A Town Called Noelle Read online

  “I’ve got Tyler and Gina on cleanup on Friday, so I could meet at five? I’m sorry it’s not earlier in the day…”

  “Five o’clock. Sure, okay. Where?”

  “Just Maggie’s Coffee? It’s a few doors along…if she’s open, anyway, what with the weather. If not, I guess ‘outside Maggie’s coffee place and we’ll figure it out from there’,” Holly joked weakly.

  Brooke favoured this with a brief smile. “All right. But please don’t… I don’t want you to get your hopes up. As of right now, the deal still stands.”

  Holly held up a hand, shaking her head. “I’m not going to oblige you to talk about this at all today,” she said. “Don’t worry about it. I’m a big girl. We’ll talk Friday. But…” She hesitated, clearly considering her next words carefully. “Losing someone close is a…really individual experience. For everyone, I think. I’ve been there myself, and if you feel the need to just talk, or vent, or…well, Greg has my number.”

  Of all the things Brooke had been expecting Holly to hit her with, commiseration over the loss of a family member had been an outlier. “Oh, um. Thanks. That’s kind of you to offer.”

  “I know you’ll have people in your life you care about, people you’re close to who are here for you,” Holly added now, apparently keen to clarify her spontaneous offer. “But…sometimes what you need is a stranger. I found. So… Anyway. I’ll speak to you Friday if not before.”

  “Right. Okay, thanks.” Holly stepped away, and Brooke watched her go for a second before turning away and looking back out across the crematorium’s well-manicured garden. There was snow drifting down, slow but steady. She was suddenly very tired. Maybe I can just sleep till Friday…

  “So honestly it seems unlikely,” Holly said, sliding the freshly poured coffee across the counter. “As much as I want to be optimistic, to try to brazen this out…it really seems like she wants rid of all Karen’s property, y’know?”

  “Even Highfield House, I hear,” her mother-in-law confirmed. “Danny passed the other day on his route and said he saw a guy in a suit with a rental car poking around there.”

  “Huh. Yeah, that’s…” Holly shook her head. “Wow.”

  “Can’t say I like the idea of some spa company coming in and bringing in a bunch of fine weather tourists. That’s not what we’re about here, you know?”

  “Is that who’s buying it then, a spa company?” Holly shot the older Mrs Jackson a rueful smile. “You hear everything, don’t you?”

  “Word travels. Especially when it’s about one of our own.”

  “Aw, Angie… I’m gonna be okay. You know that, right? We always muddle through, Maya ’n’ me.”

  “It doesn’t seem very fair, after all you’ve been through. Does she know? That you’re a single parent? She wouldn’t throw you out of the property if she knew, would she?”

  Holly’s mouth flattened to a line, and she bit back a slightly sharp response. Her parents had said the same thing yesterday at their weekly dinner—what about Maya, does she know about Chris—but… “That’s…that’s not the point. She shouldn’t need to be guilt-tripped to listen to reason. Besides, I don’t think it’d matter. Brooke Hawkins is…really in her own head, I think. Y’know? She just wants to shed this town and get back out.”

  Angie Jackson tutted and shook her head. “I suppose I shouldn’t expect anything more from her—she ran away from Noelle as fast as she could after high school. Why would she be any different now?”

  Holly shrugged. “Not everyone’s built for small town life. And, well, I guess she and her mom didn’t get along. Karen never talked about her, and at the funeral yesterday… I dunno. There was a coldness there, y’know? Detachment. She’s obviously hurting, but…” Holly shook her head. “I dunno.”

  “Well. I’m sure you’ll be able to talk some sense into her. Just let her know how much work you’ve put into the place, and she’ll see why she can’t take it away from you.”

  Four Days till Christmas

  “—weather front down from the north east. So, it looks like we can expect blizzards and general disruptions through the weekend.”

  “Oh, for God’s sake.” Brooke hadn’t meant to say it aloud but apparently, she had, going by the looks of the other patrons in the coffee shop. She glanced at her watch, wondering if she’d make it back to civilisation before the blizzard hit.

