Chancey Jobs (Chancey Books Book 4) Read online

  CHANCEY JOBS

  Copyright © 2016 by Kay Dew Shostak.

  All rights reserved.

  This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in articles and reviews.

  ISBN: 978-0-9962430-6-3

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2016912302

  SOUTHERN FICTION: Women’s Fiction / Small Town / Railroad / Bed & Breakfast / Mountains / Georgia / Family

  Text Layout and Cover Design by Roseanna White Designs

  Cover Images from www.Shutterstock.com

  Published by August South Publishing. You may contact the publisher at:

  [email protected]

  To my Fernandina Beach Friends

  You weren’t there when I began writing. That was in Illinois.

  You weren’t there when I began searching for agents and publishers. That was in Georgia.

  You met me when my dreams were at their lowest, and you splashed me with saltwater, sunshine, and laughter and encouraged me to try again.

  So I did.

  Contents

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 1

  "For crying out loud, it's not that heavy. Lift up your end."

  "Can't believe you had to do this before school. I better not break a nail."

  My end of the big laundry basket dips as my teenage daughter, Savannah, removes one hand from her end to look at her nails.

  "Hey, pay attention,” I say. “Anyway, you were already coming to Ruby's, you can't help your mother with one little thing?" Then we both stop, set the laundry basket full of paperback books on the sidewalk, and stare at the brown paper slowly being eased off the plate glass window beside us.

  Savannah cocks her head and takes a step closer, but when a woman's head appears, she jumps back. She looks at me across the laundry basket full of books and asks, "Who's that?"

  Someone new in Chancey? Someone we don't know?

  Not that we exactly know everyone here, but if she belonged here, we would've noticed her. As the piece of paper from the window falls to the floor, I can see we'd definitely have noticed her in our small Georgia town. Her black dress is tight but in a business kind of way, since the long sleeves and a turtleneck cover everything. She's so slim the tightness doesn't look too tight. Her shiny white-blonde hair swings along her jawline, and she smiles and waves at us as she removes the next panel of brown paper from inside the corner store.

  As the next piece of paper falls, the woman loses our attention and our mouths fall open, mimicking the brown sheets of paper.

  "OMG, look at that place. Where's all the junk?" Savannah says as she steps to the window.

  I can only shake my head. Since long before we moved here, the corner building has housed Mac McCartney's junk shop. Not that he ever sold any of the junk, so the shop label might not have been accurate, but his family had owned the building since Chancey was built and he stored his junk there. No one thought much about it because it was so full and so dark you couldn't see past the filthy windows.

  "Who would've imagined they could shine like this?" I say. Savannah and I stand right up at the windows and finally we look through them, past them. Lights encased in modern, brushed nickel hang from the ceiling, and the floor is made of wide-planked, old wood boards, sanded and varnished to a high sheen. The brick walls are glossy white and shine like the paint is still wet, and then at almost the same time we realize what we are looking at. Our wide open mouths widen further and then close in grins. A wonderful, fancy coffee machine. Navy blue mugs with bright yellow moons on their sides.

  "Welcome to Moonshots #34," the lady in black says from the door she's cracked open.

  "We love Moonshots. The one in Marietta is our favorite place in the world," Savannah sighs. “Are you open?" She walks away from the basket of books and me.

  "So glad you're familiar with Moonshots," the woman says as she opens the door wider and steps forward. "But, no, we're not open yet. Monday is the grand opening. I'm Jordan."

  Savannah shakes her hand and tries to look around her. "Savannah, and this is my mom. Can I go in and look?"

  "No, the guys have wires laying everywhere." She sticks her hand out at me. "Hi, I'm Jordan Moon. Where are you taking the books?"

  "Hi, I'm Carolina, and I'm getting ready to start, well help start, a business next door to you here. In the florist shop."

  "Oh, lovely, books and coffee go perfectly together."

  Savannah, ever on the stakeout for potential drama, asks, "So does Ruby know?"

  I close my eyes. Ruby.

  Jordan's sheet of hair swings back and forth. "I don't believe I know a Ruby."

  My innocent daughter with the wide-stretched, blue eyes takes a step back on the sidewalk and points past the florist. "There on the corner, with the lights and the people. That's Ruby's coffee shop."

  Jordan shrugs as she looks down the street, "So we do have some competition. Unusual for Diego to have missed that."

  "Diego?" I ask as I reach down for my end of the basket and motion for Savannah to get her end. "Is he the owner?"

  Jordan nods. "So this Ruby's is open? Maybe I should go introduce myself."

  "What a great idea. Mom and I were just headed there." Savannah pushes me ahead, but at the door to the florist slash bookstore, when I drop my end of the basket and start looking in my purse for the door key, she grabs my arm and steps behind Jordan, whispering, "Get it later. Like someone would steal a bunch of old books in Chancey."

