by Mia Ford
The town really was small. The main street was barely wide enough for two cars, and was probably a congestion hazard if anyone parked on one side. With the scant number of people moving about, I doubted that happened much anyway. The stores stood in rows next to each other, small enough to pass for kiosks. There was hardly more than two people in each one, and as I walked down the street, heads turned to watch the new guy in town.
A guy could really escape here.
Which was why Chuck’s reaction to my not wanting to tell him a last name, or pay with cash, didn’t seem very surprising. I wondered how many people had lodged up in his motel for weeks on end just to get away from it all, without a worry in the world that anyone would find them. Ludwig certainly had its small-town charm, and it probably didn’t see too many strangers. Especially one who looked like me.
It explained why everyone was staring a bit too hard.
I found the diner easily, pushed back a bit from the main street to allow for a parking space where two trucks sat idly side by side. The bar beside it, Joel’s, had music coming out the open door, and I wondered how many people were actually inside this time of the day. Actually, the fact that any business was open surprised me. The population was probably a little shy of two or three hundred people, if that. Booth was a small town. Ludwig was just a dot on a map that didn’t even merit a stop light on Main Street.
I walked into the diner, the small chime above the door bringing everyone’s attention to me. Other than the girl behind the bar and two guests, each occupying his own booth, the place was empty. From inside the kitchen, the soft sound of sizzling escaped through the small window, and the aroma of something savory being deep fried wafted through the diner.
I nodded at the other guests when they didn’t stop gazing at me, and pulled up on one of the stools directly in front of the girl behind the counter. She smiled at me, all fake cheers that hid layers of lost sleep, and passed me the menu while smacking her gum.
“Chuck says you guys make the best burgers in town,” I said, pushing the menu back.
The girl nodded. “Hell mister, we make the only burgers in town. Not much to compare with.”
I smiled. “Then give me your best. And an order of those onion rings.”
She nodded, called out my order through the window to the kitchen, and then grabbed a pot of coffee and placed a cup in front of me.
“New in town?” she asked. The way she eyed me made me feel like I was the newest animal on display in the local zoo.
“How could you tell?” I asked, giving her a wry grin.
“Staying at Chuck’s, huh?”
“Only motel in town,” I replied. “Great guy.”
“Here on business or pleasure?”
“A little of both.”
“Family here?”
I took a sip from my coffee. “You folks don’t get a lot of tourists, do you?”
She smiled at me, blew a bubble with her gum and let it pop. “I’ll get you that burger.”
“Thanks.”
The chimes rang again, and I turned around just as Ashlyn walked in. She stopped in her tracks when she saw me, hesitated for a bit, then smiled awkwardly.
So much for getting her out of your head.
“When I said I’d be seeing you around, didn’t expect to see you so soon,” I said as she approached.
“There aren’t that many places where you can go,” she said. “It’s a small town.”
“I’ve been hearing that a lot,” I smiled. “You guys running it as your tagline or something? Welcome to Ludwig, We’re a small town. Bump into you later.”
“That’s city talk for sarcasm, right?”
I laughed. Touché. This girl’s fun.
“Mind if I join you?” she asked, already climbing into the seat next to me.
“Please, I could use the company,” I said. “Looks like a pretty hard place to make friends.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Everyone keeps looking at me like I’m a walking corpse, or something.”
She laughed. “It’s because you’re a stranger. We’re unusually suspicious.”
“Is that why everyone asks so many questions?”
“Precisely.” She winked at me, then during to the waitress. “Hey, Susan, how’s your mother?”
Susan smacked her gum and shrugged. “A little too alive for my liking.” Ashlyn laughed. “Don’t tell her I said that,” Susan added with a wink.
“My lips are sealed.”
I watched them go back and forth a bit, the whole ordeal reminding me a lot of the times when Ridder Technology was still a tiny company with only a handful of people working side by side, day in and day out. Things had been a lot more personal back then, a lot closer to the heart, like we were a small family that cared about each other and where the company was going and how its success would benefit us all, as a group. I remembered how I had known every single person toiling away by my side, their families, their problems, their happy moments. There were barbecue invites, beer parties when we landed a client, and sleepless nights when one of the guys’ wife was giving birth.
Now I couldn’t even remember the name of the security guard I drove past on my way in and out of the building every day. I had forgotten how warm the whole thing had once felt, in comparison to the cold steel and mirrored glass building that now represented my entire fortune. I couldn’t even remember the last time I had met with the new hires and told them success stories of Ridder Technology, as used to be customary.
The whole thing had expanded way too fast, and beyond my control. I guess I should have been just glad that I was able to keep it all together. Thank God for Dennis.
“So, how are you gonna poison my new friend, here,” Ashlyn said, cutting through my thoughts.
“He ordered the burger,” Susan said. “Same for you?”
Ashlyn looked at me and squinted, grinning. “Let me guess, Chuck recommended the burger?”
I laughed. “He said it was the best in town.”