  A moment later a wave of cold air washed through the small café as Holly Jackson entered, casting her eyes about the room, and shooting Brooke a quick, tight smile when she spotted her. Brooke nodded at her and settled back into her seat, resigned. Looks like I’m stuck here through the weekend.

  Soon enough, both women were seated with their coffees. Holly seemed determined to make nice and opened with a friendly, “How’ve you been?”

  “Fine, thanks. How about you? How’s Maya?”

  “Um, yeah, yeah, we’re both good, thanks—she’s with her grandma for the evening so right about now she’ll be eating way too much candy and making a mess with a scrapbook, I suspect.”

  “Right, okay. We don’t have to stay long,” Brooke said, maybe unhelpfully. “I just…wanted to give you a chance to tell me how I can make this easier. Like, if you need more time, or something.”

  Holly nodded, and visibly steeled herself before diving straight in. “So, if you’re able to give me more time, I feel like you might also be able to reconsider altogether.”

  “No. I’m sorry, I can’t.”

  “I just really feel like—hang on, what?”

  “They want the properties together. They’re not interested in splitting them up.”

  “But…but…but that doesn’t make any sense. The other unit on Main Street’s much larger, and with Highfield…and there are other empty shopfronts in the town; you know what it’s like these days. Have you even asked? If they really want to buy here surely the other two are a good enough bet by themselves.”

  Brooke couldn’t help sighing; this was exactly what she had been hoping to avoid. “I don’t want to be a landlord. It may have worked for my mother but it’s not for me.”

  “Right, but I’m not asking you not to sell up. I’m sure there are lots of property managers who’d be interested in buying a unit with a successful business on the premises. We’re doing well, Ms Hawkins—better than most businesses around here. Hell, with a few months to plan and look at my options it’s even possible I could buy the premises myself, or at least find you a buyer. Can you not give me that time instead of just yanking the rug out from under me?”

  “And if you can’t do it?” Brooke said, starting to bristle now. “Then I’ve lost my buyer and I’ll have to wait who knows how long for someone else to want to take it on.”

  Holly’s brow furrowed. “I didn’t say it was a zero-risk scenario. I know it’s still an ask. Are you really only going to consider the path of absolute least resistance? Is that how you got to…wherever it is you are in life?” She waved a vague hand toward Brooke to illustrate this—a gesture that seemed to Brooke intended to encompass and dismiss both at once.

  “Actually, I got here by doing what I needed to do, even when other people told me I couldn’t. You obviously don’t know anything about me, so I’d appreciate it if you could drop the speculation and accept that I’m trying to do my best to help you out here.”

  Holly was clearly losing the last vestiges of her reserve at this point. “You’re not trying to help me at all! Kicking me out is not helping me. An extra few weeks isn’t gonna make any difference.”

  “Listen, it’s the best I can do, so if you don’t want it, fine,” Brooke said, exasperated. “That’s your choice.”

  “My choice? None of this is my f—” Holly, ever the parent, caught herself just in time, and when she continued it was in a low hiss. “You’ve taken any choice out of this for me. No opportunity for negotiation. No opportunity to investigate my options—to give
me any options. That’s your choice, not mine. It’s all about you, about the absolute minimum inconvenience for you. Look, I don’t know why you need so badly to be rid of this place, but those of us still here need these businesses. We’re not ready to pull up stakes and move—with the logistics, the expense, we might not make it. You have the choice to prevent that happening, and you are choosing not to, and maybe you don’t give a crap, but I care about this town. Your mother cared about this town.”

  As soon as she said the words, Holly knew it had been a mistake. She was leaning across the table, she realised now, to be heard over the clanking and hissing from the coffee machine, and it suddenly felt far too close, Brooke’s expression in painfully high resolution as her face contorted and she pushed back from the table. The edge of the table caught Holly in the midriff and jarred the mugs and shakers; as if in slow motion she watched as Brooke’s cup rocked backward and deposited what was left of its dregs all over her shirt. She yelped, lurching backward reflexively, her chair toppling behind her. It would have sent her flying with it had Brooke not reached out to grab her wrist. With a tug she pulled Holly back, and in their efforts to avoid jarring the table again they nearly collided with each other instead.

