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www.millsandboon.co.uk
This book is dedicated to the midwives of this story—
Kathleen O’Brien, Ann Bair, Lori Harris,
Terry Backhus and Teresa Elliott Brown.
And to Larri Mattison, who kept nudging me
to write a book set in a salon.
Special thanks to Tammy Strickland and Pam and
Bill LaBud for educating me on leukemia.
Love and appreciation to my critique partners
Catherine Kean and Elizabeth Grainger.
As always, Michael and Jen—Je vous aime beaucoup.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
CHAPTER 21
EPILOGUE
CHAPTER 1
The Garden of Proserpine
Here, where the world is quiet,
Here, where all trouble seems
Dead winds and spent waves riot
In doubtful dreams of dreams;
I watch the green field growing
For reaping folk and sowing,
For harvest-time and mowing,
A sleepy world of streams.
—Algernon Charles Swinburne
Today, as I fly out of LAX, probably for the last time, the souvenirs I’m taking with me are two truths I gleaned doing hair in the Hollywood movie industry: 1) appearance is everything; and 2) reality, that eternal shape-shifter, is the biggest illusion of all.
Reality is 99.9 percent perception. It morphs into whatever form best moves ahead the perceiver.
As I, Avril Carson, thirty-five-year-old widow of Chet, and former aspiring-starlet-turned-Hollywood-stylist, wipe my clammy palms on my Dolce & Gabbanas—which I bought gently worn at a consignment shop for a fraction of the retail price…but no one needs to know that—and prepare to speed into the wild blue yonder into the next chapter of my life, witness Hollywood truths one and two play out in real life.
It goes like this: Even though I loathe flying, I’ve convinced myself that I must fly across country because the alternative is to come rolling back home into Sago Beach, Florida, in a Greyhound bus.
No can do. Ride the bus, that is.
Not when these jeans retail for nearly three times the cost of a bus ticket.
Not when I’d have to travel twenty-seven hundred miles, stopping at forty-one different stations along the way, to arrive at 3:42 in the morning. Call me vain, but I refuse to go two days, sixteen hours and fifteen minutes without a shower. It makes my skin crawl just thinking about it and the mélange of aromas simmering in that busload of unwashed strangers.
If personal hygiene is too selfish to justify bus snobbery, think of my mother. She has taken such pleasure in my being the hometown girl who’s made good in Hollywood; I simply can’t let her down by arriving in less than style.
Work with me, here. I mean, come on, I hate to fly. If I were being completely real, I’d keep my feet on the ground and take that bus—body odor be damned—over hurling through the air from one coast to the other.
But it’s not an option. So, I keep reminding myself of the above rationale and that flying is safer than traveling cross-country via ground transportation. Blah, blah, blah—
Full of Dramamine, which has not yet kicked in, I board the plane, settle into my aisle seat and try to center myself.
Oh, God… I’m really doing this.
Chet would’ve been proud of me for venturing so far out of my comfort zone. I press my leg against my carry-on, which holds the box of his ashes, hoping to absorb some of his courage.
Chet Marcus Carson, extreme sports reporter for WKGM Hollywood. Nothing scared him, which is part of the reason he’s dead…nine months now. Parasailing accident.
Chet Marcus Carson, the reason I ended up in Hollywood to pursue my dream. Much to my mother’s hysterical dismay, he yanked me up out of Sago Beach—population 212—and set me firmly on the road to making something of myself. I was going to be an actress. A star. Just like all my favorites in the old black-and-white romances. The ones I used to watch over and over again. The ones that made me dream big and believe in happily ever after.
And Chet, he was going to be a sportscaster. Together we were going to set the world on fire and never look back at the Podunk town of our youth.
God, that sounds so stupid now. So naive.
I suppose I was. And now, Chet Marcus Carson is the reason I’m going home. I tried my best to stick it out on my own, but by the time I lost Chet, the Hurray-For-Hollywood, rose-colored glasses were gone; I wasn’t cut out to be an actress—not in this how-bad-do-you-want-it, bare-it-all day and age.
