Heather sat in her car, staring at the entrance to the grocery store, taking in the busy activity around her. Small town USA at its finest and her own personal hell. Only a week ago she was in New York, post-surgery physical therapy behind her, excited to receive the all clear from her doctor releasing her back to full activity so she could reprise her role on Broadway.
But here she was, St. Helena’s most famous nobody, back to teaching snot nosed brats barely capable of ring-around-the-rosy, a simple ball change at her sisters dance academy. She wouldn’t dance again – professionally, anyway. Her injury wouldn’t sustain the rigorous abuse a dancer’s body endures – especially on Broadway where the demanding schedule could require up to eight shows a week.
Her dream finally realized, after a lifetime of study and practice, only to be shattered almost as quickly as it had arrived. The real knife to the gut was her shattered love life. The production director – also her roommate, best friend, and lover – no longer had use for her the moment Broadway didn’t. A brutal industry, a brutal lesson, and St. Helena was the salt on the proverbial wound.
A fast life in lights was what she had always desired; it was what she was made for. Sure St. Helena and its Barre And Tap Dance Academy didn’t bother her before New York. She actually enjoyed the children, and all of their awkward two left feet shenanigans before New York…it was just a stepping stone then. Now it was pure hell. She was better than this, she was a professional dancer that had her name in lights only days before…now her name was on a pole dancing class flyer hanging in Pickers Produce, Meats, and More.
Since her life hadn’t quite spiraled all the way to the bowels of hell, she woke up to a buzzing phone and endless text messages from her sister, and friends. As it turned out, her little escapade from the previous night wasn’t so private. It was plastered all over social media. Nosey Nora Kinkaid, town busy body, armed with a loaded Facebook account and no shame whatsoever, managed to catch Heather and Clay in an unflattering state of affairs outside the dance academy as they were saying their goodbyes.
It seemed her target was Molly and Seth, and that she and the doctor were just a late night bonus with her first post, tagging the entire town
‘Ex stripper heating things up with steamy windows – newest St. Helena Fireman there to put her fire out, or start it?’
That had to sting. Molly was not a stripper, not even close. She was the new girl in town with a new coffee shop bookstore, Brewing Grounds. This couldn’t be helping business.
Right under Nora’s stab at Molly Sexton and Seth Spangler’s escapade, was a nice little picture of the dancer and doc in a lip lock, accompanied with a less than flattering tagline…
‘Late night shenanigans around St. Helena, There must be something in the air… Looks like the doc is checking the dancer’s tonsils.’
Just what she needed. She was not only the small town girl who couldn’t seem to stay away, a failed dancer, but now tagged the town floozy by a crabby old lady. She had a sneaking suspicion that her class of tots would be short in attendance for a few days. Not because she was caught kissing, but because of who she was kissing. The town’s kid doctor, the hot kid doctor that had his own fan club full of dance moms. She was now the enemy. It probably didn’t help that she also taught the pole dancing class, given the circumstances.
She could feel it. Curious eyes were on her while her ears rang from the chatter that was likely passing between patrons as she sat in her car trying to build up the courage needed to sprint through the market, for yogurt and fresh fruit, while dodging the chatty gossip brigade like the live grenade that it was. She would just do her grocery shopping at night, but the very thing that saved her the night before when her scandalous escapade was in full swing, was her demise when it came to nocturnal grocery shopping to avoid the crowds.
Small town, everyone goes home when the sun goes down – and the stores close. Great for scandalous, late night naughty…not so great for shopping the day after said late night naughty…when you were caught. New York has 24 hour markets on every corner – not St. Helena – in fact, many shops and businesses were even closed on Sunday. How was she going to make this work, make this place home, when it was the last place she wanted to be.
One thing she did find appealing about St. Helena was that it was a tourist town. People were in and out of there, sampling its abundant wine and cheese culture, never there long enough to settle. Those that did settle, the locals, were mostly families invested in said culture.
It wasn’t exactly the place you went to fish in a pool of fresh single men. It was actually quite the opposite – the dating pool was fairly dry and she was one hundred percent okay with that. She left her hopes and dreams on a curtain pulled stage in New York, and she left part of her heart there too. Men were as good to her as her washed up dancing career and bum ankle.
