Page 6 of Lemon Crush

“That’s about our sentiment on the subject. We were thinking we could get a new car PDQ and you could get started tricking it out before Gene gets home. It might keep him from beating Dave to death with the Mustang’s crumpled bumper.”

“I’d like in on that action,” Rick said darkly.

“He’ll only be gone a few weeks.” Wade sounded exasperated. “Let me make some calls.”

“Tell your contacts we’re not feeling picky. It’s called 24 Hours of Lemonsfor a reason. Any car can be a racecar, especially with you as our pit crew.”

“Yeah, yeah. I’ll talk to you two later.”

They hung up without saying goodbye, which was rude, but my mind was too busy reeling with new information to ponder the off-putting phone etiquette of the male species.

A plan was starting to come together in my head. Admittedly, it was kind of out there—bordering on potentially insane—but it was a plan. A year and a half ago, I would have refused to even consider it, but now? It might be exactly what I needed to help me deal with what I was missing out on. It would certainly be more proactive than feeling sorry for myself while accepting all theFaceTiming and wish-you-were-here postcards that were about to come my way.

If I’d learned anything in the last forty-three years—which was debatable after this morning—it was that there was a very fine line between a stroke of genius and a shit sandwich. I might have crossed that line too many times to be entirely confident in my own decision-making skills, but something was telling me this time could be different.

The lemon in the bunch…

It’s called 24 Hours of Lemons for a reason…

Any car can be a racecar…

Stroke of genius? Or shit sandwich? There was really only one way to find out.

2

AUGUST

It was a three-coffee morning.

When Wade dropped me off and took Myrtle away to parts unknown, I knew I’d never be able to get back to sleep. I’d taken a shower, refilled my travel mug and gone back out to the driveway to deal with the other car in my life—Mom’s bright yellow VW Beetle, Jiminy.

Naming our cars was a family tradition.

I’d needed to think, and he’d needed a bath, so I’d hosed off the cobwebs and pollen until he was shining again. Then, because my nightmare at the airport was still fresh in my mind, I’d also watched a YouTube tutorial, following the how-to-check-your-fluids instructions to make sure he wouldn’t give me the same problems Myrtle had if I needed to drive him before I got her back.

He was fine. The truth was, I’d taken better care of the cute little bug than I had my own car lately, driving him around the block when I couldn’t sleep and taking him in for all of his regular checkups. To somewhere other than Hudson’s Garage, of course.

The same was true for Mom’s apartment. My one-and-a-half-story soul-eater of a house with red-brick and white siding hadbeen neglected. The weeds were up to the front windows, the swimming pool I never used was transforming into a murky bog of eternal sadness, and every room inside needed a thorough scrubbing. But the separate one-bedroom apartment in the courtyard-style backyard? That was pristine.

Because, unlike your house and your hair, you remember to clean it on a regular basis.

If my place sounds expensive, that’s because it was. Especially for the shape it was in when I bought it. The shape it was still in, because I hadn’t made any improvements. But I’d signed the mortgage as soon as it was put in front of me anyway.

“Mortgage” was now my least favorite word in the English language. It had surpassed both “moist” and the sentence “but you have so much potential” over a year ago.

It was also the reason I now stood, cleaning supplies in hand, in the open doorway of Mom’s apartment—otherwise known as the Mama Casita, or Home for Wayward Sea Gypsies (Morgan had made her an actual sign to hang by the door for that one).

The wild plan I’d worked up on the ride home from the airport would cost money that wasn’t in my already painfully tight budget, which meant deciding to do something else I’d been putting off for a while now. Renting this place out to supplement my income.

My sister and her husband had both tried to nudge me in this direction once or twice. Particularly last year, when I’d been spending enough on doctor visits to worry them.

I hadn’t been ready then. I wasn’t sure I was ready now. If Morgan and Gene knew I was finally taking this step, they’d no doubt be making me lists on all the prerequisites and precautions I needed to deal with before I took the plunge, which could take weeks to accomplish. Enough time for me to lose my nerve and change my mind again.

Luckily, right now they were somewhere over the Atlantic,probably enjoying espresso and biscotti between first-class naps, unable to slow me down with their common sense and logical thinking. If I was really doing this, I needed to start today. Right now. Ready or not.

Walking into Mom’s apartment without knocking felt strange. It was still so much her space. She’d definitely had a brand, and that brand said, “I love the beach, and who needs a coffee table that’s functional?”

That was the first thing you saw when you walked through the front door—a glass-topped rattan coffee table that looked like a giant ball of pretty twine. We’d teased her about it when she made the purchase, but now I couldn’t imagine the apartment without it.

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