by Maria Geraci
“That alligator tooth is pretty cool.”
She studied him a moment to see if he was being sarcastic. But he wasn’t.
Grace walked him through the T-shirt aisles.“Take your pick. We have the standard Florida Charlie’s T-shirt that features a sketch of the front of the store, complete with Gator—um . . . complete with the alligator up front. That comes in every color you can imagine, including hot pink. But I don’t think that’s your color.”
“No, it’s not.”
“Then, there’s the more artsy fartsy version that features the seagulls in the background. Those we carry in muted pastels.”
“Pass.”
“And then finally, we have my favorite. The montage look. In one corner we have the alligator dressed in his patriotic Yankee Doodle summer outfit, the Florida Charlie’s logo on the opposite side, the store image in another corner, and a mermaid at the bottom. In honor of one of our past bestsellers, the infamous mermaid-watching kit.”
“I actually had one of those,” Joe told her.
“A mermaid-watching kit? You’re kidding.”
“I think I was about six or seven at the time. We were on our way to the condo and my dad bought me one. I spent the next two weeks trying to hunt down a real honest to goodness mermaid. The old man loved it. It kept me out of his hair all vacation.”
The correlation between the woman’s story and Joe’s made Grace smile. She was glad Joe’s story had a somewhat happier ending.
“It was my childhood dream to be a mermaid in the show at Weeki Wachee,” Grace confided. “But I couldn’t hold my breath long enough.” She found his size in the montage T-shirt and handed it to him. “Enjoy.”
“Thanks,” he said, tucking the rolled-up T-shirt under his arm. “If you’re not too busy, would you mind showing me around? I’ve always wanted to get an inside look at the famous Florida Charlie’s.”
Why not? Business was usually slow this time of day. She guided him back to the front of the store.
“Like anything else, in order to understand it, you need to start at the beginning. In case you hadn’t noticed, the place is set up like an old-fashioned general store with a sort of Ripley’s Believe it or Not feel to it. Grandpa O’Bryan, that’s my pop’s dad, loved that place. We’d stop there whenever we went to St. Augustine. Charlie and I used to wander through the rooms for hours.”
“My favorite was always the mirrors.”
“Me too! Sometimes Sarah would come along with us. She’d stand in front of the mirror that made her look tall and I’d stand in front of the mirror that made me look short and Charlie would make fun of us. We tried to take pictures with our Polaroid but the flash always ruined the effect.”
Marty interrupted them to ask Grace a question about a sunscreen shipment. He threw Joe an uneasy look and Grace introduced them. Joe shook Marty’s hand and asked him about his job at the store and after a few minutes Marty was all smiles.
“Okay, so, to the left here is the citrus shop.” She introduced Joe to Stella, Florida Charlie’s oldest employee. “Stella has been at Florida Charlie’s since our inception fifty years ago.”
“I started working here when I was two,” Stella said.
Joe chuckled appropriately.
“Stella works Monday through Friday, nine to two, and is our number one orange girl.”
“That’s Florida Charlie slang for the person who gets stuck trying to get the tourists to buy oranges,” Stella explained upon seeing the confusion on Joe’s face.
“Besides the hourly wage, the orange girl or guy gets a commission for anything they sell, but it’s not easy work,” Grace said. “All our orange juice is hand squeezed. Pop insists on it. So when you’re not actively selling, you’re squeezing.”
“It’s not so bad unless a tour bus stops. If you’ve been slacking instead of squeezing, then you’ll be in trouble. Not that I ever slack off,” Stella confided. “Everyone who comes in the store gets a free sample. Want one?” She offered Joe a small paper cup filled with orange juice. “Or do you prefer grapefruit?”
“I’ll take the orange juice.” Joe drained it in one swallow. “Thanks, it’s delicious.”
“Then, of course, you have to explain to people why the oranges cost so much when they can get them cheaper at the grocery store. So there’s the spiel on how all the oranges come from local groves and they’re packaged in these great crates, and we can ship them anywhere and what a wonderful gift they make and that there’s a money-back guarantee. That kind of thing,” Stella said. “Would you like to hear it?”