  The air rushed out of Holly’s lungs, her heart dropping through her stomach. It had all happened so fast—the spill, the pitching chair, Brooke’s strong hold of her arm, warm and steady and the very opposite of her countenance, and the contrast threw her so that for a moment she couldn’t move, frozen, gazing up at Brooke in shock. As soon as she had found her footing, she stepped back—practically sprang back—and snatched her wrist out of Brooke’s grip.

  “Sorry,” Brooke muttered, though she didn’t seem clear what she was sorry for—the accident, selling Holly’s shop, or the way her hand had lingered on Holly’s once the “danger” had passed. “I’ll get you a towel, one sec…”

  But all Holly wanted was to be gone, and she shook her head. “Forget it.” She grabbed her jacket and spun away across the café. At another time she might have appended some deeply unhelpful bit of sarcasm to the end of this—“you’ve helped enough” perhaps, or “what do you care?”—but her pulse was racing and a deep blush was rising in her cheeks and she wanted nothing more than to be out of Brooke Hawkins’s sight as quickly as she could.

  The cold air hit her like a wall as she stepped outside, the coffee down her front immediately ice-cold, and she wrapped her jacket over her shoulders and ran through the snow to the bakery, blinking back tears she pretended, even to herself, were caused by the biting wind.

  “So, did you ask her if she liked her boots?”

  Maya and Holly always talked about their day before bed. It was one of the little rituals they’d developed in recent years, particularly once Maya was doing her own bedtime reading. Sometimes, however, Holly had to gloss over the details of what she’d been doing, and today was certainly one of those days, where “one of the most frustrating and humiliating experiences of my life” was replaced with “we drank coffee and had a talk about the bakery”. So, it was hard to fault the logic of the kid, under the circumstances—why wouldn’t she have asked Brooke about her boots?

  “I didn’t, sweetie, but she was wearing them, so I guess she likes them.”

  “That’s good. Mrs Aboyan said we’re supposed to get so much snow all the roads will be closed so it’s good she has them. Why does it always have to happen on the weekends, when I’m already not at school? Can’t it be during the week instead so we can start our vacation early?”

  “Aw, I thought you liked school…”

  “I do, but all we do before Christmas is watch movies and do crafts, and I’d rather be at the bakery with you.”

  “Maybe I should take you out of school and put you to work,” Holly mused. “I could do with someone small to clean my oven—you’d fit right in…”

  “Moo-oommm!”

  “I could shut you inside in the morning with a sandwich and open it again at the end of the day…”

  “Mooom!” Maya said, giggling. “Child labour is illegal now! You’d get arrested.”

  “Not if we didn’t tell anyone.”

  “I’d tell someone. I don’t want to be stuck in an oven all day.”

  “Then I guess we’d better keep our fingers crossed that school’s in on Monday, huh? You ready for sleep?”

  “Yeah.” Maya lay back, snuggling under the comforter as Holly pulled it up over her. At the last moment she reached out to catch her mother’s hand. “Mom?”

  “Uh huh?”

  “Is everything going to be okay? Are you going to have to move the shop?”

  “Maybe, honey, but it’ll be okay if I do. You and me always work something out. Don’t we?”

  “Yeah, I guess so.”

  “Hey.” Holly ducked to press a kiss to Maya’s cheek that ended with a raspberry. “It’s gonna be fine, okay? I promise.”

  “’Kay,” Maya said, giving Holly the trusting smile that always made her heart ache.

  The rest of the house was in darkness as she emerged from Maya’s nightlit bedroom, and she wandered through to the kitchen before putting a light on and heading straight for the cabinet containing her solitary bottle of whiskey. She didn’t generally drink at all, never mind alone, but tonight seemed to call for it.

