Split(14)

If I go black, I can’t be responsible for what happens and I’ll be back to living my life on the run.





FIVE



SHYANN


“Miss Shyann Blue Jennings, I cannot believe my eyes!” Dorothy from the 87 Café, aptly named for its placement right on I-87 that runs through Payson, presses her palm against her robust stained-apron-covered chest, feigning shock. Chances are she knew I was back in town the second my front tires crossed Main Street.

She’s been living in Payson since she was a little girl and I’d swear her roots run so deep under this town she feels the earth shift when someone new steps into it. And once they do, she’s the bullhorn that spreads the good news and she doesn’t gossip the modern way with text messages and social media. No, she’s old school. She’s all about the face-to-face gab session, which I swear is the only reason she even works in the town’s busiest restaurant that doubles as Payson’s social hub.

Smacked right in the middle of town, the 87 Café isn’t your typical city diner. Trading in chrome and red pleather seating for wood and faux cowhide, old horseshoes nailed to the wall for decoration, and a signed head shot of Garth Brooks displayed proudly at the entrance. With a daily special of BBQ whatever, the place is a cowboy’s paradise. I’ve barely made it through the front door and my mouth is watering from the scent of smoked meat and sweet sauce, and it’s not even nine o’clock in the morning.

“Hey, Dorothy —Oh!”

Her arms wrap around me in a tight hug and her plump little body seems to have filled out a little more since I last saw her. She pulls back and studies my face, her smile turning sad and her dusty brown eyes shiny. “You look so much like your momma.” She pulls me back in with such force it momentarily knocks the air from my lungs.

“Good to see you too.” I pat her back, hoping she gets the hint to release me.

After a few seconds, she does. “Come on.” She jerks her head to the counter that’s sprinkled with a few people. I feel their eyes on me, but I keep mine on Dorothy as I drop down on a stool at the far end. She pours me a cup of coffee without asking. “What brings you to town?” She props a hip on the counter. “And what in God’s name are you wearing?”

I rip open a few sugar packets, grinning. “It’s Dolce and Gabbana.” Or Dolce Gambino, but she doesn’t need to know that.

“Dole-say what?” Her gaze roams my midnight-blue silk blouse. Trevor always loved this top. Said on-screen it really brought out my eyes. “Nash see you in that getup?”

“I’m a flatlander now, Dorothy.” I busy myself by stirring my coffee, a little nervous to acknowledge the flash of disappointment in the woman’s eyes. “Got a college degree, a real job . . . er had a real job.”

Her drawn-on brows drop low over her eyes and she leans in. “Heard ’bout that. Shame they let you go.”

Of course she did—the woman smells gossip like a wine taster does wine, shoving her nose right in it. Mmm . . . smells fresh with an aroma of assumptions and hints of half-truths, but it’ll make a good story, so let’s fill up the glasses and share.

I take a sip of coffee and straighten my shoulders. “Thanks, it was p-probably time to m-move on anyway. Figure I’d come home for a bit, um . . . r-regroup.” I rein in my stutter. No use giving her the real story littered with pathetic weakness I don’t need spread around town.

Her face breaks into a smile so big it deepens all her wrinkles. “That’s wonderful. I know your daddy must miss you. Be nice to have y’all together working the family business.”

I clear my throat and shake my head. “I don’t think Jennings is the best place for me.”

“Don’t be silly. It’s the perfect place for you; it has your name all over it. Literally.” She laughs and nods to an older man a few stools down when he flags her for a coffee refill. She fills his cup and returns to me, still grinning.

“I was hoping to, ya know, expand my résumé.”

She uses the pencil stabbed behind her ear to scratch her scalp, which is hidden beneath a helmet of graying brown hair. “Expand your . . . résumé?”

“Yeah, I thought you’d probably know if anyone in town is hiring.”

She turns and grabs a few plates heaping with eggs and a variety of breakfast meat, then drops them to a man with his nose buried in a newspaper and the man closest to me.

“I don’t understand.”

She wouldn’t. I shrug. “Are Deirdre and Sam still in town?” I cringe at her sharp look. I haven’t spoken to my two childhood best friends since before I left. I shouldn’t be surprised that Dorothy knows that. “College was busy and I . . . I just lost touch, ya know?”

She doesn’t respond to my lame excuse, her silence speaking volumes of displeasure, then turns to a steaming bowl the cook just put up in the window and places it in front of me.

“Deirdre moved to the valley . . .”

Oatmeal with a scoop of brown sugar, raisins, and a side of cream. She remembered.

“Thank you.”

“. . . got married and is pregnant with her second kid.”

I blink, shocked. “Wow, didn’t realize she was in a such a hurry.”

“How long has it been since you were last here?” She’s asking, but she knows. She just wants to hear me say it.