Just A Small Town Girl (2 page)

“And the bedrooms are this way,” Rose walked down the hallway beside the archway leading into the kitchen.

I peeked into the first open door, a bathroom. The walls were painted with vertical stripes alternating between a bright yellow and an equally bright pink. The combination, which reminded me of lemonade for some reason, made the room seem larger than it already was. A standalone shower stood in the corner with a garden style bathtub seated next to it. A simple pedestal sink sat below three panels of mirrors I was impressed to learn housed a medicine cabinet discreetly tucked into the wall.

Rose stood outside an open door halfway down the hall when I emerged from the bathroom.

“This is the guest bedroom or the office or whatever it might be used for,” It was a midsized perfectly square room with pale blue walls and a large window letting afternoon sunlight stream in. “And this is the master bedroom,” she opened a closed door at the end of the hall.

I followed her inside. The walls were painted pale salmon and featured four large windows, two cut into each of the walls diagonal from the door. It was large enough to accommodate a queen or king sized bed and a desk or sitting area as well as the other typical bedroom furniture. Rose threw open a door tucked into the wall to reveal a walk-in closet I could live in. The more I saw of the surprisingly tasteful apartment, the more certain I became of one simple fact; I couldn’t afford it.

“Um, Rose,” I looked at the light comforter, embarrassed, “How much did you say the rent was again?”

“Oh, don’t worry yourself with that just yet, I know you’re starting a new job and you won’t be able to pay rent for a little while, not until you get furniture and a few paychecks for savings and all of that,” she waved her hand in the air as if my concerns were gnats.

“But, I’d like to know how much it will be exactly,” I was very uncomfortable with the idea of living there for free, taking advantage of her kindness.

She threw out a number that was far too low for the apartment and I fixed her with a pointed look, “Plus utilities dear and you can pay your way by helping me with this little guy from time to time.”

Trading my pride for the reality of my financial and housing situation, I just nodded and smiled as she placed the keys in my palm.

The next morning I arrived at Dr. Schultz’s office at 8:00 AM exactly. He hadn’t told me what time to come in and I’d forgotten to ask, so I guessed at the time and hoped I wasn’t late.

“Ah, Piper, just on time,” Dr. Schultz was dragging his signs from inside the office when I came to a stop in front of his door.

“Good morning Dr. Schultz,” I smiled and began helping him pull the signs outside. He’d acquired a new sign that read ‘GET A CHECKUP BEFORE YOU CHECK OUT’ with a casket below the words.

“Would you mind getting the chalk from the top drawer of the reception desk? Actually your desk,” he laughed to himself while I went to fetch the chalk.

“Now would you please write ‘DON’T SEE THAT QUACK, WE HAVE A KNACK FOR HEALTHCARE’ and draw an arrow that points across the street next to the word quack?” he smiled at me as if this was a typical request.

My first day was boring for the morning hours, which were spent rummaging through the papers strewn about my new desk and dusting the waiting room. In the afternoon, after I spent my lunch break sitting on the curb in front of the office chewing thoughtfully on a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, the phone began to ring almost ceaselessly. The calls were consistently from old women asking for appointments as soon as possible. A few of them even requested appointments that afternoon and guffawed when I scheduled them for the following morning. Dr. Schultz sat in the waiting room, snuggled into a comfortable chair, while I struggled with the phone and appointment book. At 5:00, he began waving his arms above his head and shouted across the room for me to go home.

A few moments after I crossed the threshold into my apartment, a knock called me back to the door.

“Hello, Piper Lee, how was your first day at work?” before I could answer, Rose thrust Riley’s chubby baby form into my arms, “Effie and I have some herb shopping to do a few towns over. Do you mind watching Riley until I get back?”

“No problem,” I adjusted him in my arms, smiling at the happy baby, and waited for Rose to drop his diaper bag, playpen, play mat, and a few toys in the center of my empty living room floor. Before leaving, she pulled a stroller into the room and kissed us both on the cheek.

As I watched Rose go, I wondered exactly what I was going to do with a five month old for several hours.

As it turned out, watching Riley wasn’t nearly as difficult as I imagined. I knew quite a bit about babies, having babysat my friends’ sons and daughters when they had date night with their husbands and I’d been raised to take care of babies. That combination coupled with the years of home economics classes I’d endured helped me easily slip into taking care of Riley.