“Well, he wasn’t wrong,” Ashlyn replied. “One for me, too, then, Susan. With fries.”
Susan yelled the order through the window just like last time, then walked out from behind the bar to tend to one of the other guests. I took a sip from my coffee, pulled out a cigarette. I held it nervously between my fingers without lighting it. It was my way of going cold turkey.
“Nasty habit,” Ashlyn said.
I looked at her, then at the cigarette, and then shrugged. “I kinda like it.”
“What’s there to like?” she asked. “Smells horrible, tastes even worse. You ever kiss a smoker? Like sticking your lips to an ashtray. Nasty, nasty, nasty.”
Was she saying that she’d never kiss me if I smoked? Well, now there was an incentive if I ever needed one.
She kept ranting. “Not to mention it dulls your taste buds completely. How are you going to enjoy the best burger in town after you’ve had one of those?”
“You can’t smoke in here,” Susan said, returning with an empty coffee pot. “State health code. Take it outside or put it away.”
“I’ll put it away,” I said with a smile as they both gave me the eye. “I’ll have it for dessert.”
“Those things will kill you,” Ashlyn added, shaking her head. “I hope you’re not stinking up the room with those dang things. The flowers don’t really do much with poison in the air.”
“Your flowers are just fine, okay?” I laughed. “They smell amazing, you have my word.”
“So you say,” she said. “You just keep puffing those and I’ll forget to replace the flowers tomorrow.”
I smiled and took another sip of my coffee, already smelling the sweet aroma of fried onion rings coming from the kitchen. “So, you do this every day?”
Ashlyn reached over the bar, grabbed her own cup and filled it from the fresh pot Susan had set on the warmer on the counter. “What? The flowers?”
“Yeah.”
“Pretty muc
h,” she said, taking a sip and ruffling her hair out of her eyes. The blonde locks fell around her face beautifully, making her eyes pop. “Chuck pays for them in bulk, as long as I keep them fresh every morning. I know he does it just to support me. He and my daddy were best friends. Not a lot of call for fresh flowers in Ludwig.”
“He told me you grow them all.”
“I do,” she nodded, licking her lips. I watched her pink tongue dart in and out. “I built a greenhouse behind my place. Grow them all there.”
“You built it?”
Ashlyn laughed. “Well, paid to get built.”
“Ah, I thought you were an odd looking handy man,” I laughed.
She held up here hands and wiggled her fingers at me. There was an acre of dirt under her chipped fingernails. “Are you saying I can’t get my hands dirty?”
“Oh no, just that you seem to be a girl of many talents,” I said with a grin. “So, how big is your greenhouse? How hot do you keep it?” I wondered if she’d get the hidden meaning of my words.
“It’s big enough,” she replied with a coy smile. “And pretty hot.”
“Maybe you should expand your territory. Maybe deliver out of town to get more customers.”
“More business advice, Mr. Sabbatical?” she asked, leaning on her chin on her hand. “I thought you were taking a break.”
I can really get to like this girl.
“Just saying,” I shrugged. “I have a hard time turning off my brain sometimes.” Even though the blood was rushing to another part of my body as I gazed into her eyes.
“I have that same problem sometimes,” she said, chuckling. “You sound like you want to turn my greenhouse into a bona fide flower factory.”
I took a sip of coffee and let my shoulders go up and down. “I think a small business can become a big business with the right planning and guidance. Just how big is this greenhouse of yours?”
She looked at me for a beat, biting her lower lip as her eyes searched mine. “How about this, since you’re so eager with the advice? We finish our meal, and I’ll take you to it to see for yourself. I’ll even bring you back to the motel, just because I’m nice.”
“Good old Ludwig charm?” I asked.
She winked at me. “You have no idea.”
* * *
Ashly grossly underplayed the size of her little greenhouse.
We finished our meal (the burger wasn’t the best I’d ever had, but it was edible) and Ashlyn drove us to her house in an old truck that made mine seem brand new. There had been a few sounds under the hood I had never heard before, and the damn thing shook and rattled in a way that made me think it was going to explode at any minute.
Spending time alone with Ashlyn, though, was worth the risk.
Ashlyn lived in a large Victorian that fit in perfectly with the surrounding area. I could almost imagine a small family living there, going about their day, with acres of farmland behind it. It was picturesque, and I knew almost at once that the skies would be clear as a bell during the night, with stars scattered across it in constellations you could almost connect with your fingers.
The greenhouse was almost as big as the main house, set up a dozen yards away and to the back, connected with all sorts of pumps, pipes and wires. It would have looked like a house out of a Frankenstein movie if it weren’t for the luscious green heaven inside.
Ashlyn let us in through the locked door, and I was instantly cradled in the mix of scents emitted from all the plants around me. Flowers bloomed everywhere, shrubs folded in over each other, and in some areas, vines had crawled all the way to the ceiling and had formed a carpet of colored flowers between its green. It felt like I had stepped out of Texas and into the woodlands of New England. The whole thing took my breath away.
