“She should’ve been working on these cottages as you guys finished them,” Hailey said. Nothing like stating the obvious.
“Said the construction workers would interfere with her zen.”
Hailey’s expression turned sour. “I don’t think that lady ever knew what she was doing in the first place.”
“Well, that isn’t going to help me now.”
She clapped a hand on his shoulder. “Sorry, Bro. I can’t really give you advice in this arena, unless you want everything painted teal.” Hailey waggled her eyebrows. “With pops of red.”
Ryan glanced at his watch. “Go get Jack and let’s eat. If we don’t hurry, he’ll be late for school.”
She motioned for the little boy to join them. He ran over, holding his hands out in front of him, one cupped over the other.
“Oh no, Jack, what do you have this time?” Hailey asked, stepping behind Ryan.
“A frog! Look! Can I keep him?”
“Absolutely not,” Hailey said, backing away. “Absolutely, positively not. You are not bringing that disgusting thing into my house. Ryan, get rid of it.”
Ryan took the frog. A small one who was undoubtedly confused by his whereabouts. “Hailey, you’re such a baby. Let the kid have a pet frog if he wants one.” He took the frog and shoved it toward her, stopping only inches from her face.
She screamed. “Ryan! Get that thing away from me or else!”
“Or else what?”
She ran off, leaving him with a frog and a boy who couldn’t stop giggling. “You got her good that time.”
He mussed Jack’s hair. “I did, didn’t I? But you’ve got to put this little guy back where you found him. We don’t want your mom to have a heart attack, do we?”
Jack’s face fell. “All right.”
Up ahead, Hailey waited for them, arms crossed over her chest, a clear look of annoyance on her face. “I will get you back,” she said when they caught up to her.
“I’d love to see you try.”
CHAPTER
11
LANE PICKED UP OTIS and went back inside as soon as Ryan left, not only to calm the unwanted nerves that his presence had kicked up—was it the motorcycle that made her nervous or maybe the way he always seemed to be talking but never about the things he was actually thinking?—but also to figure out what had happened to her phone. First she checked her bedroom, but it was silly to think her mom would’ve actually put it back with Lane’s things. Odds were better that Dottie had hidden it somewhere just to keep it away from her. Lane was surprised to find it buzzing on the counter in the midst of the continued chaos of the early morning party that had sprung up in the kitchen.
“It’s like that phone has a magnetic pull on you.” Her mom practically tsk-tsked.
Lane bit the inside of her cheek to keep from saying something regrettable. Goodness knows, her frustration had been building.
“How did this get down here?” Of course she already knew the answer. Passive-aggressive looked ugly on her.
“Oh, I think Jett got ahold of it. Ryan saved it for you,” her mom said, unfazed by the invasion of privacy.
“You should really be nice to him, Lane.” Doris shook a thick, wide-knuckled finger in Lane’s face. “He’s a very good man.”
“And he’s really good-looking.” Noah’s wife, Emily, glanced meaningfully at Lane as if they were old friends communicating through subtext, and for the briefest second Lane remembered how it felt to have a sister.
“Brooks?” Noah gave Emily that raised questioning eyebrow.
Emily grinned at Lane and took another drink of what Lane could only assume was a protein shake.
“You think Brooks is good-looking?”
Emily rolled her eyes. “Duh.”
“How good-looking?” Noah seemed threatened.
“Not for me, hon. For Lane.”
“That’d be weird. He’s like her brother.” Noah’s height made his wife look even tinier.
“She’s got three of those,” Emily said. “She definitely doesn’t need another one.”
What Lane needed was an escape plan. “How do I keep that kid out of my room?” She had never really loved kids, and her sister’s monster child reminded her why.
“‘That kid’ is your nephew, Lane.” Her mom stopped wiping the counter and stared at her. “And he’s actually very sweet. He’s just rambunctious, like your brothers always were.”
“No. If we’d acted like that, you would’ve resorted to the wooden spoon,” Noah said.
