Chapter Three
Melody
After working five hours by myself on the busiest Sunday I’d had since the week before Christmas, our bi-weekly Monday night book club was a welcome relief. This time Grace was up in our hosting rotation, and I planned to spend the night at her house so I could have more than one drink.
My house in the hills just outside Ellicottville was the furthest away from everyone else’s, though it was still only twenty minutes from Walker’s Grove, the town the rest of the group called home. Still, none of us took chances drinking and driving, so we often had sleepovers or took turns volunteering to be the designated driver. It was my turn to host in two weeks and everyone would be spending the night. Fortunately, I had the room since my father insisted on the largest chalet available when I moved away, and it was far too big for just me. He paid the difference between what I wanted to spend on a two-bedroom condo and the chalet’s purchase price, so I couldn’t complain too much. He called it an investment, and since my family visited almost once a month, he got his money’s worth.
Grace met me at the door, holding it open to let me enter with my precious cargo. I arrived early to bring our traveling bar-in-a-box, one of the most important elements of book club. It started as one lonely bottle of vodka, according to the story passed on by the three original members, but it grew into a tomato box full of booze and mixers after only a few months of regular meetings. By the time I was invited to join the group, it was a plastic tote that traveled to the host’s house every other week, and Layla had the overflow stored in her basement.
You might think we were a bunch of lushes, but the opposite was actually true. We were never able to consume all the beverages we brought, so the stockpile kept growing. We would all vow not to purchase anything else for a few months but then, inevitably, someone would see a new drink recipe that required something not in the box or be in the mood for wine instead of mixed drinks, and it would start growing again.
“Yay! You’re here,” Grace said, quickly shutting the door behind me. The temperature was only in the mid-twenties and going to get colder once the sun fully set.
“I’m here and ready for a cocktail after the last two days.” I set down the tote and began removing my outerwear, starting with my boots so I didn’t track snow through her house. “I could have used you yesterday, too.”
“You should have called,” Grace yelled from the kitchen. “I just came home after church and sat around.”
“I thought you had a lunch date?” That’s what she’d told me on Saturday, at least.
“He messaged me late Saturday and cancelled. I think he was out somewhere and drunk and didn’t want to get up early the next day.”
I took a seat on the couch in front of the gas fireplace to warm up and Grace joined me, handing me a glass of the Riesling I’d added to the box for tonight.
“Are you going to reschedule?” I asked. Out of the six women who made up book club, Grace was the most fixated on finding a man.
“I haven’t heard from him since that message, so probably not. He must not have been that interested.” She shrugged like she didn’t care, but I knew better.
“Grace, it could have been a million things but, in the end, it just means he’s not the right guy for you. What kind of loser gets wasted the night before what would have been the best lunch date of his life?”
She gave me a small smile before she bounced out of her seat. “Let me get the snacks. Tonight’s theme is sausage party since we’re all sorely lacking in meat consumption.”
Leave it to Grace to make our snacks dirty. The bouncy blonde looked like the wholesome girl next door, especially dressed in her Sunday best, but underneath she was dirty and slightly depraved. Her book club selections always left one or two of us feeling either shocked or uncomfortable.
“I have pepperoni, smoked Gouda, summer sausage, aged cheddar, and smoked salmon on this tray.” She set a platter and basket of crackers on the coffee table. “I’ll bring more out once everyone else gets here.”
“You enjoyed slicing up all this meat, didn’t you?” I asked, eyeing the piles of thinly sliced sausages.
“You know cooking helps me relieve stress.” Grace batted her eyes, trying to look innocent, but she didn’t fool me. We’d been friends since shortly after I opened my shop. She’d been one of my first customers and came in so often that I couldn’t help but become her friend. We also had a lot in common. Grace lived on a small farm where she grew all organic fruits and vegetables that she sold at the local farmers markets and to area restaurants. With a dual degree in agriculture and botany, and an inheritance from her parents’ untimely deaths, she threw herself into her plants, but she didn’t have much to do in the winter. That’s how she ended up hanging out in my store so much that I hired her to work part-time once sales grew enough to require another person.
“Sooo,” she started, in a tone I was familiar with. It was the one she used when she had a request that I wouldn’t like. “My church is doing a speed dating thing tomorrow night, and I need you to come with me.”