My dream was over, but Chet’s rose like a turbo-inflated hot air balloon. I resorted to the only things I knew: doing hair and being a strong support system for him. Through his contacts, he got me a few jobs doing hair on the sets of various local productions, but my heart wasn’t in it. Once I got a look behind the curtain and glimpsed the real Hollywood, all I wanted was to ground myself in reality. I wanted to raise a family, to be a good wife—to be normal again.
Then one day it all came crashing down. The only man I’d ever loved was dead. And I was stuck in this soulless town that was just one big reminder that somehow I had to go on without him.
But how?
How in the world could I do that?
Still, today, I’m only supposed to think positive thoughts.
Buckling myself into this Boeing 707, I glance at the woman in the window seat, sitting all snug and relaxed, listening to her iPod, shutting out the rest of the world. Taking a cue from her, I focus on my breathing and try to redirect my thoughts to a happy place, but before I get there, a man pauses in the aisle beside me.
“Excuse me, I think I’m sitting next to you.” He removes a black cowboy hat, glances at his boarding pass and gestures to the vacant middle seat. “Row twenty-five? Seat B?”
The guy is tall—maybe six-four. The manly-man variety that takes up lots of space. The type who sprawls and hogs both armrests.
Great.
My legs feel like overcooked bucatini, but somehow, I manage to stand without whacking my head on the low-flying overhead storage bin.
The cowboy can’t back up because there’s a long line of people behind him. Behind me, an older couple is stashing their belongings. With no other options, the cowboy and I do an awkward dance as he slides past me to the middle seat.
Soon enough, I’m settled and attempting to resume my stream of reassuring thoughts. Let’s see, where was I…?
Aerodynamics. Uhh, sure…that’s as good a place as any to start.
Aerodynamics is a proven reality, not just Hollywood hype. Aerodynamics allow this eight-hundred-and-seventy-thousand-pound tin can, which is comprised of six million parts and one hundred and forty-seven thousand pounds of “high-strength aluminum,” to defy gravity.
Which seems utterly ridiculous if you consider the laws of gravity. Because something this heavy is not supposed to fly. Then the airline fills it full of people and overstuffed luggage and those tiny bottles of booze and—
Oh, God…
I feel as if someone’s slipped a noose around my neck. Perhaps I need that booze to preempt an anxiety attack.
All right. Settle down. Breathe.
Aerodynamics.
I learned those factoids about the makeup of an airplane on the Boeing Web site when I was surfing for comforting facts to quell my fears. I thought if anyone could sing the praises of flight safety, the airline manufacturer would have the shtick down pat.
They did.
Still, knowing myself like I do, I came up with a backup plan. Thus was born my list of the drawbacks of bus travel.
And you thought I was an insufferable snob, didn’t you?
I have one word for you: Self-preservation.
Let’s just get through this. Focus, Avril. Happy thoughts.
At this point, the flight attendants are midway through their pretakeoff spiel.
“Ladies and gentlemen, please take note of the emergency exits located throughout the cabin.” They point their manicured fingers toward the sides of the plane and smile like we’re all at Disneyland. “In the unlikely event of an emergency, lights along the floor will direct you to an exit….”
Emergency.
The engines fire up.
Oh, God…The noose tightens.
I am perfectly safe.
People fly every day.
Statistically, I have a better chance of winning the lottery than being killed in a plane crash. Hollywood cannot change that reality.
Oh, God…
As the engines roar, and the plane taxis down the runway, I’m gripped by the third Hollywood truth: When bull-shit fails, backpedal like hell and disassociate yourself from the lie as fast as you can.
I hate to fly. I really, really hate it. I can’t believe I tried to make myself buy into this crap. Forget aerodynamics. Huge, phallic-shaped metal objects that weigh hundreds of thousands of pounds are not supposed to swim weightlessly through the air thirty-five thousand feet above the clouds and the earth.
The words Let me out of this death trap! gurgle up in my throat, but even if I could find my voice, it’s too late. The plane lifts off. The G-forces press me into the seat like invisible hands hell-bent on pinning me down.
I hug myself and squeeze my eyes shut. My breath comes in short, quick gasps.
“Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, God!”
“Are you okay?” the cowboy asks.
I nod, vigorously, and realize I was probably muttering Oh, God under my breath. I hope I didn’t sound like I was having an orgasm.
Biting the inside of my cheeks to keep other words from flying out, I draw in another deep breath through my nose. Come to think of it, I hate the smell of planes—that blend of humans, jet fuel and airplane food—almost as much as bus odor. Still, the scent, pleasant or not, is a touchstone, an anchor to the here and now, and I latch onto it like a life preserver, hugging myself tighter.
“Takeoff’s my favorite part of the flight.”
Huh?
I open one eye and look at the cowboy. Not only is he taking up both armrests, he’s listing in my direction.
He’s so much bigger than Chet, who was lean and fair and Hollywood fabulous. The cowboy is dark and good-looking if you like a raven-eyed, five-o’clock-shadow, feral-looking, Tim-McGraw sort of man. I shift away from his manliness.
“There’s always so much possibility when a plane takes off.” He has one of those piercing, look-you-in-the-eyes kind of gazes. “It’s so symbolic. New places. New beginnings. New opportunities. What’s your favorite part of the ride?”
My favorite—? Why is he talking to me? “I hate to fly.”
“Really.” The word is a statement laced with a hint of sarcasm. “How can anybody hate to fly? Think of all you’d miss letting fear rule your life.”
Who in the hell does he think he is? Anthony Robbins?
“I’m here, aren’t I? I’m certainly not letting fear rule me. Otherwise I’d have my feet planted firmly on the ground rather than hanging out up here in the clouds, thirty-five thousand feet above—”
The plane dips into an air pocket.
“Oh, God!”
The words are a whimper, and I melt into my seat, too scared to be thoroughly mortified for being such a big baby.
Okay, maybe I’m a little mortified. Because he’s still staring at me.
Oh, leave me alone. I close my eyes again, feeling the first waves of the Dramamine. That foggy, far-off haziness that clouds the head before it closes the eyes is creeping up on me.
“Okay, you get partial credit for being here,” says the wise guy.
Partial credit? Like I care. I swallow a yawn.
“But to get full credit, you have to tell me your favorite part of the flight.”
I’m tempted to tell him where to put his favorite part. To leave me alone so I can go to sleep and wake up when we’re safely back on the ground. But this guy is persistent. It’ll be a long, uncomfortable flight if I piss him off. I revert to Hollywood truth number four: Tell them what they want to hear and they’ll go away.
“My favorite part of the flight?”
He nods.
My mouth is dry, but I manage to say, “When they open the door at the gate. Now leave me alone so I can go to sleep. My Dramamine is kicking in.”
“Come on,” he says. “You can do better than that.”
“Excuse me?”
“That’s a cop-out. Opening the door at the gate is not part of the flight. The flight’s over.”
“Well, it’s certainly better than the take off—”
I gesture at the air to indicate the turbulent departure, only to realize we’ve leveled off and are cruising at that smooth, steady pace that’s almost bearable.
He smiles and takes the in-flight magazine out of the seat pocket. “Sleep well.”
MIRACULOUSLY, I do manage to sleep most of the nonstop flight. My eyes flutter open to the sound of the flight attendant’s announcement asking everyone to secure their tray tables and return their seats to the upright position as we prepare to land in Orlando.
I stretch and rub my stiff neck.
“See, that wasn’t so bad, was it?” says the cowboy.
“It’s not over yet.”
Vaguely wondering what a guy like him was doing in L.A., I retrieve my purse from under the seat, pull out my Lancôme Dual Finish compact and the red lipstick I got in the free gift when I purchased the powder. Something to distract me while we get this last part of the journey over with.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see him watching me primp.
“Are you visiting Orlando or coming home?”
“Neither.” I blot my lips and check the mirror to make sure my lipstick is on straight. “I’m from a small town over on the east coast.”
“Cocoa Beach?”
I shake my head. “Sago Beach.”
He nods. “It’s pretty over there. Visiting family?”
