Play It Safe(50)

This included such comments as, “You have such a pretty figure, Ivey, and you’re always in jeans and cowboy boots. You need some pretty skirts and heels.” And, “Every time I see you, you’re wearing different perfume. A girl has to have a signature scent. You need to settle on one and stay there.” And, “You really need more than a jeans jacket in Colorado. You need to get yourself down to Hayes for a winter coat. A nice one. Long. Wool. I think for your coloring, camel. Good timing since they’re having their winter clearance sale.” And, “You have such lovely hair, child, but there’s so much of it. You should get yourself an appointment at Stacy’s and get it cut, probably to your shoulders.”

This last was unfortunately timed to come while we were at the dinner table eating the spaghetti I made (I was really getting the hang of ground beef) and Gray was sitting there.

Mostly, since he did it himself, he ignored Grandma Miriam bossing me.

This, he didn’t ignore.

“She’s not cuttin’ her hair. Ever,” Gray declared and Grandma Miriam looked to him and even though she’d known him since birth, she clearly misjudged his tone and the look in his eyes because she kept right on talking.

“She has a beautiful head of hair, Gray, but you’re a man. You don’t know anything about these things. A shorter style will become the shape of her face.”

“She’s not cuttin’ her hair. Ever,” Gray repeated and there was even more steel in it this time.

“Gray!” Grandma Miriam snapped. “It’s not for you to say. It isn’t your hair.”

“Yeah, it is. You know how it is and even if you wanted to pretend you didn’t, you don’t want me to explain how it is. What I will explain is that it’s…not… yours,” Gray returned.

Grandma Miriam snapped her mouth shut and her cheeks got pink even as her blue eyes flashed and I quickly excused myself, rushed from the table and ran to the bathroom where I burst out laughing.

I think they heard me.

I didn’t care.

What could I say? They were funny.

Later, after Gray and I made out in his truck before I went to my room, I promised him I’d only ever cut my hair to get a trim.

This got me another hard kiss then, against my lips, a soft, sweet, gentle, “Thanks, dollface.”

And I made my promise honestly but at Gray’s soft, sweet, gentle gratitude, it became a vow.

* * * * *

Being a waitress in a bar in a small town I quickly discovered that we had regulars and if they sensed you were turning local, they sucked you in. They did this by sharing their lives with you, showing you pictures of their kids, telling you what movie they recently saw and that you had to see it. They also did it by advising you about the restaurant a town over that had an unfortunate result to a recent health inspection and writing down a recipe that took four different napkins that you had to try.

Stuff like that.

Stuff I liked.

Though it had to be said that I might have been getting the hang of hamburger meat, a recipe that took four napkins was currently beyond my capabilities. Still, I kept it.

I also met Gray’s two best friends. Shim, a tall, gangly, sandy-haired man who was a hand on Jeb Sharp’s ranch and was engaged to Chastity, a seriously petite and curvy blonde who looked cute with him regardless of the fact he was eight inches taller than her. And Ronan, called Roan, who was about two inches taller than me, worked with Janie’s man Danny at some local place that processed gravel (who ever heard of such a thing, processing gravel? Still, from the way they explained it, that was what they did). Roan seemed dedicated to the task of expanding his beer gut, had no girlfriend and had a fondness for telling long-winded jokes that were hilarious. And he had a million of them.

They started to become regulars at The Rambler and I liked it because they obviously liked me and I obviously liked that.

Unfortunately, working at one of the town’s two bars meant that Buddy Sharp, his sidekicks Jim, Ted and Pete and Gray’s exes, specifically Cecily, came in every once in awhile. Just as Shim, Chastity and Roan made it clear they liked me, Buddy, Jim, Ted, Pete and Cecily made it clear they did not.

I didn’t let this bother me because, fortunately, even though they didn’t like me and didn’t mind me knowing it, that didn’t mean they didn’t tip.

* * * * *

Twice (before last night), Gray braved the wrath of Grandma Miriam as backed by God and His Word the Bible and he arranged for his cousin, Audie, to spend the night at his house to look after Grandma Miriam so he could stay with me.

I doubted this went down too well. What I knew was, however it went down, Gray and Grandma Miriam kept it between them because when I went over to his house after, she bossed me but she didn’t say anything about it. Nor did she give me any indication she was angry or disappointed in Gray or me.

I figured this was because Gray laid down the law that he was a man, I was his girl, his private life was his private life and, even though he lived with his grandmother, that was the way it was going to be. I also figured part of Gray’s law was that she didn’t bypass him with her aversion to our modern relationship and pass it onto me.

So she kept mum on the subject and Gray did what he pleased.

And luckily, what he pleased meant I had him all night in my bed with me.

And I liked that.

* * * * *