Free Sugar Springs by Kim Law

helping.”
    “And he came just like that?”
    “Apparently so.” Joanie’s shoulders lifted slightly. She was clearly having the same thoughts as Lee Ann. “I don’t get it, either. He doesn’t strike me as someone who would easily join in, yet there he was. Staying until the last string of lights was hung, from what I heard.”
    A sigh escaped as Joanie pushed herself out of the chair and straddled the rolling stool in front of Lee Ann. “Give me your feet. The least I can do is give you an awesome set of toes. It won’t make up for the crap going on in your life, but maybe it’ll make the day a bit brighter.”
    Lee Ann lifted her feet onto the footstool and frowned down at the inch-thick, bright red strip of hair edging Joanie’s dark, trendy cut. She couldn’t imagine Joanie ever being as unsure as she felt. The woman made a decision and went after it with the force of nature. And she never failed. “What am I going to do, Jo?”
    Joanie shrugged, keeping her voice low as she began cleaning off the old polish. “You can’t avoid him forever. He says he wants to talk. I’d say start with that. Speaking to the man doesn’t mean anything about your life has to change, it’s purely one conversation.”
    She moved to the other foot.
    “And I’d be justified keeping him from the girls if I determine he is the jerk I suspect him to be?” Lee Ann asked.
    Joanie nodded. “You’d be justified.”
    Yet something about that didn’t sit well, either. Why couldn’t life ever be easy?
    “It is a shame, though,” Joanie continued. “The girls could use a father.”
    Long-ago worry flared to life, setting a flurry loose in her stomach. “Why do you think that? Have they said something? I thought I was doing okay.”
    Joanie sat back and peered up at her friend, her face the definition of support. “You’re a perfect mother and you know it. But if anyone understands the frustrations of going through life without a father, it’s both of us. Neither of us ever had anyone around, and I’m sure you can admit that sometimes a girl just needs someone other than her mother to talk to.”
    “I know.” She tucked one hand beneath her thigh to keep from doing something childish like chewing on her nails, then she used the other to pick at a loose thread in the seam of her jeans. “But they have you. Don’t they come talk to you all the time? And I don’t butt in there. I give them the space I know they need.”
    “I know you do, sweetie.” Joanie reached up and tapped Lee Ann’s hand, stilling her movements. “You are the best mother I’ve ever seen. Honestly. I’m simply saying that sometimes...” She gave Lee Ann an “I’m sorry” look. “Sometimes having a male around would be good. They’d see the world from both sides of the coin.”
    Lee Ann hated when Joanie made sense. Lee Ann was the practical one. The one everybody sought out in a crisis. Joanie was...well, the flake. She was the one who jumped between businesses more often than most people did cars, and who had the audacity to name her latest venture Curl Up ’N Dye. But she had always been a pillar for Lee Ann when she needed one.
    They lapsed into more silence, each lost in her own thoughts, until a sound at the door got their attention several minutes later. Both women looked up to find Cody’s dog sitting onhis haunches, staring in through the glass. His owner stood directly behind him.
    Crap.
    Though the “Closed” sign hung over the bar across the middle of the door, it was easy enough to see the place wasn’t empty.
    “What do you think he wants?” Lee Ann asked.
    Joanie swung back around to her, one corner of her mouth lifting in distaste. “My guess? To have that conversation.”
    The door wasn’t locked, so neither of them rose to let him in. Instead, they waited to see what he would do next. It didn’t take him long to decide. With a couple quick moves, he produced a portable bowl and a bottle of water from the inside