First Step Forward Read online

  She twists the bottom hem on her pj’s with her fingers and doesn’t look my way. What the hell? I’m not a fan of this version of Whitney: the uncomfortable, eye-contact-avoiding woman who thinks I’m a callous dickhead who would strip for her, kiss her, let her rub all over me, and then slither out like a snake.

  “Jesus, Whit. I might not be the world’s most sensitive guy, but I was barely able to drag myself away from you this morning. If I didn’t have a job that takes priority right now, I wouldn’t have even gotten out of your bed. I sure as fuck wouldn’t pull some shitty disappearing act without saying goodbye.”

  “Good.” She looks up and I get it now. She needs some reassurance here, because at the core of it, last night reeks of a hookup—just without the sex.

  “In fact, my goodbye scene was pretty involved.”

  I get a tiny twitch of her lips, one side lilting up in relief. I take a step forward.

  “You were going to be in some position that made it easy for my hands to end up on your bare skin, and you were going to do that little squirming around thing that makes it hard to think straight. I was going to spend a good amount of time kissing and sucking on your neck and stuff. How do you feel about hickeys? Not big, ugly, purple middle-school-dance-make-out things, just a couple of little marks down low. In places only you and I know about.”

  Her face lights up and before I understand exactly what’s happening, she’s across the room and crawling on me like I’m a goddam tree. I manage to keep my balance, bend my knees a little to get ahold of her, and then I’m on board with the plan.

  I grip both hands under her and when she gets her legs properly wrapped around my waist, I start to kiss the hell out of her. I suddenly love the fact that this house is so small, because all I have to do is take a few steps and there’s a wall. A sturdy surface to back her up against, using that leverage to work my mouth down over her jaw, her neck, her collarbone, as deep as I can until I have to boost her up a little. She yelps when I haul her entire body up, far enough to get my face right between her tits, to kiss the swells that are exposed and bite a little spot, because I want her to look down tomorrow and see that mark, think of this moment when she does.

  She rolls her hips forward and I have to lean back a bit, fighting the irrational urge to blow off everything else, stay here, and drag her back to bed. When we finally look at each other, she’s wild-eyed and that makes it even harder to let go, but my truck putters in the background, a noisy reminder of my long drive home. I drop her down.

  She rights her shirt and looks over my shoulder.

  “Are you hungry? I don’t want you driving on an empty stomach.”

  Ducking around me, she scampers into the kitchen and then I’m standing there looking at the wall, dazed and wondering if my face buried between her tits was a mirage or a true event. She disappeared so quickly that my short-term memory has turned hazy in the wake of her bolting away.

  A bunch of things rattle in the kitchen—a drawer opening and closing, a cupboard door thudding shut. I turn around and she’s standing in the space between the kitchen and living room, holding a banana in one hand and a jar of peanut butter in the other.

  “Here. Peanut butter has protein and bananas are potassium-rich. Both good for you.”

  Christ, she’s trying to take care of me. Normally when this happens—a woman starts to demonstrate any nurturing tendencies—I get itchy. Like, all-over, skin-crawling itchy. Because I already have a mom; she lives in Texas. And I can take care of myself just fine. I cook, I clean, I do my own laundry, I even iron my own dress shirts. I’ve never needed or wanted a woman for any of those tired domestic reasons.

  But nothing’s itchy right now. Whitney is pointing a banana at me like it’s a cowboy pistol, waving it around a little and shaking the peanut butter jar to match. Slowly, I make my way over to her and take the banana.

  “The peanut butter can stay. Plenty of Clif bars in the truck for protein.” Her arm drops and I kiss her forehead. “But I appreciate the thought.”

  She’s standing on the porch when I drive away, wrapping her arms around her waist to keep the cold air at bay. I shake my head, waving my hand toward the front door of her house, hoping she’ll do what I asked her to do three times already—go back in the house where it’s warm. All she does is wave back, shooing me away with a half-smile on her face.

  And she claims I’m the stubborn one.

   10

  (Whitney)

  I hate the mailman.

