Читать книгу Christmas Wishes Part 3 - Diana Palmer - Страница 46
ОглавлениеThe next morning, still fragile, I head to the café.
“Well, lookie here,” CeeCee says as I untangle my scarf and walk through the front door. “Oh, Lil, you pale as a ghost. This ain’t good right before your wedding. How you feelin’?”
“I’m good, Cee. How are you? I felt so guilty leaving you here.” The café looks the same as it always does; one day off and I half expect things to have changed. Well, aside from the gap where one of our display fridges used to be.
“Don’t you worry ’bout me.” She huffs, and I know she’s worried about the wedding cake and what I’ll say. “Lil, I’m so sorry…”
“Cee, don’t be. There’s nothing we can do about it now. I just hope we have enough time to make another one. And this time, we’ll ban her from the café, just until it’s safely delivered to the restaurant.”
“Oh, Lil. It was terrible…when I saw the fridge come down, and your mamma fly through the air to catch it, golly…” We start laughing on account of Mamma’s clumsiness. She has trouble boiling water at the best of times. Though without her we would have been in a pickle; there’s no way CeeCee would have been able to cope alone.
Our talk is cut short as the doorbell jingles, and a flurry of customers arrive.
“Hey, Georgia,” I say to a regular of ours. She comes in most mornings with her little boy Matthew. “The usual?” I ask.
“Yep,” she says, smiling. “But Matthew wants two gingerbread men, says he’s earned it on account of his school report.”
I raise my eyebrows at Matthew. “Is that so?”
His big brown eyes look earnest as he says, “My teacher says I can read as good as the class above me. She sent Ma a letter and everything.”
Matthew had all kinds of problems when he started school. He couldn’t make sense of the words like other kids. Georgia struggled for the last two years trying to work out how to help him. She found an amazing tutor called Jo, who diagnosed his dyslexia. They’ve been working closely with him ever since.
I bend down to Matthew’s height. “Do you really think two gingerbread men are enough? I mean, that kind of brilliance needs to be celebrated. How about I give you some gingerbread men to take home, and you can choose whatever you want out of the Christmas display?”
He claps his hand over his mouth and looks up at his mother. She nods yes. Turning back to me, he says in a hushed tone, “Out of the window display? Anything?”
I scruff his hair. “Anything. You earned it.”
He shrieks and runs to the window.
Georgia and I exchange smiles as Matthew comes bouncing back with one of the chocolate Christmas boxes that are about the size of his head. “Whoops,” I say. “I take no responsibility for the ensuing sugar high.”
Georgia laughs. “I don’t see any signage, Lil, that says I can’t leave him here while I go shopping.”
I tap my chin. “Er…it’s around here somewhere.”
Matthew sits in his favorite chair by the fire, and commences eating. Chocolate crunches and cracks and falls all over the floor in his haste.
“I’ll bring your drinks over,” I say. “And maybe a plate for Matthew.” Kids and chocolate, there’s no better combination. Customers look over at the small boy as he chews happily, not caring chunks of chocolate box fall to the floor with each bite.
Matthew’s hands are smeared with chocolate as the fire crackles heartily behind him. My chest tightens as I think how lucky I am that these people are more than just customers, they’re friends. Ashford is a small town, and I know all the ins and outs of Georgia and Matthews’s life. It’s been tough for Georgia, a single mom with a child who needs extra help, yet she’s done it, she’s worked tirelessly for her son. Whenever she needs a hand, her gardens mowed, or something in the house fixed, someone will step up; they won’t expect payment, or even thanks. It’s just the way things are done here. Folk look out for one another.
And their visits almost every day are a highlight for me. This place, with its mix of eclectic people, is so easy to live in. It makes me all warm and fuzzy like one of Sarah’s heartwarming novels.
A young couple mill at the front of the café near our wicker baskets, which CeeCee has filled with shortbread shaped like Christmas trees. They flop against each other as they peruse, in that new love kind of way.
CeeCee and I set to work making gingerbread coffees, and hot chocolate for regulars who come in and hover by the fire. The café is a hive of activity this time of the day, friends catching up over plates of warm bagels, their chatter more animated as they cradle cups of steaming-hot coffee. They bunch closer when newcomers arrive, and stand back so they can warm themselves by the fire.