  She couldn’t help but replay the meeting in the coffee shop over and over in her mind, even though she wanted nothing more than to put it behind her. It had been a disaster, almost from the beginning, and it seemed fitting she had run away into the cold, humiliated.

  It’d be a lie to suggest Holly was diplomatic even at the best of times. She was a person who always spoke her mind, often when she shouldn’t. But with Brooke it was as though the meagre hold she had on her self-control deserted her entirely. Despite her own rather cool countenance, Brooke Hawkins somehow managed to make her feel completely exposed—perhaps her coolness, her distance made Holly push harder, try to get some sort of reaction. That afternoon in the coffee house she’d felt utterly at sea the moment she’d laid eyes on Brooke, long before the embarrassing spill.

  And then there was the matter of her choice of words. You shouldn’t have mentioned her mother. You knew it, and you did it anyway. Shame welled up in her throat and she knocked back a swig straight from the bottle before pouring her whiskey. What a relief this woman wasn’t going to be her landlord—they clearly brought out the worst in one another. She only wished being rid of her didn’t involve her whole life being upended.

  Still, what options did she have? She had utterly failed to convince Brooke to reconsider her “bulk deal” property sale, and had turned down any possibility of an extension that might’ve given her the time she needed to come up with plan B. She couldn’t imagine the time and expense it would take to completely relocate her ovens and fridges—and whatever else she could repurpose or transport—from her current place to a new venue, nor could she think off-hand of any other empty units in the centre of town with the space for her operation (save the other Hawkins property). But there was little point of thinking about that now—no chance of setting up meetings or viewing spaces with a blizzard on the way.

  You’ll just have to ride this out, like always.

  After all, she’d got through one massive life upheaval, hadn’t she? After Chris’s accident she didn’t think anything would feel normal ever again, and in a way, she’d been right—five years on, a day hadn’t gone by she didn’t miss him. But life did go on, and eventually she’d even learned to find joy in it again.

  Your whole world dropped out from underneath you, and you’re still here. What’s Brooke Hawkins to you?

  “Yes, I completely understand—thanks for letting me know… Mhm, absolutely… Thank you… You too… Good night.”

  Her host’s voice floated through to the dimly lit lounge where Brooke sat ensconced in a too-large, too-floral armchair, drinking. She’d bought som
e bourbon of her own, in the end. After her earlier “chat” with Holly, she needed it. The perfect end to a perfect week.

  Her encounter with Holly had been both exactly as she had predicted and completely unexpected. She had known Holly would try to talk her out of selling, known she would try to guilt-trip her—and it had nearly worked. She knew she was coming across as a total Scrooge and she hated it. Of course, she didn’t want to screw Holly over—Holly with her dark eyes and expressive face and soft sk—

  “That was tomorrow’s guests.”

  Brooke almost spilled her drink in her lap. She hadn’t noticed Janet (“Just Janet”, she’d insisted) appearing in the doorway, a combination of preoccupation and soft-soled slippers masking her approach.

  “Sorry,” she said, taking in Brooke’s somewhat flustered countenance. “Just wanted to let you know, it’s as I suspected. Your room’s free through the weekend so we won’t need to move you to the kids’ room after all.”

  “Oh, right. The storm is really disrupting everything, isn’t it?” Brooke said with a grimace. Though I’d much rather be stuck out of Noelle than in it…

  “As I said,” Janet reminded her. “I had to take Santa in today—I was worried about him blowing off the wall.”

  “Mm, poor Santa. Hope he doesn’t get stuck here as well.”

  “He could do a lot worse, being stuck in Noelle over Christmas.”

  Brooke kept silent and took another drink. She knew she was apparently alone in having bad memories of Noelle. She had already ruined Holly’s day, she didn’t need to do the same to her host. Janet opened her mouth to speak again, but was interrupted by the phone, and she bustled off to answer it.

  Her voice was once more clearly audible from the hallway. “Hello…? Oh, hello, long time no hear… Yes, sorry about that, I had cancellations… I know but what can you do…? Oh! Yes, she’s still here—she’s in the lounge, actually, would you like me to get her for you?”