Page 46 of This Time Around
Jack shot her a grateful look, then grabbed the green dress from her arms. “Please, let me get this. It’s the least I can do, since you’re taking my kid bra shopping and going with me to the reunion.”
She started to protest, then stopped herself. “Thank you,” she said. “I accept.”
The smile he gave her was enough to have Allie questioning exactly what she’d just agreed to.
Chapter 8
“This room makes such a lovely little hair salon,” Skye said as she curled a lock of Allie’s hair around a contraption that looked like she’d stolen it from a space station.
Allie shifted a little on the high-backed barstool Skye had parked in front of the mirror in a small, sunlit room on the first floor. Her grandmother had always called it the Maple Room for a tree that used to be right outside the window.
But the tree lay flat on the ground now, the victim of a bad windstorm several weeks ago, according to Skye. Allie still hadn’t rounded up an arborist to haul it away.
“I always loved the light in here,” Allie said. “My grandma used to read in that corner over there when we didn’t have guests staying in the room.”
“You must miss her a lot.”
Allie started to nod, but stopped as Skye wrapped another section of her hair around the curling iron. “I do. I keep picking up the phone to call her, and then realizing I can’t.”
“I never knew any of my grandparents, but I always thought of Vicky as the grandma I wish I had.”
“It still smells like her in this room,” Allie said. “She used to keep these big vases of roses everywhere in the house.”
“It’s potpourri. I bought some with rose petals in it, and your grandma loved it so much that I started buying huge bags of it so the place would still smell like home whenever the nurses brought her to visit.” She met Allie’s eyes in the mirror and gave her a small smile. “Sorry, I don’t want to make you cry when we just got your makeup perfect.”
“It’s okay. I’m not much of a crier.”
“Still, I’ll come up with something better to talk about.” Skye seemed to think for a moment. “What’s the latest on the woodpecker situation?”
Allie sighed. “I took pictures of the damage and showed them to a guy at Home Depot after Jack left yesterday. He told me I should put up a bunch of pinwheels and metallic streamers to scare them away.”
“Is that why the front of the house looks like a Mardi Gras party?” Skye laughed and released Allie’s hair. “I thought you were just getting into the spirit of your reunion.”
“Nope, it’s for the woodpeckers. And Jack’s reunion, not mine. I’m just going to keep him company.”
“Mm,” Skye murmured, sounding dubious. Or maybe it was just the bobby pin she’d stuck between her teeth. She used it to anchor a curl into a little upsweep she’d created at the crown of Allie’s head, then picked up another lock to twirl around the barrel of the curling device. “So you graduated from college at different times, but you went to high school together?”
“Yes. He was my date to the senior prom.”
“No kidding?” Skye beamed in the mirror. “So you were high school sweethearts.”
“Sort of,” Allie admitted, not sure how much of the story she wanted to tell. “We were friends all through middle school and high school, but just friends. Prom was kind of our first official date, but we dated in secret for about nine months before that.”
“Why in secret?”
Allie shrugged, a little embarrassed at the memory. “I didn’t want my parents to know. My family was sort of?—”
“Protective?”
“Yes,” Allie agreed, though that wasn’t what she’d been about to say.
Prominent. Judgmental. Pretentious.
Take your pick, and none of them were that flattering. She still remembered the first time she’d broached the subject of Jack with her mother.
“I’ve been seeing this boy,” she’d said. “Actually, we’ve been friends at school for a long time. He’s really cute and smart and funny and?—”
“What do his parents do?” Priscilla’s scowl had sent a burst of ice water through Allie’s arms.
