Page 136 of Give & Take

Mrs. Brown waves a hand. “You know how it is in this town. Everyone knows everyone else’s business.”

I laugh, but it’s a little shaky. “I guess so.” No one’s been saying anything to me. But I don’t exactly engage in gossip.

It was foolish of me to think we might have escaped notice. In the past couple of weeks, Raph’s been spending less time at the coffee shop and home working on his paper after hours and more with us.

With me.

Suddenly I wonder if that’s what the emergency meeting was about at his university. Is he behind? Has being with me jeopardized his degree?

“Well? What are you going to do?”

My stomach, already twisting, tightens. I want to leave my porch and end this conversation. But Mrs. Brown is a kind woman. She’s often offered to lookafter the girls before, and has once or twice, though I never lean on her, given her age and frailty. I paste on a smile. “The girls will be back in school. They’ll miss him. But we’ll manage.”

Mrs. Brown takes a sip of her lemonade, her eyes crinkled in a smile as she watches Nova and Aurora do cartwheels on her lawn. “I’m not talking about your girls, sweetheart.”

I blanch. What does she know? Sometimes I think Mrs. Brown misses everything. Other times, she surprises me.

I’ve gotten sloppy.

“He’s been wonderful,” I say tightly. “I’ll certainly miss him. I really should get going, I promised the girls ice cream.”

“Sweetheart,” Mrs. Brown says. “I say if you’re enjoying yourself, don’t listen to what anyone else has to say about it. Did you know Mr. Brown liked to wear women’s underwear?”

I nearly choke on my next breath. “Um…no I…” there is zero reason I would know this fact.

“Well he did. It was a harmless thing, strange at first for me, but when I was assured that was his only kink, and it made him happy, well I didn’t get in his way. I just told him he couldn’t wear mine. Stretched out my favorite girdle, see. That was the end of that.”

I’m truly at a loss for words. My octogenarian neighbor just said the word ‘kink’.

“Anyhoo, that hussy Mabel Johnson down at the Sears put two and two together when he started buying things for husky ladies. The fool man put them on in therestroom and—well she spread it round the whole town. Poor Mr. Brown was humiliated, lost some good friends. Luckily he worked in the Mayor’s office, and the Mayor, bless him, was the kindest man known to this town. Next to his son.”

Our town’s beloved ex-mayor is Mac’s father.

“Mom!” Nova calls from the yard.

“Well,” Mrs. Brown says. “All I’m saying is we thought that business with my husband was going to ruin us. But let me tell you, he had several people act very kindly toward him too, over the years. I think they had their own skeletons they felt a little better about bearing. So if you’re concerned stepping out with that fine boy is going to hurt you or your beautiful girls in some way—well don’t you worry. You’ll probably help loosen this town up. Worst case is some other scandal will come along soon enough.”

I stand there a moment longer, reeling from this unexpected, and frankly, shocking wisdom, from my neighbor. She gives me a broad smile, then returns to her book.

Which I could swear is the Bible.

At the Bean Scene, Dolly, the part-owner of the shop, is so delighted to see the girls, she comes around the counter and gives them each a hug, and a handful of stickers she’s been saving for them. Dolly’s one of my favorite people in Redbeard Cove. She looks exactly like her namesake—petite, voluptuous, and bottle blonde, andis as smart and kind as she is too. Plus she always remembers my coffee order, and treats my girls like little adults, in the best way.

“This one instantly made me think of you, honey,” she says to Nova, holding up a sticker of a cow skull wrapped in a snake.

“Coooool!” Nova exclaims, enraptured.

With anyone else I might be insulted they thought something so dark made them think of my eight-year-old, but not Dolly. She knows Nova. And she knows me and what I’m okay with. After going through the other stickers she got for my eldest, she gushes over Aurora next, handing her a stack of butterflies and rainbows while they talk about how pretty that real life rainbow was the other day.

“You going to actually serve the customers sometime tonight?” comes a grumbly voice from the door to the back.

I look up to see Miles, the other owner of the shop.

“It’s fine,” I say, instantly defensive. “We’re not in any hurry.”

Dolly stands up. “Thank you, Lana. The only thing scaring off customers is you,” she tosses at her business partner.

Miles grumbles, but seeing no other customers requiring attention, retreats to the back.

---