Grateful in Watch Hill : A Small Town Romance Read online

  Grateful in Watch Hill

  S.Celi and Sara Celi

  Published by Lowe Interactive Media, LLC, 2021.

  This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.

  GRATEFUL IN WATCH HILL

  First edition. April 2, 2021.

  Copyright © 2021 S.Celi and Sara Celi.

  Written by S.Celi and Sara Celi.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  ONE | SETH

  TWO | KENDRA

  THREE | KENDRA

  FOUR | SETH

  FIVE | SETH

  SIX | SETH

  SEVEN | KENDRA

  EIGHT | SETH

  NINE | KENDRA

  TEN | SETH

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  For all those who need a new start

  ONE

  SETH

  Worst year of my life.

  Eight simple words strung together and wrapped around me so I could never escape the undeniable fact. This is the worst year of my life.

  I flipped the turn signal on my truck before I stopped at the intersection on the outskirts of Watch Hill. From here, I didn’t have much longer to drive before I’d arrive at Watch Hill Pizza, a place I had to admit had become a refuge as I navigated one disaster after another. Kyle had been kind enough to give me a job when no one else could, and I had no idea how I’d pay him back for his unfailing kindness.

  Today I’ll help him finish the outdoor patio. That’s a start.

  As I turned the truck onto the main road leading into town, the canisters of patio sealant clamored and clanked together in the open bed, each sound a reminder of how much my life had changed since the start of the coronavirus pandemic. Before the virus, I’d been the owner of The Frosted Heart, one of the most successful nightclubs in the Cincinnati metropolitan area. Before the virus, I’d spent my nights overseeing expensive theme parties and upselling VIP bottle service. And before the virus, I’d been a consummate night owl, sleeping most of the day and getting up at five p.m., ready for another night of cultivating the region’s limited social scene. Before the virus . . .

  Never mind. That’s not who you are now.

  Now, I was lucky I had a job, and even luckier for my friendship with Kyle, which had turned out stronger than I realized or deserved. Kyle bailed me out at my lowest moment, and I would never be able to express to him just how much he’d done for me.

  I pulled into the parking lot across the street from Kyle’s pizzeria. The staff had taken to parking there during construction, and as I turned off the truck engine, I surveyed the new patio, pergola, and outdoor fireplace that made up what would soon be Watch Hill Pizza’s outdoor dining terrace. It looked good, and I was proud of our handiwork. A childhood spent accompanying my dad to construction projects had turned out to be an advantage. Not only did the new space expand the restaurant, but it also fit right in with the quaint atmosphere of the community.

  “Here we go,” I told Kyle as I walked to the patio with two large cans of sealant. Once we stained the wood, the project would basically be complete. “They had plenty in stock at the hardware store.”

  “Great.” Kyle put down the staining brush and walked over, squinting underneath his sun-bleached Cincinnati Reds baseball cap. He stopped when he got about six feet away from me. Even though we’d both gotten our COVID vaccines a few weeks before at the local drugstore, the trauma of the pandemic lingered all around us. I wonder how long we’ll interact like this. No handshakes. Social distancing. “How much was it?”

  “Twenty bucks. Here’s the receipt.”

  “You can take the money out of the register. Tyler is in there manning the fort, so just tell him I sent you.”

  “Thanks.”

  I surveyed the space, even more impressed with it up close. Kyle had wanted to save on the expansion costs, so we’d had to break up the project over the last few weeks, building it in between the daily tasks of running a pizza parlor. It hadn’t been easy, but there was a satisfaction in knowing we’d managed to complete the patio before summer truly began.

  “If it all goes well, I think this will be finished by tomorrow afternoon.”

  “I hope so,” Kyle said.

  “I still think you should have a grand opening for it.”

  Kyle hesitated. “Don’t you think . . .?”

  “I know what you’re worried about, but this is an outdoor space, and that’s the point, right? Anyone who might be concerned wouldn’t have to worry.”

  “Just don’t want to give the wrong impression to people.”

  “What if we offer three one-hour seating sessions? Six to seven, seven thirty to eight thirty, nine to ten? That gives us time to thoroughly clean and disinfect between each session. Paper plates and napkins, so no silverware to wash.”

  “You’ve really been thinking about this, haven’t you?

  I nodded. “We’ll place the tables six feet apart, automatically limiting the number of people per seating. Masks required while people line up outside.” I spread a hand. “People around here need good things. They’ll come.”

  “They’ve been coming.”

  Kyle was right, they had. Watch Hill Pizza had become a huge success over the last several months, and I had to give my friend a lot of credit for that. The changes to the menu, a regular and stronger social media presence, the pizza bread, and the price point had all made the place profitable during a time when most people in the industry struggled to making their bottom line.

  Once again, a bit of luck.

  “Think about it.” I glanced over my shoulder at the rest of what made up Watch Hill’s downtown, a small square with some other restaurants, a few boutiques, the Already Perked coffee shop, an insurance agency, and Sam’s Deli. “Could be good.”

