Fixer-Upper (Spinning Hills Romance 3) (18 page)

But with her big brother behaving like a rooster, always on the lookout from his perch, crowing if Johnny so much as looked at Marissa for too long, he hadn’t been able to talk to Marissa either as a coworker or a friend that day. As if he’d called him with his thoughts, Marty came up to him just then. “You got a minute?” he asked.

Johnny nodded.

Marty took a deep breath and blew it out. “I’m sorry about what I said. About your home, when you were growing up. I, uh, got mad and crossed a line. All I was trying to say was—Marissa’s always been happy to go off and do her own thing and sort of disappear into the background, while Melinda and I get all the attention. But she’s having her moment now. Her career is going well, she’s got a great guy . . . I don’t want you to mess with that just because you think you know better.”

Johnny cleared his throat. “Hey, no worries. I’m sorry, too. It doesn’t matter that I thought I was doing my best not to rattle Marissa; it matters that I did.”

Marty shrugged. “Well, you should know better than to ever mess with your best friend’s little sister, and I should know better than to say anything about my best friend’s family.”

Johnny shot him an amused look. “So, we’re best friends now?” Everyone knew they were, but it wasn’t the sort of thing men said out loud, and it was time to get the conversation onto lighter ground.

Marty shrugged. “You gonna come to the tavern later?”

“Missed your BFF, have you?”

Marty punched his shoulder and left, and Johnny knew they’d be okay. He’d missed hanging out with his oldest friend, and he’d missed the tavern, which had become like another home. He vowed never to do anything to jeopardize their friendship again.

Johnny filled his plastic cup with water and grabbed a sandwich from the pile, knowing he needed to eat if he wanted to be at his most productive. He made his way to the one table everyone had gathered around. There were six rusted metal picnic tables they’d be scraping and painting that afternoon, but everyone was at that one table. He wondered what they were all up to.

When he arrived, Veronica shouted, “Mr. A’s turn!”

A few of the kids parted, and he saw Ruby and Javier’s grandmother sitting in front of some shells. He guessed these were the “dark shells” Rosa had been referring to earlier. Rosa’s eyes met Johnny’s, and he immediately noted that her fear over the shells was gone. The way she looked at him told him she had something up her sleeve. “My turn to do what?” he asked as he unwrapped his sandwich.

“Grandma Ruby is learning to read shells.” Holly’s eyes sparkled. Ruby was her grandmother, and though Ruby’s eyes were blue and Holly’s were green, both were unusually bright.

“He should ask how many children he will have,” Rosa said. Veronica and Ruby’s eyes widened and Veronica began clapping and saying, “Yes, yes, ask that,” with a little too much enthusiasm.

Johnny eyed them warily. “I’ll ask if you tell me
why
you want me to ask.”

Rosa shrugged. “All of Spinning Hills needs to know how many little Johnnys we’ll have running around.”

Holly laughed. “They do say forewarned is forearmed.”

Dan clamped a hand on Johnny’s shoulder. “Forearmed with what? There’s no arming yourself against the stuff this one has gotten himself into.”

“Are you guys going to let me ask, or are you going to keep saying things that will give the students and parents here the wrong impression of me?”

The kids laughed and cheered him on. Ruby palmed him the shells. He made a huge show of shaking and jiggling them. First in front of him, then next to his left ear, then next to his right, behind him, and then in front again, until everyone started yelling at him to get on with it, and even Sam thumped him on the back. “All right. All right. How many kids will I have?” he asked in a booming voice before tossing the shells onto the table. Four landed with the open side up, and four landed with the open side down.

Javier’s grandmother put her hands to her mouth and gasped. “
Cuatro hijos!
”

Ruby and Veronica shouted, “
Sí!
” and “Yes!” and others clapped with glee while others looked on, wondering what they were missing. Rosa looked torn. “Four children?” she repeated, looking at him in dismay.

Johnny slanted an amused look her way. “Since when do you believe in this? I’m sorry to disappoint Ruby and Veronica, but I think I can guarantee I won’t have four kids. I already have a few hundred here, plus five dogs—until I find them homes, that is,” he said, and winked at the kids.

