“Opulent Occasions,” I said, deciding that I had to let go of the fact that I had been left out of the loop.I was here—in full elfin garb—and it was time to make the event the best we could for Steamy’s.“I haven’t heard of you before.Are you from Bar Harbor?Bangor?”
The man grimaced as if I had suggested they were aliens from Mars.
“No, we are here from Boston,” the smiling blonde said.“How about you?”
“South Boston?”the man asked.
I didn’t know Boston well enough to know what that meant, but I could tell it wasn’t a compliment.
The blonde shot her companion a disapproving look.
She was genuinely nice, at least.
“I’m Sophie.Right here from Friendship Harbor.”I offered my hand to her.
She readily accepted.“I’m Ashley.”Then she tilted her head toward her tall companion.“And this is Brad.”
“Nice to meet you both.”
Unsurprisingly, Brad didn’t offer his hand.Instead, he’d spotted Jack, who had shifted his bulky, woolly frame behind George and attempted to crane his neck over the man’s shoulder to get a drink of his beer.George brushed him away.Jack rumbled low in his chest.
Brad tore his gaze away from my large pet.“You have some sort of animal with you?”
He said “animal” as if it were the most offensive term he could come up with.
“Yes.That’s an animal,” I said brightly, unable to resist.What sort of stupid question was that?
“What is it?”
“My pet llama, Jack Kerouac.He’s sort of the unofficial mascot of all of our events here in Friendship Harbor.”
Brad grimaced again.
But to my surprise, Ashley laughed, delighted.“I love llamas!”
“Right?”Dave said from beside me.“Who doesn’t?”
Brad—if his horrified glance at Ashley was any indication.
Brandy appeared at my side.“Hey, things are starting to pick up.A lot of people are arriving.”
“Looks like it’s show time,” I said to my employees.
Dave immediately joined Jimmy in the booth, donning plastic gloves, and helping prepare lobster rolls and getting them arranged in the cooler.Brandy also jumped in to add ice to towers of our signature holiday drinks—an Elf-tini and a You Make A Mean One, Mr.Grinch punch.Which had seemed quite clever before we discovered we were supposed to be serving wassail or hot toddies or something.
“It looks like Santa’s elves are busy, busy, busy,” Brad said, watching us scrambling.He sauntered back to their elaborate booth, clearly already prepared for the crowd.
“Flatlander,” Jimmy muttered as he added a bit more salt and pepper to his giant pot of chowder.
“He’s just worried because our booth smells so good,” I said with a bright smile as I jumped in to help set out our homemade whoopie pies and blueberry cake.
By the time the festival-goers made it down to our section of the booths, we were ready.And while our decorations might look like something from a Charlie Brown Christmas, I had no doubt our food and drinks were spectacular.
Soon the festival sprang into full swing.People milled around, taking in all the vendor’s wares and food options.I breathed a sigh of relief to see our booth, despite its DIY decor, was hopping.Jimmy was already steaming more lobsters and Dave picked them as fast as he could for more lobster rolls.
“Well, thank Santa and his dang reindeer.Finally real festival food,” I heard a cranky voice say.
I turned to see our resident cynical senior, Eleanor Hall, tottering toward me with a new walker.This one was bright blue and had wheels and a place to sit.She pushed the sparkly new medical four-wheeler up to our booth, then collapsed onto the seat, effectively taking up the whole counter.
