One Wish (Thunder Point #7)(4)

Grace didn’t want to be around people and she didn’t believe she had any marketable skills. So she started helping in the flower shop, in the back, learning to make beautiful bouquets and arrangements. Portland was a funky, interesting, welcoming city—not too big, not too small, not uppity or flashy. Little by little, Grace came out of the back room to deal with customers, sometimes delivering flowers, even helping Mamie and Ross with weddings. No one made a fuss over her or asked her a lot of questions.

Every time a major skating competition was covered by the mainstream or sports networks, Grace was glued to the TV, watching every move. And invariably there’d be some short vignette about Izzy Banks, the girl who had it all and threw it all away. “Izzy Banks, the brat on the ice, the fiercest competitor in figure skating, obviously couldn’t take the pressure,” one sportscaster noted of her.

Brat. Boy, that stung.

Her mother would usually get in touch, proving that Winnie couldn’t ignore the competitions any more than Grace could. She’d pressure Grace to return home, return to skating, and the few conversations they had would end in a fight and they wouldn’t speak again for months.

A year before the 2014 Winter Games in Russia, when the dramatic story of her life might be publicly examined yet again, Grace went in search of a new place to settle and tackle life on her own. A little money had been set aside for her by her father and she found Pretty Petals, the shop Iris’s mother had owned. She’d been in Thunder Point almost a year when the winter competition took place. When Grace couldn’t watch it, she’d record it. There had been the usual newsy dish about the more stunning events of the life of Izzy Banks, but no one seemed to recognize Grace. There were, thankfully, more interesting sports scandals that year. And Thunder Point was more a football than figure skating town.

All she’d ever wanted was a life she could control. A life that didn’t include backbreaking labor, cruel rivals, endless travel across too many time zones, the occasional crazed fan or terrible loneliness. She wanted to know what it felt like to have real friends, not a staff of coaches, therapists, a security detail and competitors. She’d never had a boyfriend.

She did, however, have more than one gold medal. She’d won every significant competition in the world.

* * *

It drizzled in the days following Christmas, typical Oregon Coast weather in winter. Grace’s only part-time employee, a local married woman with a child in elementary school, came into the shop to resign. The woman’s life had grown too busy and complex, she complained. Grace knew it was going to create a challenge, even though all the woman had done was manage the front of the store. Grace was going to be back to doing it all, just as she had when the shop was new. She’d had the doorbell installed so she could lock the front door and go upstairs. The doorbell would buzz in her loft. And she could always close the shop to make deliveries when necessary. She’d ask around for a delivery boy.

Business was typically down the week following a holiday and the days were much shorter so Grace closed the shop at four one afternoon and drove out to Cooper’s for a beer. She wasn’t surprised to see Troy was back from visiting his family in Morro Bay. She was also not surprised that there was no one around the bar. People didn’t hang out on the beach in cold, wet weather like this. But she had to admit surprise at seeing a big pile of books and papers beside his laptop on the bar next to his cup of coffee. She jumped on a bar stool. “Welcome home. Did you have fun with the family?” she asked.

“More or less. My sister has three little undisciplined kids and I slept on her couch. It was brutal. What can I get you?”

“Beer?”

“Was that a question or order?” he asked.

“Beer, please.” She glanced at the books. “Homework?”

“Lesson plans,” he said, closing everything up, stacking it all and pushing it to one side. “We’re caught up in a couple of my classes so we’re going to have some fun. I’m going to offer them a chance for extra credit if they research the history of something that interests them—like a rock band or in-line skating or maybe a sport like kayaking. I’m writing up a few examples.”

“That almost sounds fun, but not enough fun. Did you get in any skiing over the holiday?”

“Nope,” he said, drawing her a draft. “We played some golf, but the weather wasn’t great. I might make a drive up to Mount Hood before I get back to work, maybe for a day. If I had more time and money I’d check out Tahoe. So, you were the maid of honor.”

“I was. Kind of short notice.”

“I heard it wasn’t exactly planned in advance...”

“That’s how I heard it, too. Iris said they decided and just did it. They got a marriage license, called a judge Seth knew, told Seth’s family and got it done. I didn’t even have time to order special flowers.” She sipped a little of her beer. “How are you handling it?”

“Fine,” he said.

“Good. That’s good.”

He leaned both hands on the bar. “I went out with my little brother and got roaring drunk. Then I bought a Jeep I can’t really afford.”

“Oh,” she said. “Gosh, I hope you don’t get your heart broken too often or you’ll go broke.”

“I’d wanted that Jeep anyway. And I deserved a good drunk.”