The Prince Charming List (11 page)

Jared said Marissa had a gift she wasn’t using to its full potential. That she was making a living, not a life. The beautiful dishes she made might end up shattered on the floor or packed away in someone’s attic. Did that mean she was putting her time, energy and abilities into something that didn’t last? And did that mean I was doing the same thing? Hair grew. Hair went gray. Nail polish chipped. Over time, gravity won against firming creams, sunscreen and Botox. Yet this was what I was planning to put my life into. And if I wasn’t supposed to, then why did I have to be so good at it? And enjoy it so much?

I wrote down one question, because I knew Dex literally needed things spelled out.

Are you talking about me?

On Wednesday morning, while I was waiting patiently for my raspberry Danish, Sally limped out of the kitchen.

“Sally, what happened?” I blurted out the question, not realizing it would momentarily suspend conversation in the entire café.

“Arthritis. It’s always there, some days it just clamors for more attention, that’s all.”

“Your ma worked in the kitchen until she was seventy-two,” one of the men reminded her. “Can’t remember anything slowing that old gal down.”

“Maybe she didn’t have arthritis,” I pointed out in Sally’s defense.

“She didn’t.” Sally poured coffee with one hand and kneaded her hip with the other. “Dad did. I thought for years his bum knee was an excuse to lie on the couch and read Zane Gray westerns, but now I’m not so sure.”

“Ain’t it about time for you to retire, anyway, Sal?” one of the men in a nearby booth cackled.

There was an immediate flurry of activity in response to his question. He was attacked and beaten from all sides with the flyers from the Sunday newspaper.

“Who’d take over the place?” Sally’s scowl swept the length of the counter. “I barely make a living as it is. The whole bunch of you howl like a pack of coyotes if I raise the cost of a cup of coffee a few cents.”

She wrapped up a Danish and slid it across the counter to me. “Here you go, kiddo. Pencil me in for a dye job, would you? Saturday afternoon? I’ll try to close up early.”

A chorus of discontented murmurs rocked the café. Sally’s eyes narrowed. “Oh, for mercy’s sake! I’ll cook your eggs, but then you all can go home and tell your wives to throw a roast beef in the oven. Or better yet, do it yourselves.”

I tried not to laugh as the grumbling subsided and the men hunkered low over their plates of eggs and bacon.

“Trouble is, I had two girls quit on me. There’s a rumor the gas station on the highway is going to be open twenty-four hours and they might add on one of those sub sandwich shops. One of the girls applied there and the other one just got hired at Whiley.” Sally had lowered her voice, but one of the men overheard us.

“That sandwich place might give you some competition, hey, Sally? Maybe force you to lower the price of your BLT a little.”

“I lower the price any more and I might as well come to your house every day and fix your lunch for free,” Sally shot back.

“One of them got hired at Whiley?” I thought about Amanda and wondered if it was the job she’d interviewed for.

“Yesterday. I can’t match their hourly wage.”

“Amanda Clark mentioned she’s looking for a job,” I said hesitantly.

“Guess I’m not surprised,” Sally said under her breath. This time no one heard her but me.

“Maybe you could give her a call.” I held my breath. Sally and Bernice had known each other for years and their friendship was the only thread that connected Sally and me. It probably wasn’t enough to give me the privilege of expressing my opinion.

“I thought Bernice said you were a city girl.” Sally speared me with a sharp look. I was a busybody. That’s what she was thinking.

“I am.”

“You sound small town to me.” Sally gave me an approving nod. “I’ll give Amanda a call today.”

A call. Hearing the words reminded me it was the middle of the week and I still hadn’t summoned the courage to stop in to see Jared at Marissa’s pottery shop. I’d seen the lights on in the garage and heard music rolling out of the windows in the evening, but I hadn’t talked to him since our impromptu picnic, and the Friday canoe outing was getting closer.

I decided to use my lunch break to say hello. What I didn’t know was that I was going to have to stand in line. A cluster of teenage girls roamed the shop while Marissa stood behind the counter, wrapping up a platter for another pair of girls who were closer to my age.

