The Milburn Big Box Set

by Nancy McGovern

  “Aah,” Faith said, as soon as she walked inside, and for good reason. Lula had done a magnificent job in transforming the place, with Faith and Laura pitching in as much as they could. The wide open windows had become a gorgeous sun-splashed reality, and the wooden walls were now a light, fresh color that reminded Faith of frothing cream. Faith had even taken the bus down to Home Depot to pick up a tiny tin of paint in her favorite color, a delicate shade of teal that was on the border between powder blue and pale green. She used that on the accent wall, painting every other board until it was striped, cream then teal, cream then teal. A white shabby chic photo frame on that wall or a sconce with lace detailing like she’d seen on Pinterest would be the perfect finishing touch, she thought, and made a mental note to create something.

  Laura had unpacked the supplies and was running her finger over a portion of the edible lace again and again, her brow furrowed. “You sure you can eat this, Faith? We’re not going to send our customers to the hospital, are we?”

  “Ha!” Faith said. “That would be a good grand opening, wouldn’t it? I can see the headlines now. Ten die from eating lace at Florida beach tearoom.”

  “Well, I can guarantee that headline’s never run before,” Laura said with a giggle. She looked at her dainty little gold watch on her slim wrist. “I’ve officially got five minutes before my start time, boss.” She winked.

  “Don’t call me—”

  “So if you’ll excuse me,” Laura interrupted, with a totally irreverent curtsey, “I’ll be having myself a sweet tea and one of your crazily delicious cappuccino cupcakes while I put my feet up and read my book.” She rummaged in her purse and fished out a book with a boy on the front cover curled up in a ball, only his fearful eyes peeking out. Laura had told her all about it a few days before – it was what people called misery lit, true narratives about people who grew up in horrible circumstances.

  “You’re like the happiest person ever and yet you read that stuff?” Faith said with a shiver. She preferred a lighthearted romance or mystery to curl up with.

  “Yep,” Laura said, swiping a cupcake from the countertop and flicking off the whistling kettle as she passed by. “I guess I can be grateful I don’t have a life like that.”

  “I guess,” Faith said, shaking her head.

  Laura paused. “But… you want to know something? Actually, I’ve never told anyone this before.”

  Faith’s chest felt warm when Laura said that. She felt like she was the first true friend she’d ever had, someone who accepted her for who she was. “Go on.”

  “Well…” Laura looked down at her feet. It was the first time Faith had ever seen her get really serious.

  Faith’s voice was gentle. “Well…?”

  “Well, that’s kind of what I want to do for a living, actually. Help people like this,” Laura said, then started to gabble. “I mean, it will probably never happen, ‘cause like, you have to do all this qualification stuff and certification, and I’m not sure if I’ll—”

  “It sounds like an awesome idea,” Faith said. “You’d be so good at that. Like, you always make me feel better. I bet you could help loads of people.”

  Laura clutched the book to her chest, her eyes a little bright, like she was just barely daring to believe she could make it work. “You think so?”

  Faith nodded firmly. “Absolutely. And think of this, right? Less than a month ago I was at home, feeling kinda miserable, thinking that I would never ever ever be able to have my own café like I’d always dreamed of.” A huge smile spread over her face. “And…?” She held her hands up, gesturing toward the beautiful new place, with its floor they’d newly stained pale blue, the wooden furniture in mix-match colors of delicate peach and country kitchen yellow and baby pink and minty green, the white curtains she’d snagged on eBay that fell down all the way to floor in frill after frill after frill, and the aura of coziness and comfort that wrapped around them as soon as they stepped in the door. “Now I’m here, doing what I always thought was impossible.”

  Laura grinned. “Now that’s inspiring. But don’t be too inspiring or I might just get enough courage to pack up this job now in search of better things, and leave you to it.”

  Faith crossed her arms, pretending to be mad. “That’s it, I’m never encouraging you again.”

  Laura giggled. “Now leave me to my book and go back to flirting with my cousin.”

