And in time... (2 page)

“So, are you named after Aunt Rosaline for a reason?”

Alexis washed down the food in her mouth with her lemon water before answering. “Yes, my parents hated me,” she teased, before confessing the truth. “I was named after her because, believe it or not, she insisted, continuously for nine months, that I be named after her. My parents named one of my brothers after my Uncle Tom, but it’s only my middle name, thank God.”

“One of your brothers, how many brothers do you have?”

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

“Try me.”

“Three brothers and three sisters.”

Alexis waited for the usual
‘that’s a whole litter’
joke, but he didn’t even look surprised.

“I’ll bet you had a very interesting childhood.”

“Actually, I was pretty much an only child. I’m the baby of the family—a menopause baby. My youngest brother was almost fifteen when I was born.”

Geesh. What was wrong with her? Alexis didn’t disclose personal aspects of her life. She didn’t even talk about herself. What the hell? They exchanged idle conversation, talking like old friends. She’d been pleasantly surprised at how easy he was to talk to, although she couldn’t help but wonder why. She told him a little about the town, about some of the people, and explained a few local events they typically had throughout the year. She bragged about how good their football team was when he pulled his smart phone from his pocket and checked the time.

“It has been a pleasure having lunch with you, but I really have to go. Maybe we can do this again sometime, when you’re not undercover, of course,” he teased with that bright white smile.
Swoon...
The stranger stood and shook her hand, holding it just a little longer than necessary.

“By the way,” he said with a smirk, “my name’s Cory Baker.”

Alexis flushed at her rudeness, feeling like an idiot. Really? She didn’t even ask his name? The warm color colored the tips of her ears again. Not sure what to say and wanting to break the tension, she did the only thing she knew. She joked.

“Thanks for blowing my cover, and I’m Alexis McKinley.”

He smiled and let go of her hand.

Cory winked and said, “Anytime.”

Wait. What? Was he flirting? Was she flirting? Alexis conspicuously watched him walk to the cash register, willing the unfamiliar blush in her cheeks to disappear. She didn’t flush around men. Surely, she had come down with something. It was the only explanation. Not now. She couldn’t get sick right now. There was too much going on. She was too busy to get sick.

Cory Baker pinky waved as he strolled by her in a strut.

“Have a good day, Rosaline.”

“Nice. Really?” Alexis questioned with a frown. Sort of. It was a mix between a smile and a smirk. Using witty commentary, she knew she’d flirted back. Alexis shook her head and waved for Carol to bring the check. Carol and the check were safer than that strut. Whoa. What was that? It was like step, dance, and step. She liked it—too much.

“Do you want dessert, sugar?”

“No thanks, Carol, just the check.”

“Honey, you don’t have a check, your good-looking friend took care of it for you.”

Alexis turned and looked at Carol’s nod, but he was nowhere in sight. Only the wet streets from the earlier rain, an occasional car, and her own black jeep.

***

Alexis had just finished up with a family of four from Canterville, about fifteen miles north of Cedar Springs, when Paige arrived. She watched the slow, steady rain, and Jordan Casino’s four-wheel drive Chevy pickup truck with big tires and loud exhaust—a Cedar Springs tradition. All the teenage boys had to have the biggest truck in town. It had been that way for as long as she could remember, and she didn’t see it changing anytime soon. Alexis once slid to the middle of the bench seat in a too-tall pickup truck, too. Her eyes squinted while she watched the make out session, pretending to do something on the computer. The young lovers kissed for what seemed like an hour before Paige finally got out and ducked under her backpack. The backpack, along with running, did little to shield the downpour. Paige squealed and shook cold water from her long dark hair. 

Paige shook with a chill, shaking the rain from her long dark hair. “Hey, Aunt Lex.”

“Hey, girl. You look happy.”

“I am
so
happy,” Paige answered while emphasizing the word “so.” “Jordan drives me crazy sometimes, and I mean that in a good way.”

“You’ve seen a lot of Jordan lately.”