“Oh, I would not have,” Dottie protested, glancing at the others. Spanking was not appropriate discipline anymore—at least by society’s standards.
“Remember the assembly line of spankings?” Lane’s phone buzzed in her hand. “We all had to line up and get our crack one by one.”
“Except Lindsay. Because she was always the one who told on us,” Noah said.
“And because she was always the favorite.” Lane couldn’t ignore the sour taste in her mouth at the memory.
“You’re making this up.” Dottie looked at Doris, whose painted-on eyebrows somehow reflected the older woman’s surprise. “This never happened.”
“Like the time we started that bonfire in the backyard, but we almost burned down the shed.”
“Now that I do remember,” Dottie said.
Lane’s phone buzzed again. And just when she was starting to feel her nerves settle. She glanced at Chloe’s text.
OK, you don’t want to talk about the hot guy, fine, but we do need to talk about Mrs. Pim. She called again. Marshall is expecting some changes on the Solar pitch before next week. Lane, are you going to be ready? How can I help?
Mrs. Pim? What about Mrs. Pim? She scrolled up and saw three missed texts, including one asking about Nate’s “hot (annoying) friend.” Good grief. What if Ryan had seen that? He wasn’t only Nate’s friend; he was hers. Sort of. But she didn’t want him knowing she thought he was hot—it would just go to his head. Besides, Noah was right. He was like another brother to her.
How humiliating.
Her stomach rolled. Mrs. Pim was one of their best—and most high-maintenance—clients. Lane couldn’t afford not to be there for her if she was having one of her many decorating crises. Sometimes Lane felt more like her therapist than her interior designer, but the woman always compensated Lane for her time.
The phone buzzed again.
Also, I assume you’re the one I should thank for the me time at the spa. I know Marshall didn’t set me up with that. Thanks, Lane. Really. Next time, you should come with me.
Wouldn’t that be nice?
“. . . that’s all I’m saying.”
Lane looked up. She struggled to comprehend the end of a conversation she’d been too distracted to hear.
“Well, do you disagree?” Her mom stared at her, and Lane felt like someone had just set a test in front of her and she didn’t know any of the answers. Her mom must’ve gathered as much because she threw her hands up dramatically and turned away. “I think it would be a good idea to give Jett that phone of yours. He could throw it in the lake and we’d actually see your face once in a while instead of the top of your head.”
Now she was just being absurd.
“I’m going for a run.” Lane tucked her phone into the pocket of her shorts, stuck her earbuds in her ears, and walked out the door.
Outside, she drew in a deep breath. Her phone buzzed again. She sent Chloe a quick text to let her know she’d call after her run and hoped that would keep the constant buzzing to a minimum. Ryan had pointed her to the bike path, but when Lane started running, she found herself heading in the opposite direction—straight for town. Their house was on the edge of Harbor Pointe but still within city limits, which was, she supposed, why it was so strange to find three lone cows in their backyard.
When she was growing up, Myrtle, Gracie, and Lou had lived out there. She imagined the three that were now standing in the fenced-in yard chomping on grass
and staring at her were probably called other names, but Lane didn’t care to know what they were. She’d always been so mortified by these animals. They belonged on a farm, not behind an old Victorian in a lakeside town. She’d prayed—literally prayed!—that her dad would lose his obsession with cattle, but the longer he had the cows, the more he loved them. He began to use them in his marketing for the cheese shop. Soon, the Summers Cheese logo incorporated a rendering of Myrtle’s face and the tagline “It doesn’t get any fresher than this.”
She ran through Harbor Pointe like she was competing at the Olympics, ignited by something unspeakable—a quiet, slow-burning rage that simmered just underneath her surface. It had been building since she pulled into town, and this was the only way she could think to squash it.
She craved that control she’d lost as soon as she crossed into town yesterday. Here, all sense of order was gone.
