“But you have the time to sit here crying your poor eyes out?”
Grover had been a close friend of her father’s since before she was born, coworkers during the tumultuous days of the civil rights movement of the 60s before opening a law firm together. It didn’t matter that she’d been a white girl. Grover and his wife, Connie, had always welcomed her into their large family of eight kids despite snide comments the families received from people of both races. The man was like a second father to her.
With her own parents dead, Grover and his kids were the only family she had. Connie had passed almost four years earlier after a stroke, right after Libbie had turned thirty-one.
He carefully clasped her hands in his large ones, enveloping them in a tender grip. “I think it’s time for you to consider selling out to Katie Beasley,” he gently said. “She made you a generous offer last month.”
“No. I won’t do that. I have to make this work. Everything I have is tied up in the building and the bakery.”
“Then at least get you some good help in here besides my tired, sorry ole ass. Jenny’s a sweet kid, but you and I both know she’s a few french fries short of a Happy Meal. Not to mention she can’t bake worth a darn. And Ruth is a good woman, but she’s retired and you need someone who can work more than part time for you.”
That made her chuckle. Ruth Callahan only worked mornings and the occasional special order, and usually left once the bulk of the day’s baking was finished. Jenny Millings helped out several mornings a week. She ran the counter for Libbie in exchange for cash under the table and day-old leftovers. She had a part-time job at a convenience store in the afternoons while her two young sons were still in school. It barely helped her pay rent and expenses for her and her kids. She couldn’t afford child care, so she couldn’t work in the evenings. Besides that, her younger son was autistic.
Her ex-husband had been in jail for over two years for a drug charge and obviously wasn’t paying child support.
If looking at anyone’s life could make Libbie feel remotely better about her own situation, it was Jenny’s.
Libbie sniffled and looked up at Grover. “Your ass isn’t sorry. You’ve been a lifesaver.”
“Glad you and my Connie think so, honey.” He brushed her brown bangs away from her face. “I had another idea, if you’d like to hear it.”
She nodded.
“You’ve got that smaller apartment upstairs. It’s just sitting there gathering dust. Let me get the boys in here to help you clear out all the furniture and those boxes of your folks’ stuff, and you rent it out. You can put the stuff in my shed. I’ve got the room because I don’t park in there no more.”
“How’s that supposed to help me?” She held up her hands. “That won’t help me get this order out.”
“
I’m
gonna help you get this order out. But you could use the money you get from rent to pay for someone else to work in here during the day to help you out. Or have the renter work for you part time in exchange for lower rent.”
Grover, bless his heart, shouldn’t even be working. He was retired, and had certainly earned it. She couldn’t afford to pay him, not that he would take money from her if she could afford to pay him. But on days like this, when cool, late-October autumn days made most people cheerfully start thinking about the upcoming holiday season, Libbie started counting the days until summer hit Brooksville, Florida, again.
The hot, moist summer heat was one of the few things that brought her relief from the sometimes severe pain of her fibromyalgia and arthritis. But the frequent cold fronts that swept through the area in winter played hell with her pain levels.
“You really think I could rent it out?”
He smiled. “I’ve already arranged for my boys to be here bright and early Saturday morning. Tommy’s going to bring his truck, and Jimmy’s going to bring two friends. All they asked in exchange is for you to whip up some of your red velvet cakes.”
She buried her face against his shoulder, holding back her tears. “Thank you. You don’t know how much I appreciate this.”
“Honey, you’re family. You know dang well if Connie were here she’d already have that upstairs cleaned out and ready to go.”
Libbie snorted with laughter again. “Yeah, I know.”
* * * *
Only because of Grover’s help was the Palmer order finished, boxed, and ready for the scheduled morning pickup by one o’clock in the morning. Libbie debated not even going to bed and just staying up to start the morning baking, but Grover nixed that idea.
