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Chapter 5

5

Drew Brooks ran a hand through his hair and stared at the man on the other side of the desk. If he hadn’t seen the bead of sweat on his boss’s forehead, he might have thought this was some kind of prank.

“I’m sorry, Drew,” Joseph Critchfield said again.

Somehow, he didn’t look all that sorry. He looked antsy.

Drew tried to find the right words. What was protocol for this circumstance? Thanks so much for letting me know that I’m now a jobless loser? “Um . . . When does this start? How long do I have?”

“I’m sorry . . . I thought I’d made that clear. This is an immediate layoff. We’re making cuts across the board. It’s a budgetary matter. Nothing personal. I hope you understand.”

It sure felt personal.

“We’ll be happy to provide a positive reference if you need one,” Critchfield said. “But once you sign everything with HR, you’ll need to clean out your desk and remove any personal belongings. And leave the premises immediately.”

He swallowed hard. “Now?”

“I’m sorry,” Critchfield said for at least the fourth time. “HR will explain the severance package to you.”

Drew could hardly rise, much less make his legs propel him down the hall. Somehow he did, feeling as if he had a fifty-pound sack of cement strapped to his back. He slumped into the chair behind his desk and stared, unseeing, out the window that overlooked the parking lot.

He couldn’t make it seem real that this was happening. It wasn’t that he loved his job so much, or even that he saw himself at this company three years from now. In the scheme of things, he wasn’t certain he wanted to work for a shipping company the rest of his life. But he’d sure never thought he’d be laid off from a job—any job, at any age, let alone at twenty-seven.

Now what? The meeting with HR was short and sweet. He came out of the office with the promise of three months’ pay and a good reference should he need it. It took him about ten minutes to box up everything from his desk and bookshelves—in lidded containers conveniently provided by HR. The company’s last gift to him. Nice.

In the parking lot, he opened the trunk of his Honda Accord and tossed in the boxes. He slammed the trunk shut and blew out a hot breath. He’d probably have to sell the Accord. He couldn’t make the almost four-hundred dollar a month payments without a steady salary.

Dallas was always telling him he should have an aggressive savings plan. He’d tucked a little away, but nothing close to what he’d need if he didn’t find work right away. He had enough in savings to cover a month’s worth of bills. Maybe two if he was careful. If he cut back. The severance pay would help, but unless he planned to cash out his 401K, he needed to find a job, like, yesterday.

Out of habit, he dialed his brother and waited to hear the familiar voice, realizing a split second before Dallas answered how much he’d come to depend on his big brother.

“Hey, Drew, what’s up?”

“Nothing good.”

Dallas laughed, then apparently realized Drew was serious. “Hey, what’s going on, man?”

“I just lost my job.” Hearing himself speak the words aloud, the stark reality of his situation hit him. Hard. Glancing toward the office, he leaned his back against the passenger door of his car. They’d probably send someone out any minute now to escort him out of the parking lot. Well, let them. He kicked at the asphalt surface of the parking lot.

“What are you talking about?” Dallas said. “You’re not serious?”

“As a heart attack.”

“What happened, man? Are you doing okay?”

“Too soon to tell.”

“Well, what happened?” Dallas asked again.

“They laid off three guys in my department and another ten in the shop. Budgetary reasons,” he said, quoting the HR guy.

“No kidding? Did you have any idea this was coming?”

“Not a clue.”

“So what’s the game plan.”

“I haven’t got one. I think . . . I’m still in shock. Nice of them to lay me off on a Thursday, so I have a nice long weekend to freak out about it. I guess I’ll go stomp the streets starting Monday. Or go to McDonald’s and fill out an application.”

“Not funny. And you won’t have any trouble getting another job. A good one.”

But Drew heard the lack of conviction in his brother’s voice. The job market was tight, and Drew’s degree in American history wasn’t exactly something that employers were standing in line for.

He cleared his throat, hesitant to ask. “Um . . . You guys don’t have anything open at Troyfield do you?” His brother was pretty high up in the food chain at Troyfield & Sons. Dallas made good money. Not that Drew was looking for a handout or anything, but maybe his brother knew of an opening.

“We’re kind of in a hiring freeze ourselves right now. Especially in the sales office—”

“Hey, I’m not married to sales. I’ll do whatever.”

“I’ll put out some feelers and see what I can come up with.” Dallas was quiet for just a moment too long. “Hey, if you need a loan or—”

“No. I’m good. Thanks, bro. They gave me a little severance pay. Not a fortune, but I’ll be okay for a while. And the 401K comes with me.” He and Dallas had just had a conversation about how their retirement funds had tanked with the stock market over the last few months.

His brother sighed into the phone. “I don’t have any doubt God’s got your back.”

“I know. It’ll be fine.” He wished he felt as confident as his voice came out sounding.

“It will. Danae and I will be praying. That is if you don’t mind me telling her about the layoff,” he added quickly.

“No, of course not.” Drew shrugged off the comment, as if Dallas could see him. “It’s no big secret or anything. No doubt the Missourian will have a blurb about the layoffs on the business page. No biggie.”