  Retro may be a chosen look for some places. For Ruby's, she'd have had to let something go in the past for it to come back around. The chairs with red and yellow leatherette seats surround white and chrome tables with sparkles imbedded in the Formica tops. The booths are flanked with high-backed, turquoise benches, made higher as the springs in the seats sag and leave you sitting closer to the ground each time you visit. Country music blasts from an old boom box sitting on top of a glass display case, which is crammed full of local peewee baseball teams wearing Ruby's Cafe t-shirts.

  At the door, with a slow look around the cafe, Jordan displays an interesting sup
erpower. Suddenly, like magic, one glance from Jordan and quaint turns to weird. Cozy becomes junky. Colorful is just plain tacky… and when did Ruby stop dusting?

  Even in my darkest moments, when Jackson had just moved our family to this sleepy small town, when I loathed Chancey with every fiber of my being, Ruby's had maintained a certain charm. A charm I can't begin to conjure up now. Savannah's wrinkled nose mimics Jordan's wrinkled nose, and a second too late, I smooth my nose from its tilted, scrunched position. Oops.

  "Hey, Libby," I greet the waitress pouring coffee at a near table.

  "Carolina! Savannah, too! Out for a morning mother-daughter coffee and chat? Hey, darlin’, I'm Libby and don't think we've met."

  Jordan's eyebrows shove down to meet her upturned nose. "Oh, no, we haven't. I'm Jordan." And as her hand stretches out her face smooths out into a smile. "I'm opening, well, the new shop on the corner. Hope—"

  I interrupt. "Libby, where's Ruby?"

  "Bathroom. Should be out in a speck. Y'all want that table yonder?"

  Jordan pulls back. "I can't stay."

  "Carolina," Ruby hollers at the door of the bathroom and then leans back in. "Wait a minute, forgot to flush."

  Wow, how did I ever miss that you can see the toilet from practically every table?

  A quick glance at Jordan tells me she didn't miss it.

  Ruby pulls the unvarnished door with the brass knob closed behind her. "You here to pick up muffins for your place?" She pushes past the chairs to us. "If you are, ain't got 'em. Been busy, and I sold 'em. Told you if y'all didn't get here early enough I'd sell 'em. And I did. Y'all sit down. You're blocking the door."

  With a smile at Jordan, I say, "We have a B&B. We get muffins here for our guests."

  Jordan leans around me. "Ah, Ruby. I can't stay—we're in the process of opening. I did want to stop in and introduce myself, though." She sways around me, you know, how tall, skinny people do displacing no air, using little motion, and making everyone else look like klutzes. "I'm Jordan, manager of the Moonshots #34, opening on the corner.”

  Law, crowd control at its finest. Barely a muscle moves, and every conversation stops on a dime. Superpower #2.

  Now Ruby's eyebrows slide down, and her mouth puckers up. "Here?"

  Just then the door behind us slams open, and my friend Laney barrels right into me. "Did you see it? We're getting a Moonshots. No more of this dumpy coffee! Oh, hey, Ruby. Guess you do know."

  Confusion leaves Ruby's face as she glares at Laney. Ever since Laney stole Ruby's daughter's boyfriend in high school, Ruby and Laney have fought. Even though Laney has now been married to the stolen boyfriend for over twenty years and has two daughters. "Out!" Ruby shouts at Laney. "Guess I'm finally rid of you, Laney Connor. Go drink your coffee with this sack of skin and bones Yankee and her shower curtain hair."

  Jordan pulls up and squares her shoulders. Her high heeled boots make a very satisfying sound on the worn linoleum as she walks to the door. Laney holds the door for her as she mouths to me, "Who is she?"

  I mouth back, "Moonshots," just as Jordan stops and turns toward us all. She once again displays her superpowers. With a sweep of her eyes, Ruby's is laid open, exposed for our innocent, unsuspecting eyes. She doesn't roll her eyes, but with only a tiny shake of her head and a slow closing of her eyelids, she leaves no doubt that she was a major league eye-roller back in the day.

  "Good luck," she says and turns to stride up the sidewalk, Laney by her side. The door shuts, the bell above it sounds once, twice, then holds still along with every tongue in the room. Until…

  Savannah cocks her head at me and asks, "Wonder if she's hiring?"

  Chapter 2

  "So, the bookshelves?"

  "Oh, hey, Carolina. You brought some more books," Patty, my partner in the bookstore says. She descends from the last step on the staircase from her upstairs apartment at the back of the cavernous room. Our building, which her mother owns, is one in a two-block row of old, attached red-brick buildings that make up downtown Chancey. About half are empty or holding junk left from some past, failed business venture. Ruby's and the newspaper occupy the two that are active. Ours is some of both, half-empty, half-active. The active half is Chancey Florist. The other half is what Patty and I are supposed to be making active.

  We might not have been the best choice for that.

  Patty’s family has history here, but she only came on the scene this past spring. Her mountain of a mother had plans to marry her off, sight unseen. Yeah, that didn’t work out. Patty’s only a few years older than my oldest son, Will who’s a senior at the University of Georgia. But Patty often seems as old as me and she and I get along pretty well. Or did until we started into business together.