I snap the compact shut, drop the cosmetics into my purse and look him square in the eyes, ready to give him the polite brush-off. Only then do I realize just how cute this guy is. Nice face. So totally not my type.
For a split second, I hope I didn’t do something repulsive while I slept, like drool, or snort, or sit there with my mouth gaping open.
I could only do things like that around Chet. My foot finds the bag with his ashes, and I blink away the thought. It doesn’t matter how I appeared to the cowboy while I was sleeping. Rubbing the place where my wedding ring should’ve been with my thumb, I say, “I’m moving back.”
“Welcome home.”
“Thank you.”
Home. Hmm. I suppose Sago Beach has always been home, even when I was away.
Hollywood certainly never was.
It was something I had to get out of my system—like a bad boyfriend who treated me unkindly and sent me running back to my mother. Only this bad relationship lasted seventeen years and cost me my husband and my youth. Chet was really the one who wanted to live there because it was good for our careers. But come to find out, I can take my career anywhere. Just like now that I’m bringing it back home to my mother’s salon.
“The name’s Max Wright.” He extends a hand. I shake it. “What’s yours?”
“Avril.”
The plane hits another air pocket. I grope for the armrests. In my panic, I end up grabbing his arm and releasing it as if it burns.
“Sorry.”
He smiles, a little half smile, and I like the way the outer corners of his eyes tilt down. “Just relax, Avril. The worst part is over.”
Hollywood truths one and two kick in and I want to believe him.
Yeah, now that I’m home the worst is just about over.
I believe that for about fifteen minutes—until we deplane and make our way to baggage claim, where my mother and half the population of Sago Beach are standing under a banner that proclaims Welcome home, Avril!! Sago Beach’s very own beauty operator to the stars.
CHAPTER 2
I want to die.
Truly, I do.
Because I hate surprises. My mother knows it. Still, once she gets an idea in that red head of hers, she tends to forget everything outside the scope of her plan.
The surprise banner-flying airport welcoming committee—a collection of at least twenty of Sago Beach’s finest—has my mother’s name written all over it.
The scene unfolds as the escalator carries me from the main terminal down to baggage claim, and I reconcile that, ready or not, this is small-town life. It’s nothing like Hollywood, where you’re invisible unless you’re the It Girl of the Moment.
I have two choices: I can either turn and hightail it back up the escalator, or suck it up and greet them like a decent person. It only takes a split second to decide that despite the embarrassment factor of seeing my name along with the words Sago Beach’s very own beauty operator to the stars, emblazoned in bright letters on a long sheet of brown craft paper, I’m touched that these people would take the time to make a banner, much less come all the way to Orlando—a good hour’s drive from the coast—to make me feel welcome.
Ready or not, I’m home.
“All this is for you?” Max smiles and a dimple winks at me from his left cheek.
I hitch the tote with Chet’s ashes upon my shoulder, feeling oddly sheepish and a little unfaithful that all of them will see a strange man talking to me.
“Beauty operator to the stars, huh?” He whistles. “I didn’t realize I was sitting next to royalty.”
“They’re good people,” I say, suddenly protective of the folks, who, just a moment ago, embarrassed the living daylights out of me.
“I can see that. They’re really glad you’re back.”
The escalator reaches the bottom, delivering us to the baggage claim, and my friends and family surge forward.
“Nice to meet you, princess,” he says.
Princess? Normally, I’d spit out a snappy retort, but with my welcoming committee rallying around me, I don’t want to encourage any further conversation with Max. That would only lead to questions from the fine people of Sago Beach. Especially Mama.
I do the next best thing. I pretend I didn’t hear him as everyone envelopes me.
Mama is at the helm, of course, hugging me first. Her hair is the same rusty-carrot shade that it’s been for as far back as I can remember. It’s long and big, as if Dolly Parton had a run-in with a vat of V8 juice. She’s a beautiful sight, and I feel so safe in her slight arms that I want to cry.
There’s Justine Wittage and Carolyn Hayward, Mama’s longtime customers, Bucky Farley and Tim Dennison, among others in the crowd, who hug and kiss me and say, “Oh, darlin’ ain’t you a sight?”
