Georgia on Her Mind(48)
“What are you doing out here?” I open the passenger door and drop the gift onto the seat.
“Eating barbecue.” He approaches, motioning to my car, eyeing it as if it’s a rare impressionist painting. “Who’d you steal this from?”
“Kid on the corner. He wanted to sell it to buy a bike.”
He laughs. “Casper & Company is treating you well.” He walks around the Beemer again, chin jutted out.
“They did.”
“This is quite a big deal for your dad and mom,” he says, leaning against the passenger door, his legs crossed casually, regarding me with his blue-green eyes and an expression I can’t describe. Interest? Curiosity? Something stuck between my teeth? I run my tongue over them just in case.
“Yes, it is.”
“Your dad is quite the businessman.”
“Yes, he is,” I answer robotically, an odd quiver in my voice. My heart swirls with surreal images of the night he visited my place, the night he almost kissed me. (I think.)
Stop, Macy. Don’t get your heart in a wad over a guy you’ll never have.
“You look beautiful,” he says. “Was it your idea to dress like your mom?” He gives me a coy look and sips from his can.
“What do you think?” I laugh. He’s looking right at me! My insides shimmy. Is my green light on or something?
“Probably not, but only you could pull it off, Macy.”
His compliments so confuse me. I know he’s sincere, but where is it all going?
“I got the second reunion flyer,” I say, changing my stance, putting some distance between us.
“Alisa said she mailed them out. How’d you like it?”
“It’s weird seeing my name in such large print. Macy Moore.” I talk too loud and too fast.
He shakes his head, laughing. “I don’t know why you discredit yourself, Macy. You’re a star, don’t you know?”
A falling star. I’m on a confidence merry-go-round and right now the horse is sinking down.
“Why’d you come to visit me that night?” I blurt out.
He looks into my eyes. “I wanted to see you.”
I tip my chin up. “Any particular reason?” I ask without considering where this conversation might end up.
He coughs. “Anything wrong with a friend visiting a friend?” He taps the heel of his shoe against the pavement.
“No, I guess not.” I feel disappointed, a little. Maybe I didn’t know where my questions would lead, but I suppose I wanted more than a friendship answer.
Why? I can’t say. I’m acutely aware that Dylan lives in Beauty. Always has, always will. And I’m bound for some northern city. Better make sure the green light is off.
Propped against my car, we slip into a gentle conversation, talking about anything and everything. He really is amazing to be around.
When the sun begins to slip behind the trees, haloing them in gold and red, I say, “I’d better get back to the party.” I’m leery of losing my heart to the fairy-tale magic of this moment.
He glances skyward. “Me, too.”
Silence. Staring in opposite directions, neither one of us moving. It’s as if all these unspoken words linger between us, yearning to be said.
My heartbeat picks up the pace to a light jog. This causes me to draw a deep breath, and while I don’t mean it to, the air whispers out of my lungs in a perfect Marilyn Monroe impression.
He snaps his head around. I jump to life. “Gotta go.” I beep the car locked and stride toward the country club.
He runs up behind me. “Wait, I’ll walk with you.”
I look back at him. “Dad has a bluegrass band lined up for the evening,” I say for no reason other than to fill the air. Otherwise, I might blurt something like, “Why don’t you love me?”
“Should be fun. I need to get going, but will I see you at church in the morning?” he asks.
My heart thuds. I glance at him. “Yes, and then Sizzler.”
He laughs. “Yes, Sizzler. It’s a Beauty Community Church tradition.”
“Who am I to buck tradition?”
He laughs with a deep, resonant cadence. “You’re all about bucking tradition, Macy Moore.”
At the clubhouse he goes in one direction, I go in another. I find my purse, drop my keys inside and tell my heart to stop dreaming.
Mid-May. Where have the days gone? Still no word from Myers-Smith. I expected more from them, but at the same time, expected nothing at all.
What’s so hard about dashing off a letter on corporate letterhead, letting a girl know she didn’t get the job? Use a lot of corporate buzzwords about how you found a candidate more tailored to their corporate needs and yadda, yadda, blah, blah, the deed is done.
On a positive note, Peyton Danner returned my call. No, she had not heard about my interview in jeans, but she dismissed it with “I’ve heard worse, much worse.”
She’s talking with other companies about their need for a person of my substantial (her word, not mine) qualities, but these things take time.
So I go about my daily, unemployed routine. Up around eight, power walk three miles (cancel all mental notes to rejoin the gym), shower and dress, then sit down for prayer and Bible reading.
I try not to let my mind drift and wander down dark mental trails during the quiet moments of my devotional time. I try not to dwell on the fact that I’m both jobless and husbandless at thirty-three.