  “Speaking of things that could be good—have you thought about the food box drive on Saturday?” Kyle grinned, and it was another small reminder of how much better things had gotten in the last few months. We still wore masks inside the restaurant, but when we were working outside, we removed them.

  “Yes.” No.

  “So, you’re volunteering, right?”

  It wasn’t a question, and it wasn’t an order, but I knew my friend didn’t want to hear me say no. He’d been pestering me about working the food drive for the last few days; he wanted to see me there. And it was important to the community—there was no question about that. People needed help, and food boxes were one way to meet that need.

  “I’ll do it,” I replied, making a snap decision after avoiding conversation about it a few times. I wouldn’t have said I was the kind of person to do a lot of charity work or community volunteering, but even I could see the need around the area. One more thing the pandemic had brought.

  “Great.”

  “How long do you think we’ll be there?” I asked.

  “Not sure, but Ashley and I are getting to Watch Hill Community Church around nine just in case they need help with setup.”

  I thought about it. Not like I have much going on these days anyway. “I can be there at nine thirty.”

  “Thanks for doing this. It means a lot.” Kyle brushed his hands on his jeans and focused on the new cannisters of weatherizing stain. “I was thinking we could work on this today, but frankly, I need a break.”

  “Why don’t you let me handle it out here? I’m sure Tyler could use some help inside.”

  “You’re right. Sounds good.” He smiled again. “I’ll leave you to it.”

  Kyle gave me another nod, then left the const
ruction site, leaving me alone once again. I had to admit, I was proud of what we’d done together. There was a certain satisfaction that came from seeing an idea become a reality. Unexpectedly, helping my friend with his pizza parlor had become a bright spot in my life. It had given me a sense of purpose during a time when nothing else felt normal. And while I wasn’t always a joiner, I also sensed that giving back at the food drive would feel good too.

  Maybe this wouldn’t be such a bad year going forward, after all.

  TWO

  KENDRA

  Humbled—that was probably a good word to use for the current state of my life. Humbled and hungry. A bad combination.

  Still, I supposed there were worse ways to reach rock bottom.

  And rock bottom meant right where I was—in the car line outside Watch Hill Community Church, one of several dozen waiting for my share of a massive food giveaway organized by the leadership of the church. For the first time in my life, I was going to take food from a volunteer, a person who would hand me a box of whatever canned goods someone more fortunate had managed to cobble together in an act of charity.

  Talk about humiliating.

  Still, I needed the help. Rather, we needed the help—my father and I. That fact couldn’t be denied—over the last few months I’d woken up many days and wondered how we were going to make it. I pulled the car forward one length and regarded my dad, who sat in the passenger seat next to me. “Lots more people here than I expected.”

  “Me too.”

  He kept his eyes on the line in front of us. Several hundred feet ahead a large blue tent marked the place where we’d receive the handout. The volunteers scrambling in and out of the pick-up spot reminded me of cheerful ants, all of them working hard in bright orange T-shirts.

  “This isn’t the man I wanted to be, Kendra,” he said after a few more minutes, and a few more creeping car lengths. “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s okay.”

  “This all feels so strange.”

  “I know, Dad.” I sighed. “I know.”

  “We’re only doing this once,” he said, a hint of forceful resolve in his voice. “One time. That’s it, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  I gave him the reply that he wanted, even though I couldn’t be sure I’d be able to hold us to that promise. The reality of our situation hit me in the face every morning when I woke hungry—stressed—a cold reminder that we had few options left. I need to find steady work. Soon. We can’t live like this much longer.

  “I don’t think they’re taking names,” I added as I watched the volunteers handing out the food. “We don’t have to tell them who we are.”

  “Good, because I wouldn’t.”

  I inched the car closer to the distribution center. Three cars between us and the box the local newscast promised would be enough to get two people through two weeks. While I knew the money in Dad’s checking account could have covered that, it would still be nice to give his disability check and my meager earnings as a part-time delivery driver for FoodSwap a break. Any margin between us and abject poverty was a good thing.

  “I posted my résumé on a couple of new message boards this morning while you were asleep,” I told him when there was one car left to the front of the line. “Fingers crossed someone is looking for a hip-hop teacher.”

  “Someone is.”

  “I hope.”

  “That’s all we can do.”

  I sighed again. It was hard to remain hopeful and getting harder each week. I might have invested more than twenty years into my dancing career, working on it every day since I was five, but the last year or so had done nothing but prove it was just a stupid dream for a life I would never lead. It didn’t matter I’d been this close to landing a job as a featured dancer for American Dance Company’s modern dance troupe. It didn’t matter I had been this close to finally getting the roles I wanted in one of the most prestigious companies in the world. It didn’t matter I had been this close to living the life I wanted.

  It didn’t matter.

  The pandemic had forced American Dance Company to close indefinitely, throwing all their performers out of work. New York City’s rolling restaurant closures made my backup income dry up too, and Dad’s health had gotten worse in my absence.

