The One Real Thing
Page 52

So the mood was light, it was fun, and it was helped along by Bailey, Jess, and Tom having a riot at the bar with Old Archie as they celebrated Jess’s decision to stay in Hartwell.
“Ooh, I just had a thought!” Bailey clapped her hands together excitedly. “You’ll be here for the pumpkin festival—we have a mini punkin-chunkin’ world championship, and—”
“Wait.” Jess held up her hand, grinning. “What on earth is punkin chunkin’?”
“You’ve lived in Delaware how long and you’ve never heard of a punkin chunkin’?”
Cooper chuckled at Bailey’s shock and explained for Jessica’s sake, “It’s a sport where people see how far they can hurl pumpkins. They can use all kinds of devices to do it. There is actually a world championship.”
“Huh.” Jess nodded. “Can’t wait to see that.”
“Oh, there’s more than that,” Bailey continued excitedly. “We have a chicken festival, too, to celebrate our majestic state bird—the blue hen.”
“And what exactly is involved in a chicken festival?” The doc looked genuinely interested and excited by the prospect of a chicken festival.
He guessed she was just excited about being part of something.
Cooper wanted to kiss her.
“It’s really just an excuse for us to take over Main Street at the beginning of October,” Tom said. “Locals enter a competition to see who comes up with the best chicken dish. We get a band for the bandstand. We sell crafts and homemade baked goods.”
“It sounds fun,” Jess said wistfully.
Bailey threw her arm around her and gave her a squeeze. “It is fun. You know what else is fun? The gay pride parade at the end of the summer.”
“I thought gay pride parades usually hit the bigger cities.”
“They do. This is little in comparison, but Hartwell is very popular with the LGBT community and Kell Summers and his partner, Jake, organized the parade about eight years ago and it’s gotten more popular every year. It’s a blast. I’m so excited you’ll be here for it!”
“Me, too. You guys certainly have a lot going on here.”
“Don’t forget the music festival,” Tom added.
“Oh yes! Next month. We get bands from all over. Kell Summers is actually a councilman and he’s head of a whole bunch of organizations so he’s, like, the official event planner for the town. Ooh, and you should probably know that our mayor is Jaclyn Rose—she’s a friend of my mom’s. Very cool lady. And our vice mayor is Paul Duggan, the doctor I mentioned. And, ugh, Ian Devlin is a councilman—”
“Bailey, give the doc a chance to take it all in,” Cooper said, amused. “She’s got more than a night to get to grips with town politics.”
“Right.” Bailey laughed. “Sorry.”
“It’s fine. I’m sure I’ll remember none of it in the morning,” Jess cracked.
“Speaking of.” Tom glanced at his watch. “I need to head back, babe.”
Bailey took hold of his wrist and squinted at the time. “Ah, hell.” She turned from him and threw her arms around Jess. “Gotta go, but so glad you’re staying.”
Jess squeezed her and then pulled back. “We’ll talk in the morning.”
“Yay,” Bailey said softly.
They said good night and Tom led Bailey out of the quieting bar. She kept waving the whole time, making Jess giggle in an adorable way that held Cooper transfixed. There were so many layers to this woman and he’d only spent just a little time with her. He couldn’t wait to learn everything about her. She was complicated, but complicated in a way that was exciting.
“I should really go, too,” Jess said, turning back to him. “I’m so wired, though.”
He glanced over as the last of his regulars called out good night as they left the bar. There were only a couple of tourists and Old Archie still sitting there. It was final call in five minutes. He looked at Jess and found she was watching him in an intense way he liked a lot. “Stay after closing.”
She raised an eyebrow.
“No funny business.” He grinned, reading her mind. “I’ll make you a decaf coffee and you can talk it out.”
Because, as much fun as she’d had with Bailey and Tom, they hadn’t really discussed why she’d made the decision to stay and what she was going to do here. This was a huge move for her. Some people, maybe most, might say it was quite impulsive after so short a time here. It couldn’t have been an easy decision and Cooper wanted to make sure her head was in the right place.
Twenty minutes later the bar was closed, and he’d sent Lily and Riley home early.
He locked up and made decaf coffee for himself and Jess and led her over to a booth at the back of the bar.
They sipped at their coffee in silence for a moment and then he finally said, “So . . . what happened today?”
She heaved a huge sigh and relaxed back into her seat. “Today was a culmination of a lot of things. For a start, you were right about me not being happy. I . . . I convinced myself that I was content with the situation I’d carved out for myself back in Wilmington. It was easy to convince myself while I was there because I didn’t really know what I was missing out on. I’ve spent so much of my life wrapped up in the world of medicine that I didn’t have time to notice.
“And then I get here and the pace is so different . . . you guys love your jobs and you work hard . . . but it feels slower and more laid-back here.”