Missy struts in with a flick of her hair, and joins us at the bench. “Hey, sugar,” she says, grabbing a gingerbread man from the basket and unwrapping the clear cellophane. “You had us worried there for a minute.”
“It was nothing,” I say, watching crumbs fall down Missy’s front, which is somehow even bigger than it was just a couple of days ago. She rubs a hand protectively over her belly as she chews. I can’t help but stare at it thinking back to yesterday and how sure I was that would be me soon.
“Earth to Lil,” Missy says, waving her hand in front of my face.
I shake myself. “I’m a million miles away today!”
“You’ve got a lot on your plate. I’ve got some good news,” she says between bites.
“Yeah?”
“Your dress is finished. I happened to walk past Bessie’s shop, and thought I’d poke my head in. I had a teeny tiny little peep. It’s truly gorgeous, Lil.”
A ripple of excitement runs through me. “She’s finished all that beading already?”
“She sure did, and it’s as lovely as you are, Lil. I stood there, overcome again by one of those God-awful hormonal crying jags, and pictured you in it. Your long blond curls cascading down the open back of the dress, that bias cut sitting so well over your curves. You need to go try it on, Lil. Bessie said she can make any adjustments you need.”
Bessie’s the local dressmaker, and tailor extraordinaire. She runs a small haberdashery shop, too. Like most folk in Ashford, you need to offer as many services as you can to make ends meet. An unassuming woman who can take a piece of fabric and sew it into something magical. She’d sketched my gown, a while back, and I knew instantly from those black and white drawings it was perfect. Now it’s ready!
It’s like a satin sheath, with long sleeves, and a plunging backline, forties style, simple yet stunning because of the exposed back, which drapes into a cowl at the base of my spine. Bessie thought the front of the gown needed a little sparkle, so she hand-sewed some antique beads along the décolletage.
“It kind of makes it more real, doesn’t it?” I ask. When I went for the first fitting a few weeks back I sat with it draped across my lap wondering what Damon would make of it as I walked down the aisle. Would he be expecting a more formal gown, or would he instinctively know I’d choose something classic, and unfussy?
Missy gives me her megawatt smile. “It’s really real! Bessie said we can all scoot on down there whenever we’re ready to try on our dresses. And we need to meet up, us girls, and discuss the bridal shower. That’s if you still want to have one? I know getting sick has been a time suck…”
The thought of a late night out when I still have so much to do makes me sigh. Would the girls think I was no fun if I bowed out?
“Would I be a total party pooper if I said no to a nightclub?”
Missy struts around the bench, and gives me a hug. “No, definitely not, and to tell you the truth, with my ankles now canckles, and the need to pee a five-minute occurrence, I’m kind of relieved. How about we spend a night in watching soppy chick flicks and eating…” she surveys the cooling bench “…a few of those right there?” She points to a rack of butterscotch tortes.
“I been running over hell’s high acre,” CeeCee says, which is her roundabout way of saying she’s been busy. “A night in sounds about right to me too.”
Missy fills a paper bag up with cookies. “Golly, I’m going to be the size of a house when this baby comes out. And you know what? I don’t give a damn.” She rubs her belly. “OK, sugar, a night in… I’ll scoot over and tell Sarah.”
“You ain’t scooting anywhere on that icy road,” CeeCee says, her voice stern. “I’ll go an’ tell Sarah, and I may as well take this here pile of truffles for her. You know what she’s like if she doesn’t have a chocolate fix. It just ain’t fair you girls so skinny.”
Missy laughs, and showers me with crumbs. “I’m so skinny? I can’t even get in the door sideways!”
CeeCee rolls her eyes. “That won’t be for ever, Missy.”
Missy winks. “I hope you’re right. Lil, let me know when you’re ready and we’ll go see Bessie and try our dresses on.”
“Sure,” I say. “How about the day after tomorrow? I should be all caught up here by then.”
“Done. Don’t forget I want a piece of that pie when it’s ready, Cee.” She click-clacks her way out of the shop, somehow making pregnancy look glamorous.
