Free Love All: A Novel by Callie Wright Page B

unopened mail he’d brought along, then placed it on the table and proceeded to ignore it.
    Hugh’s problems were reproducing at rabbit rate, and in his estimation they all led back to his wife. If Anne worked in Cooperstown, Hugh might have called her right then and the two of them could’ve met away from the house and everything the house seemed to bring with it: Anne’s father, a broken faucet in their bathroom, an infestation of flies in their basement. All of these things needed tending to, and Hugh supposed that’s what life was mainly about but, frankly, he needed a time-out from his life. When, for example, had he started noticing waitresses’ backsides?
    “Brewing a fresh pot,” Missy called from the bar. “Gorgeous day,” she said.
    Already spring, soon to be summer, and school would be out for the season. Hugh would be free to can beans and pickle cucumbers, play high-handicap golf on the nine-hole course at the north end of the lake, grow tomatoes in his backyard. Maybe this summer he really would get started on expanding Seedlings. He’d take seriously his meeting at Klawson’s Hardware this evening. He’d write down figures instead of just pretending to do math in his head. Building a larger school would mean more work—taking out a loan, hiring and training teachers—impinging on Hugh’s relatively relaxed schedule, but with Teddy off to college in the fall and Julia soon after, what else would he have to occupy him but Seedlings?
    Hugh watched Missy pour his coffee. She had been a waitress at the Doubleday since it’d opened, and Hugh had never seen her anywhere outside the restaurant—he wasn’t sure she even lived in Cooperstown—but she was such a fixture here that he felt like he knew her.
    “Do you live in town?” Hugh asked when she brought his coffee to the table.
    Missy produced a teaspoon from her apron. “Milford,” she said. “I drive in early and get back late. Might as well live here, I guess.” She laughed and Hugh smiled. He wanted to keep her talking but he couldn’t think of anything appropriate to ask. She didn’t wear a wedding ring, he noticed, and he wondered if that had always been the case.
    “Omelet’ll be right up,” she said, and Hugh nodded and thanked her and watched her walk away.
    “Read the paper yet today?” Randolph held up the Oneonta Star .
    Hugh smiled. “Not yet. Anything interesting?”
    “A few of my clients are in the police blotter, but that’s to be expected. How’s your wife holding up in the big city?”
    “I don’t even pretend to know what she does over there,” said Hugh.
    Randolph stood and collected his briefcase and newspaper and walked over to Hugh’s table. “I heard Anne’s mother passed away,” he said. “Terrible business.”
    “It is,” Hugh agreed.
    “Give her my best.”
    Hugh nodded and Randolph turned, crossed the restaurant, and stepped gingerly onto Main Street, shielding his eyes from the sun.
    When Missy set Hugh’s plate in front of him, Hugh said, “You want to join me?”
    He had not expected her to say yes, but she shrugged and pulled out the chair across from him.
    “I’m on break,” she called back to the kitchen. Then, to Hugh, “Mind if I smoke?” Missy produced a pack of Pall Malls from her apron and struck a match from a flimsy white book. Waving the cardboard match to extinguish the flame, Missy inhaled and exhaled, and Hugh, not wanting to offend her, resigned himself to the smell of smoke on his clothes.
    Missy said, “You run that school up on Mill Street, don’t you?”
    “That’s right,” said Hugh.
    Missy smiled good-naturedly, tiny lines circling her mouth and creasing her forehead. She was not unpretty.
    “They say it’s a good school.” She gestured with her cigarette. “Seedlings?”
    “Seedlings,” Hugh confirmed.
    “I don’t have any children. Nieces and nephews, but they’re in school over in Milford.”
    Hugh nodded. “We have a few kids from Milford.