“You get your butt upstairs and sit in a hot bath for a while and get some sleep. I’ll be back at four to help you and Ruth get the daily stuff going.” He only lived a few minutes away.
She hugged him, struggling to hold back another round of grateful tears. “Thanks.”
He kissed the top of her head, just like he used to do when she was a kid. “No worries, sugar. You grab some winks. We’ll get the morning stuff out the door and you can take a nap later while me and Jenny mind the store.”
Libbie didn’t argue. She locked the back door behind him and slowly climbed the stairs leading to the apartments. When she opened the door to her apartment, Galileo, her huge orange tabby cat, greeted her with a loud meow of disapproval from the back of the couch.
She flipped him a bird. “I’m not in a mood for your ’tude tonight, buddy.”
He jumped off the couch and followed her into the kitchen. There, he twined himself around her legs while she made a cup of hot tea to take into the bath with her. His loud purring filled the otherwise silent kitchen.
Libbie leaned over and picked him up. “You know mommy doesn’t feel good, don’t you?” Usually Galileo acted standoffish and grouchy, unless it was bedtime, dinnertime, or he seemed to sense she felt awful.
And other than her, he hated everyone but Grover. She’d rescued the cat as a young, skinny tom when he was a few weeks old and barely weaned.
Grover joked that if someone had cut his nuts off, he’d be grouchy, too.
The cat rubbed his head against her chin for a minute while she waited for her water to heat in the microwave. When it was ready, she set the cat down and fixed her tea. Galileo followed her into the bathroom and sat staring at her while she undressed and climbed into a tubful of warm water.
When she was comfortable, he put his front paws up on the side of the tub and meowed at her.
“I won’t drown, don’t worry. You’ll get your breakfast in the morning.”
Apparently satisfied by that response, he left the bathroom and headed to the bedroom to wait for her.
Libbie wrapped her hands around her mug and carefully sipped. The heat soaked through her hands, helping soothe the agony a little.
If I can just hang on through winter, I know I can make it.
Snowbirds from up north had started returning to Brooksville, bringing their money with them. Which meant social clubs and churches would be holding their winter events. Restaurants would get busy, and the ones that ordered specialty desserts from her would increase their orders.
Many Blessings, the local New Age store with an in-house coffeeshop, had already doubled their daily orders.
While by not a lot, her daily store sales were also slowly beginning to increase and outpace her expenses. She didn’t have to rely on special orders to make ends meet anymore.
She looked around at the bathroom. When she divorced her ex, she’d moved back home a few months before her parents died in a wreck eight years prior. After they died, she enrolled in culinary school and used the insurance money to help pay bills and tuition. Upon completing school, she spent a couple of years working at various restaurants and catering businesses in the Tampa Bay area until she had enough training and practical experience to open her own business.
The building’s previous owner, an attorney, had lived in the larger apartment, rented the smaller one out, and used the bottom floor as his law office. When Libbie bought the building two years earlier, she’d emptied her parents’ house and sold it to make the down payment and help pay for equipment.
Her dream come true, to own her own bakery.
So what if she didn’t have any kind of a social life? She’d proved her cheating ass of an ex wrong, that she could do whatever she set her mind to. That she wasn’t worthless.
That she wasn’t a burden, even with her fibro.
Sinking a little lower in the tub, she took another sip of her tea and prayed for the pain to ease up.
Libbie slumped into her office chair and breathed a sigh of relief. A little after nine o’clock in the morning, and Karen Palmer, mother of the bride, had just picked up their order. It didn’t hurt the woman was tickled to death with the results. And she took a handful of business cards with her to hand out to her friends. She was so pleased in fact that she placed a large order for her ladies’ church group, for pickup next Wednesday afternoon.
A hundred large cupcakes, four different varieties, decorated. Plus three red velvet cakes, two sour cream pound cakes, and a carrot cake.
She’d paid the order in full in advance so she could send someone else to pick it up for her.