He was an overall good baby. We ate apple sauce and spent the rest of our afternoon lying on our stomachs in the center of my empty living room. He gurgled to himself and did little baby pushups, sometimes successfully pushing himself around onto his back, while I watched, occasionally playing peek-a-boo or tickling his side, making him smile an adorable toothless grin, his dark eyes twinkling.

When Riley started to cry, an exhausted wail that couldn’t be soothed by a change of diaper or bottle, I placed him in his playpen with a light blanket tucked loosely around him. My own eyes began to droop, so I dragged the blankets I’d been using as a makeshift bed next to the playpen and curled up, letting Riley’s baby snores soothe me to sleep. The next morning, Rose knocked on my door a few minutes before I planned to leave for work and collected Riley without explanation for her not returning the night before or his parents’ whereabouts.

A few weeks passed in a similar basic schedule, Monday through Friday I worked then came home to watch Riley while Rose ran one errand or another that almost always lasted into the night. Typically Riley was collected from my apartment before I woke up the following morning, so I assumed Rose came home at some point during the night. At work, most of the patients were elderly women who asked if I was single or had children on behalf of their grandsons or sons. A few days after each older woman’s appointment, I expected a call from a deep voice with the same last name asking for an appointment. The parade of single men and matchmakers coupled with the dark haired baby who’d begun smiling at me was a sufficient distraction in my first few weeks in Dunesville.

It was the second Saturday after I began working for Dr. Schultz and the paycheck I’d deposited into my new bank account was burning a hole in my pocket. I’d given Rose what was left of my savings after I purchased some food to get by on until my paycheck came and my hard earned money, the first money I’d earned that way in my entire life, was going to be put toward furniture for my bare apartment. I’d been camping out on my living room floor for weeks and was excited at the prospect of finally purchasing a bed.

I’d visited three yard sales that morning and was finally at one that seemed to hold some promise. A white queen sized sleigh bed frame caught my attention, but the box spring and mattress still in the manufacturer’s plastic and propped next to it convinced me to buy.

“Excuse me,” I waved at the man running the yard sale and began to approach him as soon as I was sure I had his attention, “I wanted to buy that bed and mattress.”

“Aw, Baby I wanted that,” a brunette in a short skirt and cowboy hat who I hadn’t noticed before pouted.

The man blushed a little at the awkward situation before glancing to the brunette’s chest where she’d crossed her arms under her breasts, pushing them toward the low neckline of her tank top.

“But you want me to give it to you Seph,” he glanced at her cleavage again and extended his hands pleadingly, “She’ll actually pay money for it.”

“Fine,” she swayed her hips as she stepped close enough for their chests to brush and leaned forward to speak into his ear, “I guess we won’t get to enjoy it together then.”

His face flushed and I could tell he was considering giving away the bed just for the possibility of having her in it.

“Seriously?” I exclaimed, “I am going to give you money, real cash, and I don’t have a bed,” I looked at the brunette pointedly, “and I don’t have a bunch of random men I’m willing to share a bed with as an alternative.”

I almost immediately regretted my words, not really wanting to argue with a complete stranger, even if she was also a complete slut. To my surprise, she started to laugh.

“Give it to her Rick, she’s right,” she laughed out, it seemed my words hadn’t affected her in the least, “And she has balls.” her cowboy boots crunched the slightly dry grass as she took a step toward me, extending her hand to shake mine, “Persephone,” she announced, smiling.

“Piper,” I took her hand, unsure of whether I was making a friend or enemy.

“Do you have a car here Piper?” she asked, dropping my hand and placing hers on her hips.

“No, I’m really not sure how I planned to get that bed home actually,” I blushed.

“Don’t sweat it girl,” she turned to Rick, “you and your brother can put it in my truck right? Then come to her place and help us set it up?” she dragged her finger down his chest as she spoke.

“Of course, Seph,” he left us to speak with a good looking man standing across the lawn who I assumed was his brother.

“He’s so well trained,” Persephone, or Seph I guess, smiled to herself as she watched the men interact, talking for a moment before lifting my new bed set and carrying it toward a hot pink pickup truck parked in front of the house.