Clay Walker was certainly the exception to the lacking dating pool and in regards to men being anything but useful to her. There was something about that man, he was different. She couldn’t say one way or another just why or how he was different, but he was.
Still shocked by her brash behavior the night before, she found her thoughts wandering there yet again. One night stands, hookups with strangers, and the like, just weren’t her thing. In fact, she couldn’t imagine doing it ever again. Not because it wasn’t her thing, but more so because she couldn’t get Clay Walker off her mind, and she could easily be tempted into another round of no strings attached naked tango with him. She couldn’t do it again – wouldn’t – because it would be far too easy to make a habit out of Doctor Clay Walker.
A loud clanging crash of twisting metal landed on her ears with a bang, drawing her attention to the front of the market she had been stalking longer than she cared to admit. Wonderful, a fender bender in the parking lot. She shook her head in something like disgust, but more of surprise, who on earth could land in a head on collision going exactly a mile and hour in a wide open parking lot?
Two men jumped out of their respective vehicles, each with an amused smile on their faces. Greeting one another with a handshake and a slap to the shoulder, they had a good laugh, as they sat on the hoods of their vehicles, assessing the damage and likely shooting the shit while they were at it. Another reminder of where she was, small town, simple thinking, everyone knows everyone town where wrecking your car is nothing more than a quick how ya doing reunion that ended in one inviting the other’s family over for dinner where they would figure out the whole how are we going to fix it conversation.
To make matters worse, the small crowd forming at the front of the market now included a tall handsome doctor, straight from Brewing Grounds next door, with a pink bakery box and coffee in hand. Clay Walker. The looming decision to grocery shop, or not to shop, was quickly made for her. She threw her running car in gear before Clay could see her, and stepped on the gas.
Karma had a funny sense of timing and Heather had a knack for catching it – often. With her eyes on Clay, ducking ever so slightly, she put her foot on the gas, intending to sneak out of her parking spot undetected, opposite the good Doctor. With the benefit of being a half a dozen cars down, slipping out should have been a cinch…if only she hadn’t mistakenly put her car in reverse…the pole she backed into didn’t help either.
Her attempt at a clandestine move under the radar ended in a crashing clatter, drawing the gathered crowd’s attention. Lucky for her, they already had their phones out, documenting the previous fender bender. Now they were all on her, and she was probably already trending on Facebook. Thank you small town USA.
***
Clay saw Heather sitting in her car, watching the world go by, when he passed Pickers, Produce, Meats, and More on his way to Brewing Grounds for a coffee, and pastries for the ladies in his office. He contemplated knocking on her window to check on her, see that she was okay. She was just sitting there, staring, looking as lost as she had the night before sitting at the bar.
Thinking better of it, he continued into the coffee house and bookstore, respecting her decision to keep things informal and just to one night. Less than twelve hours had passed since he left her at her door, their sweet meaningful kiss still tingling his lips, and distracting his every thought. She was intoxicating.
How he ended up in the dance studio in the middle of the night, with a beautiful stranger was beyond him. He knew better – he was a doctor for God sake, the risks involved were enormous – yet he did it anyway. He had been in a bad way, lonely, and she was the muse to pull him from his low key pity party.
Though he agreed it was just a one-time, scratch an itch meet-up, he could be convinced to scratch that itch as often as she called on him. Clay knew little about Heather, just the few details she had shared and what he could find sleuthing through her Facebook account.
He understood her insistence at keeping things simple, no relationship after thirty or so minutes of roaming through her page. Heather was a sharer – with a broken heart. He knew about her injury, and what it meant for her career, but Facebook told him there was more fallout to that ankle injury than losing her career. She lost her fiancé too.
Social media was great that way. Not only did it show a change in relationship status from engaged to single, it also told him who the newly single gentleman was in New York…her boss. From what he gathered, when Heather was no longer of use for the Broadway production, she was no longer of use to him. Asshole.
Clay didn’t regret being her rebound or revenge guy, whichever she was aiming for. There was something intriguing about her, sweet, and pure. Not likely an opinion most would walk away from an ordeal such as theirs with, but despite the loose nature of their entanglement, he couldn’t help but be drawn to her.
