Chapter Four

Brandy

The wedding was beautiful and simple, and the party afterwards was a lot of fun. Someone named Flynn had taken over as a DJ for the event, and he seemed to be pretty in tune with the crowd. A mixture of oldies from the eighties and country tunes got people up and moving, filling the fabricated dance floor with increasingly inebriated gyrating bodies.

I didn’t provide any alcohol, something that I wasn’t comfortable doing despite my license to do so, and something Collin had emailed me last minute and asked that I specifically not do. He said he wanted to hire a bartender for the evening so he could keep a closer eye on overserving, which I thought was a great idea. Less for me to worry about, anyway.

But the bartender seemed to be a little lax on his duties, and there was more than one partygoer who’d had what looked like at least one too many. Suddenly, I was finding myself texting Basil to bring supplies over and make extra sandwiches so we could sober some folks up. She had been running the shop, which was drearily dead today as well, and I needed the help more than I thought I would.

I was still waiting on her arrival and trying to get pies cut and served when suddenly someone showed up beside me. I looked up into the towering but friendly face of Collin Galloway.

“Thought you might could use a runner,” he said. “Where to?”

“Honestly, I’m just trying to get food in some of these folks that look like they might be lit.”

“Smart,” he said. “I knew I should have just let you handle the liquor.”

“I didn’t really want to handle the liquor, so thank you,” I said.

“Well, you are smarter than me anyway,” he said. “Which pie to who, you think?”

“Well, that one over there, leaning against the table and dozing off standing? He’s already had blueberry and loved it.”

“That’s Steven Dundee,” he said. “Blueberry for Steve.”

“Uh-huh. And that one over there, the lady who is giggling to herself? She is going to be apple.”

“Why apple?”

“It’s heartier. She needs to sober up before some guy figures out she’s in a bad way.”

“I don’t think any of those kinds of guys are here,” he said.

I nodded toward the DJ booth, where Flynn was eyeing the poor girl leeringly.

“Ahh,” he said. “Well, maybe one. Also, I’ll have a talk with him.”

“Thank you,” I said.

“No problem.”

With a smile and a nod, he dashed off, carrying the slices of pies like he’d been waiting tables for twenty years. I watched as he nudged the one he called Steven awake, who looked like a child on Christmas morning to get the blueberry pie slice, then went over to the girl and put the apple pie in front of her. Like a magic trick, he also replaced her glass of champagne with a water and spoke quietly to her for a moment. She laughed and looked up, seeming like she was expecting to kiss him, but he moved away quickly, making his way to the DJ.

That conversation seemed a little different. It was short, it involved extremely limited movement on the DJ’s part, and when it was over, Collin looked for just a second like he might be ready to bite someone’s head off before changing his expression back to a genial one when he saw me. The DJ, for his part, kept his glassy-eyed stare and changed songs like a zombie.

“What did you say to him?” I asked as Collin got close again.

“Oh, nothing,” he said. “Just reminded him that he might be friends with Jesse and all, but that I could rip his spine out in front of Jess, and Jess would assume he must have deserved it.”

“Wow,” I said. “That’s pretty graphic.”

“Ahh, yeah, sorry about that,” he said. “I forget not everyone reads as much Stephen King as I do.”

“He’s actually one of my favorite authors,” I said. “ Salem’s Lot is one of my all-time favorite books.”

“Really?” he said, a shocked expression crossing his face. “Me too. Everyone talks about The Stand, or It , or The Shining , but Salem’s Lot or Firestarter or any of the older ones are just great as far as I’m concerned. Just as good, if not better than when he goes nuts and writes seven hundred pages.”

“I agree,” I said, “ The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon is amazing, and it’s super short.”

“I loved that book!”

We laughed, and I felt something between us. A spark, the kind that I hadn’t felt in a long, long time. It wasn’t the silly pick-up line kind of spark I occasionally got at bars before I moved back to Foley, but it wasn’t quite the same as the kind of spark you get when you just meet someone who shares a fandom. It was something… more.

He was attractive, that part was clear. Tall, handsome, a little slender and bookish, but with wide shoulders and the hint of definition in his arms that told me he was someone who might not weigh much but was all muscle. But what was really catching me was his eyes. They were a glittering green color that I’d never really seen on a person before. Hazel, sure, but not green. Not full-on green. They sparkled when he laughed, like, well, like the description of Santa Claus in that old poem. I got the distinct impression he would make an incredible Santa one day.

Collin just gave off this interesting vibe. He was commanding and suave, but also somehow kind and gentle. He had that leadership quality about him that was so quiet, you would miss it until you found yourself following his commands. He’d never have to shout them, either. He could whisper exclusively, and everyone would be on their toes to listen.

