LILY’S LIFE LESSON #8
If life is easy, then you’re not having fun.
Lily sat behind her desk, trying to integrate the new booking system with the Remington’s outdated website, which she’d dubbed Webasaurus Rex.
Focusing on work was an impossible feat ever since she’d told Lawrence her driver’s license had expired so he wouldn’t discover her real name. Her conscience was proving to be a handicap. Apparently, she hadn’t inherited her father’s ability to lie without losing a wink of sleep. It was already wearing on her, and she’d only been in Angel Fire Falls a week and a half.
Lily rubbed her eyes and let her head fall back in defeat. The website was so outdated, it would be easier to start from scratch. Website design wasn’t her thing, but with the shoestring budget she had to work with, she’d have to do it herself. Luckily, she’d found a user-friendly website-building-for-dummies program.
In need of a break after hours in front of her computer, she pushed out of her chair and walked to her cottage. Her ringtone blared from the back pocket of her black hiking pants. Lily made sure no one was in sight, then drew in a fortifying breath. “Hi, Mom.” Why did she find talking to her mother so exhausting?
“Scarlett! You haven’t called. I’ve been worried sick.”
“I called a day and a half ago.” Having to check in with her mother so often drained Lily’s energy. Probably why she found her mother’s conversations exhausting.
“How’s Vermont? Maybe I should join you at the retreat.” Her mother’s tone told Lily she was in the middle of a full-blown pity party.
“No.” Lily choked down her rising panic. “Mom, you need to stay close to home so you can visit Dad.”
“I can only visit him twice a month.” She sighed like it was a relief. “And there’s not much to do here.” Her voice shook. “I’m not going back to the country club. The service has gone downhill.”
They’d probably canceled the Devereaux family membership for nonpayment of dues.
“Mom, have you thought about getting a job? You used to work before you met Dad.” Lily tried to sound encouraging. “At least it would get you out of the house.” And off the sauce.
“I worked as a bank teller,” her mom snapped. “What bank is going to hire me after what your father did?”
“I don’t know, Mom. You could find a job that doesn’t require handling money.” Lily stepped off the path and onto the road that led to the cottages. “Or you could volunteer. Helping others might make you feel better.”
Her mom let out an exaggerated sigh. “I’m not a strong woman like you, honey. You get that from your father.”
Dear God, no. No, no, no.
Lily’s heart squeezed because there was more truth in her mother’s words than she knew. Yes, Lily was a hard worker and never took a penny she didn’t earn. But she was also posing under an alias. Maybe for good reasons—one being survival—but it was still dishonest.
“Tell me about the retreat,” her mother said.
“Well . . .” Lily’s conscience already prickling, she settled on a thread of truth. “I’ve got my own cottage. It’s adorable.” She glanced up the road toward her house, and her heart warmed.
“Oh, sounds lovely. What else, sweetie?”
A bird flew overhead, and Lily thought of her ducks. “There’s lots of wildlife on the grounds and a really great pastry chef.” She leaned her head back to gaze up at the cloudy sky. “Rains a lot. At least there are no hurricanes, though.”
The mention of the Gulf Coast’s horrible weather provoked a lengthy complaint about heat and humidity from her mom.
Lily listened patiently as she reached the front steps of her cottage. Sitting on the front porch was a gigantic plastic container that hadn’t been there when she’d left for work that morning. Her phone dinged. She held it out to read the new reservation notification on her booking app, and a sense of accomplishment welled inside her. The fruits of her hard work were already paying off. “Mom, can I let you go?”
Her mother groaned her disappointment.
“I’m in the middle of something,” Lily said. “Promise I’ll call next week.”
“Make it a few days, and I’ll let you off the phone,” her mother whined.
Lily rolled her eyes. “All right, Mom. Love you.”
She hung up and texted the guest’s arrival information to Trace, since he still hadn’t made time for her to train him on the new system. Then she walked onto her front porch to look inside the container. Puppy training pads lined the bottom, and a fleece hunting hat sat in one corner. Next to it was a reusable grocery bag that contained an assortment of fresh veggies, cornmeal, and more training pads.
Hammering echoed from the backyard, and Lily cocked her head to listen.
Bang, bang, bang.
Lily frowned.
She walked around to the back of the cottage. Ben was hard at work hammering stakes into the ground to form a large circle.
“Hey, bud.” Lily stuffed her phone back in her pocket. “Whatcha doing?”
“I’m building a pen so the ducks can play outside.” His tongue slipped through his lips on one side of his mouth as he concentrated on hammering in another stake.
Lily nodded. “Is that your box on the front porch?”
“It’s the ducks’ new inside house.” He kept hammering. “They can snuggle inside the fuzzy hat to keep warm.”
Pretty resourceful for a kid his age. “Ben, where did you get the supplies?” She really hoped he wasn’t asking his dad for money. She didn’t want to push any more of Trace’s buttons when it came to Ben and the ducks.
