It’s a beautiful setting. A white canvas canopy hangs over the sunken stage. We actually enter at ground level and walk down to stadium-style seats. After we find our seats, Jess asks me if I’d like a drink. He slips away with my order and returns shortly after with a wine for me and a beer for himself.
“To living in the now,” he says. He taps his beer gently against the edge of my glass, and I stare at him. Those were Nana’s words. Live in the now, Emily.
I want to counter with her additional advice and say speak from the heart, but it seems too romantic, and when I consider Katie’s lack of speech, perhaps inappropriate.
“To life in the moment,” I reply, though I don’t like how that sounds. I’ve lived too much in the moment with past hookups and random relationships. I don’t want just a moment with Jess—I want long term. It’s an absolute gamble to ask him if we have a chance. Could we work? Should I stay? Will there be more for us?
As I watch him swallow back a sip of his beer, my heart aches. I really like him. He turns to look at me as if he could feel me watching him.
“Thank you for tonight,” I say, not certain why I’m giving him gratitude before the night has finished. His brows furrow.
“You’re making it sound like the night’s already over,” he teases.
“I’m not. I’m just . . . thankful for this time with you.”
“Me too.” He leans over and kisses me, tender and sweet and too brief before he pulls back and sets his beer at his feet. The stage lights blink, and a young man walks to the center. He introduces himself with a smoky voice and then he strums a few strings on his guitar before breaking into song. His rendition of “Fly Me to the Moon” takes on a new meaning. It was one of Nana’s favorite songs, and my eyes well instantly with tears.
“Shit,” Jess mutters. “This was a bad idea.” His arm, which was over the back of my seat, tugs me to him, and he presses his lips to the side of my head.
“We can leave,” he suggests.
I gently turn down his offer. “No, this is perfect. It’s Nana’s favorite song, and his voice is beautiful. This . . . this means a lot to me.” It’s as if Jess knows I am struggling and missing my grandmother, but I’ve also been too distracted and working hard to fix her place that I haven’t had a chance to process everything. I’ve been a bit disgruntled over the effort needed to make the necessary improvements, and tonight is the break I didn’t know I needed. Here we can sit, listen to her favorite music under a starry summer night, and just remember her.
“It’s a perfect way to celebrate Nana, to remember her.”
I place my hand on his thigh and shift a little to lean on him despite the armrest in my way. Jess presses another kiss to my temple and keeps his arm around me while we listen to a smoky tenor and his acoustic guitar perform beautiful versions of the classic crooner songs my nana loved so dearly.
When the concert ends, Jess escorts me back to the truck, and we head back toward Elk Lake City. He suggests a stop off the highway at a quiet little restaurant along the larger lake. Once there, we order a late dinner, I drink more wine, and I feel relaxed for the first time in weeks.
“You’d really sell?” Jess asks after I tell him a story about visiting Nana’s house as a child.
“Actually, Grace and I decided renting would be best for now. It’s the end of the month, and I’ll never be able to fix it up and flip the place fast enough. It gives me time to set up workers for the remaining repairs and then rent it out in a month when fall begins.”
Jess nods and turns his head to look at the darkened sky through the window beside our table. “Just make a list of the things you want done, and I’ll do them.”
“I can’t ask you to do that,” I say, and his head turns back to me. He already has two jobs and Katie.
“You didn’t ask. I’m offering.”
I’m ready to argue I don’t need his help, reminding him of the efficiency he likes to toss back at me, but I could use his assistance. I don’t know who to trust in the area, and I don’t want to leave the care of Nana’s home to just anyone.
“Thank you. I’ll write a list and then pay you for everything.”
His jaw clenches as he silently agrees. “The sink will need to be at the top of your list.”
Ah, yes, the damn kitchen sink. I really should redo the entire kitchen and make it what I want, but I remember there isn’t a point. I’m not going to be the one living there.
“So tell me more about your assignment,” Jess says. He shifts topics, and I sigh.
“It’s nothing great, just another story. Another teacher strike, or municipal meeting, or community decision. It’s not what I’d ever planned to write. I wanted a byline column like Nana, though not necessarily on etiquette, and what have I gotten? Passed up. Again. Someone else got the column I wanted.” An editorial review of happenings and such with more human interest went to another colleague because I’ve been indisposed. At least, that’s how it was put in the email containing the minutes of our weekly team meeting this past week, which I wasn’t able to attend. For the third week in a row.
“I’m always passed up,” I say. I can hear the exasperation in my voice even though I promised myself I wouldn’t rant over this. “I’ve been waiting, waiting, waiting, and for what? It’s like I’m floating.” I hold up my hand and wave it out before us. “One-night stands. Failed relationships. It’s always the next woman. And it’s always the next colleague who gets the story I want or the column I’ve been hoping for. And I’m so tired of floating.”
“You know, there doesn’t have to a be a next girl,” Jess states, keeping his eyes on me as I clamp my lips and admonish myself for saying too much. I should ask what he means, but I don’t.
“Anyway, what about you? You say you’re happy here. You’re where you want to be. It must be a nice feeling.”
Jess stares at me, taking a long moment to look at my face, but the gleam in his eyes is too intense, and eventually, I lower my gaze to the table. He clears his throat.
“I’ve been offered another job.”
My head pops up. “What?”
“I’m not moving or anything. It’s your nana’s radio. Tom forced me to send in the schematics for a design patent. An old friend of our dad’s owns a restoration shop downstate and wants to talk to me about shipping antique electronics to me to fix. Ever see a show called The Repair Shop? He does that kind of thing.” I’ve never heard of the program, but I’ll be looking it up later this evening. “Anyway, it’s what Tom was buzzing about earlier this week when we were dancing on the street.”
“And you need Nana’s radio to move ahead with this?”
“I don’t want to ask.”
“Could you make a lot of money?”
Jess shrugs, leaning back in his seat. “One thing you gotta know about me, Emily, is I don’t care about money. I live with my mom, for God’s sake. I work two jobs because I like them. We didn’t want to give up our dad’s shop, and I help Tom out with QuickFix because that was his before me. None of it is about money.”