Page 22 of Halloween Town

“What’s the catch?”

“You haven’t lost your instincts,” he replied, mild approval coating his words, “because there is a catch.”

She rolled her index finger, silently telling him to get on with it. He stood up, slipped his phone into the back pocket of his jeans, and folded his arms. “You can stay in your old bedroom, your old bed is still in it, but you will have to share my bathroom.”

She could live with that. But she still didn’t know the price she’d have to pay.

She repeated her rolling-finger action and kept her eyes locked on his. “I’ll cover your food,” he continued, “but you’re going to earn your keep by helping me with the renovations.”

Her eyebrows flew up. She wasn’t a DIY type of girl. If there was a plug to be changed, she called in an electrician; she had her guy friends replace lightbulbs and change tires for her. It wasn’t that she couldn’t accomplish some tasks or didn’t understand them; it wasn’t rocket science. They simply bored her. She could always think of fifty other things she’d rather do.

“You’d trust me with power tools?” she asked.

Horror jumped into his eyes and tightened his jaw. “Shit, no! You’re not getting within six feet of a power tool.”

“Then I don’t understand what I can do for you,” she stated, genuinely confused.

Thom’s smile was pure snark. “I have about a hundred windowsills that all need hand sanding, and even you couldn’t hurt yourself with a piece of sanding paper and a block,” he said. “You can sweep up after me, carry stuff, strip wallpaper. You know, grunt work, everything I hate doing.”

Yay.

Poppy climbed to her feet and scuffed at the pavement with the toe of her new sneaker. When she imagined staying at the inn, she thought she could paint down by the lake, sit on the porch and embroider, gather her thoughts while journaling, letting her thoughts untangle as she relaxed.

She couldn’t imagine figuring out life’s big questions while working as Thom’s skivvy.

“You could always just find somewhere else to stay,” he said, sounding bored.

And there it was… What was more important? Staying at the inn, or time to do her own thing? Maybe there was room for a little more negotiation?

“I can give you two hours a day.”

He scoffed, and Poppy knew she was pushing her luck. “Four hours?”

“Six.”

“Five.”

He narrowed his eyes, but she caught the tiny, tiny lift at the corners of his mouth. “Deal. You can start this afternoon.”

“I can start tomorrow,” she countered, and when he started to protest, she held up her hand. “I need to buy linen, some stationery, art supplies, and a journal. A phone charger.”

“So you still haven’t powered up your phone?”

Poppy thought about the number of missed calls and messages waiting for her and grimaced. “Is throwing it away an option?” she asked.

“You’re going to have to deal with them eventually,” Thom said, gesturing for her to start walking. “You might as well bite the bullet and get it over with.”

She shook her head. “I don’t want to.”

He caught her wrist and yanked her out of the way of a tourist who was too busy inspecting the display in Spirited Grounds’ window to look where she was going. Taking her cup from her hand, he threw both their empty cups into the trash bin, and she followed him to the other side of the road where his truck was parked.

“Is this the adult version of you pulling your shirt or a blanket over your head whenever you didn’t want to hear something as a kid?”

“Did I do that?” she asked, surprised when he opened the passenger door for her.

“All the time. Your favorite trick was pretending the bad stuff didn’t exist. You always thought it would pass if you just didn’t acknowledge it.”

Huh. His words hit her harder than she expected. Poppy chewed the inside of her lip as she watched him walk around the front of the truck, stopping briefly to say hello to someone she vaguely recognized. Did she really ignore everything bad, sad, or mildly inconvenient until it passed or didn’t matter anymore? Was that how she survived her boring job, her boring relationship with Benji, and her unfulfilling relationships with her parents and siblings? Was playing possum her default setting?