My old friend Kally is conspicuously absent from the fray. It gives me a little pang that she didn’t come, but we haven’t exactly been on good terms the past five years or so.
“I suppose you’re too good for us now that you’ve been hobnobbing with them movie stars?” Marjorie Cooper, Sago Beach’s token busybody, smiles her wonderful gaptoothed smile.
“Of course not, Margie, I’m still the same girl you’ve always known.”
“I know ya are, hon. I’m just yanking your chain.” She enfolds me in a hug that threatens to squeeze the stuffing out of me. “It’s so good to have you home.”
Finally, after everyone has a chance to say hello, they decide to head for home.
“No sense in you all standing around and waiting for the baggage,” Mama insists. “Y’all go on back home.”
This incites another round of hugs and welcome-homes and I feel a twinge of guilt that they all made the two-hour round-trip for less than five minutes of togetherness.
“We’ll see you soon,” says Bucky Farley, who has lingered behind the rest of them.
“Bucky, you go on now and get out of here. We’ll manage just fine.”
Mama growls the words like a tiger. I wonder what’s got her back up all of a sudden. For a split second, I wonder if she’s going to object to any and all men who show interest in me. Not that I’m interested in dating Bucky. He’s not my type at all—not quite old enough to be my father, more like an uncle.
If there’s one thing I don’t need it’s my mother screening my friends. But she loved Chet. We’d been a couple so long, we were like one person. It would take everyone a while to get used to me being on my own.
Mama links her arm through mine as we move to carousel number four to get my bags. I glance up and see Max standing alone across the way. He smiles and tips his hat.
“Who is that?” Mama blurts.
I shrug nonchalantly, looking everywhere but in his direction. “He sat next to me on the plane.”
“Handsome.”
“Really? I hadn’t noticed.”
“He certainly noticed you. Look at him staring.” So much for the Bucky Farley theory. “Did you give him your number?”
“Mother.”
“Well, he certainly is nice-looking—”
“Stop it.”
“Avril, honey, I know you loved Chet. We all loved him, but you’re a young woman. There’s no harm in giving a good-looking guy your phone number.”
I haven’t even been home for a full hour and already she’s pushing my buttons.
“He didn’t ask for my number. Okay? Besides, I don’t have to hook up with the first guy who’s nice to me.”
“I didn’t suggest anything of the sort. But you’ve got to start somewhere and well, why not go for one with looks?”
One of my bags pops out of the chute and I retrieve it with hopes this interruption will preempt further discussion about the cowboy. I don’t want to argue with my mother on my first day back. Now that I’m home, I’ll have the rest of my life to do that.
When I turn to haul the big, black bag over to her so she can watch it while I collect the rest of my things, she’s not there. I make a slow circle until I finally spot her on the other side of baggage claim talking to Max, pen and paper in hand.
“IF HE WANTED MY telephone number, he would’ve asked me for it.” I feel murderous as I heft my bags into the trunk of Mama’s pristine 1955, cherry-red T-Bird, which she’s parked catty-corner across two spaces in the airport garage.
It’s on the tip of my tongue to tell her parking like this is begging someone to key the gleaming paint, but when I turn around, she’s standing there watching me with her arms akimbo, one hip jutting out, an undaunted smile on her face.
Vintage Tess Mulligan.
“Oh, don’t get your panties in a wad, baby. Do you really think I’d give your phone number to a total stranger—even if he was a tall hunk of handsome man? Even if the number I’d be giving out is my phone number? Hmm. Maybe I should’ve given him the number.” She mutters this last part under her breath and I want to tell her to go for it, to knock herself out.
I love my mother. We’re close, despite her ability to drive a stuffed elephant up the wall. If I’m completely honest, I suppose the things I do don’t make sense to her. It’s one of those weird codependent relationships.
I can get mad at her, but if anyone else uttered a cross word about her, they’d have to deal with me. And it wouldn’t be pretty.
When I lived in California, the miles between us helped. She flew out to see me about four times a year—and about every two months since I lost Chet—because of my fear of flying. In fact, I haven’t been home in years since she was so good about coming out to visit.