Chapter 33
The last time they had coffee, Mary Louise didn’t ask Dan how he took it because they’d already agreed it would be doused with Bailey’s. This time she had to ask.
“How do you take your coffee?” asked Mary Louise.
“Black, and with as much caffeine as possible,” said Dan.
Mary Louise smiled. As she turned to go back to the kitchen she had a flashback to her very first job. She was asked to deliver some forms to the VP, Dutch Mathers. Mary Louise was very good at flying under the radar, making herself almost invisible when necessary. She knocked lightly on the door and received a gruff, “Come in,” from the other side.
She opened the door and approached the desk as if there was a lion sitting in the chair rather than a middle aged man with a military haircut that he still felt needed to be slicked back with Brylcream. She recognized the scent.
“Mrs. Anderson asked me to give these to you,” she said.
“Put them there,” he said, pointing to the corner of his desk but not looking up from the stack of papers in front of him.
She slid them where he’d pointed like it was a hunk of meat for the lion, then quickly jerked back her hand and turned to leave.
“Sweetheart,” said Dutch.
Mary Louise stopped in her tracks, then slowly turned back around.
“Get me a cup of coffee, would ya?”
The request wasn’t unusual. Around the office men expected the women to keep the coffee pot full and serve it to them upon request. Even Mrs. Anderson, the office manager, would be asked to get up from the conference table and fetch for the men.
“Yes, sir. Cream and sugar?”
She expected him to say he took it black. He looked like a man’s man. He looked out of place behind a polished desk at a mortgage company.
“Of course. I like it blonde and sweet, just like my women.”
Now he was looking at her and she half expected him to lick his chops. She fled to the small kitchen at the end of the hall. Her hands were shaking as she poured the coffee and made it blonde and sweet.
She returned to Dutch’s office and set the cup on his desk.
“Thank you, sweetheart,” he said.
Mary Louise couldn’t recall a single time in her life when anyone else had called her sweetheart. If either of her parents needed an endearing epithet, which wasn’t often, they would use “honey.”
Mary Louise was all too familiar with the spurts of cortisol entering her bloodstream. At the time she didn’t have a name for the hormone or the response, fight or flight, but she trusted her gut. She trusted her instincts. She would stay as far away from this man as possible.
It was the first in a long line of such incidents. Years and years worth. #MeToo was a good thirty-five years in the future. That day Mary Louise’s motto became “Not me.” There was nothing she could do about the leering looks that would follow her well into her forties, but she could be aware. She could avoid situations where she was alone with the men her instincts told her were the predators.
Dan was not a predator. Dan was possibly the nicest man she had ever met. He took a careful sip to test the temperature, then a nice big gulp from the cup.
“So what is it you wanted to talk to me about?” she asked.
“It’s actually something I wanted to show you. In my truck.”
“Okay,” said Mary Louise, not having a clue what he could possibly have in his truck that would interest her.
They went outside and he led her around to the back. She peeked into the bed, seeing two large bags of something called “Thunder Turf” and dozens of assorted plants.
“Oh, Dan, I told you. The new AC - I just can’t…”
“Can’t what? Accept a few plants from a friend? These all came from my place. I needed to thin some spots out. They were just going to rot in a lawn bag somewhere. And this stuff?” he said, patting one of the bags of Thunder Turf. “It’s been sitting in my shed for over a year. I don’t even know whether the seeds are still good or not.”
She looked skeptically at everything in the bed of the truck and then up at Dan. Did grass seed actually go bad? She thought about the phone call she’d had with his son Brian, about how Dan didn’t seem to realize they were running a business. She decided that wasn’t her problem to solve, especially as she stood before a gorgeous man with an adorable pleading in his eyes.
“The only thing it will cost you is a little sweat and maybe one of those homemade pies you told me about.”
When she didn’t respond, he continued his sales pitch. “Everything is native and drought tolerant. This grass seed is a mix of Buffalograss, Blue Gama and Curly Mesquite. It’s hearty, comes back every year, and doesn’t need to be mowed unless you want to. Doesn’t grow that high, but you’d still have to watch out for snakes.”
It wasn’t like she ever strolled through the front of the property. She just didn’t want the place to look like it was abandoned.
