—Sign behind the register in Moondance
The unseasonably warm late September sun on Izzy’s bare arms was a parting gift. Any day now, rains would blow in, a cold front would decide not to lift, and thus would arrive the chilly gray slog leading up to winter. She could never understand why so many Ohioans declared fall to be their favorite season. Fall weather itself was like a rare delicacy—it did live up to the hype when it came, but often it wasn’t on the menu. The past few years it had seemed as if Mother Earth decided not to bother with autumn at all, simply flicking a switch from summer to winter. Izzy didn’t blame her, mistreated as she was. When no one appreciated the careful preparation you’d put into a feast, eventually you were going to give up and order takeout. The leaves would change and drift to the ground, of course—a lone inevitability no matter the temperature—but nothing else need move so lazily from one phase of the calendar into the next. Izzy usually felt unsettled by these transitional weeks, in which she’d rediscover the futility of trying to plan for a hike or a camping trip, but this year the unpredictability of the shift fit her mood.
She tried to focus on the warmth of the sun rather than the hard-to-place nerves churning in her stomach as she headed up Paul’s walk. It was probably just that she’d never really liked asking for help—from anyone. But it might have been that she felt skittish about asking for help from Paul in particular. So far they’d run into each other only incidentally; she had yet to seek him out. She needed help, though, in a physical way she couldn’t Google her way out of. She’d come from Moondance earlier, so knew Randi and Rhoda weren’t home, and she’d seen Benny pull up in his work clothes awhile ago—not like him on a Saturday—and hated to interrupt his abbreviated family time. So here she was. She took a breath and knocked.
“Izzy.” Paul smiled and swung the door open wider. He looked dressed for the office too—button-down, pleated pants.
“Sorry,” she said automatically. “Are you on your way to work? I was just hoping for a second set of hands, but I can—”
“I’m home early. Had some cancellations.” A frown flickered across his lips, then disappeared. “My hands are available. What do you need?”
She laughed self-consciously. “I’m afraid you’re going to make fun of me. The latch on my gate is broken, and I’ve bought this ridiculously girlie replacement. Rhoda warned me it was hard to install, but I was blinded by its cuteness.”
In retrospect, Izzy should have known the boutique didn’t carry ordinary hardware. Like something out of The Secret Garden, the oversized gate lock was itself shaped like a tiny arched door and came complete with large weathered brass keys, the kind with loops at the end so you might string them on a rope or hang them on a nail. Whimsical but functional, it looked meant for someone who lived alone and liked it that way. Which was precisely why she’d chosen it.
“Happens to the best of us.” The corners of his mouth twitched in amusement. She briefly wondered if he looked too put together for someone whose wife and children were unaccounted for, then dismissed it. It had been nearly two weeks now, and nothing. What could he do but go through the motions, and hope, and wait?
“It’s too heavy for me to hold steady one-handed. I think it’s a two-person job.”
“Then I’m your number two. Do you need a drill? Tools?”
His attention was so focused on her. For no reason at all, Izzy blushed. “I think I just need brute strength.”
“Hmm. Would a doctor’s precision do?”
“Even better.”
“Just let me change—be over in five?”
Slow down, she scolded her heart rate as she headed home. It was pulsing the way it had when she was a teenager on the few occasions she’d gotten up the nerve to talk to a cute boy at his locker. Not that anything but high blood pressure had ever come from those conversations. She ran her fingertips over the pleats in her braid. It didn’t feel like it looked bad. Looking down at her embroidered purple tank and flowy black gauchos, she gave herself a B. Not bad for working in the yard, and it wasn’t as if she could change now anyway—he’d already seen her.
But wait. What was she thinking? If his current breed of crisis didn’t render someone emotionally unavailable, she didn’t know what would. Plus … She’d be crazy not to be wary of Paul. For Kristin to have run off that way—who knew what that might say about him? It wasn’t fair to assume, but you couldn’t deny the red flag.
It was just nice to know that someone, anyone other than Josh, could still give her butterflies—even meaningless ones. The very thought of it was like finding out a fun old toy wasn’t broken after all, only out of batteries.
She was stirring a preemptive pitcher of neighborly thank-you lemonade in the kitchen when a knock came at the front door. “Come on in!” she called, bending to retrieve an ice tray from the freezer. “I’m making some—” She stopped short. The figure in the doorway was not Paul. “Oh! Hallie, you startled me.”
The girl took a step back. “You said to come in…”
“That I did.” Izzy was good with her friends’ very many very small kids, but she hadn’t spent much time with this older species and was never sure how to speak to them. “What can I do for you?” She emptied the ice into the pitcher and refilled the tray at the sink.
“I’m working on this newspaper project—my second edition. You might have seen the first one?”
Izzy shook her head. “Don’t think so.” Was that relief on Hallie’s face?
“Well … The idea is for me to report on good news. And I heard you work for that radio show, where people go on a second date?”
Good news. While Izzy was spending her days getting paid to sift through the bad in search of the meaningless, here was someone—a child, no less—pushing for something better, something more.
“Cool,” she said, trying to sound like a peer without being too ridiculous about it. “I take it you’re as bothered by the endless stream of bad news as I am?”
Hallie looked annoyed. “Of course I’m bothered by it. My dad is in Afghanistan.”
Izzy blanched. How had she become so self-absorbed that even a kid could make her feel like a dolt? Unlike her, Hallie didn’t need to seek out perspective checks to put her life up against real tragedy—she lived with the knowledge that she was always a breath away from one.
“An-y-way,” Hallie said, singing each syllable. “The dating show?”
She nodded, for once glad of the change of subject to her least favorite one. “Second Date Update. But more often, they don’t go on a second date.” She slipped the tray in the freezer. “I agree that we could all use more good news, but I’m not sure you’re likely to find it on Second Date Update.”
Hallie’s face fell, but she recovered quickly. “Well, could I ask you a few questions about it anyway? Our teacher says that often the real story is the one people don’t set out to cover.”
Izzy stole a glance out the window into the yard. No sign of Paul yet. “I’m working outside; let’s talk in the garden for a few. Would you like some lemonade?”
Hallie nodded. Izzy loaded the pitcher and a stack of plastic cups onto a tray and motioned for her to follow, out the back door. The patio table she’d just bought was in pieces on the ground, its six chairs stacked with the tags still on. “Sorry for the mess,” she said. “I’m still setting up back here.” The tray was just small enough to fit on the little mosaic stand between her chaise lounges, and she set it there and poured Hallie a glass. The girl perched awkwardly on the edge of a lounge and took a pad and pen out of her pocket.
“What’s your favorite part of working at Second Date Update?” she asked, chewing the pen’s lid earnestly. Izzy grabbed a pair of scissors from her toolbox and started cutting the tags off the chair legs.