“You do seem to have a way with persuasion,” I didn’t know if I was admiring her talent or judging her actions.

She shrugged; “you needed to get it home somehow right?” she started walking toward the truck, a massive keychain shaped like a unicorn dangling from her fingers.

“Yeah, thanks by the way,” I hurried after her.

Persephone let me sit in the bucket seat beside her in the cab while the men helping us, I still hadn’t caught Rick’s brother’s name, sat in the back, balancing the mattress and headboard during the short drive to my apartment.

Seph visited Rose and Effie while I directed the men to my bedroom and asked them to shift the headboard around until I was sure I liked its placement. When I finally emerged from my bedroom, Seph was standing in my doorway holding a screaming Riley and speaking to a dark haired boy a few years older than me. It wasn’t just
a
dark haired boy. It was
the
dark haired boy from the day I moved in. I hadn’t seen him since we collided, but I’d let my mind wander occasionally to the way his hair fell in his eyes or the gentle outline of his muscles beneath his shirt. Today he wore a dark gray v-neck I wanted to run my fingers along the neckline of, tickling them across the place where skin met fabric.

I shook my head slightly, focusing on the other two people in the room. I couldn’t understand what exactly they were saying, but I could tell the low tones they spoke in were heated. Neither of them were paying very much attention to the wailing baby I assumed Rose must have pawned off on them, so I took a few steps forward them and tugged the baby from Seph’s arms.

Without a word, I walked across the apartment to my kitchen and began feeding him applesauce I’d invested in a few days after I began to watch him and realized it was one of his favorite foods. Riley gurgled at me and smiled while I fed him, the tears on his face drying almost instantly.

“Hey little one look at this,” I whispered to him, walking into my bedroom and laying him on the floor far enough away that he wouldn’t be in the way as I pulled sheets and blankets across the mattress, glad I’d pulled the plastic off and sent it to the dumpster behind the building with Rick. “Pretty nice right?” I tickled his belly and smiled at the gurgling laugh that exploded from him, “Yep, this place is becoming a home. Pretty soon it’ll be finished and I’ll have to find another project.”

I placed Riley on top of the blankets then crawled into the bed beside him, curling up next to him and rolling the baby so his back was on the bed. I rubbed his belly until he fell asleep, making sucking motions with his mouth and breathing out delicate little baby snores. Sleep seized me before I realized how exhausted I was and I dozed in the bed beside him.

I sensed someone watching me before he spoke.

“What is wrong with you? He could roll off the bed or you could roll over and smother him,” a voice pulled me from a very vivid dream about floating on the ocean and I opened my eyes to gather more information about the situation. The mattress caved a little as the dark haired man from earlier kneeled on it and scooped Riley into his arms. His face was colored with concern and I realized his earlier statements weren’t angry, they were just extremely anxious. I was struck by the dark handsomeness of his face and his clean smell in the few moments he leaned close to me before stepping away from the bed, cuddling a still sleeping Riley to his chest. His eyes I’d thought were simply dark brown actually had flecks of gold in them that seemed to light up his entire face. I imagined they might glimmer when he smiled. His hair was almost straight, with only a little wave at the ends, and hung low into his eyes. He was staring at me, no doubt waiting for me to explain my actions.

“Sorry,” I shrugged a little, “I fell asleep,” I wondered who he was to demand explanations from me, but that didn’t stop me from mumbling, “It won’t happen again,” he nodded, seeming satisfied. “Where’s Seph?” I asked, just remembering my feisty new friend.

“She left,” he nearly growled the words, this time his voice was indisputably angry. He slit his eyes before stomping out of my bedroom and slamming my front door.

I visited a few more yard sales that weekend, finding a cute table for my kitchen and a reasonably priced living room set. The couple selling the table delivered it to my apartment for a few extra dollars, but I had no idea how I planned to get the living room set home until a familiar pink truck pulled to a stop in front of the yard I was perusing.

“Hey Pipe,” Persephone grinned out, walking toward me and bumping my hip with her own before coming to a stop next to me, regarding the bright blue couch and loveseat I was trying to get home.

