town car, her legs extended. She flinched at how swollen and red her knee was. There was no doubt about it, she’d overdone it today. She could hardly wait to put the bag of crushed ice on her knee. They’d picked it up at a 7-Eleven store when they left the Amish country.
“How bad is the pain, Eva?” Angus asked, his voice full of concern.
“Probably as bad as yours. We’re two old fools, Angus. At least I am. I didn’t think this little trip through. I didn’t realize we’d have to get in and out of the buggy so many times. I don’t know what I thought. I’m sorry. Do you want some of my Advil?”
Angus held out his hand. He swallowed two of the tablets while Eva took three with the soda pop they’d also bought at the 7-Eleven.
“As soon as the ice and Advil kick in, we’ll feel better. You have five weeks on me, Angus. I’m just eight days from surgery. Did you have trouble getting used to the pronged cane?” Eva asked, in the hopes that talking would take her mind off the pain in her knee.
Angus leaned back and closed his eyes. “Not at all. I had trouble with the walker. I felt like I was ninety years old. Tell me this damn trip was worth it, Eva. Just tell me that.”
“It was worth it. Five hundred quilts! And all those jams and jellies. Even with all that horse-trading you did with the elders, I suspect we might have overpaid a little. The kids will have to mark them up considerably. Everyone wants a homemade quilt.”
Angus opened his eyes, then reached for Eva’s hand. “What’s bothering you, Eva?”
Eva patted Angus’s hand. “What makes you think something is bothering me?”
“Because I see something in your eyes. Sometimes if you talk about it, it helps a little. I’m a good listener, Eva.”
“It’s Angie. She thinks I don’t know, but she’s planning on leaving in January just the way your son is leaving. I was looking for something, and for some reason I thought it might be in her book bag. I wasn’t spying. There was a teaching contract that she hasn’t signed as yet. For a school in Sunnyvale, California. If you want the whole ball of wax, I need to work. If the store closes, I don’t know what I’ll do. My Social Security isn’t all that much. My house is paid off, but the taxes are now more than the mortgage payment was. Angie wasn’t really taking a salary, just money as she needed it. We have to pay Bess a regular salary. I’m sure that by January, if the store closes, my knee will be okay. I’ll just have to find a job where I can sit part of the time. I just wish I had known about the store’s difficulties before I had the operation. I would have put it off. The worst-case scenario is I’ll sell the house and move into one of those garden apartments. I don’t think apartment living will be too bad. Most of those apartments come with a little terrace. I might even get a cat for my golden years.” Eva wound down like a pricked balloon.
Angus digested this information as his brain whirled and twirled. “You could move in with me, Eva.”
“No, Angus, I cannot move in with you. Now, are you sorry you asked me what’s wrong?”
“No, not at all. Good friends always share their problems. If there’s a way for my pigheaded folly where the store is concerned can be corrected, Josh will do it. I have so many regrets, Eva. I don’t think Josh is ever going to forgive me.”
“You don’t know that for sure, Angus. This is no time for negative thoughts. Parents are allowed to make mistakes. It’s human and it’s normal. You do your best at the time. However, once our children come of age, there’s no more room for mistakes. At least that’s how I look at it. In many ways we’ve both been lucky. Your son stayed with you the way Angie stayed with me. That has to mean something. We can’t be selfish now. Do you agree?”
“Yes, I agree. Maybe our answer is to just close the store in January.” He watched as Eva nodded her head. For some reason he felt disappointed.
Eva’s eyes opened wide. “So, what you’re saying is we’re quitters. You and I. You said if there was a way to turn things around, Josh would find it.”
“I did say that. I don’t know if it can happen or not. I’m trying to convince myself that Eagle’s won’t be closing its doors.”
“Let’s give them a chance, Angus. But only from the sidelines. All we’ll do is offer encouragement and compliments. I think we can do that.”
Angus squeezed Eva’s hand. “I think so, too. How’s the pain?”
“It’s easing up. How’s your pain?”
“I feel wonderful,” Angus lied.
Bess covered her ears when Angie let out a shriek that almost split her eardrums. “What? What, Angie?”
But Angie was out the door calling Josh’s name as she ran through the ground floor of the store. People turned to stare as they tried to figure out why the young woman was shrieking her lungs out. Josh appeared out of nowhere. Like Bess, he shouted. “What? What’s wrong?”
“Wrong? Nothing’s wrong. I have news. Good news! Wonderful news!”
“Come with me, my dear,” Josh said leading Angie to his private sanctuary in the stairwell. “This,” he said, pointing to the steps as though they were His and Hers thrones, “is where I come to think and plan. Good place for good news, I’m thinking. What, what?” he all but shouted, his excitement palpable.
“Okay, okay,” Angie said, sitting down on the second step from the bottom. She was aware Josh was holding her hand. She squeezed it. “I found this woolen mill in Portland, Oregon, that’s going out of business. We can buy up their entire inventory. Their entire inventory, Josh! You can go online to see what I’m talking about. It’s up to us to truck it here. The mill and the manufacturing end of it is all family-owned. The last surviving member of the family just sold out to a developer for big bucks. He was almost giddy that he could unload his warehouse in one swoop. All he wants to do is take his money and go. You need to call them right away and make an offer. They’re expecting your call. Here’s the number. The man’s name is Samuel Eikenberry. Hurry, before he changes his mind, Josh.”
“Stay right here. I have to go to the office for my cell phone. Wait for me. I want to make this deal in my…here on the steps. Will you wait?”
“Of course.” A nanosecond later, Angie felt his lips brush hers.
“I promise to do better next time,” Josh grinned.
“I’ll hold you to it.” Oh, Bess, my line has a nibble. Angie clapped her hands in glee at what had just transpired.
Twenty minutes later, Josh snapped the phone shut. His clenched fist shot in the air. “We have a deal and Mr. Eikenberry is going to truck it here at my expense. I snapped up the offer. The latest styles, the best of the best and all wool. He asked if I wanted the blankets, and I said yes.”
Josh’s excitement was contagious. “You can never have enough blankets.”
Then she was being kissed like she’d never been kissed in her life. Her world rocked, righted itself, and then rocked again. “You didn’t lie. You did do better. Wanna try for perfection?”
Josh was about to give her his definition of perfection when his cell phone rang. Thinking it might be Mr. Eikenberry,