“Dan, I don’t know what to say.”
“Say yes! Say yes, and I’ll start spreading the grass seed while you decide where you want to put the plants. It’s supposed to rain this afternoon, so it would be a perfect time to get it done.”
Why did it feel like this was so much more than accepting a few plants from a friend? Why did it feel like this man, these plants were too good to be true? Would it all just blow up in her face? Would she get to the end of this road only to regret ever having started down it in the first place? When he got to know her better, would he have regrets? Would he let her down gently or would he “ghost” her, like on some awful TV show. Simply disappear never to be heard from again. It felt like a crossroads. She wasn’t sure she was ready for this. Oh, but that Texas Sage peeking out from the front of the bed was so pretty! She already knew where she would plant it. If she said yes.
“C’mon, Mary Louise. What do you say?”
She smiled up at him. “What kind of pie do you like?”
“Lemon meringue is my favorite.”
“Lemon meringue it is. I’ll go find my gardening gloves and grab a shovel.”
They spent the rest of the morning and early afternoon digging and planting and laughing. Mary Louise took a moment to rest, sitting cross-legged on the ground, turning her face to the sun and enjoying its rays even though sweat trickled down her back. Eyes closed, she took a deep breath. Is this what it was like to be happy? Was that the feeling flowing through her?
Her moment of zen ended when the crunch of car tires slowly made their way down the driveway. Carla.
Dan left the zingy-wingy push cart that he was using to spread the grass seed and headed toward Mary Louise.
“Do I need to move my truck?”
“No, it’ll be okay.”
Carla pulled up on the other side of Dan’s truck. When Mary Louise saw her close the front door and open the back, she went to see if she needed any help. Her daughter emerged laden with Target bags strung along each arm. She kicked the door closed with her knee.
“Do you need some help, honey?”
“No, I got it. They’re not heavy.”
Miss Independent. Carla walked slowly, sizing up Dan as she approached. “Looks like you two have been busy,” she said.
Mary Louise pecked her on the cheek, then turned to face Dan.
“Dan, this is my daughter, Carla.”
“Nice to meet you,” he said, smiling and waving a dirt-covered hand.
“Same,” said Carla, lifting her chin in a pseudo wave since her arms were full. “I’ve heard a lot about you.”
“Oh?” said Dan, hand dropping and eyebrows raising.
“Yeah,” said Carla. “Thanks for expanding her horizons beyond Outlaw Country.”
“I do what I can,” said Dan.
“Hey, now,” said Mary Louise.
Carla smiled, a genuine smile. “I’ll let you two get back to it,” she said and headed for the house.
Dan returned to flinging grass seed and Mary Louise got busy planting the sage. It was going on five o’clock when Dan’s truck bed was bare except for the empty bags of grass seed stuffed with the empty pots from the plants.
“Can I interest you in a cold beer?’
“That would be wonderful,” said Dan.
He went back to loading his tools and Mary Louise went into the house to grab a couple of beers. She took a minute to try and scrub at least some of the dirt off her hands and arms before gathering koozies and grabbing the beers.
“What do you think?” asked Carla as she came twirling into the room in a casual, flowered cotton dress.
“Very pretty!” said Mary Louise.
“My first maternity dress,” said Carla, pausing to show her mother how much growing room she would have.
“You look lovely,” said Mary Louise.
“So do you, Mom. Truly. I get good vibes from Dan. He’s cute, in an old guy sort of way.”
“In an ‘old guy sort of way,’ huh? Well I guess it could be worse.” Mary Louise put the beers into koozies and popped off the caps. “What are you feeling for dinner? I’ve got some chicken in the fridge…”
“Ugh. I need pizza. Plus you’ve worked in the yard all day. What do you say? You could ask your man friend to stay.”
“You’d be okay with that?”
“One hundred percent.”
“Pepperoni and mushroom?”
“Is there any other way?”
“What if Dan doesn’t like that? What if he’s a ham and pineapple guy?”
“Then I retract any previous positive statements I said about him and he will need to leave immediately.”
Lucky for Mary Louise Dan was not picky about pizza. Except for pineapple. That was an absolute no.
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