A Lot Like Christmas (Wishful 11)

As she waited for the line to move forward, Brooke sent a text to Shelli. How goes the search for fosters?

Two more people had been checked out before the answer came back.

Shelli: Not great. Nobody wants to get out in the mess.

Brooke: It’s already started?

Shelli: Haven’t you looked outside?

Brooke: I’m still stuck in line at McSweeney’s.

Craning her head, she tried to see past the crowd to the front windows overlooking the parking lot. Even from here, she could see the spitting sleet.

Shit.

It took another fifteen minutes to get through the line. As soon as she stepped outside, she flinched at the bite of ice hitting her skin. Of course they’d start with sleet instead of snow. God forbid they get the fun stuff that merited an excuse to play, then come in and eat good, hearty stews and cuddle—or other things—with a naked companion. Not that she had a companion for such activities. She’d been on a man diet for longer than she cared to admit. Didn’t matter. She had way more important things to worry about than her total lack of love life. She needed a miracle to save all her animals.

Hunching into her coat, she trudged through the parking lot and headed across the street. Knowing McSweeney’s would be a madhouse, she’d parked a couple blocks away in the nearly deserted downtown. The sleet got heavier as she walked, mixing with the first signs of actual snow. It stung her cheeks, clinging to her knit hat. Her hands ached with cold, and she wished she’d remembered to shove her gloves into her coat pocket this morning. Brooke was wet and half frozen by the time her little compact car came into view. Ice was already beginning to accumulate on the town green. She hustled across it, as fast as she dared, skirting by the fountain that was the town’s namesake. And then she paused and went back a few paces.

This was Wishful. The town where hope sprang eternal. It was in all the brochures and on all the banners marching down Main Street. Brooke didn’t know if she believed all the hype that wishes made in the fountain—fed from nearby Hope Springs—would come true. But she figured she could use all the help she could get to keep her animals safe and in good health.

Shifting all the bags to one hand, she grabbed one of the coins she’d received as change at the market and fisted it in her freezing hand.

Please send me a miracle to save all the animals at the rescue.

It dropped with a musical plink into the basin.

Then, as if she’d angered the gods, the sleet seemed to double.

Great.

Shrugging off the idea of divine intervention, Brooke headed to her car and prepared herself for a long night of hard work.

“It’s gonna be a Mississippi blizzard.” Chester Harkin made this pronouncement with all the accumulated wisdom of his eighty-odd years.

From his position behind the register, Hayden Garrow scanned the crowded aisles of the Wishful Feed and Farm Supply. “Everybody else certainly seems to think so. We just sold out of the last of our generators, and I think we’re down to two space heaters.” That didn’t even touch on the run they’d had on kerosene and propane since that morning. He was grateful he’d bought up one of the generators first thing and stowed it in his truck, along with a couple tanks of propane. He didn’t really expect things to get that bad out at the farm, but if it did, he’d be ready.

At the other register, his boss, Abe Costello, just shook his grizzled head. “Everybody’s running around, actin’ a fool. They’re either convinced it’s gonna be the apocalypse or driving as if there’s nothing at all different from a normal day.”

“Well, is anything actually gonna happen?” Hayden asked.

“We’re due up for a good snow or ice storm,” Chester insisted. “It’s been…what? Ten, twelve years since the last one? We usually get about one decent one a decade.”

“Do you really think this one’s gonna turn into something?” Hayden asked. “I mean, how many times over the past five years have they called for snow and we didn’t get more than flurries?”

The door opened at the tail end of this, and Corbett Raines, the rookie officer of the Wishful Police Department, stepped inside. “It’s definitely more than flurries. The weather’s getting filthy. The rain’s already turned to sleet, mixed with snow. Temps are dropping and the roads are starting to freeze. I’ve dealt with three accidents since this morning, from people driving like idiots.”

“See?” Abe said. “Actin’ a fool. They don’t know how to drive in this kind of weather and don’t have the good sense not to try.”

Brody Jensen, a local contractor, set his purchases on the counter. “There was a guy on a job I worked a few years ago who gave the best advice I ever heard for people who have no experience driving on snow and ice. He said to imagine your grandmama sitting in the backseat, wearing a new Sunday dress, with a crockpot full of gravy on her lap, a tray full of fresh biscuits on the seat, and open jars of sweet tea on the floorboard. Everything has to get to church unscathed.”

Hayden laughed and began ringing him up.

Chester considered. “You know, that’s not half bad advice, actually.”

“I still say people need to get on home and stay there,” Abe insisted.

“From your mouth to God’s ear,” Corbett said. “Chief’s got all hands on deck while the worst of this rolls through.”