A Man Of Influence. Melinda Curtis
“I did shower today and use deodorant. Scout’s honor.”
Tracy studied him as if he was an overpriced used car, one with high mileage and no warranty.
He studied her in return. That tousled hair. That determined jut of her chin. It was weird. Just looking at her made him want to smile. That was the point of his new life, wasn’t it? He smiled.
“Fine,” Tracy grumbled. “But I’m driving.”
“What?” Chad’s gaze bee-lined to his beloved sports car.
“It’s settled.” Agnes/Aggie clapped her hands.
A few minutes later, he and Tracy stepped out on the brick sidewalk. Harmony Valley could have served as a backdrop for a Norman Rockwell painting. Old fashioned lamps lined Main Street. The buildings had brick fronts and canvas awnings. The wind blew brown and orange leaves down the road listlessly, as if even the elements knew the pace here was slow. Tracy zipped up her tan jacket against the autumn chill, and then extended her palm. “The keys.”
“To my car?” He glanced at his cherry red convertible and gripped the key in his hand. He’d ordered it custom from the factory. No one had driven it but him since he’d bought it. It required nimbleness to get in and out of. Neither a walker nor a wheelchair could fit in its trunk. “How about you sit in the passenger seat and I drive?”
“Nope.” She made the gimme motion with her hand and spoke slowly. “I had an accident...” Each word she spoke was labored. “I was in the...side seat.” She scowled, clearly not pleased with her word choice. “I don’t know you. Or how you drive. Or if I can—”
“You can trust me.” He gave her the grin he’d used to charm his mother’s friends when they’d come over to play Bunko. “I’m a good driver.”
“Don’t. Finish. My sentences.” She glowered at him. As glowers went, it was cute.
Chad’s father had been the King of Glowers. Until the last six months of his life when he hadn’t glowered at anyone. Dad’s soul, his personality, his very being had slipped away, leaving Chad to wait until his body gave up, as well.
“Give me the keys.” There was a pleading note hidden between the demanding words and the glower.
Chad stared at her, then at the gray-haired audience inside, and finally at his car. “It’s a stick shift.” A lost art form.
“Perfect.” She breezed past him and slid into the tan leather driver’s seat, leaving Chad no choice but to ride shotgun. She held out her hand for the key fob as soon as his butt hit the stiff leather.
He inserted the key in the ignition. “On cold mornings, she’s a bit touchy going into third gear.” He hoped Tracy wouldn’t grind the clutch. He hoped the B&B wasn’t far away. He hoped he wouldn’t regret coming to Harmony Valley.
“I knew it.” She patted the dashboard and grinned. “Midlife crisis.”
“I’m thirty-five. Too young for a midlife crisis,” Chad grumbled.
“Huh. Makes me wonder...” Tracy swallowed, her grin fading as she forced out the words. “What you’ll drive...when the real crisis hits.” She shoved in the clutch and started the engine with a roar. The grin came back. She backed out competently and sent the car forward without so much as a neck jerk or a grinding gear.
Chad’s apprehension eased. “Why do I get the feeling no one wanted to come with me?”
“Leona is... She’s... You’ll see.” Tracy forced the words out like stale dough through a noodle press.
“Are there a lot of young singles in town?” The place didn’t look like it had much nightlife.
She laughed and came to a stop at the intersection of the large, deserted town square. It had a broad expanse of grass and a huge oak tree with a single, wrought-iron bench beneath it. Tracy glanced at him with those clear blue eyes that seemed to see so much. “Agnes is single. Rose is single. Mildred is single. Eunice, too.” She smiled at her listing of old ladies. “Need I go on?”
“Please don’t.” He fought off the thought that he’d slipped back into his parents’ world. No nightlife. No metropolitan eclectic energy. A pace slower than frozen molasses. All these old people. They’d get sick. They’d drift mentally. They’d die. They’d leave behind friends and family with holes in their chests that nothing seemed to fill.
Suddenly, Chad didn’t want to be here. He gripped the seatbelt strap across his chest.
Oblivious to his need to flee, Tracy turned right and continued to drive his car as if it was her own—a bit fast, banking into the turns. It was oddly relaxing—the ride, her youth, the way her hair dipped and tumbled in the breeze. His grip on the strap eased.
“Where’d you learn to drive a stick?” Few people had the skill anymore. His dad had taught him to drive a manual transmission on his 1967 Ford Mustang.
“First, a farm tractor. Then Mildred’s Volkswagen Beetle.” Tracy made another right and slowed down through a residential district.
Single-story ranches and Craftsman-style homes. Dirty windows and peeling paint. Empty driveways and neglected yards. Many seemed abandoned.
The neighborhood was an afterthought relative to the puzzling woman next to him. “Have you always struggled to get the words out?”
Tracy slammed on the brakes, sending the tires squealing, even though they hadn’t been going faster than twenty miles an hour. She gripped the steering wheel and turned to glare at him. “I had an accident.” And then she lifted her gossamer blond hair, revealing a ropey scar on her skull. “I have...expressive aphasia. I’m trying to be normal.”
Chad was beginning to think Tracy wasn’t normal. She was extraordinary.
An aluminum screen door screeched on protesting hinges. An elderly woman stepped out on her front porch in a pink chenille bathrobe and white tennis shoes. Her short gray hair stuck into the air as if she’d rubbed her head against a balloon. “Everything okay, Tracy?”
“Yes, Mrs. Beam.” Tracy glared at Chad, but her voice was sweet as sugar, and didn’t sound forced.
“I could call the sheriff for you,” the old woman said.
“We’re fine, Mrs. Beam.”
“Okay, dearie.” Mrs. Beam went back inside. Her screen door groaned as if it belonged in a haunted house, and then banged shut.
Tracy put Chad’s car in gear and continued slowly down the street.
It was time for a change of subject. “So your brother owns the winery. Do they make good wine?”
“Is your car fast?”
That was a good sign. “Do wine lovers come from miles around to taste their wine?”
“No. They only...soft launched.” She turned to the left and parked in front of a forest green Victorian with white trim and an expansive lawn.
Chad was used to seeing narrow painted ladies in San Francisco’s Cow Hollow district, but this house was easily three times the width of one of those classics. “Impressive.” Why hadn’t the Lambridge Bed & Breakfast turned up on his internet search? It had a great location. It couldn’t have been more than a ten minute walk from downtown. He hoped it was as nice inside as it was out.
Chad made to open his door.
Tracy put her hand on his arm, stopping him. Her touch was soft, personal when Chad had lived an impersonal life for years. “Don’t hurt them.”
“Who?”
“The people here.” She gestured back the way they’d come and then she fixed him with a warning stare. “You’re the Happy Bachelor. Well... Your columns aren’t happy. They’re...they’re...mean.” She made a frustrated noise, slapped her