Paige popped a pink bubble around her happy smile. “Yes, I have. What do we have this afternoon?”

“Not a lot,” Alexis replied with her finger gliding down the screen. “The Hartley family is next, a sixth-month-old little girl, the Baylor boys, professional portraits for Bradford Realty—um…four of them—and a seven-year-old. I’m not sure if the seven-year-old is a girl or a boy, Bernie booked it.” Alexis hated when she did that. How hard was it to check the box? It made her job easier when setting up the studio if she knew she would be going with tiaras or footballs.

“You can have the Baylor boys. Those boys are the meanest kids I’ve ever met.”

Alexis took a deep breath and spit it out. It was now or after the Hartley family shoot. The last time she photographed the Hartley’s, they took over an hour.
Please don’t let them take over an hour.
Alexis had been hungry for Chicken Divine for a week. She’d been looking forward to her favorite casserole and a six-pack of bottles, chilled to almost slush.

“Are you having sex?”

Paige beat herself in the chest as her eyes went as big as saucers. Alexis was sure she’d just swallowed her gum. “Aunt Lex!”

“I just don’t want you to get into trouble. Are you on the pill?”

Paige dropped her eyes to the floor before responding. “No.”

With all the confirmation she needed, Alexis suddenly felt anxious. The head drop was a dead giveaway. “Do you need me to take you to get on the pill?” Her tone stayed neutral with little mirth while she fought control to be the understanding aunt. Paige having sex?
Nooooo!
She was a baby. Paige couldn’t have sex. When did this happen?

Astonished, Paige looked up with raised eyebrows. “You would do that?”

“Yes, even though your parents would kill me, especially your dad,” Alexis added while thinking about what her brother would say. He would kill her—probably shoot her right in the head.

“I’m not giving you my blessing. My advice is to stay far, far away from boys. But... You’re not going to listen anyway. I’m only doing it because I was your age once. I, too, was in love with the captain of the football team, and I can tell you until I’m blue in the face not do it and you still wouldn’t listen. So yes, I would take you. I have to go to Canterville next Tuesday. Will that work for you? I would rather it be there than here, if you know what I mean.”

“I most certainly know what you mean.” Small towns are all the same. People talk. Some way. Somehow. Somebody would find out and from experience. They both knew it to be the truth. “Besides, Dr. Rice is so old, I would be afraid he would give me blood pressure medicine instead of the pill and I’d end up pregnant with hypotension or something.”

Alexis laughed. “Yes, one would think he’d retire. I bet he drops over dead in that office.”

Dr. Rice occupied the only clinic in Cedar Springs. He opened it himself back in 1972. The closest hospital was in Canterville. It was actually just a clinic, but they did have maybe twenty beds or so for patients that were not in critical condition. They did an excellent job delivering babies, stitching cuts, setting broken bones, that sort of thing, but nothing major. The small clinic wasn’t equipped for that.

Alexis and Paige ran through the rest of the day’s appointments with Paige doing most of the work. Alexis gave her instructions and Page listened. Paige was the ideal student. Her eyes and ears focused on every word Alexis said. She was so eager to learn and Alexis was thrilled to teach her.

“I’m tired,” Alexis confessed once they were finally cleaning up the studio. Alexis and Pagie tag-teamed and breezed through the afternoon appointments in no time. Paige wanted out of there to spend time with Jordan, and Alexis couldn’t keep her mind off the casserole. The ice-cold beer had been sounding better, too.

Paige tossed her a feather duster—used for tickling noses—and a ball. Alexis caught it after one bounce. “I’m hungry. I think I’m going to make Jordan take me to McDonalds.”

Alexis flipped the light off and Paige followed her out. “I’m hungry, too, but McDonalds sounds gross. I’m making Grandma’s Chicken Divine casserole. Do you need a ride?”

Paige gave her a sly grin just as Jordan pulled to the curb. Alexis stopped her by tugging on her backpack.

“No sex. You have to be on the pill for thirty days before they’ll work.”

“We use condoms. Stop worrying.”