  I’m sure he’s a perfectly nice fellow. He’s always wearing a safari hat as he roars down my county road in a seventies-era Jeep CJ7 that has only a US POSTAL DELIVERY magnetic decal on the door to identify it as such. The safari hat is almost costume looking, a pith style, with a hard plastic brim at the front and a leather cord dangling from the chin to act as a strap, just in case his rural mail delivery route turns adventurous. His well-kept, short gray beard indicates he someone’s granddad and I’d guess that he has a detail-oriented hobby of some sort. Like building historically authentic model airplanes, collecting obscure British stamps, or carving intricate art out of tree stumps.

  The problem is that he’s always leaving bad stuff in my mailbox. Mostly, it’s bills I can’t pay. Sometimes I get a fun catalog or an enticing store circular that appears promising, right up until I remember that buying anything fun isn’t an option. I never find greeting cards from a long-lost cousin or checks payable to me for large sums of money.

  Maybe today will be different, though. Maybe Cooper drove straight home and penned a love letter to me. I try to picture him crouched over a piece of fine stationery, chewing on the end of a pen while considering the best way to elucidate the memories of his time here. Or, perhaps, wax poetic about hickeys and a newly acquired appreciation of rooibos tea.

  Impossible. Cooper might be oddly romantic—in a blunt, cantankerous way—but I suspect that love letters aren’t his forte.

  So, today, as the mailman speeds away from my box, I prepare myself for the usual. I wave; he waves. I consider keeping on my way, headed out the driveway to a farmers’ market in Grand Junction, without stopping to see what unpleasantness he’s delivered. But delaying my fate won’t change a thing, so I heave my truck into park and walk the few gangplank-like steps to my mailbox.

  When I pull the front open, a bright white envelope is on top, and its heft hints that I won’t like the contents. I spot the return address and my heart sinks. It’s the name of the bank, but in care of a very swanky-sounding attorney’s office. Five partners: Hall, Haverstock, Smith, Kole, & Cartwright, LLC.

  Five partners is overkill, I think. Three is more than enough. Enough to take on someone like me, at least. I rip open the envelope. When the first few inches of the letter come into view, my already sunken heart manages to tumble again.

  NOTICE OF SALE DATE

  Dear Ms. Reed:

  RE:  Delaney Creek Orchards

     79562 County Road 56

     Hotchkiss, CO 81419

  Pursuant to the mortgage agreement and Colorado Property Code 51.0025.79, the above referenced property will be sold at public auction to the highest bidder on JANUARY 10th at 10:00 AM. Location: Outside steps of the DELTA COUNTY COURTHOUSE, in DELTA, COLORADO.

  Shit.

  I’ve done enough research to know what I have in my hands: the final nail in my apple-stuffed coffin. If my situation felt desperate before, the addition of a real sale date means it now feels dire. Any hope of persuading the existing bank to restructure the terms or approve a payment plan to get caught up on the past-due amount is off the table. My only option is to find a new bank, one that employs an ever-benevolent loan officer who believes in championing the underdog and likes taking chances.

  Crumpling the letter up into a ball and tossing it out the window as I drive might feel good, but wouldn’t be terribly constructive. Instead, I need to get my keister to Grand Junction, sell some product, and keep trying. Between now and Ja
nuary tenth, I would apply for every loan that exists and turn over every new stone along the way.

  I know they might win in the end, and I may not find a way out, but I’ll be damned if I’m going down without knowing that I kept at it until the sheriff showed up to get the keys.

  The Mesa County fall harvest market is held inside a new expo hall at the county fairgrounds. Unlike the regular market held on Saturdays during the summer, this event is centered around the hardiest veggies of the season, those that survive a light frost and are pantry friendly: squashes and onions, potatoes and hardened-off garlic, bags of dried beans and Pennsylvania Dutch Butter popcorn. For me, it’s a great time to sell the few crates of storage apples I managed to salvage this year and find homes for all those jars of apple butter.