“You don’t need me there,” I replied, wrinkling my nose at even the thought of spending my night in a church basement, rotating between boring conversations with strange men. Not my idea of a good time. “Won’t it just be all the same guys you see every Sunday, anyway?”
Grace attended the Catholic Church in Walker’s Grove. She wasn’t particularly religious, but she said the routine and ritual reminded her of her parents. And it was a way to meet single men.
“No, it won’t be, that’s what’s so great. There’s actually a group of churches participating, and it’s at the Red Mill Inn in Olean. There will be drinks and food, too. I’ll buy your ticket if you come as my wingwoman. Please?”
I groaned and she knew she had me. It was the last thing I wanted to do, but I couldn’t say no to her.
“Fine. But do not pressure me to find a man. I’ll go and be nice, but my goal is not to get a date. I don’t have time to date.” I liked my life just the way it was, for now. I did not need a man coming in and demanding things. My store was my number one priority. Maybe in a few years, I’d start thinking about settling down, but I was only twenty-six; I had plenty of time.
“Yay!” she shouted in excitement, and I winced at her volume. “This will be so much fun. Wear that black dress you bought the last time we visited your family.”
“Isn’t that a little much for this event?” The dress was a classic little black dress but had sheer netting at the top, giving it a little push toward the sexy side that I didn’t think was appropriate for a church-sponsored singles mixer. Plus, I didn’t actually want to get a date out of the night and that dress would send the wrong message. “No. I’ll figure it out, but I won’t be wearing that dress.”
Grace pouted for a second, then perked up at the sound of a car crunching up the gravel drive.
“They’re here! Get the door, please, Mellie. I’m going to get the rest of the snacks out now.”
Raquel, Layla, and Kenny arrived together; no surprise there as they were the original book club members. The three of them piled out of Layla’s SUV carrying several bottles of wine and trays of food. Even though we had a tote full of booze and Grace was in charge of food, no one wanted to arrive empty-handed. Before they made it to the door, Charlotte pulled in and parked off to the side so she didn’t block the driveway.
“Hey, ladies, how are we doing tonight?” I asked after opening the door.
“Excellent.”
“I’m thirsty.”
“I’m the DD.”
The last grumbled comment was from Layla, and only partly in jest. She always took her turn as the designated driver, but it wasn’t her favorite night of the month.
“Just eat a lot of snacks. You’ll be fine,” Raquel responded, rolling her eyes. The two were best friends and had been since high school. They enjoyed poking at each other but never actually fought, just good-natured teasing. They said it was their love language.
“Hello, hello,” Grace called from the kitchen. “Do I smell Kenny’s famous sausage balls?”
“Yep,” Kenny, whose real name was Kendra but nobody dared called her that to her face, replied. “You said tonight was sausage night, so I brought hot balls for us to bite into.”
She carried the tray into the kitchen, and we all followed like a bunch of desperate women.
“Gimme one of those.” Grace ripped off the foil as soon as Kenny set the tray down. “Oh, so good,” she moaned, sinking her teeth into a meatball.
“Gee, Grace, do you need some time alone with your appetizer?” Layla asked as she grabbed a plate and started loading it up from the spread on the kitchen table.
“Maybe you should get laid,” Raquel suggested as she opened a bottle of wine and poured herself a glass.
“I know. I’m trying. But when dickheads cancel on me at the last minute, it’s a little difficult to find a partner.” She popped another sausage ball into her mouth and tried to act casual, but everyone looked at me in alarm. It wasn’t like Grace to be so blunt about her dating woes, so it had to be bad.
I gave a small shake of my head so everyone would drop it. “I told you, Grace, he was a loser anyway. Now, I need more wine and a plate of meat and cheese.”
We moved around the kitchen, filling plates and cups, chatting about mundane things, as comfortable in each other’s homes as were in our own. Even though Charlotte, Grace, and I had only been in the group the last few years, we never felt like outsiders. These ladies were true friends, something I’d never had before, and I treasured these meetings as a way to decompress, talk to other professional women, and sometimes just be silly.
After we all had full plates and glasses, we settled in the living room. Grace’s eat-in kitchen was small, but her living room spanned the front of the house, with the fireplace at one end and a cozy window seat at the other. Two couches and four club chairs filled the space in between with the television mounted on the wall above the fireplace. Her décor was comfortable French country done in hues of blue and cream. It was feminine without being over-the-top girly. Pretty, but not too delicate. Much like Grace.