She headed toward Harbor Pointe’s small downtown. Lane had never run these streets. When she’d lived here, she’d been much heavier and, sadly, lethargic. So much had changed once she went off to college. She “found herself.”
Her feet hit the pavement at even intervals. Ah, yes, this felt good. It felt right. This was what she needed in order to get a grip on her spiraling emotions.
She’d started working out freshman year. Lost weight. Cared about what she looked like. Something about realizing she could have a second chance—that she didn’t have to continue to be who she’d always been—inspired her somehow. So she became someone new.
Smart, capable, independent, and most important, thin Lane Kelley.
She was in control now. She had the whole world fooled. But at every turn, she wondered if someone would uncover her as the fraud she really was—an introverted chubby girl who should be hiding herself away in a closet somewhere with a good book and a pint of Ben & Jerry’s.
The staccato of her footfalls quickened.
Someone had exposed her, hadn’t they? The one person she’d trusted most. Why had she convinced herself it was safe to fall for him? Deep down, she was still Lane, no matter what size her jeans were, and girls like Lane didn’t get the guy in the end.
She must’ve known that.
Her pace quickened and she struggled to get a deep breath. She worked out almost every day—her breathing shouldn’t be this erratic.
None of it mattered now anyway. She was good at what she did. She worked. Work, work, work. Always something to do. Never a moment to allow her mind to be quiet—just the way she wanted it. It was the way she found her worth. Productivity.
So why did she still feel like an impostor? Like at any moment, it could all come crumbling down, and she’d be left with literally nothing but a too-expensive apartment and a French bulldog?
She ran past Sid’s Barbershop, the general store, and Anita’s Yarn Emporium, then crossed the street near the Forget-Me-Not Flower Shop and down toward the Hometown Creamery.
Breathe in. Breathe out. Something like electricity buzzed at her core. She still had so much to do. So much to prove. She picked up the pace.
As she turned the familiar corner, she approached Summers Cheese. The place where she’d spent hours of her life, learning the ins and outs of cheese making, dreaming about what it would be like if her dad had a normal job, like teacher or banker or policeman.
It was decidedly difficult for her to work in a place surrounded by cheese. Never mind that her lactose intolerance kept her from eating it; more than once kids found ways to compare her to Myrtle, and that was perhaps the worst part of all.
She stopped running and stared at it, her heart pounding, still unable to catch her breath.
She supposed now that she’d experienced more of life, she could appreciate the charm of a local cheese shop. In some ways, she could even relate to her father. He’d built his business from the ground up, which wasn’t all that different from the career she’d built for herself.
She’d never seen a single similarity between them before.
The large, barnlike building looked a little worse for the wear. It could use fresh paint and some landscaping attention. The sign out front was weatherworn, its paint chipping. She should help. She should make this place better. What tourist wanted to buy their cheese in a run-down shop?
She should, but she wouldn’t. She was better off on the outskirts of their lives, and besides, she hardly had time to handle her own responsibilities.
Lane met up with the bike path and ran along the lake, the bright-red lighthouse off in the distance. How many summers had the lighthouse been the thing anchoring her, reminding her that there were places to travel outside of Harbor Pointe, that one day she might be able to go away too, that things weren’t always going to be painful and people weren’t always going to be mean?
She didn’t want to think about the way Maddie and Ashley and Sabrina had continued to treat her every summer after the one they’d first ostracized her. She didn’t want to remember how they’d nicknamed her “Smelly Kelley” or how they’d snorted at her like a pen of pigs as she walked by—or how their teasing and insults had caught on with Lane’s classmates and followed her throughout each school year. She didn’t want to remember the day she walked home from the cheese shop, the summer after her freshman year, and saw photocopied pictures of herself haphazardly stapled to the lampposts all along Darby Lane. Someone had taken a photo of her in her bathing suit on the beach, taped it to a sheet of paper, and scribbled the words Life in the Fat Lane in bold, black handwriting above the image, then pasted copies all over town.
