Page 3 of The Pumpkin Spice Cafe
‘I really don’t think––'
‘There’s no other logical explanation.’ She crossed her arms over her chest. Case closed. ‘This place is definitely haunted.’
‘No other explanation?’ Logan thunked his mug on the counter. This was too much. ‘Raccoons, old pipes, drafty windows, your own imagination.’ He counted the other explanations off on his fingers. Jeanie narrowed her eyes at him on that last one, but he went on. ‘Could be the kids in town messing around. There are an infinite number of explanations that make more sense than ghosts. Now I really need to go—’
‘What do you mean kids messing around?’
Logan sighed and resisted tearing the hair from his head. ‘I don’t know. Maybe some kids were messing around in the back alley.’
Jeanie nodded slowly, taking in this new theory.
Logan slid his mug across the counter, a thank you and goodbye on the tip of his tongue.
But Jeanie was faster. ‘So what are we going to do about it? I really need sleep.’
‘We?’ He backed away from the counter. Maybe he could just turn and run. The last thing he needed was to get further entangled with the new café owner. He could practically hear the book club ladies cackling about it. They ate gossip for breakfast.
Jeanie nodded. ‘You’re my only friend in town. I can’t confront a gang of teenagers by myself.’
‘Gangis being a bit generous,’ he mumbled, still backing toward the door, but now Jeanie was following him. Definitely hedgehogs on the jammies. He refused to find that endearing.
‘Please? I’m new here and I feel like I have no idea what I’m doing...’ She shook her head, her words trailing off. ‘Sorry. This isn’t your problem.’ She smiled. ‘I’ll figure it out.’
The smile she forced onto her face tugged at something inside him again. She looked so ... so lost. Even as she smiled and pushed the hair from her face, attempting to assure him she was fine. She clearly wasn’t. And that scrambled him up even more than her constant talking.
Damn it.‘Come to the town meeting tonight,’ he said.
‘Town meeting?’
‘Yeah.’ He ran a hand down his beard already regretting his next words. ‘They’re every other Thursday. You can bring up your ... uh ... problem. Get some help.’
Her smile grew into something bright and real.Oh, no. Jeanie’s real smile was even more endearing than the damn hedgehogs. How had his usual morning deliveries taken such a drastic turn?
‘Thank you! That’s a great idea.’ Jeanie clasped her hands in front of her, like she was stopping herself from reaching out for a hug. Logan didn’t know if he was relieved or disappointed by that.
He needed to go. He had one hand on the doorknob, nearly there. Nearly back to his normal morning, his blessed quiet.
‘Will you be there?’ Jeanie’s question stopped him before he could escape. Logan usually only went to town meetings if forced to by some farm issue and only then if his grandmother was too busy with her knitting circle to come into town. His grandfather would rather have teeth pulled, without anesthesia, than attend a town meeting (his words).
Logan had no need to show up this week and yet for some reason found himself saying, ‘Yeah, I’ll be there.’
Jeanie’s delighted squeak followed him out into the predawn light.
The book club was going to have a field day.
ChapterThree
Hello, I’m Jeanie Ellis, Dorothy’s niece, and the new owner of The Pumpkin Spice Café. I’ve been having a little issue with a nocturnal disturbance...
Nocturnal disturbance?That made her sound even crazier than she had this morning. Jeanie’s knee bounced up and down despite her attempts to stop. She was nervous. She wanted to make a good first impression at this meeting, and she’d gone over her little speech in her head at least a dozen times since she got here. Twenty minutes early, apparently.
She sat at the back of the room; the old floors and possibly even older chair creaking beneath her. There were only a handful of other people milling around the room, greeting each other with the easy familiarity she hadn’t found since she was a kid. She’d missed it. The sense of belonging, of home. She hadn’t realized she’d missed it. In fact, she’d run from the little town where she’d grown up as soon as she graduated high school, so ready to be free of its constraining borders. But somewhere along the way, the thrill of the city, the crowds, and the concrete had lost its allure.
She shifted in her seat and the chair groaned ominously. An older gentleman offered her a friendly smile and a salute as he walked by to join a group gathered near the podium. Jeanie raised a hand to return it, but he was already gone. Tucking her hands between her thighs in an effort to warm them and to keep from fidgeting, she watched the group greet the man with good-natured teasing about his bright-green tie. Jeanie couldn’t remember the last time she’d joked around like that. The last time she had people like that to joke with. At least not in person. Somehow in the last several years, her closest friend had become her brother. And their relationship consisted of random texts, memes, and the occasional FaceTime chat.
Jeanie pulled her coat around her shoulders. It was freezing in here despite the rattling efforts of the radiators lining the walls.
The town meetings were held in the original town hall building, which according to the engraved brick out front was built in 1870. Jeanie couldn’t really imagine what it looked like in 1870, but tonight it looked like a small auditorium with several rows of metal folding chairs and a podium up front. The stage behind the podium was decorated for what Jeanie imagined would be an upcoming fall performance. Hand-painted scenery with pumpkins and apple trees lined the back of the stage with hay bales scattered in front. Jeanie pictured kids in costumes dancing around up there, waving to their parents in the audience. It would be adorable, she was sure. Although she did question the safety of putting children on a stage that old. Would those old wooden planks support them?