  “Ugh!” Faith said, her mouth dropping open. “I was so not…”

  But she trailed off as she heard a disturbing sound in the distance. It sounded like men shouting, and the aggressiveness in their voices set Faith’s nerves on edge.

  “What the…” Laura said, hurrying over to the window to look out.

  They couldn’t make anything out from there, as some of the new plants Nathan had put in obscured their view, so they ran outside, hoping to catch a better look.

  Nathan acted casual and shook his head. “Probably just some jerks. Don’t even give them the attention. That’s what they crave.”

  But Faith was still concerned and kept going on forward with Laura, leaving Nathan shrugging behind them.

  “Oh, look!” Laura said, pointing to a group of young men. They looked like some sort of gang, as they were all dressed very similarly, with tracksuits that were far too heavy for the Florida weather. They were facing someone, though the trees blocked out the view, hurling insults and rocks.

  “Nathan, come on!” Laura called out.

  He sighed deeply, put down the pineapple plant he was attending to and came over. “What?” He saw what they saw and turned back. “Like I said, just some jerks. Leave them to it. They’ll get bored eventually.”

  But Faith wasn’t to be placated. She kept going, moving around the bushes until she came out right in front of them. It was Ellis’ huge frame the thugs were aiming their rocks at, and he was shouting at them as loudly as they were at him. The whole situation looked like a firework explosion, but Faith was sure the loudest bang was yet to come.

  “Ellis!” she hollered, her heart hammering in her chest. Whenever Faith was scared, her natural instinct was to confront it right away. She then looked at the rock-wielding thugs, who up close she realized couldn’t have been much more than 15.

  The ring leader, a tall boy with blond hair cropped so close to his head it shined gold in the sun, strode up to her, turning the rock over in his hand. “Oh, look, it’s Ellis’ girlfriend, come to save him.” He laughed and his whole gang sniggered.

  “Get out of here,” Nathan said, suddenly coming up from behind Faith and standing as tall and wide as his stature would allow – it looked like he worked out from time to time but he was no Incredible Hulk. “Go on, get lost.”

  *****

  Chapter 6

  The gang leader stayed cool when Nathan stepped up beside Faith. “Ooh, so this is your boyfriend. I knew the other guy was too fat for a pretty little thing like you.”

  Faith balled her fists instinctively. Being called a ‘pretty little thing’, especially by a 15 year old, set her blood boiling. Her mother had always told her that a woman was worth much more than her looks and any person that judged her on that first was simply not worth knowing.

  “Come on, out,” Ellis said, striding over to them and casting a huge shadow over them all. The man was 6’5”, wide, and clearly a lover of all the vendors’ offerings in Paradise Point. “I’ve called Deputy Sheriff Valdez and he’s on his way over.”

  “Ooh, I’m terrified,” the ring leader said, but there was actually a flicker of fear in his eyes and he began to slope off lazily, looking Nathan and Faith and Ellis up and down with disgusted eyes. “Don’t look at me,” he snapped as they returned his gaze.

  The rest of his crew followed him toward the path and soon disappeared behind the palms that lined it. As soon as they left, Faith couldn’t help but burst into laughter, and Nathan joined in.

  Ellis didn’t look pleased, folding his doughy arms over his chest and twisting
his mouth into a knot.

  Laura, who had been behind a bush, came over and began to laugh along, wiping her eyes.

  “Don’t tell me you were crying?” Faith said to her, laughing all the more.

  Laura burst out laughing all over again. “Yep!”

  “She cries at everything,” Nathan said, shaking his head and grinning. “Don’t you, Weepy?”

  Ellis let out a huffing sound. “None of this is a laughing matter,” he said sternly. “Those scum bag boys keep coming down here. The front desk knows not to let them in. I’m not sure if they go over the rocks at the beach or climb in some other way. But it’s got to stop. It’s got to.”

  Faith shrugged. “I know what you’re saying, but their bark is much worse than their bite, surely?”