Yay. I can pay Jenny today instead of on Tuesday after all the Friday checks clear.
Karen Palmer wouldn’t stiff her and write a bad check. And the young mom would no doubt appreciate the early payday with her food stamps not paying out for nearly a week. Jenny never asked for an advance on her pay, but Libbie saw how the woman struggled this time of the month, every month, making sure her kids had good food while she sometimes subsisted on day-olds Libbie gave her to take home.
Grover leaned against the office doorway. “You okay, sugar?”
Libbie nodded. “Exhausted. How are you?” Out in the shop, she heard the bell jingle as someone entered, followed by Jenny’s cheerful voice as she greeted them. Back in the kitchen, Ruth had the giant mixer running as she put together the basics of a cake order going out the next day. Ruth didn’t do the special decorating. That fell on Libbie’s shoulders. But the older woman had a special touch with even the fussiest recipes and rarely ruined anything.
Grover shrugged. “If I wasn’t here, I’d be sitting in my chair at home. Don’t worry about it. But I meant your hands.” He nodded to where she had them clutched in her lap, the apron wrapped around them and the microwaveable gel hot pack she held. “You don’t think I didn’t see you do that, did you?” One bushy eyebrow threaded with grey arched over his friendly brown eyes. “Don’t make me cross-examine you, kiddo.”
She felt her face flush. From the stories her father had told her, Grover had been a formidable trial attorney. “I’ll be okay,” she mumbled.
“You’re this bad and it’s only October. Honey, you’ll be in misery come January and you know it.”
Libbie knew all too well where this conversation was going and decided to head him off at the pass. “I can’t afford to go to Doc Smith.”
“Why don’t you let me be the judge of that,” a man said from behind Grover.
Grover turned with a smile and held out his hand. “Hi, Doc.”
Dr. Smith shook hands with him and stepped past him and into the office. “Grover. Libbie.”
She shot a glare at Grover. “You called him?”
He returned her glare with an arched eyebrow. “Of course I did, you stubborn thing.”
Dr. Smith waggled an accusatory finger at her. “How am I supposed to get my morning crullers if my favorite baker can’t make them?”
Dr. Smith was a general practitioner who’d been practicing in Brooksville for over twenty-five years. Thin and tall, he stopped in every morning on his way to his office four doors down from Libbie’s building. He’d been their family doctor when Libbie was growing up.
This also wasn’t the first time they’d had this discussion. “I don’t have insurance yet, Doc. Maybe by next spring I can afford it.”
He walked in, sat in the folding chair next to her desk, and held his hands out, waggling his fingers at her. “Give ’em. Hand ’em over, girl.”
With her head hung low, she released the gel pack and held her hands out to him. She winced as he gingerly probed and manipulated her hands before releasing them. She pulled them back and once again buried them in her apron, wrapping her fingers around the still-warm gel pack.
He cocked his head at her. “I can’t force you to come see me. I also keep telling you I’ll make you a special cash deal so you can.”
She shook her head. “I don’t want charity.” She already felt guilty enough about Grover’s insistence on coming in to help without compensation.
The doctor pulled a prescription pad and pen from his jacket pocket. “This isn’t charity. This is self-interest.” He smiled as he scribbled on the pad. “I don’t smoke or drink. Your crullers are the only monkey on my back. Do an old man a favor, would ya?” He tore the sheet off and handed it to Grover, who pocketed it. “And how am I supposed to get my fix guilt-free if I know you’re killing yourself over here?”
She finally smiled, which earned her a pat on the knee. “But I can’t take anything that’s going to make me sleepy,” she said. “I have to get up so early.”
“How’s the fibro fog doing?”
She shrugged. “It doesn’t matter because I have everything written down and organized so anyone can help me. And I can’t do something stupid like forget.” She had hundreds of laminated pages in several binders in the kitchen, with all her standard recipes in them, so she could use dry-erase markers on them while baking and not miss a step or forget an ingredient.