Jen Safrey - Ticket To Love

“Right now I’m trying to get a grant for this new cat shelter a few towns away. It’s a great place, a no-kill shelter. But when you commit to keeping animals for a long time, you need money to do it.”

“Hmm. I admit I thought writing grants sounded boring, but not if you get to help places like that. Have you been to see the shelter?”

“Of course, several times. Every time I go I’m supposed to be there for business but I end up playing with an armful of the cutest cats.”

Acey’s eyes widened, and she turned her face to the side, muttering something that sounded like, “God, even animals love you.” But why would she say that?

“Excuse me?”

“Nothing, nothing. I have a habit of talking to myself all the time.”

“You are a good conversationalist. I don’t blame you for wanting it to go both ways.”

“Very funny.”

The rain continued to beat down, and small talk kept Harry and Acey busy until their beers were finished.

“Another?” Harry asked, putting out his hand for her bottle.

“No, thanks. I didn’t have lunch yet. Any more alcohol and I may say things I’ll regret.” She stood and stretched her arms out to her sides, then walked toward the kitchen. “I’d better go bag my stuff.”

Harry followed her and pulled out two plastic bags from his cabinet. He gave her one, and they bagged her things together.

“Thanks. Hey, you do have photos!” Acey pointed to the refrigerator door. “Who are they?”

“Those are my sisters, Minnie and Corinne.”

“Do you miss your family?”

Harry chose his words carefully. “I miss my sisters, mostly. My parents, well…I love them, but distance is the best solution, if you know what I mean.”

“I do,” Acey said. “My parents finally moved to Florida this year. Though you’d hardly know it by the number of times Ma still calls. She can’t miss any quality nagging opportunities.”

Harry laughed. “My mother didn’t nag me, I’ll say that. She was too busy for that.”

“Lucky you.” And just at that moment, something else on the refrigerator caught Acey’s eye. “Hey, you have a lottery ticket.”

“Yeah.”

“And is it…? Yes, it is, it’s from May twenty-fourth. Did you buy it at Bread and Milk? You know that was the winning store, right?”

“It’s been the big story every night.” Harry couldn’t keep the wryness out of his voice. “Must be a slow news week.”

Acey tilted her head. “Don’t you think it’s exciting? Someone in the neighborhood? A homey?”

“There have to be better things to occupy the public’s mind than someone becoming a member of the rich elite.”

“Maybe.” Acey moved away from the refrigerator but kept her eyes on Harry. “Just think, thirty-five million dollars. All your financial problems solved. Like that.” She snapped her fingers.

“More like, his problems are probably just beginning,” Harry retorted, failing to keep annoyance out of his voice.

“What are you, crazy? Most people dream of hitting it big.”

Harry didn’t say, I’m not most people.

“I knew a rich guy once,” Acey added. “Trust me, he had no problems.”

“Did he cause any?” Harry asked.

Acey paused for a long moment. “I still think you should check your numbers,” she finally said.

Harry realized the last thing he wanted was to tip this woman off to his sad truth. He reined in his emotion. “The rain’s stopped.”

“So it has.” Acey picked her bags up off the table.

“I’ll throw out your apples because they fell in the street. Wait.” He reached into a silver bowl on the table and picked out two shiny apples, dropping them into one of her bags. “I bought these yesterday.”

“You didn’t have to do that.”

“I always buy fruits and vegetables and never eat them. I just end up eating take-out food and letting the produce rot. Please take them.”

“A’right, thanks. I bet you can tell by my appearance that I never waste food.” She rolled her eyes.

Harry took her self-deprecating comment as an invitation to sweep his gaze over her body. She was not overweight. She was as lush and ripe as a piece of fruit herself, and when he turned his eyes back to her face, it was the color of the apples in question. She practically ran from the kitchen. Harry followed her but paused to peel the offending lottery ticket out from underneath its magnet. He went to drop it in the trash, but he’d forgotten to replace the bag this morning, so he chucked the ticket on top of the refrigerator. He didn’t want to have to see it anymore.

“Thanks,” Acey said, edging toward his door. “I mean it. This has been—”

Harry tried to help. “Yeah, it really has been, uh—”

Silence.

“Unexpected,” Acey finished, and Harry agreed. Acey was unexpected, filling his apartment with exuberance and light, which he was sure he’d miss again the second she left.

He wanted to ask her if she would come by again, or go out somewhere, just spend time with him in some way but his promise to himself was still there, humming through him, stopping him. Acey stood a moment, quiet, and with his untrained eye, he could almost see her own inner struggle. He wondered if it was the same, and he wondered at her reasons. He hoped she’d give in first. If she did, if she asked him out, he could cave. But if she didn’t, he knew his resolve was too strong for him to overcome.

She didn’t. She put out her hand. “It was so nice meeting you,” she said.

He shook it. “Y’all be careful going home now, all right? Walk slow on that knee,” he added with a half smile.

“I like that ‘y’all’ thing,” Acey said. Then she blurted, “Oh, I forgot my purse,” and she trotted back to the kitchen. When she returned, she looked at him a bit differently, with her head cocked just slightly to one side.

Harry narrowed his eyes with curiosity.

Acey picked up her grocery bags, stepped outside and said over her shoulder, “See ya around, cowboy.” Then she clattered down the stairs.

Harry grinned. Everything that woman did was noisy.

“I wasn’t stalking him,” Acey called, squeezing water out of her hair and into the kitchen sink. A second quick downpour had caught her two blocks from home, drenching her. She wrapped a towel around her head and entered the living room where Steph was sitting, her eyebrows raised in amused fashion.

“I wasn’t stalking,” Acey repeated.

“Uh-huh,” Steph said, leaning back on the sofa and lacing her fingers behind her head.

“I wasn’t.” Acey tucked the towel behind each ear to hear better. “The supermarket run happened to take me past his building. And then my bag sort of ripped open, maybe because I sort of absentmindedly picked a hole in the bottom of it with my nail.”

“Suddenly this all becomes more believable.”

“Listen, I had to meet him again. So my bag breaks, and he comes running like…like…”

“Like what?”

“Like the hero. Every time I see him, he’s saving the day. In the store, he was all sweet to Rosalia, and he said the nicest thing to Cassandra I ever heard, did I tell you?”

“About twenty-three times.”

“He helps kids, and elderly people, and me.”

“So, is his place papered with hundred-dollar bills?”

“No, it’s…totally nothing. It was like, white walls and brown chairs and that’s it.”

“Doesn’t sound very megamillionaire-ish.”

“No, I thought the same thing. I talked to him and I felt…” Acey stopped. She’d felt, and that was amazing in itself. She’d wrapped up and protected her heart since her bad breakup last year, and she hadn’t really enjoyed a conversation with a man in so long.