  “They were throwing rocks!” Ellis said, shaking his head and turning in the direction they’d left in, though they were long gone.

  Nathan stooped down to pick one up and turned it over in his hand. “Not much more than pebbles, really.”

  “Well, just see how you’d like it if they were pelted at you,” Ellis snapped, then marched his bulk toward his office as fast as he could, swinging his arms violently. After a couple moments he turned back, his face like thunder. “This is a family place, you know, and I’m not standing for this thuggish behavior any longer. I’m calling a meeting for tonight. Be there, Faith and Laura.”

  “All right,” Laura said, then turned back to the others and widened her eyes. “Whoah. I guess that’s what you call trouble in Paradise.”

  “Oh ha ha,” Nathan said. “I don’t see what Ellis is getting so upset about. They’re just idiot kids. He called the Sheriff, the kids are gone. What else needs to be done?”

  They started ambling back toward the newly named Slice of Paradise. They’d yet to create the sign, but they’d already painted over where it used to say Bessie’s Café, which Faith felt quite guilty about. But, she reasoned with herself, her grandmother had put her in charge, and she was doing what she best saw fit to make the place profitable. Marlene was bringing the account books over to Faith’s apartment that evening and Faith was expecting to see a lot of red.

  “I agree with Ellis, actually,” Laura said. “If it wasn’t for you guys being so brave, it would have been pretty scary.”

  Nathan turned to Faith and smiled at her, his dark eyes deep and dancing. “I think we make a good team, huh?”

  “Oh, brother,” Laura muttered to herself, retying her bun since so many blonde wispy flyaways had escaped.

  Faith smiled, then looked away as she felt heat flush her cheeks. “Yeah,” she said quickly. “We all make a great team, me, you and Laura. We’re making this café into something special, I think. I just really hope my grandma likes it.”

  *****

  The meeting, as Faith has expected, was dreadful. Everyone had been dragged in unexpectedly after a hard day of rushing about on their feet, cooking, cleaning and serving customers, and no one was pleased.

  As usual, it was held in Ellis’ tiny little wooden office, with half of the vendors crammed in on folding chairs so close together they were thigh-to-thigh, while everyone else had to stand up.

  Faith, Laura and Nathan – who Laura told not to come but he smiled at Faith and came along anyway – had arrived early, even before Ellis, who was out on some errand, so managed to squeeze into some squished up seats. Joanne Cobb arrived after them but pointedly did not take a seat and stood by Ellis’ desk, fiddling with her fingernails and making little huffing noises now and again.

  Josiah Kelly, who ran an awesomely successful smoothie and juice shack down by the shore’s edge came in and flopped down in a chair, his long blond semi-matted hair falling everywhere. On her first day Faith had taken a stroll along the beach with Grandma Bessie and they’d each had a mango and coconut cream shake from his shack that had tasted like heaven on earth. He was quite attractive in an alternative sort of way. He tossed his satchel down and pushed the stray white-blond curls away from his tanned forehead. “So what’s this all about then, uh?” he said loudly. “Eh, Joanne?” He grinned.

  She completely ignored him, pretending to find her fingernails fascinating and not giving him so much as a glance.

  “It’s something about those young boys that keep coming in,” Faith said. “They were throwing rocks earlier today.”

  Josiah tipped back in his chair. “Ugh, no one cares. I just wanna go home.” He puffed out a long sigh. “I’ll bet any of you a hundred dollars, it’s just gonna be some long lecture about make sure you keep an eye out for these miscreants and report it back to Deputy Sheriff Valdez, the most stuck up, annoying, fuddy-duddy-acting young guy in the history of—”

  “Well, I’m terribly sorry if I want to do something meaningful with my life, instead of blend fruits together all day everyday.” Deputy Sheriff Valdez stood in the doorway, his booted feet firm on the floorboards in a wide stance and his fists planted on his hips.

