Page 19 of Loving Carter

I’m not sure what he means by sometime. Later today? Tomorrow?

I text,When?

Again, it takes a few minutes to hear back from him.

Does later tonight work?

I’m surprised he wants to meet this soon, but hey, we might as well get started. I text,Come to my house when you finish work.

It will be late.

Okay.

That settled, I set my phone down. When I originally agreed to work on this expo, I had a nebulous idea in my head that it would only take a little work on my part and would be a lot of fun. We’ve just gotten started, but I’m beginning to think I was seriously wrong and that it’s going to be a staggering amount of work.

At least we’re starting to get a few things done.

***

Carter

IPARK MY TRUCK INfront of Skylar’s house and unbuckle my seat belt. Man, I’m tired. Not only did I spend most of the day interviewing kids who weren’t right for the jobs, but I also had to check out the current group of visitors. We’ve had groups of visitors every six weeks since I came back, but as time goes by, the groups get bigger, louder. Needier. The two main summer groups will be huge, and the first group is scheduled to arrive in two days.

I’m running around like the proverbial chicken with its head cut off, and I haven’t had any time to devote to the expo beyond making lists to share with Skylar. But this afternoon, Kellan told me that he, along with Janie, are working on some of the items.

That’s great. Someone needs to work on it, or this expo is never going to happen. I signed up for too much during the meeting, which was foolish. Sure, Skylar and I can accomplish all the tasks if we have enough time, but neither one of us has enough time.

I don’t know what came over me at the meeting. I wasn’t going to sign up for anything, and instead, I walked out having signed up for a lot. So now, like it or not, I’m going to have to figure out how to accomplish it. I made a promise, and although that doesn’t mean anything to some folks, it does to me.

The only plus in this whole mess is that I can work with Skylar. We’ve always worked well together. Whenever there was a group project in school, I’d tried to get in Skylar’s group, hence the goat project. Like me, she takes promises seriously.

I climb out of the truck and head to Skylar’s front door. Her door is decorated with a vibrant yellow and orange wreath filled with smiling daisies. She’s always changing the wreath on her door, and this one is a doozie.

I raise my hand to ring the doorbell, then stop. Even though we agreed to meet this evening, I’m now wondering if I should have texted or called before coming over. I’d had to wait until after the aunts had dinner, so it’s late. I still came because I had told her I was going to stop by. Plus, I’m restless, and the only way to get rid of restlessness is by accomplishing tasks.

Well, if she thinks it’s too late, she can tell me. So I ring the doorbell, then wait. She has one of those video doorbells and can see it’s me. From inside, I can hear crazy barking, and then Skylar pulls open the door.

“Hi. I thought you’d changed your mind and weren’t coming,” she says.

“Sorry. Is it too late?”

She opens the door wider so I can come inside. “No, it’s not too late. The dogs and I were just watching TV.”

I take two steps inside and am immediately overwhelmed by dogs. Skylar has three dogs of various shapes and sizes. She adopted them from shelters over the years, and although she’s tried to train them, they’re still on the rowdy side.

“Down,” I say when the smallest dog keeps jumping in front of me. It’s so small it barely jumps up to my knee.

Skylar laughs and scoops up the dog. “Little Bit is not going to settle down until you pick her up and give her lovies.”

I like dogs and even have two that live with me, but I tend to treat my dogs like dogs. Well-loved dogs, but still, dogs. Skylar treats her dogs like they’re fuzzy people.

“Hi,” I say to the small brown dog she’s holding in front of me. The dog just looks at me.

“Here.” Skylar hands me the dog. “Hug Little Bit and sit down. I’ll get us some iced tea.”

With that announcement, she disappears into the small kitchen. Left alone, I survey the dogs. The little one I’m holding can’t weigh more than five or six pounds. The other two dogs are midsized. One is a scruffy black-and-white dog whose name escapes me. The other dog is brown with white splotches. That one is called Bob, although I have no idea why.

I walk into the living room. This house and some of the furniture were left to her when her parents moved to Arizona. Her folks now live in a retirement community and play golf and tennis all day. Must be nice.

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