“Yes. Please?”
“Absolutely,” I tell her. If anything, it’s comforting to me that she still eats the same comforting snack she did back in high school. It tells me in a way that Lacy’s still the same girl I used to know.
She thanks me. “You can’t just keep saving me like this.”
I tell her bye and hang up, knowing that’s exactly what I intend to do. I want to take care of her. I want to be there for her and show her that she can count on me, she can take a chance with her heart on me again because this time I won’t hurt her.
7
Lacy
“It’s no problem, I’m already here,” the handyman says as he examines the balustrade on the front porch. “It’s loose, but I can get it fixed up for you.”
I can’t help smiling. Service in the city is nothing like this. I’d have been stuck having to schedule another visit by the handyman to fix something that he’d not come to fix for the original call, no matter how small the issue was.
“You’re great to do this for me today. You’ve got to let me do something to thank you. I have some donuts in the kitchen. Would you like one?”
Trent clears his throat as he carries groceries up the steps on the porch. “What’s he doing here? There’s no need for you to call a handyman with a friend like me around.”
I look between Bradley and Trent. “Trent, that’s rude,” I tell him.
“No, it’s not. It’s the truth. I didn’t know it needed done or else I would have done it,” he says stubbornly. I would scold him more for being rude to the handyman if I wasn’t so caught off-guard. Is Trent Keller jealous?
No way! There’s absolutely no reason for him to be jealous. Trent and I are no more. That is in the past. And I feel like I’m going to have to keep telling myself that over and over to make me believe it.
Trent is being amazing, but that is precisely why I need to get outside help. I don’t want to start to depend on him. I was raised in the B&B, I know it inside and out, and I have no doubt I can do this job. But dipping my toes in again is definitely going to take getting used to.
“You’ve done enough for me, Trent. I know you’ve got your ranch to get back to. I can’t expect you to drop everything to come and help me with all the little projects I have around here.”
Trent keeps glaring over at the handyman. I look over at Bradley, who is trying to work on the railing and act like he’s not paying any attention to Trent and me going back and forth.
I turn back to Trent. “Thanks for picking up the groceries. I’ll meet you in the kitchen and pay you for them,” I say, walking past him to go into the house with the groceries.
Trent
“Please don’t tell me you were about to give the last of my donuts to that oaf out there?” I ask as I take a bite out of said donut.
“Well, I’m not going to anymore, am I? Who knew you were so possessive over food?” Lacy says.
“It’s not the food I’m possessive over, Lacy,” I say, looking directly into her eyes as I do.
Lacy’s breath catches, and the way she starts backing out of the kitchen, I think that maybe she’s having a mini panic attack. “I, I said friends. That’s all,” she says.
I pushed too far. I know what I want and I’m the type to go for it at all costs. But the way Lacy is reacting I know if I keep it up, she’s going to refuse to even see me. I can’t have that. I want to push for more but not when she seems so fragile and afraid. The hard verbal shove I’d given her toward the city had been given with the best of intentions. I knew it was what she wanted, and I wanted her to be happy. I’d truly believed it was what she wanted. It was all she talked about when we were in our senior year.
How could I tell her that I wanted her to have the chance to fulfill her dreams; I didn’t want to be the reason she was held back.
She starts putting away the groceries, and I step in to help.
“Trent, really, don’t you have a ranch to run?”
I think about my answer before blurting it out. What would she think if I told her that as soon as I found out she was in town, I told my brothers I needed some time off? Ranchers don’t usually get time off, but my brothers didn’t try to stop me or even guilt trip me for slacking on work. They both know how important Lacy is to me. They saw me after she left, after I pushed her away.
But instead of telling her all that, I just shrug my shoulders. “I have some time.”
“Yeah, well, if you have time off from the ranch, you don’t need to be here working. When most people have free time, they go on vacation or rest. They don’t run errands and work somewhere else,” she tells me as she puts the bananas on the banana rack.
I slide beside her to put the milk in the refrigerator. “I’m not working. I’m hanging out with an old friend.”
When I straighten, we are staring at one another. There’s a moment, so brief, that her eyes aren’t guarded, and she’s looking at me like she used to back when she loved me. I don’t move. I don’t dare breathe because I want it to last. I want to kiss her, taste her sweetness on my lips before carrying her up the stairs, past the handyman so he knows that she is in fact mine and he doesn’t stand a chance, and then prove to her exactly how good we are together. The sound of her screaming my name as I take her is something I miss and would give anything to hear again.
But my luck doesn’t last. She snaps her eyes closed and shakes her head as if she’s trying to put everything we could have for each other into the past where she thinks it belongs.
She turns away then. We are both quiet as we get to work putting items away. The silence is awkward, and I can tell she’s worried about what is happening between us. I need to lighten it up a little. If anything, Lacy and I were always able to have fun with each other.
“Have you heard from your folks? Did they make their cruise?” I ask, changing the subject.
Lacy looks relieved, and we talk about how silly her father is going to look in his outrageous swim trunks and the bright sunblock he always wears.
8
Lacy
“Picture it. Your dad in his pineapple swim trunks walking around the cruise ship with purple zinc warrior stripes on his face. And you know your mom is having fun with it. She’s done some kind of cool design, and he doesn’t have a clue.”
I’m laughing so hard I’m holding my sides. “You’re right. Dad won’t have a clue for a while, but he’ll figure it out.”
Trent leans back on the counter next to me. “Yeah, but your dad won’t get mad. He’ll just find a way to get her back. I always loved that about your parents. They always know how to have fun.”
I can’t help but agree with him; my parents are something else.
“Gosh, and your dad will do a doozy back to your mom. Can you imagine? I almost hate to miss it.” He chuckles.
Trent has me laughing so hard that I forget to keep my guard up with him. It almost seems like the old days the way we are able to laugh and joke with each other.