Joe looked at Grace with a smile that asked, Didn’t I just hear the spiel? He ended up buying four of the most expensive gift arrangements and when he was bent over the counter, writing in the names and addresses of where he wanted them sent, Stella mouthed “wowza” over his head. Grace wasn’t sure if Stella referred to the pricey sale she’d just made, or to Joe himself. The oranges were a terrific gift but he was doing it to be a nice guy and to impress Grace. And it was working. Big time.
They moved on to the hat and flip-flop aisles. Grace was about to show Joe the back section of the store, when he stopped, transfixed like a little kid who’d just entered Disney World for the first time.
“Those aren’t what I think they are, are they?” He pointed to a row of funny-looking machines.
“Yep. Mold-A-Rama machines.” Grace had always thought they looked like something right out of an old TV episode of Star Trek. “There aren’t a lot of places left that still have them, but Florida Charlie’s is one of them,” she said proudly.
Joe fished inside the pocket of his scrub pants for change. He walked up and down, staring at the machines like he couldn’t decide which one to try.
“This one makes some very nasty-looking alligators,” Grace said. “And of course, we have the space shuttle machine, and this one makes dinosaurs, and this one does flamingos. And—”
“I want a dinosaur. A T. rex.”
“Got two bucks?”
“I could have sworn these cost a quarter when I was a kid. Fifty cents, tops.”
“Inflation,” Grace said with a shrug.
Despite complaining of the cost, Joe eagerly plunked his change into the machine. The Power Forward button came on and the mold snapped together. Grace got a kick out of watching the looks on the faces of people who remembered Mold-A-Rama machines from their childhood. They looked exactly like Joe did right now, both stunned and excited. The machine made the familiar whirring sound as the liquid wax poured through the tube and into the mold. A couple of minutes later, a palm-sized, gold-colored T. rex plopped down into the sliding glass chamber. Joe bent to retrieve it.
“Careful, it’s hot,” Grace warned.
He picked it up anyway and brought it up to his nose. “It even smells like summer vacation.”
She showed him all the different kinds of beach towels and hats and the entire aisle of sunscreen and lotions available. He seemed impressed by the variety but he didn’t show much interest again until they got to the Hemingway corner. She explained Pop’s fascination with the writer and Joe picked up a couple of books and read the backs. He tucked one of them under his arm. He’d picked The Old Man and the Sea.
“That’s Pop’s favorite.”
“I don’t ever remember reading it,” he said.
“I’ve never read it either. It’s kind of a guy book.”
She finished the tour by showing him her office.
“What does that lead to?” he asked, indicating a door across the hallway.
“That’s the museum. It’s what we call the storage room that holds all our outdated bestselling and not-so-bestselling junk.”
She hadn’t been in the room in forever, but based on Joe’s reaction to the Mold-A-Rama machines, he might get a kick out of it. She opened the door and flipped on the light.
“Holy shit,” Joe muttered. “Look at all this stuff.” It was four hundred square feet of ceiling-to-floor shelves jammed with
products from bygone eras.
“Mami—that’s what I call my Mom—catalogued all this. It’s all in order, from the date the product was originally sold. I bet we even have a mermaid-watching kit here.” Grace searched for the most likely aisle to find it on. “Yep. Right here.” She pulled one down. Inside a clear plastic cellophane bag was the “kit”: a child-sized scuba mask and breathing tube, an underwater magnifying glass, and a book on mermaid lore. “These were specially prepared for the store,” Grace explained. “We stopped selling them in the mid-eighties, so you probably got one of the last ones.”
“How long have you worked here?” he asked, clearly impressed with her knowledge of the inventory.
“All my life. I was practically raised at Florida Charlie’s. Officially, I started drawing a paycheck at fifteen. First I was a cashier, then I worked my way up to orange girl. I was pretty good at that. After I went off to college, I worked here during the summers, and then when I graduated I came on full-time, mostly as Pop’s Girl Friday. For the past eight years, I’ve been the store’s main buyer. That’s the person who buys all the stuff you see here. I bet I’ve been to more trade shows than you’ve filled cavities. I also helped develop ads, filled in as manager, that kind of thing. Then, a couple of years ago, after my dad had a heart attack, I took over everything.”