Everyone knew everyone in St. Helena, at least by a single degree of separation, so it was easy to find out about those that you may not know and had only heard of. The town bragged about its celebrity dancer off in New York making a big name for herself. She was painted as a town favorite, America’s sweetheart, if you will. It was unfair, almost, giving her such praise and cementing an expectation she could no longer sustain.
She referred to herself as washed up and her expression and body language, combined with a newly broken heart, made it pretty obvious that no one was holding her to that expectation more than she was holding herself to it. The more he learned about Heather, the guiltier he felt. She was the kind of girl you take home to mom and plan forever’s with, not take to the closest dark place and rock her world.
What had he been thinking? What did that say about him? He thought he could pull off the one night stand deal, but clearly he couldn’t. As much as he wanted to say he was committed to the single life, he couldn’t, especially after Heather. Was it possible to be so attracted to someone after a thirty minute conversation in a bar and a quickie next door? A hot quickie…
He obviously had some emotional crap to sort through, and reclaim his man card when he was finished. He was feeling like a vulnerable sap, full of sensitive feels, and that just wasn’t him. He felt like punching himself in the face and saying, man up, pussy! That should do it.
A loud crashing sound pulled him from his thoughts as he completed his purchase. A small crowd was forming by the time he made it outside, to the front of the store. His first reaction was to see if everyone was okay – that was just the doctor in him – but he was met with laughter and handshakes instead of injuries…crisis averted.
He stood there longer than necessary, his sights loosely on the fender bender in the front of the store, using it as an excuse to spy on the beautiful blonde still sitting in her car. What could she be thinking about, he wondered? Was it him? Them? Why did she seem so distraught – was the previous night that bad for her? He began to feel a bit insecure and self-conscious when he saw her look in his direction and duck down.
His ego was completely shot when her urgent desire to get the hell out of there became obvious. In her rush to leave unseen, she backed right into the pole anchored behind her parking spot, before tearing out of there like a bat out of hell. Yep…she was avoiding him.
“Poor thing can’t seem to catch a break.” A sweet voice, that he would recognize anywhere, came from behind him. “After what Nora put on that computer thing she does, with all the pictures she takes with her phone, I’m surprised to see you out here.”
Chichi Deluca, one of the elder ladies in town, leader of the old bitty brigade, and chief of mischief stood behind him with a sympathetic look pinned on him. Chichi and her gray haired lady friends had a finger on the pulse of St. Helena. If it was happening within a hundred mile radius of town, the ladies knew it, and were probably behind it. The prying ladies were always good intentioned, and respected by the towns people. Exception being Nora Kinkaid…the town feared her.
“I’m sorry…did I miss something, Chichi?” Clay was trying to piece things together with the little bits of information shared, but he already had a nervous chill. Nora, and her Facebook habit, in the same conversation as him and Heather couldn’t be good.
Chichi chuckled, seeing the wheels turn, and anxiety fester. She let him off the hook quickly like a ripped off band aid. “You’re all over that Facebook. Nora has pictures of you and Heather posted for the whole town to see.”
Pictures, Facebook. Nora. Clay did a face palm sigh, less embarrassed for himself than he was worried for Heather.
“I have to say, Doctor Walker, you do make a mighty handsome couple. You would be quite perfect together in fact. Good choice. The ladies and I are cheering for you,” she said.
“Wait. What? Cheering for what? I’m not sure you saw what you think you saw…”
“Oh c’mon, Clay. It was plain as day. You and Heather were in a sultry embrace, lip locked, and clearly…enjoying each other. Good for you! She’s a dear girl, you’ll be excellent for each other,” Chichi chided.
“Really? You think so? Wait! No, don’t do that!” he fired back.
“Do what? Clay, darling, are you okay?” Innocence was her plea, but he wasn’t buying it.
“That! You’re doing that…thing you do. You like Heather, you like me, and you think we need to be together so you’re…doing that thing!”
“Oh Clay, honey. I had nothing to do with you and Heather being together, in front of the dance studio, in the middle of the night. That was all you, dear.” She gave him a wink and pat to the shoulder before walking away.
Touché…