Summer on Main Street

by Crista McHugh

  “Ash?” Lacey waltzed into the kitchen. “Carla just called. Said she can’t make it tonight. Car trouble or something.”

  “You’re kidding.” Their newest waitress, a single mother of two, had called in late three times in the last week. Ash really needed to tell Marty to get rid of her. If they couldn't depend on Carla, she might as well look somewhere else for a job. Ash would pick up extra shifts if she had to.

  Lacey started making salads, draping them loosely with plastic wrap and storing them in the refrigerator. “Sorry.”

  Ash shrugged. “We’ll deal. Rain might keep people away, anyway.”

  “Remember that Ladies’ Day idea you were talking about?” Lacey asked. She dumped out the afternoon’s coffee and started another pot.

  Ash nodded. She’d thought about opening the restaurant on Sunday afternoons, offering specials for Paradise’s wives and girlfriends whose men spent the day staring at eight straight hours of baseball. Maybe introduce a vegetarian dish or two. Maybe get one of the local salons to offer manicures. She didn’t know any of the girls who worked in Hair Heaven or Nails and Tails, but she supposed she could ask around.

  Ash bit her bottom lip as a thought snuck its way in. That wasn’t exactly true, was it? She knew Cass worked at one of the salons in Paradise.

  “Hi yourself, Cassandra. What the hell are you doing here?”

  “Stopping by to say hi, that’s all…It’s been a while. You haven’t stopped by the salon…”

  Cassandra. And Eddie. That thought hurt.

  “Ash?”

  “Sorry.” She jumped, and the pencil slipped from her fingers. “What?”

  Lacey gave her a funny look. “I was talking to my housemates about it. They think the Sunday thing’s a great idea. They’d definitely come.”

  “Oh. Well, good. Maybe I’ll mention it to Marty, see what he thinks.”

  Lacey nodded and backed through the swinging door. “Let me know if I can help. I wouldn’t mind picking up another shift.”

  Ash straightened her shirt and grabbed a fresh stack of order slips. Deep down, she hoped the rain brought people in today, rather than kept them away. That way she could keep her mind on juggling trays instead of botched kisses and awkward telephone conversations she didn’t know how to sort out. She spent another ten minutes sorting through napkins and tablecloths in the back. Then she filled two pitchers of ice water and walked into the dining room.

  “Could we have some menus?”

  “I asked for Absolut, not Stoli.”

  “I thought tonight’s special was going to be chicken.”

  Ash stopped and stared. Three-quarters of the restaurant was packed with people escaping the storm.

  “Can you believe this?” Lacey whizzed by on her way to the kitchen. “I’ve never seen a night like this.”

  Neither had Ash.

  “Came in for the meatloaf,” June Frisbie confided, as she stopped by the elderly woman’s table. “Saw it on the specials board outside and couldn’t resist.”

  “Glad to hear it,” Ash said. “Don’t know if there’s enough back there for everyone, but I’ll make sure to set aside an extra-large serving for you.” She bent closer and aimed her voice at the woman’s hearing aid. “Make sure to save some for Dobber and Jones.”

  The woman broke out in a huge smile at the mention of her two beloved poodles. “Oh, I will.” She patted Ash on the wrist. “Dear, you’re the best thing that’s happened to this place since Marty took it over. I hope you’ll be staying a while.”

  Ash moved on without answering.

  “Ash!” A heavyset man dressed in head-to-toe camouflage waved her over.

  “Hi, guys.” She nodded a hello to the three farmers, portly and red-cheeked. “Nice to see you.” She glanced at their empty table. “Need a pitcher of Bud?”

  The men nodded in unison. “Better make it two.”

  “Coming right up.”

  She headed for the bar and checked in with J.T. “What do you need?”

  “Another set of hands would be nice.”

  She cracked a smile. “Wish I could.” But she slipped behind the bar and started pouring drinks and filling pitchers. “Give you a few minutes, anyway.”

  Lacey flashed back to the bar, slim legs trotting faster than Ash had ever seen them move. The young girl loaded up a tray, grabbed some cocktail napkins, and took off again.