“You say that like it’s no big deal. Like you do it all the time.”

“It’s not! And we do. Don’t be a hypocrite. You just offered to help me get on the pill.”

“UGH. Why did you have go and grow up? Stop it. I’ll see you tomorrow. Behave yourself.”

“Always do,” Paige called with a parade-wave goodbye. Alexis grunted a disapproving grumble while watching her slide to the center of the seat. The wish for her to be five again was felt with nostalgic memories. What was wrong with five? Five was a good age.

***

Alexis placed the random items in her cart—rice, chicken, lettuce, a six-pack of Coors Light in bottles, shampoo, and tampons. She stood in front the fresh vegetable aisle and clicked her tongue.
Hmm—broccoli or asparagus?

“You could just get them both,” her new banker friend suggested. “Chicken and beer, my kind of girl.”

Alexis had smelled him before she saw him. Nice. No, not nice. Wait. What? Her eyes went from his white smile to his feet. Shit. She just checked him out. Alexis checked out a guy—one that stood right in front of her with a teasing smirk. What the hell? His crisp white shirt and tie had been replaced with a black Journey tee shirt, stylish jeans, and sneakers.
Whoa
…

Cory’s smile embellished the bust. It wasn’t his fault she got caught, she made it very obvious. Alexis had been checking him out and she got caught. Her rosy cheeks increased the hilarity, and the dimple on his cheek appeared.

Once the inability to form words passed, Alexis recovered. “People are going to start talking around here if we keep meeting like this. That’s what people do in small towns, you know?” She didn’t mean for it to come out as nasty as it sounded. An automatic defense mechanism kept men like him at a distance, not that Cedar Springs had men like him, but still.

“Well, maybe we should just give them something to talk about.” Cory’s mouth curved up in some sort of wicked, sexy smile that Alexis couldn’t help but stare at. Jesus. What the hell was wrong with her? She acted like some kind of high school girl. Like Paige. Ugh.

Alexis looked down at the fresh vegetables again and tried to hide her flustered cherry-red face, wishing she, too, had on jeans. Her ill-fitted khakis and button-up white blouse did absolutely nothing for her toned figure. They weren’t supposed to. They were for crawling around on the floor, trying to get little kids to smile at her camera. She thought about what her long, dark hair looked like, knowing it was pulled back in its customary ponytail. Great.

“Would you like to have dinner with me?”

Would she?

Alexis was saved from the awkward, caught-off-guard moment when one of the locals walked up to her. Sue Maynard carried a baby and pushed a little girl, who talked busily in the cart.

“Hey, Alexis. I was going to call you tomorrow. You wouldn’t happen to have an opening this week, would you? I want to get Tobi’s six-month photos done,” the young mom asked, coming from the opposite direction.

“I don’t, Sue,” Alexis answered. There were only two days left in the week and she’d been totally booked. “But if you want, I can put you down for Monday or Tuesday. Would that work for you?”

“Let’s do Tuesday.”

Cory nodded to the local mom and turned his attention to the fresh vegetables. Sue fanned her face and mouthed one drawn out word—“Nice…”

“I’ll call you tomorrow,” Alexis said with a scowl. Her eyes had shifted to Cory before she shoved the mother away.
Dumb girl.

“So, do you think maybe I could book an appointment on…say, Friday night?” Cory asked after the young mom took her children and walked away.

Alexis grimaced again over Cory’s shoulder when Sue turned to check out his ass. Susan quickly jerked around when Cory turned to look, too. Her friends were so juvenile.

“I don’t even know you.”

“Really?” Cory questioned disbelievingly. His hand moved to his cocked hip in an attitude formation. “Boyfriend, lunch, Aunt Rosaline, ring any bells? Besides, that’s why you should have dinner with me.”

Alexis couldn’t help but laugh at his playfulness. “I should have dinner with you because I don’t know you?” she clarified while failing to hide the evident smile.

“Yes. You can get to know me and I can get to know you—perfect plan, don’t you think?”