“Sounds like a great job.”
That startled Grace. “It can be. Sometimes.”
He looked like he was about to say something when her attention was drawn to a shrink-wrapped doll on the counter to her right. “Good grief!” She reached for the doll and brushed the dust off the plastic. “C’mon,” she said, grabbing Joe by the hand. “I think she’s still here.”
Joe didn’t ask questions. He followed Grace to the front of the store where the woman she’d spoken to earlier was waiting in line for Marty to ring up her purchases. “Ma’am, is this the doll you were talking about?” Grace showed her the package.
“That’s her!” The woman took the doll in her hands and turned her over in amazement. “Where do you have these?”
“It was in the back, in a storage room full of old products.”
“Can I buy it?”
“Actually, it’s not in the store’s computer system, but since you remember her, you can have her, free of charge.”
“Oh! Thank you. Thank you so much! My sister . . . she’s . . . she’s going to love this.”
Joe waited till the woman left the store. “What was that about?”
“Customer relations,” Grace said, thinking about the expression on the woman’s face when she talked about her sister. There was another story there, Grace was certain of it. Funny, if Joe hadn’t stopped by the store today, Grace wouldn’t have had a reason to check out the “museum” and the woman wouldn’t have gotten her doll. It was like the two events were intertwined somehow.
“Would you mind ringing this up for me?” he asked, holding up the book. “I wish I could stay longer but I need to get back to work.”
“It’s a freebie.” Joe began to protest. “No, really, you spent a small fortune in oranges. Take the book,” she said.
“Customer relations?”
“You got it.”
“So what are you doing New Year’s Eve? Because I’ve been invited to a party and I’d like you to go with me.” There was no pretense that this was a friends anything. It was a date, pure and simple.
She almost said yes. And then she remembered Sarah’s party. “I’m sorry, but I already have plans. I’m going to Sarah’s for New Year’s Eve. It’s an all-girl thing. Chocolate fondue and champagne and chick flicks. Sarah’s divorce will be final right after Christmas, and even though she’s come to terms with it, it’s still going to be a sucky time for her. I’m her best friend, so I have to go.”
He nodded like he understood, but deep down she wondered if he thought he was being blown off. Grace walked him back to the store’s entrance just as Pop and Mami and Abuela came through the front doors. They’d been out shopping, Mami explained, and Pop had insisted they stop by.
“So, Tomato, how’s business been today?” Pop asked.
Joe smiled at her. Tomato?
Ha. Ha. Yes, Tomato, her expression said. She smiled back at him and it felt like they’d just shared a secret joke.
“Business has been okay,” she said. She introduced Joe to the family.
“So you’re the guy who took over for Dr. Fred, huh? Nice of you to stop by the shop.” Pop shook his hand and when he saw Joe had a copy of The Old Man and the Sea, his face lit up and the two of them talked Hemingway for a few minutes. Then Joe spoke in Spanish to Mami and Abuela and Grace thought both of them might melt into puddles right there on the floor.
Later, after Joe left with his T-shirt and his book and his wax T. rex safely wrapped up in tissue paper, Abuela made a point of finding out more about him. “He’s so handsome! And he seems like a very nice young man.”
Grace thought about the past hour Joe had just spent in the store. It felt more like a date than any date she’d ever been on. Men had bought her flowers, candy, and now even bottles of Dom Perignon, but no one had ever wooed her like Joe. If she thought his interest in the store had been strictly for her benefit, then it wouldn’t have made such an impact. But he’d been genuinely charmed by Florida Charlie’s and that, in turn, had charmed her. It was the most potent aphrodisiac Grace had ever encountered. She’d told the girls she wasn’t interested in anyone, but she couldn’t lie to herself anymore. She was interested in Joe.
“Abuela, do you . . . do you remember telling me about the dream? About my future husband?”
“Of course I remember.”
Grace waited for Abuela to say something. “Oh,” Abuela said, after a few seconds. “You want to know if your dentist friend is the one I saw in the dream?”
