brat, so I’m constantly trying to change that.”
I shook my head. “Tucker, you are the farthest thing from a spoiled brat.”
He sniffed. “That is called revisionist history. You’re not remembering the whole story. Like the boy who waited in his run-down Chevy pickup on the street outside your house until you came home at midnight just so he could get one more kiss before sleep.”
“Pretty much the kind of romance every girl dreams of.”
He waved it away. “Needy and annoying. I know because my needy self sat all alone in that truck listening to Hank Williams and feeling sorry for myself that you had ditched me for your friends that night.”
I giggled. “You sound angry.”
“I still am. What a dork. And what about the time I picked a fight with you because you talked with Dan DePhillips during study hall and you knew Dan DePhillips had liked you since seventh grade?”
I was laughing. “I just saw Dan DePhillips last week. He’s struggling with a receding hairline and a conversion van full of kids. You win.”
“Not the point. I should have been the bigger man.”
“You were sixteen!” I exclaimed. “Your spoiled brat evidence is pathetic. Rest your case.”
“And what about,” he said slowly, “when I let the girl of my dreams walk away and I was so busy nursing my pride, I did nothing to stop her?”
We sat in silence, the only sound coming from the truck as it hurtled us forward, the road slipping away in a long, uninterrupted line behind us.
I turned toward him. “That girl was unstoppable, I’m afraid. The whole stubborn thing was already an issue.” I watched his profile, the flex of his jaw.
He shook his head. “I should have tried. I mean, I did try. Just in the wrong city. Chicago is a few miles from New York. Even a farm kid knows that.” His grin was shaky and we looked at each other for a long time. So long, in fact, that he turned back to the road with a nervous laugh. “Better keep my eyes on the road if I’m going to get you and your fancy fabric back home safely.”
I returned my gaze to the view outside my window, though reluctantly, and we made our way to Silver Creek. Gradually, the tenderness of our conversation faded and we eased into more safe and shallow waters. We listened to Tucker’s beloved eighties mix, even after I made an apparently unconvincing demonstration of the superiority of Spotify in his fully loaded truck. He shook his head when I scrolled through the myriad station options and just reached over to turn up Bon Jovi, who was belting out “Livin’ on a Prayer,” a moment Tucker insisted was serendipity. Culture Club was on when we pulled off the interstate and onto the two-lane highway that would eventually lead us into the town square. We passed three abandoned farmhouses in a row and I reached over to turn down the music. I asked Tucker why there was so much emptiness in the acres we were passing.
“Large corporate farms have been swallowing up these smaller family farms for years,” he said. “Lots of the smaller operations, like the one my uncle owns, need supplementing with other streams of income in order to stay afloat. Or they depend heavily on family to help keep things running.” He pointed to a large long building that had a commercial real estate sign out front. “When the Atlantis factory moved operations overseas, that was another blow. Lots of jobs lost, lots of hurt people who’d worked there for decades, suddenly unemployed. This area hasn’t recovered.”
I stared at the empty building, lonely and vacant, long parking lot empty.
“Makes me sad to see things so lifeless. Silver Creek seems downhearted. I hear it in conversations all over town, and Gigi has talked about it too. The spunk is gone.”
Tucker slowed as we entered town and turned onto Gigi’s street. “We’re not the only ones, either. The same story plays out over and over around here.”
Gigi scurried out to the driveway when she heard the truck. “Did it work? Did you actually get it?”
“Thanks to some charm from Tucker Van Es here, we sure did,” I said.
“Not true,” Tucker mumbled, but Gigi wasn’t listening anyway. She was ogling the fabric under the tarp.
“Holy catfish, that’s a lot of bolts,” she said, suddenly somber. “We’ll be sewing until I’m two steps from the grave.”
I looked at her, hit with a thought. “Gigi,” I said carefully, as if wary of frightening a barn swallow, “how long does it take you to sew a dress—not the kinds of alterations we’ve been doing, but from start to finish?”
Gigi thought, her breath coming out in a forceful exhale when she decided on an answer. “I’d say . . . a month?” She winced. “I never really kept track. I was mostly in it for the social aspect.”
Tucker caught my eye but I ignored his smirk.
“A month?” I felt a blanket of dread descending. “One month per dress won’t work.” I ran my hand over the top bolt of fabric, wondering if we’d just made a long trip in vain. No business could survive making one product a month, no matter how unique the product, how vintage the material.
“Now, I must say,” Gigi added, “I wasn’t exactly moving at top speed. I would mostly work during Sewing Club.”
“Sewing Club?” I asked, hand paused on the fabric. “You mean the ladies from church?”
“Every Tuesday night in the fellowship hall for years, until we decided to take a break last fall after a bad snowstorm. Just never started up again after the holidays.” She looked at Tucker. “We rotated who brings snack.”
Tucker nodded as if this were the most pertinent information. “Sounds fair. Just between you and me, Gigi”—he lowered his voice and looked around the neighborhood—“whose snack night did you do your best to avoid?”