  All of that brewed together forced me to move back home. I thought I’d have better luck in Ohio, but that had proved a joke too. During hard times, there wasn’t much demand for a trained modern dancer. Who cared about the number of pirouettes I could complete in succession or the arch of my feet when I performed the buffalo tap step? Those skills didn’t make me employable.

  Are they even skills, at all?

  And I was getting older. Twenty-five. I was already pushing it, and soon enough I’d be too old to grace any stage. Dancers had a quick shelf life. Simple and undeniable. How I wish I’d known that before I’d thrown so much time and money into my profession.

  “I’ll look around when we get home and see if there are a few more places where I can post my availably. Someone somewhere has to need me.”

  “Maybe you could teach yoga or Pilates.” Dad coughed twice. I knew it was likely his chronic bronchitis, not the virus itself. He’d been lucky to stay moderately healthy, and we both received our second dose of the vaccine a few weeks earlier. “Those are kind of similar, aren’t they?”

  “They are.” I glanced over at him. “You feel okay? You sound kind of hoarse.”

  “Just the usual.” He spread a weather-beaten hand, one calloused from years of working as a carpenter making custom kitchen and bathroom cabinets. “You know how it goes; I’ve been living with this forever.”

  Dad was right, he had. In fact, his lungs were the reason he couldn’t work anymore and finally went on full disability a few years before. They didn’t work the way he wanted.

  “Here we go.” He pointed at the line. “Our turn.”

  I drove the car forward, then pulled my neck gaiter over my mouth and nose. Thanks to my dad’s health status and a few lucky breaks, both of us were now fully vaccinated against the virus. Even so, we were still following most of the CDC’s precautions, and a large sign at the entrance to the church parking lot had served as reminder that masks were required for box pickup. I rolled down the window. “Hi, I’m here to pick up our food box.”

  A woman in a yellow windbreaker, black mask, and blue baseball cap leaned toward the car. “Did you reserve your box ahead of time?”

  I nodded.

  “Name?”

  “Collins.”

  “Collins.” She scanned the tablet in her hand. “Hmm. Collins, here I have you. Kendra . . . wait . . . Kendra Collins?”

  I blanched. “Yes. That’s my name.”

  “You don’t recognize me?” She shook her head. “No, of course you don’t.” The woman stepped away from my car and pulled her mask down briefly. “It’s me, Ashley Stevens. You know, we both know Seth Sampson.”

  I recoiled.

  “From The Frosted Heart,” Ashley added.

  I glanced at my dad, heat rising to my cheeks. This would have been a welcomed circumstance if this were a normal thing, like running into someone at the grocery store or at the pharmacy, but this was a food line for people who needed immediate assistance. This is the last place I want to run into anyone I know.

  “Oh, yes, Seth,” I managed. “How is he?”

  “He’s great. He’s right over there.”

  Ashley replaced her mask and pointed into the distance, but I didn’t follow her gesture with my eyes. I didn’t want to run into her, and I didn’t want to run into Seth. A lifetime ago, in the before time, I’d worked for Seth as a cocktail waitress at one of his early bars. Over the years, we’d kept in touch, and sometimes when I was in town for the holidays, he’d hired me as a performer for his theme parties. The last time had been on New Year’s Eve, before the pandemic began.

  I do not want to talk to Seth. He can’t see me like this. He can’t . . .

  “It’s
okay,” I tried. “He’s probably busy, and—”

  “You’re right.” She turned to the rows of boxes listed in alphabetical order on the blacktop. “Let me get your box, okay?”

  “Great.”

  She rushed away, and I cringed. Just a few more moments and this will be over. Thankfully. My extreme embarrassment over the reduced circumstances of myself and my dad would pass and would become more bearable once I wouldn’t run into someone I knew. That was one good thing about the pandemic. It created natural distance between people, and that meant not having to see people on a regular basis, not having to endure them seeing the fallout of what had happened.

  Ashley returned with the box, loaded it in my car, and had me sign a form saying I’d received it. Soon enough, I was on my way, empty promises that we would “get together soon” trailing behind me. That was the kind of thing people always said to each other and never truly meant. Thank God.

  One more day of survival in the books.

  SETH

  I had to admit, doing charity work felt good. Community service didn’t just have to be a penalty for traffic violations or petty misdemeanors, a few of which a younger me had committed. I might have shown up to the church with some reluctance, but by mid-morning, I didn’t feel that way. I wanted to be there, I wanted to help. That could have been me waiting in those lines outside.

  “Here you go, this stack is done,” I told Kyle. For the last hour or so, I’d slapped stickers on some of the overflow food boxes. While a lot of people had reserved theirs ahead of time, turnout for walk-ups had been larger than expected. I wouldn’t have been surprised if the church ran out of donations before noon. That’s sad. A lot of people are hurting. “You can take these to be filled.”

  “Thanks.” Kyle scooped up one group of unfolded cardboard boxes and tucked them underneath one arm, then did the same with a second pile.

  “Do you need help?”