  “She’s working her tail off tonight,” Ash noted, glad to see it.

  “Nice tail it is, too,” one of the guys at the bar guffawed.

  Ash pointed a finger in his direction. “Watch it,” she said with a serious squint of the eyes. She recognized him but couldn’t come up with a name. Give me another hour and I’ll remember it for the rest of the summer. Once again, she was glad the photographic memory that had served her so well in college was coming in handy.

  “Ash?” The new Blues and Booze hostess, a meek woman of forty, shuffled over. Behind her, a crowd of people jostled for space in the restaurant’s narrow lobby. “We just got a party of twelve. Can we take them?”

  “Let me see.” She surveyed the dining room. “I think Gus Masterson’ll move if I ask him to, and the Wallaces just decided they’re getting take-out instead of staying, so we’ll push those tables together and…”

  ***

  “There.” Three hours later, Ash set down the bill for table nineteen and exhaled. Her feet ached. Her throat was raw. Her shirt stuck to her lower back. Her hair had fallen from its ponytail and hung around her face. She rolled her neck. Well, at least the rush had kept her mind off anything except running orders, replacing napkins, and filling empty glasses. What next? She looked around for a table to clear, a new party to seat. But the room was quiet. Finally.

  She took a few minutes to drink a tall glass of water and then found Lacey in the kitchen. “Are we actually finished?”

  The girl smiled. Her eyes shone with fatigue. “I think so. God, I never saw such a rush.”

  “Me either.”

  Lacey pulled a wad of bills from her pocket. “Definitely over a hundred.”

  “Good for you.” Ash sagged against the salad bar, exhausted.

  Lacey eyed her. “You okay? You were running like crazy tonight, too.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  The college student pulled off her apron and headed for the door. “You’re good at this, you know. I mean, I know you’re probably not staying around Paradise forever, but still…” She shrugged. “You’d be good at running a restaurant. If you ever wanted to.”

  Ash didn’t say anything. She wasn’t sure how she felt about that. She did like being in charge. She liked the social part of the job. And there was a lot less stress involved in keeping customers happy than memorizing cases or prepping briefs, even on a night like tonight. But a lifetime of it? She thought she’d probably go a little stir-crazy.

  “You can head home, Lace,” she said without answering the girl’s question. She glanced at the time clock. Almost nine on a Tuesday, and Eddie hadn’t stopped in. He always came in on Tuesdays after work. Always, since the second day she'd worked there.

  But could she blame him for staying away? He hadn’t called or come upstairs since their fight, over twenty-four hours earlier. She thought again of the anger in his voice, the disappointment in his gaze, as he waited for her to talk about Colin. About her past. About her family.

  He had no idea what he was asking her. Something clutched inside her chest, and she bent over in pain.

  “Ash? You okay?”

  “Yeah,” she said, waiting for the feeling to pass. “Just a cramp. I’ll be fine.”

  Eddie. Mom. Dad. The Vineyard. Blues and Booze. Ash stared at her toes. How had her life become this complicated? Four months ago, she’d been a regular law student, with a regular boyfriend and a regular job awaiting her. Today she had none of that. She had nothing to count on, no predictability beyond her weekly shift schedule. Most mornings, she didn’t even know the woman who star
ed back at her from the mirror.

  How on earth had she gotten herself so far away from her life as a Kirk? And where was she headed from here?

  Chapter Eighteen

  The rain broke around eleven, and by the time Ash left the restaurant a little after midnight, the moon had begun to sneak its way through the clouds.

  It changes in an instant. She stepped over puddles that caught the reflection of the trees lining the parking lot. One minute everything was dreary, and the next there was light every place she looked. She sighed and sank into her car without turning it on. Or the other way around. Bright to black in a heartbeat.

  He hadn’t shown. She’d waited all night for Eddie to walk through the front door, almost certain he’d come. Certain he felt the same way she did, shaken up and fizzy, but wanting to hold on to whatever had started up on the porch roof two nights ago. Maybe this time she was wrong. With leaden fingers, Ash turned the key in the ignition. No more problems with her car, that was for sure. Since Eddie had worked his magic on it, it hadn’t so much as purred the wrong way.