Gigi didn’t hesitate. “Myrna Hopkins. She took whatever was in her pantry and threw it on a plate.” Gigi shuddered. “Any woman who thinks stale Wheat Thins and spray cheese can be dignified as a snack for a group of hungry women is deluding herself.”
I tried to rein in the conversation from spray cheese. “Gigi,” I said, impatient. “We need to troubleshoot here. One dress a month is about fifty dresses too few. Maybe worse.” I held back for a beat, hoping this wasn’t a nail in any sort of coffin to ask Gigi the question that might be too risky. “Gigi. Do those Sewing Club ladies still sew?”
“Of course,” she said immediately. “It’s like riding a bike. Only not as dangerous as one ages.”
I was still processing when I saw Tucker standing with his arms crossed, his smile wide. “Gracie, it sounds like you’ve just found yourself a workforce.”
Gigi’s eyes got wide as the plan dawned on her. “Moses,” she said, the closest she came to cussing.
“It’s a lot to ask,” I admitted, worry already creasing my forehead. “Do you think they’ll do it?”
“Of course they will,” Gigi snapped, her sternness revealing just how sure she was. “You keep forgetting where you are, city girl. Around here, we help each other when help is needed.” She started for the front porch, already feeling in her pocket for her cell phone. “Of course, we also gossip about you and shame you for your spray cheese, but y
ou take the good with the bad, right, Tuck?”
“That we do, Miss Gigi,” Tucker said, laughing.
I bit my lower lip as I watched Gigi let the screen door slam shut. “Oh man,” I muttered. “I hope this works.”
Tucker leaned against his truck and crossed long legs in front of him. I felt a spike of adrenaline watching him, his chin tipped up in thought, one hand running across his day-old beard. “It will work,” he said finally. “Though the fellowship hall isn’t going to be big enough.”
I felt my forehead crease at this new worry. “It’s not? What will we do? Where will—”
Tucker stopped my words with a wide, beautiful grin, a technique I found to be both disconcerting and rather effective. “I’ve got it,” he said. He jogged around to the driver’s side door and turned the key in the ignition. I could hear Bonnie Tyler belting “Total Eclipse of the Heart” as he started to pull away.
“Wait,” I called. I walked toward his moving vehicle. “What about the fabric?”
“Don’t you trust me?” A roguish grin spread across his face.
“Totally,” I said without reservation, then blushed at my ready response. I smiled tightly, glad he couldn’t see the color of my cheeks in the gathering twilight.
“All right, then,” he called back.
“Tucker,” I said over Bonnie. “Listen, thank—”
“Don’t do it, Kleren,” he said in a warning voice before stepping on the gas and driving away.
fourteen
Five days later, Tucker and I walked through the grass, our shoes quickly covered in dew. The sun had just arched over the eastern fields. Shimmering light caught the droplets on the ground and on the leaves of a sprawling bur oak that reached for wispy clouds overhead. We passed the farmhouse in progress, and I glimpsed a finished porch floor, new since the time Tucker showed me the site a few weeks before. He nodded at a path ahead of us and led me farther onto the property.
Tucker reached the barn first and heaved open the two mammoth doors. When the creaking stopped, we stood side by side, watching the sunlight cut into the darkness. Tucker walked to one side and flipped a switch, causing the room to flood with light, and I inhaled sharply.
“Tuck,” I said, my eyes greedily taking in the scene. “This is perfect.”
The Sewing Club ladies were set to arrive within the hour for our first day of work, and a beautiful work space would be here to greet them. Tucker had told me not to worry, advice I had completely ignored, but he turned out to be utterly trustworthy. Over the weekend he’d tweaked the space inside this barn to be a perfect spot for dressmaking. Long tables stood in rows, each already set up with the sewing machines I’d gathered from the ladies over the last few days. Each workstation had ample overhead and desk light, rolling drawers for supplies, and clean, weathered plank flooring underneath comfortable office chairs. A lump formed in my throat when I saw each station had a Ball jar filled with a small bouquet of farm flowers.
Without pausing to think, I reached for him and buried my face in his chest. The good, clean smell of him was familiar and warm and I felt a lump form in my throat. “You got them flowers,” I said.
I could feel him shrug slightly as he hugged me back. “Girls like pretty stuff,” he said, sounding embarrassed.
“Thank you,” I said, my face still in his chest. “I am in your debt. Huge. Really big. Scary big.”
He laughed softly. “Well, if all it takes is a few extension cords and picking some flowers for you to feel like that, I think I’m the winner here.”
Gigi knocked on the big white door leading into the room and we moved away from each other quickly, dropping our arms to our sides and jumping back a step as if burned. But Gigi only had eyes for the barn and its facelift.
“Tucker Van Es, you have outdone yourself.” She shook her head as she entered the room, her eyes traveling upward to the high beams of the ceiling. She seemed lost in a memory, and after a moment she smiled at Tuck. “Your uncle ever tell you what used to happen in this barn?”
He nodded. I was likely the only one who would ever notice, but his cheeks were a bit pinker than normal. His face was somber, and he studiously avoided looking in my direction, training his eyes instead on the room. “Miss Gigi, he certainly did. Those stories were a big part of why I took on this property in the first place.”
