“I get it. The area is still new to you and it can be hard to navigate the one-way streets downtown.”
“Actually, it’s more the fact that I’ll be walking.” She hoists her bag a little higher onto her shoulder as if preparing to do just that.
“Walking?” I ask.
“Yeah. I don’t own a car.” It’s a little sheepish but not ashamed.
“Oh.”
Oh.
Really? That’s the best I can manage? But there are too many questions sparked by that one sentence and I’m not sure which to go with. Luckily the rational part of my brain wins out over the curious one.
“You’re welcome to drive with me. I’m parked just down the street.” I point, as if it were necessary.
“I’d appreciate that. Thank you. I’d hate to slow you and Jim down. Since we’re on a time crunch and all.” It’s said tongue-in-cheek, as if she’s uncovered my secret and wants in on it. Her smirk is there then gone when I don’t immediately respond, my mind whirling trying to figure out how much of it is teasing.
Rachel looks up at me expectantly, so much shorter than my six four now that she’s in flats, and I realize that despite my pointing she has no idea which car is actually mine nor does she have a means to get in without me.
My strides eat up the difference but she keeps up, her hair bobbing along in its ponytail as she walks alongside me. My dad’s voice is in my ear when we get to the car and I open the passenger door for her.
“Thank you.” This time the dimple creases her cheek and I find myself giving her an answering smile of my own.
The radio hums quietly as we chug down Main toward the outer parts of downtown.
“Hey, I know we don’t know each other very well, and it might be presumptuous to say this to my new boss on day one of working but . . . I’m here to help. Let me know if I can. I don’t want to overstep or anything so if my questions with Jim were pissing you off I’d rather you let me know outright.” She’s turned to face me, and I can practically feel her eyes on the side of my head.
“No. No! That’s not it at all.” I steal a glance at her at a red light, hoping she can see the sincerity on my face, and pretending I’m not trying to pick out the shades of warm earth in her eyes. “I’m—not very good at this stuff. I’ve never been anyone’s boss and I’ve never run a company, and I’m worried I’m in over my head.”
Rachel is puzzling me over, the same way I’d like to do to her. “So, you weren’t mad that I was kind of getting into the thick of it there? I’m not trying to be bossy or overbearing.”
Part of me wants to ask why there’s a tinge of worry, a negative turn to her words as if she’s been accused of them before and is waiting for some kind of inevitable.
“Not at all. Please, ask whatever you can think of. I value your input. The only reason I wanted to leave was because it was starting to get to me. I don’t do very well in the dark. Plus with the dust . . . it just felt like the place was looming, shrinking around me.” I’m not usually this honest, and never with people who don’t know me and how I can be, but the last thing I want is her thinking she’s done something wrong.
My hands tighten on the steering wheel, leather creaking a little as they do and I remind myself to do that deep breathing exercise they had us practice at the company’s one-month-stint of office-wide morning yoga sessions.
“Oh.” Is all she says before she clears her throat, likely weighing her words. “I’m that way with temperature. If I get too hot, it’s over. I can’t focus on anything else. I’ll never live in Florida, I can promise you. That’s not even accounting for the alligators and the snakes.” She shivers with disgust and I can’t help the chuckle that escapes at the sight.
And it’s just that simple. In a few sentences Rachel Mackey has turned me inside out and right way round, dusting off the shoulders and I’m ready to go again. When I look over at her—not at a stoplight but a rather risky stolen glance after changing lanes—she’s looking out the window and drinking in the sight of the old Civil War markers along Main, each picture describing an event. My freakout is over, washed away by understanding and letting go.
“I have to ask. Why Locke Box?”
“It’s my middle name. BryceLockeDawson. Not quite sure what my parents were thinking but it serves my purpose well enough now.”
“Meant to be, for sure.” Our eyes meet at the next red light, the last one before the mill, and something weird curls inside me at her words and the conviction behind them.
Maybe she’s right. Maybe thiscanwork, if I let it.
My rumination is cut short when we pull up the gravel drive toward the mill. Our arrival is a rush of tires, the click and zip of the seatbelts set free, and shoes on shifting ground. This time when Jim lets us inside, Rachel lets her questions run wild.
I follow behind them, acclimatizing myself to the sawdust smell from outside, before it can get too overwhelming. The floors are concrete and the brick building stands tall around us. Small square windows take up most of the upper parts of the walls and I swear I can still smell the machinery even though it’s been gone for years.
My grandfather brought me here on a tour when I was a kid and somehow the impression of it stuck—the work benches, the loud grinding of the saws against wood. My eyes are covered with protective glasses and too-big ear covers held against my head with my hands. I must have been seven or eight.
I miss him.
“So, what do you think, Bryce?” Rachel asks, pulling me from my memory.
