“Are you working?” I sunk down onto one of the suitcases.
“Yep, just slid two cakes into the oven. On track for a banner day.”
Parker owned a boutique bakery called Delicious and Vicious. Her cakes were traditionally flavored with not-so-traditional messages and theming to go along with them. Her business had boomed a couple of months back after being featured on the Food Network.
“I need you to keep me company for the next few hours,” I explained, curling my legs under me. “A plan would have been smart.”
“No shit.”
“Shut up, I just meant that the car rental place is closed.”
She sighed into the phone. “Get an Uber, Charlotte. Or better, call your dad.” She punctuated each word with a short pause. It was an argument we’d had for the past few days. I didn’t want to let him, or anyone in Hope Lake, know that I was coming.
“Obviously, you’re going to have to see him, and explain things, eventually. You know, like when you show up on his doorstep and say, ‘Oh, hey, Dad, I’m home—’ ”
I interrupted. “Here.”
“What?”
“I’m here, not home. Home is where you are. Here is not home. This is a bump in the road. A sad little pit stop in my life. Nothing more, and certainly not home.”
She huffed. “One thing is for certain.”
“What?”
“You’re not going to be writing the Hope Lake tourist advertisements,” she barked, laughing as she repeated, “ ‘Sad little pit stop.’ ”
“I’m serious. I can’t let this, whatever, distract me and make me lose focus of the end goal. Getting back to New York.” I paused, feeling a sense of unease wash over me. “To civilization,” I finished.
“Whatever it is, a pit stop, a roadblock, or the start of something new, you can’t just sit on the side of a highway alone in the middle of the night. It’s like a Stephen King novel. Or better yet, an M. Night Shyamalan movie. He’s from Pennsylvania, right? I’d be worried sick.”
“You’re enjoying my imminent demise a little too much, thanks,” I lamented. “Wait a minute, the ‘start of something new’? You’re either living in a Hallmark Channel movie or High School Musical, Parks.”
She sighed, no doubt dreaming about Zac Efron. “Whatever, send me your exact location so if you go missing, I can have a lead to give to the hot country detective who’ll want to question me about your disappearance.”
“This isn’t the country exactly,” I corrected. “It’s just not the city.” I put the phone on speaker so I could share my location with her via text.
“Brilliant explanation, Sherlock. You know that anything outside of New York is the country to me. Okay, I’m sending you an Uber now. You’re limited out there in the sticks on what type of vehicle will come pick you up, so hopefully whatever comes fits all your crap.”
I sighed. “You don’t have to do that, Parker. That’s not why I called you.”
There was a long pause. I could hear pots and pans clinking and clanking in her kitchen.
“I know it’s not.” I hated the thought of my recently not-so-broke friend sending her super-broke friend a charity Uber.
Then, something howled. It was coming from the thick wooded area next to me. Are those eyes in the darkness?
Okay, maybe I didn’t hate the charity Uber that much. I wasn’t going to last five minutes out here. This didn’t exactly bode well for my being stuck in Hope Lake for the foreseeable future.
“I’ll pay you back,” I insisted, knowing that it would be a bit before I could. Things were tight. It helped that I was saving on not having to rent a place when I got to Hope Lake.
Parker grumbled. “Unnecessary. This is me helping you after you helped me manage everything after the coverage from the Food Network. Now, if you just took the job I offered you, you would still be here with me, in New York, instead of leaving me here all alone.” She sighed longingly. “Now I have to let my idiot brother’s idiot friend move in.”
Even with all the press, she had thankfully stayed the same witty, generous best friend I had for the past twenty years. Even if it meant offering her untalented-in-the-kitchen best friend a job.
“I’m sorry about that, but we both know my working as your assistant would have been disastrous. I burned water and destroyed your favorite caramel pot. With my luck, my first day on the job would involve my burning down the entire place instead of a small stove fire. No, thanks.”
Parker laughed just as a car drove past. Not the Uber.
“I didn’t think it was possible to be that bad at boiling, but, surprise, it was. I’m sure the fire department is still telling that story.”
I pinched up my face, not that she could see me. “In my defense, I forgot about the stove because my phone rang and I got tied up.”
“Fair enough, I know that was the last phone call you were hoping to get,” she said kindly, having been there to witness my pathetic mood after I got the bad news.
The caller was the head of HR at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, After almost three months of trying to find something new, I officially gave up the search in New York after my last job prospect didn’t work out. Sure, I could have gotten a job almost anywhere else, but I wanted a job in my field. Wasn’t that why I was still paying off my student loans? The position at the BBG wasn’t exactly what I had hoped for, but it was close enough and I would have been happy. Plus, there was the idea that the change of scenery would have been a good move for me. Getting out of the flower shop and into more of a business role with greater responsibilities and a chance to move up would have been worth it.
It was just after they courtesy-called to say they went with another candidate with more community-engagement experience that I decided to head back to Hope Lake with my tail between my legs. There were options, of course.
Sure, I could have found a way to stay—cater-waitering, something soul sucking in Times Square, tour guide on the Gray Line tourist buses—but how long would that have lasted before the boredom crept in? I was in debt, desperate, and after a come-to-Jesus conversation with Parker about my options, Hope Lake seemed like the best, well, hope to get my life back on track.
Plus, I figured that if I ducked out of the city for a couple of months, the gossip that my former boss Gabrielle had started about me would die down and I wouldn’t be shunned in the floral world any longer.
“Hey, not to beat a dead horse, but has there been any more Gabby gossip floating around?”
Parker sucked in a breath. “Do you want me to be honest?”
My stomach dropped. I thought it would get better if I left. “No, but yes,” I responded, nibbling away at my thumbnail.
“She said you were trying to steal clients from her and that some of the accounting was off. Which we know is a lie, but it’s added to people not wanting to hire you because they think you’re shady. I’m really sorry, Charlotte. It’s my fault that she’s going after you.”
The worry latched onto my heart and squeezed. If this kept up, August wouldn’t be enough time for the damage to fade away.
“No, it’s not. She was always looking for a reason to give me the boot. The cupcake incident just added to it.”