  Josiah rocked forward on his chair. “I… uh… well, I meant…” Then he sighed. “Oh, I can’t be bothered to backpedal. Yeah, I don’t like you.”

  “Obviously that’s not important to me,” Deputy Sheriff Valdez said, striding to the front of the office. He couldn’t have been any older than her, Faith reckoned, but he had the most disarming self-assurance, somehow with only a tinge of arrogance instead of being steeped in it. It really did look like he was devoted to his job, his uniform neat and all tucked in. He was clean shaven with neat jet black hair. Totally not Faith’s type. She turned to raise her eyebrows at Laura, but found her gazing at him appreciatively, and suppressed a giggle.

  Ellis came in at that moment, scanned the room quickly and said, “Where’s Tonya?”

  “Oh, man, can’t we just do it without her?” Josiah said with a groan.Ellis frowned. “She’s never late. Hello, Tyler,” he said to Valdez.

  “Hello,” Valdez said in a voice much too loud for the tiny office. “I’m ready to talk to your vendors whenever you are.”

  Ellis kept taking glances outside. “I think we should wait for Tonya and Mer—”

  “I’d like to bring something up first,” Joanne said, her voice quiet but shaking with anger. “About what food people can serve and what they absolutely cannot serve.”

  Faith’s heart sank. Joanne really wasn’t going to give this up, was she?

  Ellis shook his head. “I told you earlier, Joanne. Faith and Laura are well within their rights serving cupcakes. They’re also serving juices, which is Josiah’s—”

  “Everyone serves juice!” Joanne snapped. “It doesn’t take rocket science to chuck fruit in a juicer, does it?”

  Josiah rolled his eyes. “Yeah, hold the Nobel Peace Prize for the intricate genius of cupcake baking.”

  “Cupcake baking is an art!” Joanne said ferociously.

  Josiah, Ellis, Nathan and Laura laughed.

  But for the first time, Faith felt herself able to agree. “It kinda is. Well, at least to people who really care about it.” She tried to offer an olive branch. “I get what you mean, Joanne. I really hope we can work this out.”

  Joanne flashed an ice cold look directly at her. “Then wipe cupcakes right off your menu.”

  Faith took a deep breath, trying to compose herself. Confrontation was the worst, leaving her with shaking hands and a dry mouth. “Look, I studied your cupcakes to make sure they’re totally different. We don’t have any of the same flavors, or anything.”

  “Really, we don’t,” Laura chimed in.

  “Tell you what,” Faith said brightly, sure it would fix everything, “why don’t I get some of my cupcakes now and bring them to you, so you can see how totally different they are?”

  “No way am I waiting around for that,” Josiah said, then yawned widely. “Some of us have beds to go to.”

  The sun was only just beginning to set outside. Tonya Tate, the lady who ran the pancake house near the playground, came hurrying in, a folder tucked underneath her substantial
arm. Her gold earrings flashed in the dusk light and what seemed like thousands of teeny tiny braids skimmed her waist. “Sorry we’re late!” she said, and Merlene the redheaded accountant entered after her with an exaggerated creep and stage whisper of, “Sorry!”

  Faith’s heart was still beating a little faster as she waited for Joanne’s response.

  “Absolutely not,” Joanne said. “And to stop you wasting your breath, let me tell you that nothing you can say will ever shut me up or placate me. The only thing I want to hear out of your mouth is that you’ll stop stealing other people’s ideas. Bessie would be ashamed of you.”

  “Hey, hey, hey,” Tonya said, standing back up as soon as she’d sat down. “Is this really still an issue?”

  Josiah swung his satchel over his shoulder and headed for the door. “I haven’t got time for cupcake drama, man. I’m out.”

  Ellis shook his head but made no attempt to stop him.

  “I would like to remind you all to be civil,” the deputy sheriff said, though no one was listening.

  Nathan stood up by Faith’s side. “I really think Faith’s idea is a good one. She should let Joanne see the cakes to show her how different they are.”