  “I, on the other hand…” she said aloud. She managed to break things before they even showed signs of cracking.

  She pulled out of the lot and made a left instead of a right. She didn’t want to go home. Not right away. Not if it meant looking at Eddie’s closed door and wanting more than anything to knock and tell him her secrets. Maybe he wouldn't think she was crazy. Maybe he wouldn’t care that she'd lied to him about her name. Maybe he would understand if she told him why.

  And maybe he wouldn’t.

  Ash swung into a new development on the edge of town, slowing as she passed the bi-level homes. She wondered who lay sleeping inside them. Newlyweds? Single moms trying to keep it all together? Happy families with perfect lives? Or hardworking laborers trying to piece together a living the way their parents and grandparents had? She rolled down the windows and fresh air poured inside.

  Barely a sound filled the night air. Just the hum of air conditioners and the occasional chirp of a restless bird carried through the evening. She imagined for a moment the constant buzz of the city—the mix of cars and voices and music from dance clubs—that would fill the streets of Boston at that hour. She didn’t miss it. Not one bit.

  At the end of the cul-de-sac, she swung her VW in a slow circle. She couldn’t stay in Paradise. It wasn’t her home. She had no ties here, not really. But the thought of joining the rest of her family on Martha’s Vineyard next weekend turned her stomach. The thought of seeing Colin again tied her up in knots. Not there, not here. Where did she belong?

  A door opened suddenly, and a beam of light speckled one of the driveways to her right. A black Lab emerged, sniffing the air. It meandered down the lawn and flopped onto its back. Legs straight up, it rolled from side to side on the wet grass. Ash could see its tongue lolling from its mouth.

  “Angus!” The voice was a hiss in the darkness. “Stop that!” Into the frame of light waddled a woman so pregnant she looked as though she might fall over.

  Ash smiled. Dottie Warren stopped into the restaurant once in a while after her shift at the Post Office. “I told Mick I didn’t need to do desk duty,” she’d told Ash over a vanilla milkshake and french fries last week. “Told him I could still deliver on the route. Christ, I been through this three times already. But you know how men are. Always think they know what’s best…”

  Ash raised a hand to wave, though she knew the woman couldn’t see her. Still, as she drove by, she thought Dottie took an extra look at her car, tucking away the color and the silhouette of its driver. After a moment, the dog peed and trotted back inside. Dottie shut the door, and the outside light turned off again. Ash grinned. Tomorrow or the next day, she knew, the woman would amble into the restaurant and ask Ash what she was doing on Miller’s Circle after midnight.

  No secrets in this town. You know that. The minute you tell Eddie who you are, word will spread. Everyone will know. And everything will change. She yanked the rubber band from her ponytail and let her hair fall to her shoulders. The breeze picked up as she pulled away from the stop sign and gave the car some gas.

  “Well, so what if it does?” She couldn’t pretend anymore. She was tired of living a secret. It was too damn hard. Ash tightened her fingers around the steering wheel. She had to make things right.

  “I’m going to tell him everything.” And they would take it from there.

  She bit her bottom lip and hoped he would still look at her the same way afterwards. She hoped he would still wrap those strong arms around her, still press his lips against hers, and still pull her into his embrace like there was nowhere else he wanted to be.

  ***

  It was after one by the time she killed the engine in front of the house. Ash dragged herself up the sidewalk. Do I see if he’s still up? Or do I wait until tomorrow? I want— She didn’t know what she wanted. That was the problem.

  She pushed open the front door, which he’d left unlocked. The porch light still burned, too. All good signs. Ash stood in the foyer and studied the stairs, working up the nerve to knock on Eddie’s door. She took one step forward, raised her hand, then glanced down at herself and realized she probably smelled like the kitchen of Blues and Booze. Wrinkling her nose, she stepped back again.

  Tomorrow, when I’ve had a shower and some sleep and we can talk about this rationally.

  But when was the last time she’d done anything rationally when it came to Eddie West? That was what worked, what made him – and her, when she was around him – different. Better. Her hand reached up and knocked before she could stop it. “Eddie?”