  This is the first of two harvest markets held each year. The second will take place a month from now, on the Saturday after Thanksgiving, in hopes of capitalizing on everyone’s spendthrift mood just before Christmas. The only drawback is that it’s a marathon event, nearly ten hours with setup and takedown of my booth, twelve hours if you count travel time. By the time the crowd finally starts to thin out, it’s nearly four thirty, and the giant cinnamon bun I splurged on this morning has long since metabolized.

  On the upside, I won’t have much to haul back out to the truck. All the apples are gone and after the cost of the booth and fuel, I’ll still head home with five hundred dollars in my pocket, which counts as a success, even if it won’t fix the bigger problem of my loan.

  Gathering up all the silly marketing materials I once thought were so important, I stack them neatly into cardboard boxes tucked under my display table.

  I have it all: refrigerator magnets with my logo on them, a roll of little apple stickers I thought would be cute for kids, even a gallon-sized bag full of bright red golf balls. The golf balls aren’t my fault—I ordered red ballpoint pens and the company sent golf balls. Sometimes I fib and tell customers that they’re apple-scented, just so their presence doesn’t appear entirely random. The power of suggestion means that people automatically take a sniff, and then offer a delighted sound to indicate how much they enjoy the, in fact, nonexistent scent.

  “I’ve been looking everywhere for you.”

  I wrangle my upper half out from under the folding table where I was trying to fit the baggie of golf balls into the remaining space in a box. Justin Clarke of Chinampas Farms extends a long-abused Tupperware container my way, tipping it down so I can peer in.

  “Beet chip?”

  Justin’s shoulder-length blond hair is pulled back in a ponytail, topped off with a snap-back hat that has the logo of a global seed conglomerate (one with a name rarely uttered aloud because no one wants to risk a possible Beetlejuice phenomenon) with a big red X through it. A hemp cord is around his neck, with a cannabis leaf charm dangling from the center. There are a few tiny green flecks of metallic paint on the charm, just faded enough to mimic the color of his eyes.

  If Justin ever does something wild enough to have a biopic made about his life, all they’ll have to do is find Chris Hemsworth, douse him in patchouli, force him to lose about fifty pounds of muscle mass, and stick him in a pair of carpenter pants. Shoo-in for the part. Between Justin’s good looks, his earnest love of this life, and his ability to roast up the best beet chips I’ve ever tasted, he’s the veritable rock star of this farmers’ market. I’ve watched gaggles of women circle his booth unnecessarily, like fresh-faced vultures in North Face jackets.

  “I bet you have no idea how enticing the offer of beet chips could be to an exhausted apple farmer, do you? Because I could do one of two things right now. Propose marriage or knock you over the head and abscond with your beet chips. I’m that hungry.”

  Justin rattles the plastic container and laughs. “I choose option A. I have kale chips in my truck. Can’t wait to hear what you might do to get your hands on some of those.”

  I gather up a handful of the beet chips and admire the rainbow of colors in my hand. Chioggias with their distinctive candy stripes, the rich red of Detroit Darks, and beautiful butterscotch discs of Golden goodness.

  Speaking around a mouthful, I point to the Tupperware. “Your beets?” He nods and I take another handful. “Why were you looking for me?”

  “Why wouldn’t I be? No particular reason, other than the obvious. You’re the best-looking apple farmer here.”

  “You just want my apple butter.” I slide two of the pint jars his way while snagging another handful of chips.

  Justin gathers up the jars and tucks them into the crook of one arm. “How’d you do today?”

  “Good. And I couldn’t afford otherwise, so I’m glad.”

  “That bad?” I give a blasé shrug of my shoulders to answer without having to say anything more aloud. He narrows his eyes. “How’s next year looking?”

  I nearly answer with every depressing descriptor that comes to mind. Nonexistent. Impossible. Long-gone memory. But I find a word that sounds far less melodramatic.

  “Fuzzy.”

  Justin sets the jars down on the table and pulls his phone out of his back pocket, poking around until he finds whatever he’s looking for, then digs a mini steno pad out of a cargo pocket.

  “This is a new slow money program based in Boulder. Check it out—you might find some resources through them.”

