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Last year, I was all set to rent out the space next door and finally realize my dream when my landlord’s cousin opened a pizza joint. The day I was supposed to sign the lease, my landlord backed out and leased the space to his cousin, Jose. It’s been a battle ever since.
Jose complains about everything to his cousin, our landlord, including the fact that my business is so successful that the parking lot is always full of my customers. He claims that’s why he has no customers, because they have nowhere to park. It’s not my fault his pizza tastes like cardboard, and everyone loves my coffee, pastries, and bagels.
I flick on the lights, plug everything in, throw my apron on, and get to work cleaning the ovens and coffee makers. It’s part of my ritual each week to scrub everything clean before opening time. It’s cathartic for me. I blare my country music and scrub away like my life depends on it.
After a few hours of cleaning, the place looks shiny and new. My daily bagel delivery has come and gone, so I make pastries and coffee so I have something to sell when it’s time to open.
“Kate?” I hear my best friend, Grace, call from the back entrance.
“In here.”
“Hey. What’s up?” Grace asks as she walks into my kitchen. She’s wearing jeans and a pink tank top and sandals. A very ‘Florida’ outfit. She looks adorable.
“Not much. Just finished cleaning and now on to cooking.”
“How’s your finger?” she asks.
I hold up my bandaged finger. “Well, it’s not throbbing as much anymore. The antibiotics are helping.” I change the subject. “You look pretty. What do you have planned for today?”
Grace leans against the counter with her ankles crossed. We’ve been best friends since grade school. “I’m going on a picnic brunch date to a park.”
“With whom?”
“James. The guy I told you about. The pilot,” Grace says as she fluffs her hair.
Grace is hellbent on finding a boyfriend. She’s a serial dater. Luck has not been on her side. She’s on every dating website out there, and yet she still hasn’t found someone. She has more hope than I do on the dating front. I just gave up. No use looking when the options out there aren’t looking at me. I’m plump and I know it. If it’s in the cards for me, great. If not, great. I don’t need a man to make me whole. Grace, on the other hand, thinks she does. Her self-esteem waivers and she struggles with being alone.
“So, you’re going on a Sunday brunch picnic with James? I thought you weren’t too impressed with him.” I put the pastries on a sheet pan and place them in the oven.
Grace shrugs, “I’m not, but I had nothing else to do today, so I thought, ‘Why not?’ So, I said yes.” She turns around at the counter and starts setting up the pastries that I pulled out of the oven earlier into the display case for me. “What are you doing today? After work, I mean.”
I shrug, “I don’t know. Same thing I always do. Go home, hang out with Wilbur. Maybe walk with the ladies this evening. I have some vegetable plants I need to move from pots to the ground. I’ll probably do that this afternoon. I also want to check on Mrs. Broxton. She hasn’t been feeling well lately.”
“God, Kate. You’re not an old lady. You’re almost thirty years old. Why do you live your life like you are eighty?”
I gasp. “Where is this coming from? I’m not living like I’m an old lady.”
“You live in an RV park and you’re the youngest one there by at least fifty years. You never go out, and all you do is work, garden, and hang out with old people. You need a life. I’m creating your dating profile tonight and I don’t want to hear about it. I’m taking over your life. You suck at it.” Grace’s self-righteous tone of voice irritates me.
“The hell you are! Just because you can’t find love doesn’t mean I have to. I live in my tiny house because it’s mine and I have no mortgage or rent. I like where I live, there’s no drama. And I don’t want a dating profile. I’m okay all by myself. Maybe you should learn how to like yourself enough to be comfortable alone. That may be why you can’t find anyone. You don’t like yourself. How can anyone else?”
I hold up my rolling pin and point it at my friend. “Maybe that’s your problem, Grace. You don’t know how to be by yourself. Maybe you should work on that first before you tell me I can’t run my life.” I bark at my best friend.
She gets into these phases where she’s unhappy and decides everyone else is unhappy and she makes herself feel better by trying to fix someone else’s life. Well, I will not be her guinea pig.
Grace straightens her shoulders. “It’s been five years since he left. It’s time for you to move on, Kate. He broke your heart. Maybe the next guy won’t.” Grace is referring to my last relationship that ended disastrously.
“I’m okay by myself. I have a full and wonderful life between keeping track of you, my neighbors, Wilbur, and this place,” I swing the end of my rolling pin around my kitchen, “my life is full, Grace. If having someone is in the cards for me, so be it. But if it’s not, and you could work on this part yourself, so be it. I’m happy.”
This isn’t a new argument. We have this conversation at least four times a year. She gets in a dating rut and seems to think I need her help. She’s wrong.
Grace huffs. “Fine. But someday you’re going to expand your horizons past this shop and that goose. I’m just saying.”
I start making more pastries. “I’ve heard you. Now, why don’t you go on your date? Call me when you get home and tell me all about it, okay?”
“Okay.” She hesitates, “You know I love you, right? And I just want what’s best for you, Kate. You deserve nothing but the best.”
I look up because I can hear the tears in her voice. The love we have for each other is unbreakable. Grace and I are the epitome of the saying ‘chicks before dicks.’ “I love you, too. Now, go before you cry because then I’ll start crying. Then we’ll hug and I’ll get flour all over your pretty tank top and make up down my face.”
