Vicky took a sip of her beer and set it back down. “True, even with our rival high schools. I was born and raised right here in Pick. My grandparents owned this house, and when they died they left it to my mother. I can remember my grandpa telling me stories about Pick while we ate red Popsicles out here on this swing. Then he passed away and my dad and mama moved in here when I was four. I’ve lived in this house ever since,” she said. “Lots of mileage on this swing, for sure.”
“Didn’t you move out when you got married and had your daughter?”
She shook her head. “My new husband and I were going to rent a place of our own, but we stayed here with Nettie to save some money. He died six weeks after the wedding.”
His long arm stretched across the distance and patted her shoulder. “I’m so sorry. That must have been tough. So Nettie is your grandmother?”
She didn’t see stars or hear bells and whistles, but she did like the way his hand felt. And there was a little spark there, but she attributed that to the nerves about this whole marriage and baby thing.
“No, Nettie was my mama’s distant cousin and friend. When she divorced the summer that I was seventeen, she moved in with us. Thank God! I don’t know what I’d have done without her then or now.”
“How long had she been here when your mama died?”
“A month. Nettie moved in with us in June. Mama died in June, too, leaving me this house and half ownership of the diner. I found out I was pregnant in August and was a widow by the end of September.”
“That’s too much for anyone to endure, especially a teenager.” He took her hand in his and held it on the swing between them.
It was a simple gesture, but it felt right and good. Maybe she would go out with him if he asked.
“That which does not kill us, and all that . . .” She smiled.
“You should be able to shoulder a full-grown longhorn steer if that’s the case.” He held his bottle toward her. She retrieved hers and touched it to his.
“To nothing but good luck in the future,” he said.
“I agree.”
“Okay, then, looking toward the future. Will you go to dinner with me on Friday night after you get off work?”
Had she heard him right? She’d just been thinking about going out with him and then, less than a minute later, he asked. Could he read her mind?
“We are about to get knee-deep in wedding stuff. A rain check?” She needed a little more time to think, even if she had already let the idea flutter through her mind.
“After the wedding, we’ll celebrate getting through it all by going to dinner, then. We won’t get many more pleasant evenings like this. Pretty soon even the nights won’t drop below the nineties and it will be too hot to sit out here.”
“This old swing has seen me work out problems in the heat, too.”
“Then here’s to lots of evenings on this swing.” He smiled. “I really like spending time with you, Vicky.”
“Likewise,” she said.
“Good, that’s a step in the right direction.”
“For what?”
“Hopefully, a relationship when things settle down, but a friendship until then,” he answered.
“I’d like that.” She nodded.
He stood up and brushed a kiss across her forehead. “I should be going now. Please, call me if you want to talk or if you want me to drive up here. I’ll be on my way.”
“Thanks, Andy.” She smiled for the first time, and it lightened her whole attitude.
Shane wrapped his hand over Jancy’s in the middle of the wide bench seat in the 1958 Chevrolet he’d been restoring for years. He’d put the top down and they were both leaning back, looking at the twinkling stars circling around the faintest sliver of the moon.
“If they gave out crowns for the luckiest girl in the whole world, I’d be wearing it tonight,” she said.
“And if there w-was one—” he started.
She put her fingers over his lips. “You’d already have it.”
He captured her fingers in his hand and kissed each one. “Ryder says I don’t have m-much self-esteem, but wh-when I’m w-with you, I feel like I’m on top of the w-world.”
“Amen.” She grinned. “Me, too, when I’m with you. Can we leave the top down when we go?” she asked.
“Anything you want,” he told her.
With wrecked cars all around her and a sky full of stars above her, Jancy’s future had never looked so amazing. “I guess it’s time to take you home,” he finally said. “I don’t want Vicky or Nettie to get the wrong idea.”