“Are you having a sale today?” I wandered over to her after she closed the cash register.

Marissa snorted softly. “What I have is a graduate student that every girl in this town between the age of sixteen and sixty has a crush on. You’d think Michelangelo was working in the back room.”

I could feel the heat that crept into my face. “Oh.”

“What can I help you with, Heather? I’ve been selling so much this week I haven’t had a chance to put out any new pieces.”

“I don’t need—”

“Hey, Heather. It’s about time you decided to stop by. I was beginning to think you don’t support the arts.” Jared appeared in the doorway just behind the counter, grinning, and immediately the girls hovering by the vases inched closer.

One of them sighed. Not that I blamed her. Jared took ripped blue jeans and a plain white T-shirt to a whole new level.

I saw the flash of surprise in Marissa’s eyes and then something that looked like…
disappointment?

“Never mind. I guess you found what you’re looking for.”

“C
ome on back.” Jared motioned to me and I scooted around the counter in a cowardly attempt to escape the angry glares of the girls who stood watching us.

“I only have half an hour.” I followed Jared into his makeshift studio, where an enormous mound of clay, molded in the rough shape of a cow, stood in the center of the room. Next to it, Jared had pinned a series of black-and-white photos of Junebug to an easel.

“The tricky part will be getting her out of here. We might have to take the service doors off.” Jared walked over to a deep sink attached to the wall and scrubbed off the clay on his hands.

“I’ve heard rumors about Junebug. Is she really the diva everyone says she is?”

“She insists on having her own trailer—with fresh flowers—and ten gallons of Evian water. Or else.” He stretched out the hem of his T-shirt, which looked like a prop from
Jaws
. “Lester insists it was a love bite.”

“Mmm. Maybe she’s the president of your fan club.” Was he going to deny it? Seriously, when did teenage girls start spending their money on
pottery?

“Musicians. Artists. It’s all part of the mystique.” He winked at me, then snagged a thermos on the floor next to Junebug and used it to nudge me toward a backless, red velvet sofa. When I plopped down on the cushion, a cloud of dust rose into the air.

“Another piece of history from Marissa’s basement,” Jared said. He perched on the edge of the sofa and gave it an affectionate pat, raising another dust cloud. “Not quite as cool as the sea serpent, though.”

Which I still hadn’t met. But maybe other girls had. Now that I was sitting next to him, I felt awkward. Probably the aftershocks of a major reality check. A guy like Jared Ward was a novelty in Prichett. A gorgeous, unattached novelty.

He poured our coffee into a pair of Marissa’s handmade mugs and gave one to me. “I can’t believe there are still towns like this. I talked to a guy in the café last night who’s never traveled outside a three-county area.”

“Maybe Prichett is like Brigadoon.”

“Who?”

“Brigadoon isn’t a
who,
it’s a movie about a village in Scotland that only appears for a single day, every hundred years.” I’d seen the movie at least half a dozen times. It was one of Grandma Lowell’s favorites.

“Never heard of it.”

Maybe likes musicals
was another one of those unrealistic qualities Bree had hinted at.

My cell phone suddenly began to dance in my pocket and I saw Annie’s name on the screen.

“Do you mind?”

Jared shrugged. I took that as a
no
.

“Hi, Heather. I hope I’m not interrupting anything.” As usual, Annie’s voice was full of laughter, as if she had a secret she was willing to let you in on if you asked.

“No, this is fine. I’m on my lunch break.” I didn’t mention
where
I was taking it.

“I was wondering if you’re free this evening. The senior high girls are having a going-away party for Greta. We’re going to do the typical girl’s night out thing—watch a movie, eat chocolate. I thought maybe you’d like to come.”

I couldn’t say no. Bernice had a soft spot for Greta Lewis and I knew she’d want me to be there to cheer her on. Greta was leaving at the end of the summer for college in New York, where she planned to major in fashion design. The evening gown Greta had designed for Elise to wear in the Proverbs 31 pageant was the reason she’d been accepted into the program.

