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“Have you decided what you’re going to do?”
“About?” I asked.
Mom refilled my cup and coffee and sat across from me. “Your job, Wilder. You have to have a job. You’re only twenty-eight.”
“I have a pretty hefty savings account, mom.”
“How?” she asked. “You were living in the city where things are not cheap, Wilder.”
As if I didn’t know that. I had learned very quickly when I moved to Chicago that I would need to start making bank if I wanted to get anywhere.
It was easy to make money and save it when you didn’t have anyone or thing to blow it on. Sure, I had dated for the past nine years, but it was never serious. After about three dates, they would get bored with me, or I would be too busy working to go out with them.
The year before I moved back to Adams, things had slowed down because I had worked my way up to a management position, but I still worked steadily. “I worked a lot, mom, and I only went out with friends once or twice a month. I also lived in a studio apartment with a brick building view that hadn’t been updated since the eighties. It was easy to save money.” I could have easily dropped over two thousand a month on a place, but I instead opted for the place I had and saved every penny I could.”
“Well, that’s good.” Mom sighed and sat back. “So does that mean you aren’t going to have a job?”
Mom and dad both thought that if you didn’t have a job, you didn’t have anything. They were the ones I had gotten my work ethic from, but I had also learned the past nine years that if all you did were work, you wouldn’t have anything more than a stack of money to count with no one to share it with. So, I had my mountain of cash, and now I was ready to find the person to count it with.
I was going to get a job eventually, but for right now, I was good enjoying just living.
“I will eventually have a job, mom. I need a little time just to relax. For the past nine years, I worked sixty-hour weeks without stop.”
She reached out and patted my hand. “Good, honey. Your dad and I are very proud of you, but we just don’t want you to move back to Adams and lose everything.”
They would see eventually. I wasn’t going to lose anything. I was going to gain a lot.
I leaned back and stretched my legs out in front of me. “When did that gas station pop up?” I asked.
Mom tipped her head to the side. “Oh, probably over a year ago. Some big wig came into town and bought up a bunch of property on the west side of town. They put up the gas station, and there is word that he is thinking of opening that chicken place.”
“That chicken place?”
Mom nodded. “Chicken King.”
“Why on earth would he do that? We have Chicken Biscuit. Nothing beats Chicken Biscuit. I used to dream about that place while I was gone.” Nothing beats running over to Chicken Biscuit during lunchtime in high school and getting a honey chicken biscuit and a large Coke.
Nothing.
Sure as hell not Chicken King.
Mom shrugged. “I don’t know, honey. That’s just the rumor I heard. I’m sure once he realizes we already have a chicken place, he’ll think of some other restaurant to open.”
“The guy can literally build anything he wants except for a chicken place,” I laughed. “Someone needs to help him see the light if he thinks Chicken King is it.”
“Have you visited with any of your friends yet?”
I shrugged. “Macon helped me move yesterday. I haven’t reached out to anyone else.” I didn’t really talk to anyone from Adams while I was gone besides my mom and dad. It wasn’t like I had talked to Macon that much either.
I wasn’t kidding when I said I worked a lot and didn’t have much time for anything else.
“I heard you ran into Shelby yesterday.”
I nodded and took a sip of my coffee.
“How did that go?”
I smiled and set down my cup. “I’ve been away from Adams for a while mom, but I still remember how things work around here. I’m sure you got the scoop firsthand from Del and Flo before their shrubs recovered.”
Mom tipped her head to the side and cringed. “Did she really fall face first into the bushes?”
“It wasn’t as bad as it sounds. She just tripped and didn’t have anything to catch her.”
“But she did have you there to help her up.” Mom took a sip of her coffee and batted her eyes at me over the rim of the mug.
“Anyone would have done the same thing,” I reasoned.
She set her mug down and quirked her eyebrow. “I don’t think most people would stop their car and jump out to help someone who fell into the bushes.”
“In Adams? I’m sure they would.” Without a doubt. They might stop just to be the first to have the gossip to spread, but they would still stop.
Mom shrugged. “Maybe you are right, but I think there might be more going on than what you are telling me.”
“I didn’t tell you anything, mom. Flo and Del told you what happened,” I laughed.
“And did they tell me everything?” she asked.
“For the most part. I don’t think they knew that I called her name, and then she tripped.” It wasn’t something I was hiding. It was just no one had asked me for my side of the story.