“Jesus,” I whispered.
“Not bad, huh?” Ashlyn said from behind me.
I turned just as she was adjusting something in one of the pots, her golden hair falling across her face like a carpet. When she turned to look at me, I felt my heart skip a beat.
Fuck, man, you’re in trouble.
I whistled and turned my attention back to the wondrous world around me. “Not bad is an understatement,” I said.
She smiled at that and looked around her. “Took a lot of work, too.”
“I bet,” I breathed. “How much did this whole thing cost?”
“Well, let’s just say I need to deliver flowers to Chuck every day if I want to eat,” Ashlyn grinned.
“My delivery idea doesn’t sound all that bad right now, does it?”
Ashlyn laughed and shook her head. She walked past me, beckoning me to follow her. She led me down rows of plants and flowers, stopping momentarily at some to let me know what they were, watching me for a reaction. I must have been a disappointment, though, because I had no fucking clue what the half of it all was. Still, it didn’t faze me from admiring the greenhouse as a whole. It was like she had created her own little rainforest here.
“The flowers are further down at the back,” she said. “But I don’t think we need to go all the way there. I mean, you see most of them at the motel anyway.”
“Ashlyn, I am seriously impressed,” I said. “I have never seen anything like this.”
She frowned. “I’d expect you moved around the country a lot, surely this isn’t that great.”
“Are you kidding?” I asked. “Just the sheer devotion to it is impressive. Something like this must take a lot of time and effort. I can never remember to water the plants in my place. If it weren’t for Pauline, they’d all be dead.”
“Pauline?”
Watch yourself, I thought, cringing that I had so casually mentioned my maid in a conversation when I should have been trying to remain inconspicuous.
“My sister,” I lied, wondering if there would ever come a time when I would have to explain why I didn’t have any pictures of my imaginary sister.
Ashlyn nodded. “Well, tell Pauline that I appreciate her efforts,” she said. “I hate it when someone buys a plant and can’t take care of it.”
“It’s not a pet,” I said.
Ashlyn looked at me with wide eyes and slapped a hand against her chest in mock shock. “How could you, Mr. Sabbatical?” she gasped, giggling just a second after, unable to keep up with the façade. “In all honesty, though, if you actually thought of them as pets, you’d probably act differently around them. They’re alive, too, you know?”
“If it can’t play catch or purr when I scratch it, then it’s not a pet,” I chuckled.
“Okay, you know what? Get out of my greenhouse,” she laughed, pushing me playfully back to the large double glass doors.
“Hey!”
“If they could react to what you just said, we’d both be dead right now,” Ashlyn said. “That’s enough disgrace for one day.”
“Alright, alright,” I laughed along with her and let her push me back into the bright light of the afternoon.
She invited me for a glass of iced tea, and we spent most of the afternoon on her porch, laughing and drinking and talking about nothing at all. It was probably the best couple of hours I had ever had in my life, and when the sun began to set, we both agreed that it was high time I get back to the motel.
“Don’t want Chuck to worry,” I joked.
She drove me back, the ride mostly silent except for a few instances when she would ask me a question I’d reply vaguely to. When she dropped me off, she went to the back of her truck and pulled a pot out from under the tarp, handing it to me.
“What’s this?” I asked.
“Consider it a little welcoming gesture,” she said. “You know, so you can remember Ludwig when you go back to your big city.”
“What is it?”
“Echinomastus warnockii,” she replied with a grin.
“Echino what the fuck?”
Ashlyn laughed. “A Warnock’s pineapple cactus.”
I grimaced. “Okay. Thanks, I guess.”
Ashlyn laughed
again and slapped my arm. “The flower, when it blooms, is gorgeous. And it’s a cactus, so you won’t kill it if you forget to water it for a few days.”
“Now this I can work with.”
“Right,” Ashlyn smiled, walking back to the driver’s side and climbing in. “Good night, Sabbatical. See you in the morning.”
I waved as her truck pulled away, clinking and clunking as it disappeared down the road.
Chapter 8: Ashlyn
The minute I got home, I made straight for the greenhouse. I needed to keep myself busy, to get my mind off of Chance. It had been so long since the last time I had had a proper conversation with someone, and although the man was literally a stranger, talking to him almost felt like I had been talking with an age-old friend.
I went straight for the flowers in the back, grabbing my chart and quickly marking off with flowers I would be taking to the motel tomorrow. My mind kept wandering back to Chance, a part of me wondering if maybe I should change the lilies in his room for something a little more colorful. Maybe a stronger scent if he was going to keep smoking in there.
Which shouldn’t be something you’re thinking about.
Right, of course. I shook my head and tried to concentrate on the task at hand, and after a few minutes, I realized I had screwed up the order completely. I sighed in frustration, ripped the checklist off my pad, and started over again. I needed to keep my head on straight. There was no logical reason for me to be thinking about the guy, especially since I knew he’d be gone within a couple of days.