  She heard nothing for a minute. Her stomach clenched. What if he was in there with someone? What if he'd completely changed his mind? She guessed there were half a dozen women in Paradise who’d be more than happy to warm his bed and soothe his wounded ego.

  Ash traced a crack on the floor with one toe. She knocked once more and waited a long thirty seconds. Well, if he was home, he wasn’t answering. It would have to wait until tomorrow after all. She turned to go.

  “Ash?”

  She’d almost made it to the stairs by the time his door swung open. She turned around, heart in her throat. Eddie stood on the threshold, bare-chested and dozy-eyed. He wore a pair of cut-off sweats and nothing else.

  She forgot how to breathe.

  “What time is it?”

  “Late. I’m sorry.” The words came out in a rush. “I shouldn’t have—were you sleeping?”

  He shook his head and ran a hand through his hair, standing it up on end. “Watching TV.” He paused for a moment, then pushed the door open all the way. “Want to come in?”

  “Okay.”

  The living room smelled of him, of that complicated scent she associated with baseball games and late nights on the porch and winks in the bar as he sat and watched her count tips. Ash stopped near the recliner and looked around. The kitten, now a few pounds rounder in the belly, slept on a towel Eddie had tucked into a cardboard box.

  “You ever give it a name?”

  He closed the door and stepped beside her, breathing the words into her ear. “Call ‘im Tiny. Seems to like it.”

  She smiled. “It fits him.”

  He sat on the edge of the couch. “So?”

  “I’m sorry.” Second time in less than five minutes. Why didn’t she just apologize her way into tomorrow? But there didn’t seem to be any other words to fit the enormity of what she needed to say.

  “Sit.” Eddie cocked his head at her. “Stop being so goddamned nervous and tell me what’s going on.”

  “It’s complicated.” She worked her way toward him.

  “So start with something small.” He leaned back as she edged onto the couch. “Start with—I don’t know. Why you decided to leave Boston.”

  Ash laughed. “I wouldn’t call that something small.” That was the biggest part of what she need to say. And the hardest.

  He didn’t say anything, didn’t pr
ess, didn’t keep questioning. He just studied her with his intent gaze, until she felt sure he’d stripped off every last stitch of clothing she wore and saw through to the heart that beat erratically under her skin.

  One hand worked its way across the cushion until it rested on his bare leg. “What happened the other night…” she began.

  “Was nice. Was good. Should happen a lot more.”

  She let out a long breath. “Yeah.”

  Eddie’s hand reached for hers. Ash let her gaze move across his chest, over the pale fuzz that spread there. Up to the tattoo on his triceps. Over to his square chin, that bobbed when he spoke too fast or got too excited. Down, just for an instant, to the waistband of the cut-offs that dipped below his navel. Then up, where blue eyes met hers and a mouth looked as though it waited for her to make up her mind.

  “There’s so much I need to tell you.”

  “Can it wait?” Eddie pulled her toward him, working his hand from hers. He slipped his arm around her waist and drew her across the cushions, so that her curves melted into his. "Because I am so damn crazy about you that all I want to do is this." He caught her mouth with his, tongue opening her lips and seeking, teasing, making her ache. "And this." His hand moved inside her shirt, burning her skin everywhere he touched it.

  “Eddie…” But there was nothing she wanted to say. Nothing she wanted to explain. All that could wait. A dizzying rush of desire came over her, so strong and so sudden that she felt as though all the air had been sucked out of the room.

  His mouth moved to her neck. Her earlobe. Then down. Inch by inch he tasted her, achingly slow, taking his time. One hand moved to the small of her back. She heard a quick breath, a gasp of pleasure, and realized seconds later that she’d made the sounds.

  In agonizing layers Eddie peeled it all away: her T-shirt, her bra, her shorts, the lacy pink panties she’d chosen carefully that morning, hoping and not hoping that this moment might unfold. Then he moved over her, and she reached for him, easing down the cut-off sweats that remained between them until there was nothing at all but skin upon skin and desire filling the room from ceiling to floor.