  Slow money. I hadn’t actually thought of exploring that option, but I’d heard enough about the concept to know it might be a perfect solution. The slow money movement was all about supporting local food systems, grounded in the idea of connecting investors to the organic farmers and food producers in the places where they live. These were people who believed heartily in lending money to beekeepers, goat farmers, and wild fermented food makers. Maybe even an organic apple farmer who needed a second chance.

  He tears out the sheet from his notepad and hands it my way. “You headed home right away? If not, we could grab dinner somewhere. A couple of Mesa State girls I met swear by a Thai joint over on the east side of town.”

  I pause. Two weeks ago, I might have considered his offer. Pondered what could happen over dinner—or after.

  Justin’s farm is set on twenty acres of gorgeous land in Fruita. He’s certified organic and found a way to thrive through drought conditions, hailstorms, and the expansion of a natural gas pipeline that claimed eminent domain on a good one hundred feet of his south property line. We made out once, after a Saturday market, in the heat of July. We were halfway through a growler of local beer he kept iced in the Yeti sitting in the back of his truck and—well, he looks like a skinny Chris Hemsworth, so, hello.

  But that was BC.

  Before Cooper. Before a guy who seemed so wrong for me showed up in my kitchen and somehow ended up in my bed a few hours later. Before he kissed me, spooned me, and marked my skin in places I haven’t stopped staring at for the last two weeks.

  When those delicate marks started to fade, I missed the sight of them. Which is why it’s easy to give Justin a hug and send him on his way, with instructions to get those Mesa State girls to buy him dinner.

  Because Cooper said he’d call and he did. He called just as he was getting ready to board the team plane to Phoenix, and I could hear how relieved he was at being healthy enough to play. He thanked me for letting him stay at Chez Whitney. Then he lowered his voice and asked if I had marks on my breasts, and told me he wanted to put more on my skin, in even more interesting places.

  I could barely breathe, let alone respond. I wanted more so intensely that it was mind-numbing. And under the weight of my real life, numb sounds damn appealing.

  Across the street from the expo hall is a big-box store, one I’ve managed to avoid for years, refusing to play part in their world domination by way of plaguing the world with too much plastic junk. Unfortunately, I need a few things best purchased at a place like that, rather than paying three times as much at the local Hotchkiss grocer. Toothpaste and toilet paper, dish soap and the jars of coconut o
il I use for moisturizer. With a fat stack of cash in my bag, I may even splurge a little. Whitening toothpaste, here I come.

  A fifteen-minute walk through the store and my cart is already half-full, so I make a beeline for the registers. Halfway there, I stride past the shoe section and a few displays of clothing, where I find myself unexpectedly slowing to a stop.

  Here, the so-called lingerie department is less about frills and lace, more about flannel and fleece. But a few more seductive ensembles are jumbled together on a sale rack, hangers twisted every which way and delicate straps flopping about in a mess of tangled fabric. At the very front of the rack, I zero in on a cherry-red slip of sorts—essentially see-through because of the lace, it’s definitely sexy and the exact opposite of what I currently sleep in. The tags show that it’s my size and it’s on sale, marked down to a measly twenty-two dollars.

  I try to picture myself wearing this. Conjuring up the idea is hard, and the first image that comes to mind isn’t of me … instead, it’s Cooper. His face, his hands, his body. All of him, entirely focused on me.

  I’m guessing that Cooper is a lingerie guy. Lots of men are. But he’s probably seen a hundred different iterations of this look, on women who wear ludicrously expensive ensembles to bed every night, purchased from places other than a big-box store. So, if I buy this, it needs to be for me. For the times when I’m tired of seeing myself in multiple layers and my skin demands something softer.

  I toss it in the cart. Who cares if I’ll only wander around my empty house in it, wearing wool socks to stay warm enough? Who cares if I shouldn’t blow twenty-two bucks on a scrap of cheap lace likely constructed with a one-time-use-only design in mind? We all need to see ourselves in a new light sometimes.

   11

  (Cooper)

  Boarding the team plane after a hard-fought overtime win probably isn’t what most people would expect. I’m guessing fans think that it’s like some party cruise in the air, despite the fact that we’re essentially on a business trip—with our bosses sitting at the front of the plane to observe any hijinks.