“Well, just for fun. I mean, I don’t really—”
“Is he the one who sent you the flowers?”
Grace shook her head no.
“I’m sorry, Gracielita, he’s not the one. But he might make a nice husband for your friend Ellen.”
19
What Are Men to Champagne and Chocolate?
The chocolate fondue was sinful. The champagne wasn’t Dom Perignon but it was cold and bubbly and delicious. And the company was, without doubt, the very best. It should have been a recipe for a successful New Year’s Eve party. So why was Grace miserable? It wasn’t that she didn’t love her friends. But New Year’s Eve was meant for glittery cocktail dresses and handsome men dressed in tuxedos and waiters carrying trays of exotic hors d’oeuvres while a band played the kind of stuff Michael Bublé sang in the background.
Grace speared a fat strawberry onto a skewer, dipped it into the dark, velvety mixture, and wondered if a chocolate-covered strawberry still counted as a fruit serving or if it rolled over into the dessert category.
“This is so much better than sex,” Ellen said, pulling a chocolate-covered marshmallow out of the fondue pot.
“Nothing is better than sex,” Penny muttered. “Except maybe a cigarette.” Before anyone could say anything, Penny put both hands up in surrender. “Which I’m giving up! Again. It’s my New Year’s resolution.”
Ellen stuffed the chocolate marshmallow in her mouth. “I’m going on a diet. Starting tomorrow. Or rather, the day after tomorrow, since I plan to continue eating until well after midnight.”
“I’m going to journal,” Sarah said. “A lot of books on divorce therapy recommend it.”
“What about you, Grace?” Penny asked. “What’s your New Year’s resolution?”
“I don’t know. There are so many things I need to improve on, it’s a little daunting trying to narrow it down to just one or two. I know I want to learn to cook. But not that fancy stuff on TV. I want to cook what Mami makes, so that I can pass it down to my own kids. If I ever have any, that is.” She waited till the chocolate hardened on her strawberry before she took a nibble. “Ellen, tell us who you’ve b
een having mediocre sex with, so I can cross him off my potential boyfriend list.”
Sarah and Penny started giggling.
Grace smiled. “You didn’t think I was going to let that comment slide, did you? I love chocolate-covered marshmallows as much as the next girl, but better than sex? I don’t think so.”
Of the four of them, Ellen was the most secretive about her love life, but she now looked resigned to the fact that she was going to have to talk.
“You remember I told you about the IT guy who was revamping all the computers on campus? I went out with him a few times.”
“Ellen, I’m shocked!” Sarah said. “A few times? And you gave it up that easily? What happened to your ten-date rule?”
“The ten-date rule is only good if you actually go out ten times. I haven’t had more than four consecutive dates with the same guy in almost three years.”
“That’s because you’re not giving it up fast enough,” Penny said.
“Was it that bad?” Sarah asked.
Ellen reached for another marshmallow. “He was all right. But he certainly wasn’t—”
“Heathcliff!” the three of them shouted.
“Honestly, Ellen,” Grace said, “if you’re going to have a crush on a fantasy hero, why him?”
“I have to agree with Grace,” said Sarah. “What’s the fascination? Because I don’t get it. He’s, like . . . sadistic.”
“I know Heathcliff isn’t perfect,” Ellen said. “But nobody is, not even Mr. Darcy, which Grace would know all about since she has her own live version of him.” Grace started to protest but Ellen made a shut it, you gesture with her thumb and four fingers.
“You want to know what I love so much about Heathcliff? It’s not Heathcliff himself; you’re right when you say he’s over-the-top. What I love about Wuthering Heights is the unbelievable passion that he and Catherine shared. The feeling that there’s someone out there who is so utterly perfect for you, and you alone, that you feel that you’re actually that person. It’s like when Catherine says, ‘Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.’ ” Ellen paused. “Who wouldn’t want that? Even the title of the book tells it like it is. Wuthering Heights. Wild crazy passion. That’s what I want. And honestly, I’d rather be single for the rest of my life if I can’t have that kind of love.”