“Mostly from the boathouse.” Ben finished hammering in the last stake, then unwound the roll of chicken wire. He tore open a package of colorful pipe cleaners. “My teacher gave me these because she had extra.” He used them to secure the chicken wire to the stakes.
“Where did the stuff on the front porch come from?” Lily asked.
“Charley took me to the store.” He moved to the next stake. “Hey, Lily!” he blurted. “You know how the ducks think you’re their mom?” He didn’t wait for her to answer. “That’s called imprinting. It’s science. My teacher said the ducks can be my science project! Can we take pictures of the ducks every day?” It all tumbled out at once. “My teacher helped me find more stuff online about raising them.” He hammered some more. “And Miss Etheridge stopped being mad at me for saying her hair is ugly.”
Um. Wow. Telling any female her hair was ugly couldn’t have produced a positive result. “I have a few pictures of them, but we can take more each day.” Lily shoved her hands in her pockets. “Have you cleared this with your dad? For real this time?”
Ben didn’t look at her. “He says I have to do my own project. The other kids at school have their dads do all the work.”
Lily smiled. She’d chosen a few science projects specifically because they required building something; having a dad who was a builder had been convenient.
Her chest squeezed. It had been a long time since she’d remembered anything good about her father. Working on those projects with him had been fun.
But Ben still hadn’t answered her question.
“Ben”—Lily dropped the tenor of her voice—“is your dad okay with this?”
He still wouldn’t meet her eye. “It’s a surprise.”
Sounded like a smooth way of not clearing it with his dad. “You need to tell him. There’s a difference between a surprise and a lie.”
She nearly choked on her own words.
Lily swallowed back the bitterness of guilt that welled up in her throat.
That was quite the moral platitude from someone whose mother thought she was at an exclusive retreat in Vermont instead of working hard on a tiny island in the Pacific Northwest. She’d tell her mother the truth eventually. For now, she couldn’t deal with the threats and the verbal abuse from the public if her true identity got out, and her mother wasn’t exactly discreet after too much scotch on the rocks.
Lily refocused on Ben. “I’ll leave my front door unlocked so you can check on the ducks after school. But only if you promise to tell your dad about the science project.”
His nod was reluctant.
“Want to feed the duckies?”
She didn’t have to ask twice. Ben dropped the pipe cleaners and ran to her. She tousled his hair. “What are we going to do with the veggies and cornmeal?”
He skipped along. “Grind everything up and feed it to them.”
They rounded the corner and climbed the front steps. She took out her key and opened the door. “Thanks for shopping for them. I’m almost out of oatmeal and bread, and I don’t have a way to get to the store.” She made a face. “They eat a lot for being such little things.”
“And poop a lot too.” Ben giggled.
They carried everything in, and the ducks tuned up. She pulled up the camera on her phone and handed it to him. “Take a few pictures, and make sure they have fresh water. I’ll start their food.”
Ben ran to the bathroom.
She searched the cabinets and found a mini chopper. “Here we go.”
Ben emerged from the bathroom, rubbing one hand against his thigh rhythmically. “Megan looks sick.” He slid Lily’s phone onto the counter next to her purse.
Lily hurried to the bathroom. Nine of the ducks cheeped their lungs out, but one sat off to the side, quiet and still. She adjusted the shade of the table lamp she’d moved to the bathroom for warmth to direct more heat downward. Still, the little lone duck didn’t seem right.
She glanced at Ben, who rubbed his thighs faster.
“Maybe she’ll feel better after she eats.” A tremor of regret flowed through her at Ben’s worried expression. The last thing she wanted was to cause him heartache.
She had him follow her back to the kitchen and pulled a chair to the counter. He clambered onto it, and she gave him a mixing bowl and a spoon. “You read up on how to do this?”
He nodded and worked with painstaking diligence. When he was done, he scooped the smooth mixture into a shallow container and carried it to the bathroom.
The cheeping stopped the second Ben set the food bowl into the tub. The other ducks edged Megan out.
“Be right back.” Lily filled another container with food and brought it back to the bathroom to feed the weak duckling separately from the others.
“They’re getting bigger, aren’t they?” Lily said. In fact, they’d doubled in size.
“Miss Etheridge helped me find a library book with pictures. They’ll start getting real feathers soon.” Ben sat by the tub. “Megan is the only one that hasn’t gotten much bigger.”
Lily studied the ducks. Ben was right; she was smaller than the others.
Ben pointed to one of the ducks. “Sir Walter Raleigh is the biggest.” He named off each duck in order of size.
Her gaze ping-ponged between the ducklings and Ben, amazed at how observant he was. “So, Ben, what do you think about changing Megan’s name to Molly?”
His little body rocked. “But her name is Megan.”
