Chapter Thirteen

HALEY

When she wanted something from her parents, she hovered. Haley couldn’t remember exactly when this habit started, but for most of her life it had worked, more or less.

The parents were big readers. Instead of watching the eighty-ninth season of Survivor or CSI Dubuque, they actually read books. Dad read naval novels; Mom, medical journals, how-tos, and memoirs.

“What is it, Haley?” Mom didn’t even bother to look up.

She’d been leaning against the wall of their den, tucking her hands in her jeans pockets, commenting every once in a while how much she loved the plush leather reading chairs.

“I need to talk to you.” She bolted in, sitting on the edge of the matching leather sofa, the tip of her boots disturbing the golden angle of Dad’s reading lamp.

Mom removed her reading glasses and closed her book, keeping her place with her thumb. “Is this about the shop?”

“Yes. Look, I know y’all—”

Dad held up his finger. “Hold on, Hal, let me finish this paragraph.” He could never stop reading in the middle of a sentence. “Okay, now, what is it?” He set his book on the end table and leaned forward, arms on his thighs, his focus on Haley.

“I need money.”

“I knew it.” Mom slapped the wide wooden arm of her chair. “What did I tell you, David? There’s no way Haley can renovate that shop without help.”

“Did you talk to the bank?” Dad said.

Haley nodded. “This afternoon. They are happy for me to have the shop. They are not happy to give me a loan. I have no collateral.” She glanced from one parent to the next. “You two could cosign for me.”

“Nope, we did that with Aaron and we’ll never do it again.” Mom lived by the rules she set. Dad claimed it was her way of feeling secure. She was fifteen when her father died, and it was the rules and the boundaries her mother set that helped her feel safe.

“I’m not Aaron.” Oldest brother Aaron asked the folks to cosign on a sprawling place in north Atlanta five or so years ago. But his wife wanted a bigger house, and after that Haley only knew about some kerfuffle over money and being upside down and defaulting. Brother Seth said the tension was pretty thick for over a year. Haley missed the fun by being in Afghanistan and California. “I have twenty thousand from the city as well as some of my own money. Ten grand. I’ve earmarked that to get the business going. Website, advertising, inventory, blah, blah.” Haley leaned forward. “Cole Danner’s going to be my foreman.”

“Cole?” Mom said. “How can you trust him after what his father did?”

“Joann, come on.” Daddy’s rebuke was subtle but unmistakable. “Cole’s a good contractor. A good man.”

“I agree. Don’t blame him for what his dad did, Mom. Look at his mother, Tina. She’s running Ella’s like a well-oiled machine.”

“Then maybe ask her for a loan.”

“Right. ‘Hey, Tina, my wealthy parents can’t see their way to give me a loan so they sent me to ask you.’ ” Sarcasm rarely worked on Mom, but Haley employed it anyway. “You know I’ll pay you back.”

“How much do you need?” Daddy, the engineer of the family, always asked for the details and facts.

“Eighty grand.”

“Eighty grand!” Mom fired out of her chair. “David, don’t even think about it. No.”

“Why not?” Haley stood, arms wide. “Look at this place. You have a beautiful home, nice cars, a pool, a maid and lawn crew, a country club membership. You go to Hawaii or Europe every other year. You’re successful people. I know you have money in the bank. I’m your daughter. Why can’t I have a loan? Loan. I’m not asking for a freebie.”

The three of them stood in a triangle of silence. Cold, stone silence. Daddy jiggled the change in his pocket while studying his old, worn slippers. Mom stared at the loaded built-in bookshelves, her hands resting on the back of her hips.

“Okay, well, thanks.” Haley started for the door. Weirdness from the parents wasn’t unusual. They were kind and thoughtful, loving, but lived by an unusual set of ideals. Dad said it went back to Mom’s teen years, but Haley figured Mom got it naturally, born in her genes. She paused at the door. “Is this about grad school?”

“No.” Daddy’s clipped response raised more questions.

“Then what?”

“Joann, you want to field this?”

Haley waited, her pulse deep and steady in her ears. “Mom, is something wrong? Is it your practice? Are you sick or something?”

“I’m not sick. And it’s not my practice.”

“But you just don’t want to help your only daughter with the shop.” Haley stated it plain, leaving no room for doubt, pulling her “only daughter” card. Desperate times called for desperate measures.

Mom faced her. “I do not want you opening the old wedding shop. Let them raze it to the ground and put up the stupid parking lot. Akron wants to bring a lot of business to Heart’s Bend, Haley. That wedding shop is only going to service a small portion of the population. You’ll employ, what, one or two people? Akron will employ hundreds.”

“You’re more concerned about Heart’s Bend’s economy than your daughter’s personal venture?”

“Of course not. But I am concerned that a wedding shop doesn’t make sense. This is not 1890 or 1930 when women dress up to go into town to buy a slab of beef or a pair of stockings. Brides order online today. They go to Atlanta or New York for gowns. No one buys a trousseau anymore. How are you going to make it work? Huh, tell me?”

“I’ll make it work. I have a plan. The wedding market is a billion-dollar industry.” Haley glanced back and forth between her parents. Something was up. Mom’s opposition wasn’t about Haley. Or the shop. “Are you two in with Akron?”

“No, we’re not in business with Akron,” Daddy said.

“But you agree the corner of Blossom and First needs to be a big parking lot? Makes no sense. Daddy, you’re on the Downtown Restoration committee. You supported me at the town council meeting. Mom, you used to be on the board of the Historical Society.”

“Joann, tell her.”

“Tell me what?”

“There’s nothing to tell.” Mom disappeared from the room, leaving Haley surfing a wave of confusion.

“Daddy, help me out here.”

“Hal, I’ll support you any way I can, but that’s my wife who just left the room and I have to be on her side. Can you understand?”

“Why is there a side, Dad? I’m not against her.”

“I know. I know. But she’s got something on her heart that bothers her and this shop just pokes at it.” Dad gave her a gentle shoulder squeeze. “Buck up. She’ll tell you when she’s ready. I’ve been telling her it’s time.”

“Tell me what? What does the wedding shop have to do with Mom?”

“That’s her story.” Daddy leaned to see down the hall. “Sometimes the things that hurt us don’t make sense, but they hurt all the same. Your mom is a stellar woman. A rock. Raised you kids while starting her career, then her clinic.” Dad wagged his finger in the air. “But she’s got a pain deep in her craw she doesn’t talk about. It shadows her decisions sometimes.”

“I’m only asking for a loan, Daddy. Me, your daughter.”

“I know, kiddo, and I’d give it to you in a heartbeat if this thing didn’t touch a deep chord with your mother.”

“Then tell me. What is it?”

“It’s not for me to say.” Daddy kissed her forehead. “As for your shop, I remember a young woman of faith in this house who took her brothers’ teasing without so much as batting an eye when she came home from a church camp with Tammy saying she’d met Jesus. Trust in your prayers and your God. If it’s meant to be, the money will come.”

Haley leaned against the doorframe. For a man who didn’t see the need for God or faith in his life, who only attended church on Christmas and Easter, Daddy spoke an awful lot of truth.

“To be honest, Daddy, I’m not sure where my faith got off to the last few years.”

“Then hunt it down. Bring it back. And don’t let it go.”