Jodie Bailey - Mistaken Twin

Normally, the hustle and bustle of the day energized her, made her feel like she was infusing a love of art in her customers, but not today.

Today, she was simply worn-out, keyed up, a little bit on edge. It could be from all of the additional tourists in town for the bluegrass festival. More eyes meant the need for more vigilance. In her life, strangers truly meant danger.

“Jenna?” Liza Carpenter, the sole employee at The Color Café, leaned against a bright purple wooden chair in front of a teal blue table across the room. “I asked if you were okay. You’ve been spacey all day. Flu season’s kicking in to high gear. You’re not about to fall out on me, are you?”

“Girl, I hope not.” Maybe the flu was it, though. Her brain could be wonky because she was running a fever, not because she was on high alert, praying no one from El Paso would wander into town and recognize her.

Because someone recognizing her would mean she had to turn her back on everything. Again.

She’d worked too hard to make sure being found never happened. After three years under the radar, this tiny North Carolina town was beginning to feel like home. If she had to flee Mountain Springs, it would rip her heart into pieces.

Jenna ran a hand along the polished wood bar, soaking in the peace born from a sense of belonging. When she’d moved to town, this building had been an abandoned eyesore, an old bar named Ridgerunners that had served as the local watering hole for close to a hundred years before shutting its doors nearly a decade earlier. Jenna had attacked cobwebs and cheap wood paneling with all of the fear and pain she’d brought to town with her. By the time she’d finished painting the walls with bright colors and had furnished the space with funky painted tables and chairs to express the artistic inspiration she couldn’t keep from flourishing inside her, she’d come to terms with the life she’d left behind. Having a new friend tell her about Christ in the process made the remodel even more symbolic of a whole new way of living.

She hadn’t been able to part with the bar, though. A live-edged slice from one of the huge oak trees that grew in the mountains above the town, it had spoken to her and drawn her in. She used it to separate the main area, where Liza helped customers paint, from the employee area, where they served coffee. The antique wood connected her to the history of the area, even if she was the newest of newcomers to the tiny little up-and-coming craft community.

“Might want to start planning.” Liza shoved the chair under the table then crushed her apron into a ball and walked over to hand it across the counter to Jenna. “Even if you’re not sick, one of us could fall out anytime. Wouldn’t hurt to have temporary help waiting in the wings.”

“True.” Jenna took the apron and shoved aside her negative thoughts. Enough time had passed that surely she was safe now. “I’ll call Rena and Caleb, see if they want to be on call for some possible extra hours.” She aimed her index finger at Liza. “But don’t you go wishing ill on us. I’d rather you didn’t talk about the flu at all.”

Liza saluted. “Want me to clean the bathroom?”

There wasn’t much left to do. They’d straightened the shop as they went during the evening, working around the few tourists who’d come in to paint. The bluegrass festival was drawing crowds to the old courthouse, which the town had converted into the Fine Arts Center, so their typical Friday crowd had been thin. “Go ahead. I can handle it. I’m wound so tight it will do me good to get moving, get some cleaning done. Might make me tired enough to get some real sleep tonight.” A full night’s rest didn’t happen often. Since she’d fled El Paso, sleep had been more like an estranged relative than a trusted friend. It sure didn’t like to come around to visit her house.

Liza glanced at the door and eased closer to it. “If you’re sure...”

Her thinly disguised eagerness dragged a much-needed laugh from Jenna. “I’m sure. Go to the concert. It doesn’t start for another half an hour, and I’ll guarantee Tim is staring at the door waiting for you to walk through it.” Liza had been dating Tim Stewart since their senior year of high school, five years earlier. Sooner rather than later, the firefighter would ask the artist to marry him. Likely sooner.

“Don’t have to tell me twice... Well, three times.” Liza blushed and grabbed her thick coat off the rack by the door. “I’ll see you in the morning? If the weather forecast is right and it’s going to rain, we’re probably going to be slammed from the minute we open.”

Jenna waved her out the door, then followed to twist the dead bolt behind her. They followed the weather with the same intensity as the hikers up the slopes and the ski-resort owners farther to the west. Rain, snow and cold drove customers to them, searching for a warm place and an outlet for the creative energy they’d built visiting all of the craft stores and artisans’ shops in and around town.

Mountain Springs might not have the draw of places like Asheville or Boone, but it was doing very well on its own. On the sidewalk, tourists and townsfolk alike were bundled against the cold as they hurried toward the Fine Arts Center.

A Mountain Springs Police SUV glided past. Probably Wyatt Stephens. He typically started the night shift about now.

Things outside were going on exactly as they always did. Even with the increased foot traffic, nothing looked out of place.

The best thing she could do to settle herself was to get moving, then go home to hot coffee, a warm fireplace and whatever cheesy movie looked good on Netflix.

Better yet, she could call Christa Naylor and see if the older woman would let her come up to her little mountain retreat for the rest of the evening. Christa’s tiny pottery studio might be just the thing to soothe Jenna’s spirit. It had worked many times before, as had some long talks over Christa’s valley-famous tea.

That’s exactly what she’d do as soon as she finished prepping for the next day. With the weather turning, she’d stock the paint trays and refill the bottles tonight so she wouldn’t be rushed in the morning. It was likely a crowd would be waiting outside the door for her to open like the last time the rain and cold had blown in together. They’d had a rough day then. The shop had been behind from the time the door opened all the way until they locked the doors for the night. The chaos of a day of unpredictable, bad weather wasn’t something she wanted to repeat.

At the counter, Jenna tugged out large paint jugs and began to refill the smaller ones they kept on display. It didn’t take long for the work to chase away the creepy crawlies. There was something about the swirls of color, the order of the paints across the spectrum from dark to light in shelves along the side wall... Color filled her heart, reminding her of the rainbow God had sent to Noah.

As she reached for the next jug, her phone vibrated in her hip pocket. Erin Taylor. The closest thing she had to a best friend. Cradling the phone between her ear and shoulder, Jenna reached for a jug of blue. “Hey, girl.”

“Are you coming to the concert tonight? I’m just walking in the door. It’s filling up fast and I’ll need to save you a seat.”

Jenna unscrewed the cap on Mediterranean Seashore and grabbed a smaller bottle to refill. “Probably not. I’ve been off my game all afternoon, so I’m going home to get some rest.”

“You are zero fun.”

“Is Jason with you?” The answer was almost definitely a yes. An instructor at the army’s nearby Camp McGee, Erin’s fiancé was rarely far away from her side when he wasn’t on duty.

“Yes.”

“I’m definitely not crashing date night.”