She’d torn them off one by one, only to find the girls at the end of the block, laughing, her own sister at their side. Lane’s eyes met Lindsay’s, and she tried to convey a broken How could you? But in return, she saw only weakness.
Lindsay the follower. No backbone. No original thoughts in her mind.
Lindsay had stared at Lane as she passed, her eyes confused, as though she were caught between two terrible choices—stick up for her sister and turn herself into an outcast or go along with these mean girls to avoid drawing their wrath toward herself.
Lindsay always did choose herself.
And while Lane would deny it to anyone who asked, that had broken her heart.
When she’d walked onto her front porch that day after what felt like a mile-long trek across a desert with no water, Betsy Tanner had been waiting for her with a stack of torn papers ripped down from other lampposts on the other side of town.
“I’m so sorry, Lane,” Betsy had said. “It’s all so juvenile. We’re in high school, for goodness’ sake.” Her eyes filled with the kind of tears only a person who understood could cry. Betsy had been the subject of Ashley’s ridicule a couple summers before, and Lane had never stuck up for her. If she were honest, their treatment of Betsy made her feel like she was one of them, someone who didn’t get made fun of, someone “cool.”
She felt oddly distant from the memories now, as if the wall she’d put up around herself was enough to keep them from ever really hurting her again. As if time and distance from those things had given her perspective. Yet had they somehow contributed to the person she’d become?
Breathe in. Breathe out. It’s not a race, Lane.
How much had changed that summer. Betsy became her only friend.
And Lane had thrown that away too.
Her phone buzzed. She pulled it out but didn’t slow down.
Marshall had texted. Solar meeting officially set for Monday. Sending you the changes they’ve requested based on our preliminary meeting and the new direction Miles suggested. Will you be back by then?
She stumbled, disoriented and unable to keep her pace, falling in a heap on the pavement of the newly built bike path.
It had been so many years since she’d skinned a knee, she’d forgotten how it stung, but it all rushed back at her now as her eyes caught a glimpse of the angry red of her bloodied skin. A Barbie doll of a woman stopped to see if she was okay, still jogging in place as s
he offered Lane a hand. She said something, but Lane couldn’t hear with her earbuds in. She pulled them out. “Sorry; what did you say?”
“I said you really shouldn’t text and run at the same time,” Barbie said. “It’s dangerous.”
Really? She couldn’t win. Even strangers had an issue with her phone.
Lane bit back a snarky reply, forced herself to thank Barbie, and waved off her second attempt to help. “I’m fine.”
She watched as the woman took off in the opposite direction, her long blonde ponytail swinging behind her.
Lane staggered over to a bench and sat down.
Next Monday suddenly had a stranglehold around her throat. It was too soon. She’d been optimistic in thinking she’d be able to work here. She hadn’t even read over the changes Marshall wanted, but she had a feeling they were substantial. How could she possibly be ready to pitch something new to Solar by Monday?
But this wasn’t the kind of opportunity you put off. This was the kind of opportunity you made room for. And Lane was accustomed to moving everything out of the way to accommodate work. It’s what she did. Stayed up all hours if she needed to—anything to meet a deadline, to get it done.
The image of Nate in that hospital bed raced through her mind.
She stared at Marshall’s words. Will you be back by then?
She quickly typed back, No way we can push that back a few days?
His reply came in immediately: Do you really want to make Solar jump through hoops for you? JB is paying attention to this one, Lane.
No. Of course not. She’d never made anyone jump through hoops for her—why would she start with the trendiest and largest client she’d ever had the chance to pitch to?
Marshall was right. It could be a deal breaker if she pushed him off. It sent the wrong message.
And yet . . . Nate. The one who’d told her to take the scholarship to Northwestern and get out of town. The one who’d told her being smart was better than being popular. The one who’d always stuck up for her, even if it meant sacrificing his own friendships.
The one who didn’t go to Lindsay’s wedding.
Just Look Up Page 12
