Page 3 of The Christmas Cottage
When her coffee was finished, she grabbed a cranberry orange muffin out of the basket she had on the counter from her baking the day before to have as a snack for later, and headed out to her car to drive to the shop. Some of the town’s residents were already out and walking around, enjoying the crisp morning as they headed to work or went to get coffee, and it always brought a smile to Mabel’s face.
Fir Tree Grove had been her home for a long time, and she loved it dearly. She waved to one of her close friends, Shelly, as she saw her coming out of the diner, slowing down the car as Shelly picked up her pace to come over and say good morning.
“How are you this morning?” Mabel asked, her gaze zeroing in on the Thermos Shelly was holding. “Already grabbing coffee from Jackson?”
“I thought I’d get a little pick-me-up and then head over to the bookstore to get the December book for book club.” Shelly gave her a bright smile. “Don’t forget about it! We’re meeting next week at my place.”
“I wouldn’t miss it,” Mabel assured her. “Not a chance.” She still needed to go and get the book too, and she mentally added that to her list of things to do. With her wrist bothering her the way it was, maybe a quiet night reading and drinking tea was exactly what she needed to rest it. Maybe a couple of them.
She’d never wished for an assistant at The Toy Chest before. She was happy to do things herself, and happy to be able to do it all exactly the way she liked, without having to check up after anyone else or teach someone how she liked things done. But that particular morning, as she winced putting the key in the lock, she thought it might have been nice to have an assistantwho could have run things for a day or two. Just so she could give her wrist a break.
The shop opened at ten though, so she had plenty of time to do her morning tasks, straightening and cleaning anything she’d missed from the night before and opening the register. But this morning, she found that she barely made it in time to open by the time ten a.m. rolled around. Her wrist throbbed even with the bandage and painkillers, and everything took twice as long. Once again, the thought of going to the clinic flickered into her mind, but she pushed it away. It would let up. It was just a little tweak, like that time she’d slept crooked on her pillow and hadn’t been able to turn her head to the left for the better part of a week.
The morning was busy too. Tourist season was in full swing in Fir Tree Grove, along with the usual smattering of local business, and there were already three people waiting when Mabel opened the doors. She tried to distract herself from her wrist by helping them find the toys they were looking for, including one customer who needed a particular nutcracker special ordered. She had a catalog for a company that put out a variety of unique and quirky nutcrackers, including a special edition every year. This year’s was a lumberjack, complete with a small wool-felted bear on the stand and an axe with a peppermint-striped handle, and she’d had no end of customers wanting to order it in time to have it for Christmas decorations.
Then there was a customer wanting help picking out a wardrobe that Mabel thought her daughter would like for the doll that she’d picked for her, and another who dithered over whether her daughter was old enough to start a porcelain doll collection, or whether she should stick with plastic and cloth for now. All of that kept Mabel running from one corner of the store to the next, and she should have been so distracted that she didn’t even think about her wrist.
But by the time she’d been open twenty minutes, and finished putting in the special order, she knew she was going to have to close for the day. She’d had to ask the customer looking at the porcelain dolls to repeat herself three times, because it felt like the pain in her wrist was starting to make her head hurt too, and she just couldn’t focus.
There was no way she was going to be able to do her job with how badly her wrist hurt. It was more than just a tweak, and she was going to have to go and get it checked out. Even if it meant closing up the shop at the beginning of a busy day. She was fortunate that the missed income for the day wouldn’t be a bother, but it wasn’t that that she minded. It was the disappointment of any customers who would come by and find it closed, and the fact that she genuinely enjoyed her days there, helping people find the perfect toys. She would miss all of the conversation and fun that she would have had for the rest of the day, now that she was going to spend a part of it at a doctor’s appointment instead.
Sighing, she tugged on her jacket and locked up, heading out to where her car was parked so that she could drive to the local clinic.
Fortunately, once she got there, there wasn’t much of a wait. There were a couple of older folks there with cold, and a mother with her son there for a checkup, but it was a mostly empty waiting room. Dr. Ellis, a kindly man in his fifties who had been overseeing the bumps, bruises, and colds of Fir Tree Grove for years, called her in within ten minutes, and it didn’t take much longer for him to give Mabel a diagnosis.