“Exactly!” Rosa gave him an imploring look before turning to whisper something to Sherry.

“I don’t see the problem. Don’t you want four great-grandchildren to spoil?” Sherry asked.

Rosa immediately perked up. “I hadn’t thought about that.”

Johnny shook his head, trying to make sense of their latest riddle.

“
What
are you all talking about?” Holly asked, laughing.

“
Nada
,” Veronica said, before shooting the others a warning look.

“They had a bet going on, that’s all.” Sherry shrugged. “They bet that nobody would have more kids than Johnny.”

“No gambling with my students,” Johnny warned the three women, only half-kidding. He’d lost too many gumballs and candy to them growing up to doubt they really were placing bets.

 

Marissa called Brian to let him know she was running fifteen minutes behind schedule, but they’d ended up getting into an argument over it, and she was now running even further behind. She sighed, threw the phone onto the passenger’s seat, and pulled out of her parking space, shooting one final look at the group. They had all ended up at the same picnic table, and everyone was crowded around Johnny as he tossed the cowrie shells.

He always ended up being the center of attention somehow, but never in a selfish, obnoxious, or intimidating way. He was someone people enjoyed being around, period. The thing about Johnny was that he seemed to know exactly what it was like on the sidelines, even though he never seemed to be there himself.

Brian was used to the kind of attention that came with being in the limelight, and Marissa liked that about him. She liked supporting and applauding others. It gave her purpose. It was in her nature to nurture. It made her happy.

She got home, showered, and dressed in record time. By the time she met up with Brian, they were still only running fifteen minutes late, and he had calmed down and was happy to see her.

But by that evening, Marissa was starting to doubt her earlier thoughts about supporting and applauding others. She and Brian were on their way home after seeing nine houses, and they still had not been able to agree on what type of house they wanted, or even how much land they needed. Brian liked vanilla inside and out. Marissa liked color. She could compromise on either the inside or outside being vanilla, but not both. Brian wanted cookie cutter too badly to compromise.

Brian gripped the steering wheel tighter. “We need to find a home, Marissa. I’m moving down here in less than six weeks, I don’t want to waste any more money renting, and we’re too old to be living with our parents.”

Marissa hesitated. “Brian . . . we’ve looked at twenty-three houses in all, and we can’t agree on anything. I’m compromising on hiring a wedding planner I don’t want, or even think I need, and I’m willing to compromise on some things when it comes to the house, but you’re not meeting me in the middle on anything. You say you are, but you’re not. Can’t you see that?”

Brian glanced her way. “Look, I didn’t want to say anything, but you had to know Huffy’s wasn’t exactly what I had in mind for our engagement party. But Marty’s a good friend and I know he’s being generous, so I’ll do it. I also agreed to a smaller wedding and living in the Dayton region, even though I’d be much closer to work in Cincinnati.”

Stunned, Marissa turned in her seat to look at him. “You’re the one who said Springboro was a good midpoint between both our jobs, and I don’t see why you can’t be happy about having a free, cozy, fun venue for our engagement party. I didn’t even expect or want an engagement party!”

“I chose Springboro because you only looked for a job in Dayton when you could just have easily looked for the same position in a similar school in Cincinnati. And I
am
happy about our engagement party—I’m just saying we can’t always get what we want. You’re leaving
for an entire month
almost as soon as we move in, even though we’ve barely spent time together lately as it is. Do you think I wanted that?”

Marissa stared at him. “You know why I want to work in Dayton. We discussed that a long time ago, when we first started dating. And I said yes to Ecuador only a month after we’d started dating and you barely blinked. You said you understood. The fact that you bring it up at all tells me you obviously didn’t.”

“I did. I do.” He sighed and reached for her hand, but Marissa had it bunched up into a fist and couldn’t seem to unclench it. “You’re right,” he said. “I shouldn’t have brought it up. But you’re usually so easy to please, and now suddenly you’re fighting me at every turn. I’m just trying to show you I do consider you, and I do think of you, too.”