“Hmm.” Lily sat on the floor and pulled her knees to her chest. “I like the name Molly, though, don’t you?” Megan was actually fine with her, but Trace had insisted on renaming it for some reason.
Ben shook his head and rocked.
“Is there another name besides Molly and Megan you like?”
“No,” he said and rocked harder. “Megan is her name. It wouldn’t be right to change it.”
Lily wanted to rock back and forth too. Or maybe draw into a fetal position and suck her thumb. Because she knew firsthand how strange it was to change her name. “We can talk about it later. Want to take them out of the tub for exercise?”
The rocking stopped, and Ben shot to his feet. In ten seconds flat, the ducks were following Ben around the den in a game of chase. He laughed and giggled as he slowed enough for them to catch up, then took off again. The only duckling that didn’t play along was Megan. She stayed by her food in the bathroom, sitting idly like she had no energy. Lily’s volunteer work at the wildlife rescue had taught her enough to know that something was wrong. She scooped Megan up and fished a knit cap out of her dresser drawer. She sat Megan inside of it and cuddled the tiny bird against her chest.
While Ben and the ducklings circled the den, Lily used her phone to search for a vet on the island. Only one came up. Problem was, she had no way of traveling to town. She couldn’t ask anyone at the resort for a ride because it would get back to Trace, and he’d likely be upset with her for the worry and disappointment the duckling’s downward turn would cause Ben. More importantly, Lily didn’t want Ben to be worried or disappointed any more than his father did. She wanted to save the duck for Ben’s sake.
“Hey, Ben, let’s put the ducks in their new home.”
“Sure!” His voice was a squeal of joy as the ducklings waddled after him. He led them to the plastic container and gently scooped them up one at a time while Lily moved the lamp out of the bathroom.
“Can you do me a favor?” she asked. “Do you happen to have an extra bicycle I could use?” She’d gotten most of the way to the resort on a tricycle; she could make it two miles into town on a bike. She’d moved here for independence. She’d take care of the situation herself without help from anyone, especially her boss.
The man with a voice so sexy, her bra unhooked on its own every time she heard it.
Gah!
“There’s a girl’s bike in the boathouse,” Ben said.
“Great. Could you get it for me?”
As soon as he walked out, Lily dialed the vet. “Hi, I have an emergency. Can I bring a duckling in right away?”
“We’re about to close, ma’am,” the receptionist clipped out.
Lily glanced at the clock on her stove. Dang it. She hadn’t realized it was getting so late. “Please. I’m afraid it might not make it through the night. I have to try to save it.”
The receptionist heaved out an annoyed sigh. “Hold a moment.” The line went quiet for an eternity.
Ben threw open the door without knocking. “The bike’s out front!”
Lily nodded and held her phone away from her mouth. “Thanks, Ben.”
The line beeped as the receptionist picked up the call again. “Dr. Shaw will wait for you.”
“Thank you. I’m on my way, um, but a bicycle is my only way to get to your office.”
The receptionist drew in another exaggerated breath.
“Tell Dr. Shaw I’ll pedal as fast as I can.” Lily hung up, grabbed her purse, and eased it over her head so it hung across her body.
“Is Megan gonna be okay?” Ben rubbed his thighs. “Can I go with you?”
Lily forced a brave smile. “Do you go to the doctor when you have a cold or fever?”
Ben nodded.
“Well, I think Megan . . . or Molly—”
Ben scowled.
“Or Megan probably has a cold, so I’m taking her to the vet to make sure. You can finish their pen while I’m gone, okay?” She hustled them both out the front door. “That way they’ll have a place to play outside when I get home instead of being cooped up indoors all the time. I bet staying inside gets boring, don’t you?” She tried to make light of the situation.
Ben didn’t look any more convinced that Megan wasn’t seriously ill than Lily was.
She straddled the bicycle, thankful it wasn’t a racing bike. It was more like a let’s-take-a-leisurely-ride-along-the-boardwalk kind of bike, and it had a wicker basket attached to the handlebars. The bird, still ensconced in Lily’s winter cap, fit perfectly.
She looked up at the churning gray sky. Would she ever catch a break?
Her dad used to say, “If life is easy, then you’re not having fun.” She should be having a freakin’ party by now. The kind of wild party New Orleans had every Fat Tuesday where the more adventurous tourists woke up in a strange place wearing nothing but colorful beads and a matching Mardi Gras mask.
Then again, living by that philosophy had landed her father in a place where orange jumpsuits were mandatory.
She grabbed both handlebars and flicked up the kickstand. “Ben, try not to worry.” She’d do enough worrying for both of them. All she could do was get Megan to the vet and hope for the best.
Ben looked a little more optimistic.
She pushed off and pedaled, trusting that this one time since she’d boarded the plane to move to Angel Fire Falls, the universe wouldn’t be against her.