“What time should I come over?”

“Seven. That’s when the twins go to bed.”

I tried to imagine keeping a group of teenage girls—who’d been devouring large amounts of chocolate—quiet. “Annie, why don’t you bring them over to my apartment? That way we won’t keep the twins awake and Stephen can have a quiet evening.”

There was such a long pause that I flipped my phone over to make sure we hadn’t been cut off. “That’s exactly what Bernice would say,” Annie finally said. “Are you sure?”

“Positive.”

“We’ll be there!”

“Big plans for tonight?” Jared asked when I tucked the phone away, still basking in the warmth of Annie’s compliment.

“That was my friend, Annie Carpenter.” I hadn’t been sure about Sally, but I knew I could safely claim Annie as a friend. “We’re going to watch a movie tonight with the girls in the youth group.”

“Sounds like fun.” He crooked an eyebrow at me and the sarcasm registered. Without thinking, I elbowed him in the side.

“It
will
be.”

Jared chuckled. “I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone like you, Heather Lowell.”

“Hairstylists,” I demurred. “It’s part of the mystique.”

But I spent way too much time that afternoon trying to figure out what he might have meant by that.

After I closed up for the day, I ran upstairs to do damage control. Dex had been loose in the apartment and I couldn’t remember what the next thing on his list was.

Easing my way into the apartment, I discovered a new maze of paint cans; only these were filled with varnish. He hadn’t stripped the hardwood floor yet, which was a good thing, because it’s hard to entertain if all your furniture is crowded into a galley kitchen.

I checked my watch. An hour would give me time to vacuum, dust and make a pan of brownies. I tackled them in order of importance. Which meant brownies first, dusting last. I collected the ingredients and ignored the recipe on the back of the box. The brownies were supposed to be fat-free but by the time I added pecans, white chocolate chips and half a container of caramel ice cream topping, I think I successfully defeated their original purpose.

In the name of multitasking, I pushed the vacuum cleaner with one hand and dusted with the other. When I got close to the sofa, where Snap was napping, she gave me the evil eye. She was sprawled in the center of Bernice’s afghan, which I distinctly remembered folding into a neat square before I went to work that morning. Unless Snap had figured out a way to
unfold
it, I could only assume Dex had been the culprit.

“He was sleeping on company time again, wasn’t he, Snap?”

Snap yawned, refusing to rat him out. I
knew
the catnip mouse I’d found under the coffee table had been an attempt to win her over.

Bree was the first arrival. Annie hadn’t mentioned she was coming to the party, too, and I happily reeled her inside to help me get things organized. It also gave me a few minutes to tell her about my lunch break with Jared.

“I wouldn’t worry about all his groupies,” Bree said when I took a breath. “Not when he keeps making plans to spend time with you.”

“I keep waiting to find something
wrong
with him.”

“You can’t find anything?”

“Nothing. It’s…scary.”

Bree didn’t crack a smile at my description. “Because he might be the one?”

I was amazed she could put my confusion into words. “When you meet someone while you’re in high school, you know in the back of your mind that it probably isn’t going to last. But then you get to a certain point and suddenly, it could. He could be the
forever
and that makes it different. It makes it—”

“Scary.”

Now we both laughed but mine faded into a sigh. “You have to get to know him, Bree. He’s great. I think my dad would like him.”

“You said he wanted to go riding. Bring him over. Horses are a great judge of character.”

“I thought that was dogs.”

“So we’ll introduce him to Clancy and the Colonel.”

A knock on the door interrupted us and before I could open it, Annie’s girls burst into the apartment, armed with videos and enough junk food to stock their own vending machine.

“Stephen says thank you,” Annie whispered as she handed off a grocery bag to Greta’s best friend, Melissa. “I don’t think giving the twins a bath and putting them to bed was as terrifying as a living room full of girls watching
Sense and Sensibility
.”

Ooh, one of my favorites.

Everyone crowded into the living room and sprawled on the floor but gave Greta a place of honor on the sofa next to Snap. Halfway through the movie, Alicia scooted closer to me.