He clicked off the phone. But it was sort of a big deal. He felt like a failure. Why had he been one of the ones they’d chosen for the cut? He was a good employee. Maybe not the best or brightest, but he came to work on time, put in his hours, and worked hard while he was there.

He knew it was probably easier to let a single guy go than a family man. He didn’t begrudge them that. But a man still had to support himself. If Troyfield was hiring, he would do whatever they asked him to. He didn’t know beans about manufacturing air filters, but then his brother hadn’t either, when he started there. And who knew? Maybe he’d eventually work himself into a high-paying position the way Dallas had.

He sighed. Who was he fooling? He’d never had the business sense his brother had. He’d be lucky to get that job slinging hamburgers.

* * *

Bree studied her reflection in the mirror, remembering for some silly reason how critical she’d been of her looks before she met Tim. But from the day they met, he’d changed that. He’d loved her squeaky-clean, “wholesome” image. Even loved her stick-straight not-quite-blonde-not-quite-brown hair. He’d made her feel self-confident and interesting, and he’d made her quit wishing she was beautiful and be perfectly satisfied with “cute.”

Until this afternoon. This afternoon she wished she looked more like a woman and less like somebody’s high school babysitter. She knew she would be grateful for her adolescent appearance someday—like when she was turning forty—but right now, it was no fun to constantly be mistaken for a teenager. Maybe if she cut her hair? She held it up off her shoulders, trying to decide if it made her look older than sixteen.

She’d tried wearing lipstick, but it only detracted from her best feature—according to Tim—her aqua blue eyes. She frowned at herself in the mirror. The V that appeared between her eyes definitely aged her. Maybe she’d just walk around with a perpetual frown.

Why do you care how you look, Whitman? This is not a date, remember?

She’d thought having breakfast with Aaron Thursday morning would have made her less nervous about tonight, but if anything it made it worse. They’d had a great time together at the pancake house. But by the time they left, laughing and . . . flirting—there was no other word for it—it had felt very much like a date.

So what did that make tonight? Sighing, she went to the hall closet for her sandals.

Tim would have laughed at her keeping half her wardrobe in the coat closet, including twenty pairs of shoes. With Tim’s insurance and the pension she would receive the rest of her life—or until she married again—she could afford to buy a bigger house. One with a decent closet in the master bedroom. But she liked this house. And leaving it would feel like a betrayal somehow.

She and Tim had bought the little house shortly after they got married. He was already stationed in San Diego by then, but wanted her to be settled in Cape, near his family, before he was shipped out to Afghanistan.

Bree glanced through the wide, arched openings that created a bowling alley view from the living room through the dining room to the open kitchen. She tried to view the house through objective eyes. They’d had such great plans for the house, but except for painting over the Pepto-Bismol pink master bedroom, and tearing out the shag carpeting in the hallway, Tim hadn’t gotten to see any of their plans come to life.

A year after Tim’s death, she was still in the house, but for a long time, she’d refused to change anything. Moving so much as a throw pillow felt like a betrayal of her husband. But then one night, shortly after the two-year anniversary of his death, she’d ruthlessly rearranged every bit of furniture in the little house. She would have moved the bed into the living room if it would have been at all practical. Anything to change everything about the way the house had been when she’d shared it with Timothy.

And when she’d finished, long after midnight, she felt a sense of freedom. She’d crossed over some imaginary line that night and it had felt like a move in the right direction. But now, here she was almost three years later, and had she really made any progress at all?

Admiring the space now, she thought the white-painted kitchen cabinets and open shelving, the bright tile backsplash, and the colorful curtain panels on the large windows said she’d come a long way. Her little house was nothing fancy, but she had a knack for decorating and she’d made this place her own, made it a haven against her grief and pain.

The winter before the Chicory Inn opened, Grant and Link had helped her tear out the rest of the carpeting and refinish the original hardwood floors. She loved the way the old-fashioned played against the modern. Tim’s brother had told her later that doing those floors was a labor of love. “For Tim, I mean,” he’d stuttered, fearing she’d misunderstand. But Link had always been like a brother to her, and even though he later confessed that Audrey had encouraged him to ask Bree out on a date, she and Link had both been a little repulsed by the idea. “I told Mom it’d be like dating my sister,” he’d confided, all inhibitions pushed aside by then.

“It would,” she’d agreed. “But just so you know, I have the best ‘brother’ a girl could ever ask for.” She still felt that way about Link. And about Tim’s sisters. They were her family. They just were.

Ten minutes later, she parked as close as she could to the theater’s entrance so she wouldn’t be a sweaty mess by the time she got inside. Aaron was waiting just inside the door. He smiled and waved when he spotted her and held up two tickets. Over breakfast Thursday, they’d decided on a romantic comedy. The romance part gave her pause, but it beat the World War II drama that was the only other option amidst a slew of R-rated movies playing. Unless they wanted to watch a Disney cartoon.

