Page 12 of Christmas in Watch Hill
“Good.” Ryan paused. “I’m glad to see you again this year. I know last year was . . . it was the worst. But this year . . . I don’t know. I’m just hoping it’s a fresh start.”
“Me too,” I replied. The fresh start wasn’t just about me this year. “I’ve been thinking about the holidays, and we can choose how we feel about it all. We have each other, and that’s . . . that’s what Monica would have wanted.”
“She would. I’ll see you in a few days, man. Mom’s going to be really happy to have us all together again.”
After we said goodbye, I worked for a few more hours, tweaking and refining until I liked what I saw on the screen. I also sent a few important emails and text messages before dragging myself to bed around one.
I checked my phone when I woke up. And for the first time in a long time, I was satisfied.
EIGHT
NORA
Normally, I didn’topen The Pink Box on Sundays.
My mother always had the philosophy that she needed at least one day of rest when running the store, and I applied that same principle most of the year. I worked as hard as I wanted on the other days, but Sunday would always be a day of rest.
Except when it came to the holiday season.
Between Thanksgiving and Christmas, I opened the store every day, driven by the chance that the extended hours might lead to more sales during that critical time of the year. I got to the shop by ten and put the open sign out at ten thirty.
And then, I prayed. Prayed that someone would decide to shop local instead of at a mall or on their phone. And prayed they would choose my store instead of one of the other small businesses around town.
I was fairly sure no one was hearing me.
“What if we run some different ads on social media?” Tara called down from the top step of the ladder. She moved a collection of beanies from one side of the shelf to the other, making room for new stock. “My brother-in-law ran a couple ads on Google and Facebook back at the end of Thanksgiving, and he got a lot of clicks for his insulation business.” She moved a few bracelets on the shelves, running over them with a small feather duster as she went. “Maybe if we did a few good ones, that would drive decent traffic to the shop.”
“I’ve tried that a few times with different websites,” I replied from the cash register area, where I was gift wrapping an online sale that had surprisingly come into the shop’s website overnight. A man in Illinois had ordered two graphic T-shirts and one of the chunky gold necklaces I’d found during a trip to Soho in September. “I gothorribleresults. The cost-per-click was awful, and before long I was blowing my budget. I just couldn’t figure it out.”
“Yeah, that can be a major problem with that kind of advertising.” Finished with her cleaning, Tara climbed down the ladder. “Graham said he was basically flying blind for a couple weeks while he tested the ads. It was a whole process.”
“That was probably my problem,” I admitted. “I didn’t have time to be patient.”
She closed the ladder and brought it back to the office, where she stored it against the wall. “I just don’t want you to have to close this place.”
“Me neither.”