Someone called his name, and he left abruptly, holding a finger up as if to say he would be back. I went back to my duties, and when Basil arrived, began to cycle through the rest of the food until there was nothing but empty boxes to clean up and plastic silverware to recycle. Basil was helping finish that off when Collin showed back up at my table, a wide grin on his face and a little bit of sweat coming from the top of his forehead. He was also missing his jacket.

“Brandy?” he asked.

“Yes?”

“Are you finishing up?”

“Yeah,” I said. “We’re almost out of everything, and I…”

“Would you like to dance?”

I paused, staring at him for a moment, trying to determine if I’d heard him correctly.

“Dance? Me?”

“Yeah,” he said. “With me.”

“I’m… I’m wearing a chef’s coat.”

“Take it off,” he said, then his eyes widened, and he crumpled in on himself a little in embarrassment. “I mean, if you can. I don’t know what chefs wear under their coats, honestly. I mean, you can keep it on. I don’t care. No one would care. Unless you don’t want to dance, which is fine. You know, I think I am going to just go over this way somewhere and pretend I have a working brain…”

“No, stop,” I laughed. “I’ll dance with you.”

“Yeah?” he said, smiling from ear to ear. “All right. Come on, little lady.”

He held out his hand, and I took it, my heart thumping in my chest. I certainly had not expected this when I’d taken the job. I’d just wanted to get in, provide sandwiches and pie, get out, and get paid. But now… now I was dancing with an incredibly handsome, incredibly interesting man.

The first song was upbeat and from the eighties, and we danced more near each other than with each other. But as the song ended and the next began, he took my hip in one hand and my hand in the other. The slower tune allowed me a chance to breathe, but I wasn’t really capable of taking it. I felt like I was going to pass out. Stuff like this never happened to me.

Collin was surprisingly good on his feet. My only experience with slow dancing was in high school when they made us learn the box steps with the poor boys who had the coordination of a drunken moose, and then with my ex-husband who somehow had coordination that would make a drunken moose seem like a Russian ballerina.

Not Collin. He was light and quick on his feet, and I was finding myself increasingly overwhelmed by him. In a good way.

When the song ended, another began, and I let myself get closer to him. I couldn’t exactly put my head on his shoulder, but I put it nearby, and we swayed to the crooning love song for a precious few minutes that went by all too fast.

“Collin!”

The song had just ended, but someone was calling his name from across the tent. It looked, as far as I could recall, like two of his brothers. I vaguely knew the Galloway boys. I was closer in age to Jesse, with Logan a few years younger than me, but I couldn’t recall if we’d actually gone to school together or not. We must have, but I might have been a grade ahead of him because of my birthday month.

As he left, I made my way back to the table and a very smug-looking Basil.

“What was that?” she asked with a devilish grin.

“Just a friendly dance,” I said. “Nothing more.”

“Uh-huh,” she said. “I know you better than that. You got a crush, don’t you?”

I shrugged. There was no use denying it. Basil could catch a lie coming off of me immediately, and she knew it.

“Yeah, obviously. Who wouldn’t? Look at him.”

“Not… exactly my type,” Basil said. “But I get it. I absolutely get it.”

“Yeah, well, your type is what exactly? You never nailed that down.”

“My type is anything I feel like nailing down at that moment,” she laughed. “I’m an equal opportunity hammer.”

“Lord,” I said, shaking my head, eyes still on Collin on the other side of the tent. “I could go for a hammer right about now.”

“That’s it,” Basil said. “I’m writing that one down.”

The reception started to drift after that, with several people leaving and the DJ dejectedly doing everything he could not to look any woman in the eyes. Whatever Collin had really said, it had shaken him.

Basil took a bunch of our stuff back to the shop, and I was packing the rest up in my car when I noticed there was something yellow sticking out of my windshield.

Immediately, I assumed I’d gotten a ticket and got irrationally angry at a parking attendant that didn’t exist. When I opened the note up, I realized that not only was there no one to give a ticket in the first place, the yellow note wasn’t even a note at all. It was one of the napkins I’d provided for the event.

Brandy,

Would you like to meet up for a drink sometime?

-Collin

Grinning, I folded the note and put it into my pocket. My cheeks felt like they were on fire, and as I finished packing everything into my car, I suddenly felt a whole lot less tired. As a matter of fact, I felt downright good . I drove home, checked in on Mom, checked with Basil to tell her I’d come in for a movie and some popcorn in a bit, our post-event tradition, and went into my room downstairs.

The downstairs had once been a playroom, and then when I was a teenager became my tiny apartment. There was a bathroom, and the only downside was that it had the only access to the basement and the laundry. Since I did all the laundry for everyone anyway, it didn’t really matter to me. It was a sanctuary.

I got undressed, tossing the chef’s coat into the dry cleaning wash pile, and pulled out the note. I caught myself reading it over and over and wondering just what had gotten into me.