  "Yep, just need something to put them on." Opening my arms and pointing out the still-empty space hopefully stirs something in the girl. "When's the guy delivering the shelves?"

  Patty tucks a piece of lank brown hair behind her ear and folds her arms over herself. Between her hair, pale skin, and huge, faded purple tee shirt, she's about as non-descript as you can get. And when you add the monotone, mushy way she talks, you just wouldn't be surprised if she melted into the floor like a scoop of ice cream falling off a cone in the middle of July. Cheap vanilla ice cream.

  She makes me look like a ball of fire.

  "Well, I didn't call him. Thought you'd want to."

  "You met him. You talked to him at the flea market. What's his name?"

  "Andy."

  "Why should I call him? You call him. Now." Lord, this is like dragging a big old rug through a field of mud. I turn around so I don't have to watch her, but her sigh lets me know what I can't see. Finally, after two more sighs, I hear the buttons on her phone being mashed.

  "Hey, Andy? Yeah, this is Patty Samson over in Chancey… yeah, with the bookstore. Except we don't have any shelves." Loud laughter coming through the phone makes me turn around and the surprise smile on Patty's face surprises me. "You probably done sold them, right?"

  More laughter on the phone and bits of color show up on her face as she listens. Rapid blinking with her mouth hanging open tells me she's trying to come up with some answer. Okay, I'll give her a little help. "What is it?" I whisper.

  She pulls the phone away from her face. "Today, he wants to bring them today."

  "Good. Right? Tell him." I lift her hand with the phone back toward her face.

  "Okay," she says into her phone. She listens, then finishes off with two more "okays," and hangs up.

  "He's bringing them this afternoon."

  "Six of them, right? Where do you think we should put them?"

  We look at each other and sigh at the same time. This isn't going to work.

  Patty sits down on the window ledge. "You want some coffee?"

  "Yes, but I'm kinda scared to go up to Ruby's right now. Did you know it's a Moonshots going in next door? Savannah and I met the manager this morning."

  "You met Jordan? Isn't she beautiful?" Patty stands up. "I have instant coffee upstairs."

  With a look around at the laundry baskets, boxes, and stacks of books, I make an executive decision. (Quit laughing, I can do that.) "Coffee it is." We cross the concrete floor past the flower coolers and work bench and walk upstairs. "Besides, I want to see what you've done with your apartment."

  Patty stops on the step ahead of me and turns to look at me. Wonder if the term 'hangdog expression' comes from what a dog about to be hung would look like? I shake my head and push her on up. "I know, I know, you've done nothing with the apartment."

  And we sigh.

  "This is a huge mistake, Laney. She's driving me crazy. And her apartment? Might as well be a storage unit down on the highway. There's a closet, but no hangers, so everything is still in boxes and one old suitcase. Her kitchen is left over from World War II, I'm sure.”

  After a couple hours working with Patty, escape was needed, and Laney walking across the park provided it. While I’ve been getting the boo
kstore ready, Laney has been taking over more duties with Crossings, the B&B Jackson and I opened last Labor Day. Specializes in railroad enthusiasts (read “nuts”) ,since we are right beside the busy train bridge. I don’t know why she’s away from the B&B, but I don’t care. I have to talk to someone. Now!

  Shockingly, Laney has barely gotten a word in edgewise, because I have barely stopped talking to breathe. “Rusted metal cabinet, a two-burner stove crusted with either food or rust, I couldn't tell, it just looked gross. And the refrigerator door has to be propped up with a can of food for it to even close. And there's no air conditioner. What are you looking at?" I'm sitting on the steps of the gazebo in the park, and she's standing in front of me and staring behind me. Before I can turn, Missus beckons.

  "Ladies, isn't it a beautiful day!"

  Wait, that can't be Missus, sounds too, uh, nice. And happy.

  Missus is talking in a singsong manner. And smiling. "So beautiful! And the azaleas are magnificent, aren't they? I had to come over to stroll in the park and see them up close. Gazing at them through my front window no longer sufficed."

  Laney meets my eyes while our mouths form the words: Stroll? Gazing? Missus never strolls, and her gazing is more like glaring.

  "Carolina, what a pretty sweater! Is that cotton? Peach looks good on you. May I sit with you?"

  She settles on the step next to me and weaves her arm through mine then pulls me to her in like, well, a sideways hug. Laney's big, purple-blue eyes express her disbelief. "Missus, you're sure in a good mood. Or high. Are you high?"

  There, that should do it. Missus’ back will stiffen, and her jaw tighten, but instead—she laughs. Laughs and waves her free hand at Laney. "Sweetie, you are just delightful. And so pretty this morning. I've always said you have the prettiest eyes in town."

  For a moment, we sit and take in the quietness of a spring morning. Birds provide a bit of background music, and every so often a breeze sets the boughs of pink azaleas to swaying. Overhead, the layers of white that form the dogwood trees barely block the morning sun. Of course, the only one paying attention to all that is Missus. Laney and I are staring at her.