“Your wrist is sprained,” he told her sympathetically. “The nurse will get you fitted with a brace, and I’ll prescribe you some painkillers that will be a bit stronger than the Tylenol in your medicine cabinet.” He smiled at her. “Just take it easy. If you overwork it, you’ll end up with bigger problems. Rest it as muchas possible. I know how you can be over at the shop,” he added with a knowing look. “If you can get some help, do. If you make it worse, you could end up needing much more than a brace to fix it.”
Mabel nodded as he patted her good hand and got up to go tell the nurse, but inwardly she was panicking.
What on earth am I going to do?she thought as she sat in the exam room, waiting on the nurse.
This time of year was the busiest season for the toy store. She had no idea how she was going to manage with this injury slowing her down constantly. Any other time of year, it might not have been so bad, but she needed to be at her best right now.
On top of that, she thought, she always played Mrs. Claus for the town during the holiday season.Thatshe might still be able to manage, but running the toy shop singlehandedly—no pun intended—was absolutely going to be out of the question. She was stubborn, but not so stubborn that she wouldn’t listen to Dr. Ellis. If he said ignoring the injury and overworking it would make things worse, she believed him.
She sighed, running through options in her head. Some of her neighbors had children back home for the holidays, and she considered asking around, seeing if anyone wanted a seasonal job. But she knew it was unlikely. The college kids usually enjoyed their time off, and she doubted she would find anyone chomping at the bit for a chance to do some extra work around Christmas. Anyway, it would be difficult to teach them how she liked things done quickly enough for it to all run smoothly. Getting help was no good if it made more work for her in the end.
There had to be a solution. There always was one, in her opinion, if one just sat and let it come. Nothing was ever hopeless, and she certainly didn’t believe that this time of year, of all times. There was something she could do to make this work.
She mulled it over as she sat waiting, and just as the exam room door opened and the nurse walked in holding the brace, she felt the lightbulb go on.
She had an idea. But first, she had to find out if there was even a chance itwouldwork.
CHAPTER THREE
On Saturday afternoon, Vanessa set up at her favorite coffee shop in between her apartment and work, a small, mid-century modern spot called the Outer Grounds. Technically, she was off work, but she had plenty of tasks to get through, and she saw no reason not to spend her afternoon working on them. The sooner they were done, the less of a chance things would pile up, especially since she was sure that Russell would find more that needed doing. Besides, she really didn’t mind working on the weekend. She wasn’t sure what else she would do. She didn’t really have friends in the city—making friends required making time to meet them, and then making time for them, and none of that was possible when she spent almost all of her available time at work. She definitely didn’t have a boyfriend, and she didn’t care to find one. She hadn’t put any effort into dating apps or trying to meet someone, so if she were going to date, one would have to quite literally make himself known all on his own. She didn’t think that was typically how it worked.
She could go shopping, but she didn’t need anything. She had a bi-monthly clothing subscription service that sent her four outfits in a box, that she could try on and send back what she didn’t want. Her apartment was nicely furnished, and she didn’tbother decorating for the holidays. She also got her groceries delivered, and she’d already finalized the order for the week. She could go see a movie, or a play, but it felt depressing to do that alone. Anyway, her mind would wander, and she’d start thinking about all of the things that she tried to crowd out by staying busy. Reading books also had the same effect—her mind would wander.
So, stay busy it was. And there was plenty to do. Her work, and not just hers either. Russell had sent over some spreadsheets from accounting that he thought were off, and he wanted her to double-check the work from that department. She had mixed feelings about it.
On the one hand, she was proud of herself that he thought she was so capable that she was the one who he trusted to oversee not only her own work, but others. On the other hand, she thought he was likely just looking for problems, so he could feel like there were things he needed to find a way to solve.
She was also on her third coffee of the day by two in the afternoon. She’d started with a maple cappuccino and then tried a regular coffee with the shop’s signature Christmastime peppermint creamer, which was rich and delicious, and now she was working her way through a pumpkin spice latte. Truthfully, she was a little behind on her coffee consumption—usually by this point in the day she was on her fourth cup. Caffeine just didn’t seem to affect her at all any longer. At least not without consuming it in large doses. She was considering an espresso next, just to get that extra jolt.
Just as she took another sip, her phone buzzed, and she glanced over at the screen. It was a number she didn’t recognize, but she picked it up anyway. She often got calls that weren’t in her contacts for work, and she was supposed to answer all of them, so she wasn’t at all surprised.
Whatwasa surprise was hearing her grandmother’s voice on the other line.