“What stories?” I asked. I walked to one of the tables and set down my bag and a folder of design instructions. “I want the stories.”
Gigi walked slowly to the perimeter of the room, her hand running lightly on the whitewashed walls. “This is the old Morrison barn. The Morrisons were a lively family, six kids and all the happy chaos that suggests. When I was a girl, they were famous for hosting dances and parties in this barn.”
I’m sure my eyes lit up with this information, because Gigi frowned at me. “Now, don’t start asking about the level of scandal. There wasn’t any.”
Tucker raised his eyebrows, a grin playing on his lips.
“Okay, fine,” she conceded. “There was a little scandal. But mostly dancing and laughing and more dancing till the wee hours.” She pointed at me. “Your grandfather and I had some lovely times in this barn.”
“In or out of the hayloft?” Tucker asked, and she swatted him as she walked by, her gait back to business and firmly off memory lane.
“I will not be dignifying that with a response,” she said, chin up.
“So in the loft,” he said, loudly enough that I could hear. I giggled and we glanced at each other. I let my gaze linger and swallowed hard when he did the same.
We heard the chatter before we could see them.
“They’re here,” Gigi said, and led us to the source of the noise. Walking three astride to the entrance of the barn, we saw The Ladies. They made their way toward us, arms linked.
“Morning,” Tucker called out as he strode toward them. “I know none of you needs a hand, but a gentleman always offers.”
I smiled as they clucked over him, clearly charmed with a boy they’d known who was now a handsome man. They stopped in front of the barn, facing me with open faces and warm smiles. I started at the right and went down the line, hugging each of them in turn.
Goldie was first, and she finished our embrace with a slap on my tush. The twins were there, wearing matching embroidered sweatshirts, one that rooted for the Iowa Hawkeyes and one for the Iowa State Cyclones. Myrna Hopkins was next, and I recognized her as a front door greeter from church, every Sunday growing up. She held out the hand I’d shaken many times before but pulled me into a quick, efficient embrace right away. “You look just like your sweet mom,” she whispered into my ear before letting me go. Edna Kuiken had worked as an English teacher in our high school for years, even while raising five children on a farm. I remembered her as a ruthless grader, but she took both my hands in hers and said, “I’m so glad to be here, honey. Sometimes a crossword puzzle just doesn’t do it for me.” She stepped back and shook her head, gathering a full image of me, head to toe. “I helped potty train you in the church nursery, Grace Kleren. And now look! A fancy New York designer!”
Tucker bit a cheek to halt a grin but the orneriness in his expression was firmly planted in seventh grade. “That Grace Kleren,” he said with appreciation. “She always was a quick study.”
The women were tsking in disapproval of his uncouth talk, with the exception of Goldie, who was egging him on.
“To that end, ladies,” he continued, still working the smile downward. He pointed to a door in a corner of the room. “We do have a restroom and it’s not even a porta potty.”
The women murmured in appreciation and Myrna Hopkins called out, “Tucker Van Es, a restroom is the least you owe us. Several of the women here were the ones who held you down while your aunt Jane, God rest her, pulled three wasp stingers out of your rear end when you were a little, screaming terror. So, yes. I’d say you owe us a beautiful, clean restroom.” She winked at me. “Grace, honey, don’t you w
orry. There are lots more stories where that one came from.”
The ladies nodded, and several started in on their favorite Tucker Van Es stories. He clapped his hands before raising them in defense. “Right. So that’s my cue to leave here, probably for good.” He turned to go, tipping his ball cap at the ladies and smiling sheepishly at me, but Goldie stopped him with a rhinestone-heavy hand. She looked up at him, tugged him closer to her.
“Before you go, Tucker, I think I speak for all of us when we say thank you to you both.” She reached for my hand and stood between us, patting our arms affectionately. “Tucker, you made this place so pretty, just the kind of spot where we want to come and work. And, Grace.” She paused, her dark blue eyes shining. “Thank you for involving us in this dream of yours. We’re honored to be here, and we will give you our best.” She squeezed my arm and said, quietly enough that only Tucker and I heard, “It feels good for us old ladies to be called into action. You see us, Gracie.”
I felt my eyes sting, and when I glanced up at Tucker’s face, I saw him looking at me in a way that made my heart jump.
“To the youngsters!” Goldie said, and though we held nothing to toast, no other moment in my life had held such a resounding ring of celebration.
The women took turns hugging me and giving me a peck on the cheek. I laughed and allowed myself to be kissed and hugged but stopped, suddenly thrown together with Tucker in the center of the circle. He cleared his throat, eyes on mine, and said, “To work, then.”
I nodded, trying to find my voice but discovering the way he was looking at me a distinct impediment to productivity. “To work.”
“Where do you want us, Grace?” Myrna sounded like she was ready to be unleashed.
Tucker smiled a small smile, the spell broken, and he turned toward the open barn doors and soft light of morning.
I shook my head and smoothed my hair as Tucker walked away, the look on his face still with me and a complete and total distraction to the huge day that lay before me, before all of us. Not exactly the most professional way to begin a business venture, but I had to admit it was a lot more interesting than my cubicle at Milano.
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