She wove through the matinee crowd, fishing her wallet out of her purse as she went. She motioned toward the snack bar, and they got in line. “I’m buying snacks.” If he paid for everything, it would definitely qualify as a date.

“In that case, I’ll have an extra large popcorn, nachos, two chili dogs, and a milkshake.”

Straight-faced, she pretended to enter his long list into her phone notes.

He laughed and playfully grabbed her phone. “I’m kidding, you nut! You want to share a large popcorn?”

“Sure. No nachos?”

“Popcorn and sodas ought to do it.”

She placed their order, trying not to gasp when it came to almost ten dollars.

“Been a while since you’ve been to the movies?” He threw a smirk over his shoulder and led the way down the corridor to the theater.

She let him choose their seats and followed him to the center section, center of the row, halfway up. She and Tim had always had to sit on an aisle—Tim’s always-on-alert instincts strong even before he joined the Marines.

Sitting beside Aaron now, she knew she might feel a little claustrophobic if the theater got crowded, but at least he hadn’t made her worry about his intentions by choosing a dark corner at the back of the theater.

She needn’t have worried about feeling closed in. Except for a group of giggly teens a few rows behind them and an elderly couple on the front row, they had the theater to themselves. With twenty minutes until the film started, they chatted about work and joked about their escapades with the last-minute funeral chairs.

“You were a good sport, Whitman. Especially the part about not making me get a Mohawk. I promise I’ll give you more notice next time around.”

“There’d better not be a next time, Jakes.”

He shrugged one shoulder and took a slurp of his Coke. “I’ll try.”

“Do or do not,” she said, doing her best Yoda imitation. “There is no try.”

He laughed. “I thought you never went to the movies.”

“That movie is probably the last time I did.”

“Get out of here. You weren’t even born when that movie came out.”

“Middle School obsession. We watched it four times back-to-back at a slumber party once.” And it had been Tim’s favorite of the Star Wars movies.

“Interesting. I always wondered what happened at slumber parties.”

“Ahh. Much to learn you still have.”

He rolled his eyes. “Don’t tell me—”

She nodded. “Yoda.” Why did she have to go and quote Yoda. That had been her and Tim’s thing. She’d captivated him on their first date by quoting his favorite movie character—or so he claimed—at length. And it had been love at first sight.

Now, she was grateful when the curtain began to rise.

She and Aaron both cracked up when one of the previews featured Yoda himself in yet a new Star Wars film. The feature film was lighthearted and clever, and made them both laugh—thankfully, in a rated-PG way. Maybe she should start going to the movies again. She settled in, feeling comfortable with Aaron, and realizing that for the first time in a long time, she felt truly relaxed and happy somewhere outside of Chicory Lane.

When the credits rolled, Aaron turned to her and whispered, “Did you like that?”

She smiled. “I did.”

“Want to come see the Yoda movie with me next weekend?”

She made a face. “Let me think about it, okay?”

“Okay.” He gathered up the trash from their snacks off the floor and rose.

She followed him out of the theater, picking her way through spilled popcorn and abandoned nachos. She’d let her guard down and let him take advantage of that. No. That wasn’t fair. He was only behaving as any man who liked a girl and wanted to ask her out. It wasn’t fair to Aaron to keep dragging her feet this way. Either she was ready to date again, and Aaron was a great person to start with—maybe even end with? Or she was just not ready, and she had to tell him now and quit leading him on.

Tim. For so many years, she’d wanted him to be a constant in her thoughts and even in her subconscious. He’d begun to fade from her memory after the first two years had flown by. She’d panicked at the odd feeling of losing him all over again. But then she’d decided it was the natural thing. A blessing even, for his memory to fade.

But since she’d entertained the idea of going out with Aaron, Tim had been as present in her thoughts as he had in those dreadful days immediately after his funeral. She had to get over him. It was one thing to mourn the love of your life for a few years after he was gone. But she was bordering on crazy. This had to stop.

Blinking against the sunlight as they came out of the theater, she turned to Aaron, forcing a smile. “Okay. I’ve thought about it. I’d love to go to the Yoda movie with you.”

He looked taken aback. Which made her laugh.

And suddenly the good feelings were back again, and Tim was in the background—where he belonged? The thought felt cruel. And yet she thought it was right. Wasn’t it? “What time should I be ready?”

“Ready? What know you of ready?”

She gave him a quizzical look. “Excuse me?”

“Yoda.” He laughed, looking sheepish. “I guess I kind of mangled it.”

“Well, you’d better brush up before Saturday.”

He gave a little salute. “How does six o’clock sound? That’ll give us time to get something to eat first.”

“Okay.”

“I’ll pick you up. Except you’ll have to tell me where you live.”

“I’ll tell you next week. At work.”

“Sounds good.” He turned for his car, waving over his shoulder.

It would have been nice if he’d walked her to her car, but after all, she was the one who hadn’t wanted this to be a date.

Still, date or not, it had been a good afternoon. She smiled all the way home. And wished she could figure out whether it was because she’d had such a good time with Aaron. Or because Aaron had made her feel the way she used to feel with Tim. With her husband.