I took a second to absorb her outfit, tiny cutoffs with leather boots that reached just above her knees paired with a red crop top that showed off a flat belly with a little ring poking out of it. She finished the look with the same cowboy hat she’d been wearing the last time I saw her.

“Hi Seph,” I smiled in what I hoped was an endearing way, “Could I ask you a tiny favor?”

“You’ve got to stop buying furniture you can’t get home!” Seph scolded as if she was the one carrying my couch up the flight of stairs leading to my apartment.

We stood at the top of the steps watching Rick and his brother, whose name I still didn’t know, maneuver the jewel toned furniture upstairs. At first I’d laughed when she suggested calling Rick to help us move my furniture, but I discovered she was completely serious when Rick showed up at the yard sale and began helping without question.

“I don’t see a point in stopping now,” I laughed as they successfully cleared the stairwell and Rick’s brother whooped triumphantly, “now I have this awesome friend with a truck and a couple of movers at her beck and call.”

She grumbled some sort of profanity at me before walking away to flirt with Rick. Her intimate petting made me a little uncomfortable, so I walked into my apartment where Rick’s brother was lounging on my new couch.

“Are they making out in the hallway yet?” he asked, expecting a serious answer.

“Not yet, but I think I cleared out just in time,” I plopped onto the couch beside him, slightly aware of his arm draped behind my shoulders.

“Well that’s how she always pays him for this stuff,” he took in my confused face before explaining, “He washes her car and she gives him a kiss, he helps you move they make out a little, if he buys her dinner or takes her dancing she’ll spend the night.”

“So are you expecting…” my cheeks colored at the thought, “from me? For helping me move?”

He laughed; a good hearty laugh that made his pale blue eyes glow with mischief.

“You, Piper, do not seem the type to trade your body for favors,” he twirled a strand of my hair around his finger, “But if you’re offering I would be open to that too.”

I slapped his chest lightly, almost flirtatiously, and gave him a look that made my answer clear.

“You don’t even know my name do you Piper?” he smiled, not angry when I shook my head slightly in response, “Well, that’s embarrassing,” he placed his hand on my shoulder, pulling me a little closer to him, “I don’t often get crushes on girls who have no idea who I am,” he traced the line of my chin with his index finger while his other hand still gripped my shoulder lightly, “I’m Puck,” he leaned forward to press a feather light kiss to the corner of my mouth.

Feeling his lips on mine, even in the minimal touch he used, was exciting. I was doing something unexpected, something my mother would not approve of, something a wild girl would do. That thought, or maybe just a part of me that was starved for male attention, pushed me to lean forward, pressing a full kiss on his lips; allowing him to part my lips with his own and dart his tongue inside my mouth.

“Oh, wow Rick, we’re interrupting something here,” Seph exclaimed in mock surprise, shocking me away from Puck and bringing a bright blush to my cheeks.

Rick zipped his pants before chuckling out, “Alright little brother!” enthusiastically and offering Puck a high five he didn’t return.

Instead, he turned his attention back to me, whispered, “I’ll see you around Piper,” and kissed my ear softly, before walking through my door followed by Rick and Seph.

Riley was lying on his back on his play mat in my living room, grabbing at the stuffed giraffe hanging from the arch above him when a knock on my front door pulled me away from peeling potatoes in my kitchen.

“Coming,” I yelled, putting down the peeler in my hand and drying my fingers before crossing my living room and opening the front door.

I expected to find Rose on the other side, ready to pick-up Riley and tell me about the moon for that evening, but I was pleasantly surprised. When my door opened, I found Puck standing in the doorway wearing a pair of loose jeans and a bright red t-shirt. His usually curly brown hair was flat on top like he’d been wearing a hat, but it was an endearing look on him. I felt a smile tug at my lips as he ran his eyes over the pajama pants and fitted t-shirt I’d slipped into after work as if they were the sexiest thing he’d ever seen.

Before I could ask why he was visiting my apartment so suddenly, he placed a work roughened hand on each of my cheeks and pulled my lips up to his in a claiming kiss that set my skin on fire. His lips bruised mine, massaging and prying until I allowed his tongue access. One hand wrapped in my hair while the other traced a path down my back and grasped my behind, pulling my body closer to his and making his excitement apparent.