“Can you braid my hair, Heather?”

I nodded because it would give me something to do with my hands other than scooping up salsa and tortilla chips. “You don’t have much for me to work with,” I teased her.

Alicia knew what I was talking about and she grinned. Last December, she, Greta and the other girls in the youth group had had their heads shaved to convince Melissa, who was undergoing chemotherapy, to come to the senior Christmas tea. I’d driven to Prichett to help Bernice at the salon that day but hadn’t told her I was coming.

She wasn’t as shocked to see me as Alex Scott was.

Bernice hadn’t told me anything about my birth father up until that day. Sometimes in our conversations I could hear the tension in her voice and I sensed that if I followed it to its source,
he
would be there. So I’d never asked. I told myself it was enough that I’d found Bernice after twenty years. I didn’t need to know
him,
too. But her silence made me uneasy. If she’d had a relationship that had produced a child—me—then why couldn’t she talk about him? Maybe I was the child of an abuser. Or a drug addict. My imagination had conjured up different scenarios but none of them came anywhere near the truth, which I discovered that day at the Cut and Curl when Alex had decided to surprise Bernice, too.

After the girls left, I’d gone into the back room to get us some chocolate. When I came out, Alex was standing there. I remember telling him he looked like Alex Scott. Instead of laughing, he got the same expression on his face that Devon Ross had had when his partner pulled a gun on him in
Streets of Gold.
But it wasn’t his expression that answered all my unspoken questions. It was Bernice’s.

I was the child of an actor. A celebrity. The man whose face I occasionally saw on magazine covers at the grocery store. The man who played the part of Devon Ross in a series of espionage movies that were favorites in my video collection.

I hate to admit it, but I immediately assumed that Alex had dumped Bernice when he found out she was pregnant with me. Later that night, she told me that she was the one who’d left. I didn’t quite understand what happened between them, but she’d never told Alex about me. She thought he’d want to meet me, but a month went by and I didn’t hear from him. Until the end of January. He contacted my parents and told them he’d like to meet me but he understood—given the situation—if I didn’t want to meet him.

I’d talked to Mom and Dad about it. Prayed about it. Lost sleep over it. And then I made my decision. Someone who’d hurt Bernice, I could have gone a lifetime without knowing. Someone who’d loved her—who I was pretty sure
still
loved her—I wanted to get to know.

“Heather, are you falling asleep? There’s a line forming in front of you!” Greta’s voice rose over the hum of conversation and brought me back to reality. The movie was almost over and the girls sat in an uneven row behind Alicia, eager for me to do their hair, too. I didn’t mind, because it gave me a chance to get to know them better…and give them some subtle tips on basic hair and skin care.

If you go a little lighter on the eyeliner, it actually makes your eyes look bluer and you want people to notice them, not the eyeliner.

You don’t need to buy an expensive face peel. I have a recipe for one and your mom has everything you need for it right in the kitchen. Remind me to jot it down before you leave.

I talked one girl out of getting her lip pierced and another out of chemically straightening her naturally curly hair.
Anti-frizz gel. It’s your best friend.

Annie noticed me trying to hide a yawn.

“Okay, girls, Heather has to open up her
other
salon early in the morning. Before we leave, though, I’d like everyone to come over and stand in a circle around Greta. I have something for her.”

“Grace graffiti!” All the girls shouted the words.

I knew what they were talking about. Bernice had told me about the scripture verses Annie wrote on three-by-five cards and gave to people to encourage them. Bernice had taken the habit to heart. Since I’d moved in, I’d discovered a few of them sprinkled throughout the apartment. One in the medicine cabinet. One taped to the inside of the closet door. I’d even found one skewered on a wire hanger in the closet.

Annie put her hand on Greta’s shoulder and the laughter in the room subsided. It got so quiet I could hear the second hand on the kitchen clock ticking.

“Greta, you are
so
loved. A light in the world. Chosen. Gifted.” Annie’s words may have been for Greta, but silently I claimed them, too. “The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you. The Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace. The Lord gift you and make you prosper.”