The large woman in the hairnet, who Lily assumed was Roberta, was shoving lemons in her cloth bag, her back to them. “I beg your pardon, Tiny,” she said. “I am not clumsy. It’s hard to hold on to a dozen lemons when someone rams you from behind.”
Lily opened her mouth to apologize again, but Tiny shook her head. “You didn’t ram,” she whispered. “Gentle nudge.” Then in her regular voice, “Looks like you have the makings of a darn good breakfast. Let me guess—waffles.”
“Close. Pancakes. My mom’s recipe.”
The woman nodded. “I have a knack for these things. Oh, and you have kiwis. Did you know kiwifruit is named for a bird?”
“I did not know that.” Lily couldn’t keep the smile from her face.
“They are! These fuzzy things look so similar to a little brown bird in New Zealand that they named the fruit after the birds. Kiwis!”
Behind Tiny, Roberta let out a deep, throaty laugh. “Tiny Collins, is there anything you don’t know?”
Tiny threw a look back at Roberta. “I know nothing about cooking. Not a smidgeon. That’s why I show up at your café seven days a week.” Turning back to Lily, she smiled. “Kiwi birds. Look it up when you get home. I’m sure you have the Google. Do you travel, hon?”
“Not really. Before I got married, I’d hardly left my hometown.”
“And where was that?”
“North Georgia. A little town called Fox Hill.”
Tiny paused, pondering. “Nope, never heard of it. But no matter. You’re young. Plenty of time for New Zealand later. Did you know the Europeans used to ship their criminals off to New Zealand?”
“That was Australia.” Roberta shook her head and dropped her bag of lemons into the cart. The bag was practical canvas with sturdy handles. It had a picture of a broken egg with an orange sun popping out of the eggshell. Cheery red letters across the top spelled out Sunrise Café.
Tiny noticed Lily eyeing the bag. “Have you ever been to the Sunrise?”
Lily shook her head. “I just moved here. Is it close by?”
“Oh no,” Tiny said. “It might as well be in another country. You take a right at the airport, down West Boulevard, over the bridge, and around the bend. You can’t miss the sign—it has this same sun, just like the bag. It’s in Safe Harbor Village, where we live.” When Lily didn’t speak, Tiny continued. “It’s a community for . . . well, I guess for old folks like us.” She gestured to herself and Roberta. “It’s right on the tip of Safe Harbor Island, looking out over Bon Secour Bay. It’s a beautiful place, though I’m a little biased because it’s home.”
Behind her, Roberta rubbed her forehead. “Remind me not to take you shopping with me again. She could be an ax murderer and you’ve just told her where we sleep at night.”
Tiny smiled, the apples of her cheeks as pink as a baby’s. “She doesn’t look much like an ax murderer.”
“They never do.” Roberta pulled on Tiny’s elbow and directed her toward the cash registers at the front of the store.
As they passed a rack of sunscreen and aloe gel, Tiny called out, “You should stop by sometime. We can continue our chat. You can tell me more about Fox Hill.”
After stopping for a carton of milk, Lily paid for the groceries and walked toward the door. Along the front wall, a bulletin board held several layers of flyers and notes, all thumbtacked and flapping gently in the breeze that whooshed in every time the glass doors opened. She passed the board without a thought, then paused and took a step back. One flyer at the bottom corner might as well have jumped off the wall and pinched her.
“Help wanted,” it read. “Hairstylist at Safe Harbor Village. Experience necessary.”
The image came back to her in a rush, a great flood of memory. She closed her eyes and let her mind drift back to that frozen flash of time—the steamy heat, the clean scent of washed hair mixed with the chemical tang of dye and permanent solution. The headiness of women’s camaraderie. Lives lived out in animated conversation, laughter, and tears. Oh, how she missed it. How she missed being a part of that whirlwind of life and love.
A moment later a cash register dinged. Lily opened her eyes and she was back in the grocery store, the glass door sliding open and closed, carts wheeling past her.
Outside, she put her hand up to her forehead to block the sun pouring through the high clouds. There, along the edge of the parking lot, Roberta was loading bags into the back seat of a blue Subaru. Tiny sat in the passenger seat checking her hair in the pull-down mirror. Lily hurried across the lot toward them.
“Excuse me. You said you live at Safe Harbor Village, right?”
Roberta looked up at the sound of Lily’s voice and sighed. “I did not say that. Tiny did. Please tell me you’re not going to kill us in our sleep.”
“No, I just . . . I saw a note on the bulletin board.” She gestured back toward the building. “About a hairstylist position?”
“That’s right.” Roberta’s eyes narrowed.
“Is the position still available?”
Roberta pointed at her hairnet. “Does it look like I know anything about a hair salon?”
Lily tilted her head and shrugged. “Actually, with those curls, I’d guess you’ve spent a fair amount of time in a hairdresser’s chair.”
Roberta put a hand to her curls and patted them softly. “Well, maybe.” She grabbed the last bag and shoved it in the car, then slammed the door. “What? You looking for a job?” Her eyes swooped over Lily, head to toe.
Lily fought the urge to beeline out to her own car. Instead, she squared her shoulders and sucked in her breath. “Maybe I am.”
Roberta’s eyebrows lifted, just a millimeter. She opened the driver’s door and stepped one foot inside. “Stop by and talk to Rose,” she said just before sitting down and pulling the door closed behind her. She cranked the engine, then pressed a button to roll down the window. “But watch out. She’s got thorns.”
Roberta backed up as Tiny waved from the front seat. Lily remained rooted where she was, her thoughts racing until a horn honked close by, startling her and making her jump back. She realized she was standing in the middle of the row, blocking a string of sedans trying to exit the parking lot. She waved an apology and walked across the lot to her own car.
On the drive back to the house, questions hovered around her like a fog she could almost see. Doubt and possibility slipped through her mind. Fear and hope mingled together.
Could she really look for a job here? In this unfamiliar beach town where she knew no one? She couldn’t go back to Fox Hill; she’d ended that part of her life when she closed the door to Lillian’s Place for the last time and handed the keys to the small house over to the new owners. There was always the option of going back to Atlanta, though it had been her home for only a short time. If she moved back there, she’d be closer to Mertha, closer to the people who would no doubt think Lily had done something to run Worth off. Looking at it that way, Alabama was preferable. Could she try to make a fresh start here? Wasn’t that what she wanted?
Hunger grumbled in her stomach, reminding her of her mother’s pancakes, which was the whole reason she’d gone to the store in the first place. With all the packing and unpacking over the last several weeks, she hoped she could locate the recipe.