“Wilder,” mom gasped. “Why on earth did you call her name? You must have scared the living daylights out of her.”
“Because I wanted to talk to her,” I said simply.
Mom gasped, and her jaw dropped. “Shelby Lyn Baker? I didn’t even know you knew her, let alone enough to call her name just driving down the street.”
“Mom,” I drawled. “Shelby Lyn and I got to know each other senior year.”
“Why didn’t I know this?” she demanded. “I really like Shelby. She makes the most beautiful wreaths that just make the whole town of Adams so homey and gorgeous.”
“So I’ve heard. Flo told me I better have my porch decorated by her.”
Mom smiled. “She is so right. Do you want me to call Shelby and see if she can fit you in?”
“You have her number?”
Mom nodded. “I think everyone does. I’m not joking when I say she decorates everyone’s porches for all the holidays and seasons. She’s made herself a wreath empire.” She pointed her finger at me. “And boughs, too. She’s done swags before, but she tends to do the wreaths and boughs the most.”
“I don’t even know what a bough is.” Was I supposed to?
“It’s like a wreath, but not a circle. More like a tapered rectangle.”
“Why don’t you give me her number, and I can set up a time for her to come over,” I suggested. “That would be easier than you calling her and then calling me, to only call her back.”
“Or you could just go over to her house. She has her work area in the basement of her house. She bought the beautiful Victorian over on Maple.”
“Really?” Flo had mentioned Shelby Lyn lived over on Maple, but I didn’t know it was the Victorian. Shelby had confessed to me before I moved that she dreamed of one day living in that exact house.
She had done it. And all with the help of wreaths and boughs, whatever the hell those were.
“Yeah. She repainted the outside pretty much the original color, and from what I hear she spruced up the inside. I would love to see it.”
The Victorian over on Maple was huge and was more than big enough for one person. At least I assumed Shelby Lyn was just one person living there.
“Does she live there with her husband?” I asked.
Mom shook her head. “Shelby never got married. Heck, as far as I know, she never really dates. At least not anyone around town.”
That was interesting.
The guys of Adams were idiots for not calling dibs on her. I would have done it a long time ago if I had stayed in Adams.
But I hadn’t.
I had to leave. I needed to get out of Adams and prove to myself I could make it no matter where I was. I knew if I stayed in Adams life would be easy, but I didn’t want easy. I wanted to go out and make it on my own without anyone knowing who I was and just giving me things because of my name.
“Kids?”
Mom shook her head. “No, honey.”
This was the most information I had been able to get about Shelby. I should have just come to mom right away.
“Give me her number.”
Mom pursed her lips. “What are you thinking, Wilder? Shelby is a sweet girl, and I don’t want you stringing her along or anything.”
I cocked my head to the side. “Name one time I strung along any girl, mom. I don’t do that type of thing.”
“Well,” mom drawled. “I haven’t seen you too much in the past nine years. Maybe that city corrupted you.”
“Mom,” I laughed. “Just give me her number, and I promise I won’t hurt Shelby.”
She rattled off the number from her phone, and I plugged it into my phone.
“You know, it’s kind of funny how you’re telling me not to hurt Shelby when in reality she could be the one to hurt me. She might hang the phone up on me or use me.”
“Pfft,” mom mumbled. “You don’t know Shelby if you think she would do either of those things. Shelby is the sweetest girl, and I would be surprised if she even knew how to use someone.”
I stood and dropped my cup into the sink. “I’m going to head out. I want to finish unpacking, and then I need to run to the furniture store for a few things. The house is a lot bigger than my studio apartment was.”
“You want me to come with you?”
“You’re gonna help me unpack boxes?” I asked.
Mom shook her head and laughed. “No. I meant I could go with you for the furniture shopping.”
I pulled my keys from my pocket and leaned down to press a kiss to the top of her head. “I’ll be back in a couple of hours to pick you up.”
“I’ll be ready, honey.”
I walked out of the house and slipped into my truck. I stuck the key into the ignition and cranked the engine.
The truck roared to life, and I pulled out my phone.
I had Shelby's phone number now.
Something I had wanted for nine years, but I had been too chicken to get.
Now it was time to see if I was going to use it or if I was going to chicken out like I had the past nine years.
I cleared my screen and tossed the phone on the seat next to me.
Only time would tell if I would get the courage up to call her.
*