Marissa knew she was generally easy to please, but something about him saying it out loud that way troubled her. There were givers and takers, and she was very much a giver, easy to please because she enjoyed seeing the people she loved happy. And it had won her many good friends . . . and a few hurtful users. The users showed their true colors when she had to say no to something, or she had to put her foot down, but she had no problem walking away from them when they showed her what they really were like.

But Brian wasn’t a user. So why was she having a hard time letting go of her wants this time? With a sinking feeling, she realized she knew exactly why. How would Brian respond? For the first time since they started dating, she had doubts.

Marissa swallowed before speaking. “I’m still easy to please, Brian, but these are big decisions and I feel like—if I give up too much, and I have to live with the consequences of that every single day—I’ll end up feeling resentful. It’s not like deciding where to eat or what movie to watch. Settling for a waffle when I really want a pancake, or watching a thriller when I really want a romantic comedy isn’t a big deal. At least, it never has been for me. But if I don’t like the outside of the house I come home to every single day of my life, don’t you think I should at least be happy with the inside? If we want our marriage to last forever, shouldn’t we both have happy memories of the wedding? I can agree to the wedding planner, and even to a bigger wedding, but only if it’s to share our big day with more family and friends . . . not your clients. When I think of having your clients there, it begins to feel like something else.”

Brian glanced at her again, this time frowning. “You sound like you’re having doubts,” he said, his voice even, but the look she’d caught in his eyes told her he was alarmed.

Something in Marissa ached hard. She unclenched her fist and allowed him to hold her hand, and held on tight. “I think these are our first big compromises, that’s all. We need to make sure we’re on the same page, even if one of us is at the beginning of it and the other is at the end.” She shrugged. “It probably happens to everyone.”

Brian sighed and squeezed her hand hard. “I love you, Marissa. I don’t want to make you unhappy. We don’t have to invite all my clients to the wedding. And we can look at more houses online and narrow them down before meeting with the Realtor again. I’m sure there’s something we both like out there. We should probably cast a wider net.”

Marissa raised their combined hands to kiss his fist. “Thank you,” she said, feeling relieved. “There’ll be something we both agree on, I’m sure of it.”

She thought about the Cursed Lover then and smiled to herself. If Johnny could quite happily choose to live in the house where his own descendant had murdered someone so five orphaned puppies could have a home, surely she and Brian could compromise on little things for each other.

But when they met with the wedding planner that evening, new disagreements surfaced. “Your wedding will take place in the winter and yellow is not a winter color. It’ll look odd.”

Marissa smiled and shrugged. “I don’t mind. Yellow’s my favorite color. It’s sunny and happy, no matter the season, and that’s what I want my marriage to be.”

But when she looked over at Brian, she could tell he did mind. “This is why we hired her, Marissa, to help make it look classy. I told you I’d limit the number of clients and colleagues I’ll invite, but there will still be a few.”

Marissa breathed in and out, and managed to swallow her first reply, which was that he was acting like a groomzilla. Compromise. That’s what relationships were about. It wasn’t like her to have mean thoughts. “Red, then.”

Brian looked at the wedding planner, who smiled wide. “A red and white winter wedding will be classy and beautiful.”

“Like you,” Brian said to Marissa, before placing a sweet kiss on her lips. The wedding planner beamed at them.

Later on, when they were swinging on the porch swing in front of Brian’s house, Marissa asked, “Why do you love me?”

Brian gave her a puzzled smile. “What do you mean?”

She scraped her foot against the floorboards. “I don’t know. I’m just wondering.”

Brian kissed the bare skin on her shoulder. “Remember when you were my Spanish tutor, in high school?”

She nestled into his arms and nodded.

“I always thought you’d make someone a great girlfriend someday. You were patient and caring, and you smiled and laughed a lot, even though you were worried I’d flunk.” He chuckled. “Being with you was easy. I was dating Helena Katz at the time, and there was always some sort of drama going on.”

Marissa laughed. “I remember. But you were captain of the football team, and she was head cheerleader, so you made the perfect couple.”