Sweet Tibby Mack

Who was this woman? Cole shaded his eyes against the sun. And if the set of her shoulders and the twist of her lips were any indication, she didn’t like him.

“Hey, wait,” he called as she climbed into a woodsided station wagon and prepared to leave. “Have we met?”

“Blue moons ago, whiz kid. I’m Tibby Mack.” Slamming her door, she pushed the key into the ignition and gave it a twist. Tibby thanked her lucky stars that for once the wagon started without a sputter. “I hate to run, but I’m delivering May baskets to the residents. Then I have Pulaski’s dogs to feed and Mabel Sparks to take to the airport. Afraid you’ll have to get your caffeine fix elsewhere.”

Tibby Mack. Lara Mack’s granddaughter? Cole’s jaw nearly hit the asphalt. That skinny kid who wore pigtails and had braces on her teeth? Maybe the moss green eyes were familiar, but now they appeared in a whole different package. He hadn’t seen her for—what?—at least ten years. The summer he’d been a college sophomore. Hot stuff. Nineteen going on thirty. His friends had spent their spring break in Palm Springs. Gramps had wanted him to come to Yaqui Springs—and after all, Yale had paid for his education. If memory served Cole, his vacation hadn’t turned out half-bad. He’d met an “older woman” of twenty-five. A tennis instructor working the resort at Bogey Wells. She’d greatly enhanced his education—and not just in tennis.

Cole stared after the disappearing car. “Well, whaddaya know.” Though he hadn’t been back since, he’d spent most previous summers in Yaqui Springs. He remembered the year Tibby Mack had come to live with her grandmother. The kid had looked so lost and forlorn. Because Cole understood loneliness, he’d taken her fishing and given her rides on his moped—until she’d gotten one of her own.

Cole checked his watch. The store sign said she opened at eight. Was business so good she could take off on a whim? Not by the look of the big empty parking lot. It was all pretty much as Cole remembered, except for a new building Gramps must’ve put up. Even that needed a coat of paint. If Tibby’s eye was on progress, it didn’t show. Maybe she’d become the type to flit around living off inherited money because it was her due—like his mother, he thought bitterly. Old news, Cole reminded himself. No longer affecting him. Nor did anything about Tibby affect him.

Cole jerked his thoughts back to the mission that had brought him here—Joe Toliver’s letter. It’d come at the right time. Tired of traveling, he’d been giving serious thought to settling down and starting a family of his own. He even had a lady in mind. Cicely Brock, an actress. They got along well. Plus, when the two of them walked into a room, men stepped all over their tongues. A guy could do a lot worse.

Cole wasn’t going to let one rude woman deter his plans. He’d survey his grandfather’s property, then visit the committee who’d asked him here. Those old boys just might have themselves a first-class golf course.

BY THE TIME Tibby had finished delivering her fiftieth May basket, she’d nearly ground the enamel off her molars. If one more person brought up Cole O’Donnell’s name, she thought she’d scream. First of all, she didn’t see how anyone could forgive him for skipping his grandfather’s funeral, let alone roll out a red carpet for the man.

“Yoo-hoo, Tibby!” Henrietta Feeny came out onto her porch to collect the May basket hanging from her doorknob. “Tibby dear, have you heard the news?”

“What news, Henrietta?” Tibby fidgeted on the bottom step. She was afraid she knew exactly what Henrietta would say.

“Yale’s grandson is back in town.”

“Do tell. Amazing how fast bad news travels,” Tibby muttered.

“Bad? But he’s so handsome, dear.” The plump woman preened a bit. “Why, if I were thirty years younger…”

“Yes? And what about Fred?” Tibby knew that Henrietta and Fred had been married forty years. They still walked hand in hand when they came into the store.

“Oh, you know what I mean.”

“No, Henrietta, I don’t. Am I the only one who cares that Cole didn’t show up to pay his respects to his grandfather?”

“He couldn’t help it. The dear boy’s been working out of the country. Tibby, you have dirt on your dress. Will you have time to change before you open the store?”

“Change?” Tibby blinked. Her mind stalled on the information about Cole. How on earth did Henrietta know where he’d been? Was there a full moon or something? Her friends were acting very strange. Absently Tibby scrubbed at the spots on her skirt. “It’s honest dirt, as Gram used to say. I’ll put on a smock at the store. No one’ll notice.”

“Tibby, about those smocks. They were all right for Lara. But they make you look…frumpy.”

“Frumpy? Thanks a lot, and happy May Day, Henrietta. I wish I could stay for more hot fashion tips, but I’ve got a very full schedule today.”

“You shouldn’t do so much, Tibby. I’ll take Mabel into Palm Springs and get her to the airport.”

Tibby had almost reached the street, but the remark gave her pause. Henrietta’s eyes were so bad she had trouble telling red peppers from green; she certainly couldn’t identify traffic lights. And she probably hadn’t driven in five years. Far-fetched though it sounded, Cole O’Donnell had apparently cast a spell on the women of Yaqui Springs. Some of the women, Tibby corrected. She saw through him.

“I’m not doing too much, Henrietta,” Tibby said more gently, worried that the woman might truly take it upon herself to drive Mabel to the airport. “Maybe you should go in out of the sun. Drink a cup of chamomile tea.” Tibby checked over her shoulder after starting her car. Was Henrietta exhibiting some form of mild dementia? Ginkgo encouraged blood circulation to the brain. She made a mental note to bring her friend a supply at the earliest opportunity.

Before Tibby finished delivering the remaining baskets, she decided half the town needed ginkgo. Either that, or she needed the spring tonic. Men and women alike bubbled excitedly over Cole’s sudden appearance.

Tibby drove past the O’Donnell house on her way back to the store. She craned her neck and saw Cole surveying the property. At the funeral, she recalled, his mother had mentioned that he’d inherited virtually everything. Tibby’s stomach tumbled. Was he planning to sell Yale’s place?

To whom? she wondered. Since his land bordered hers, any sale concerned Tibby. If only she could swing buying twenty or so acres. Yaqui Springs expanded every year—it’d be nice to have space between the store and any new dwellings. Except for the nearby bird sanctuary and the state park, the smattering of retirement communities dotting the shores of the Salton Sea were loosely zoned. A few oldtimers like her grandmother and Yale had built permanent homes; most others lived in mobiles or prefab homes that had sprung up willy-nilly.

Tibby parked and got out. She didn’t understand how Cole could sell and never lay eyes on Yaqui Springs again. Everything that mattered to her was right here. Unlocking the door, she flipped the Closed sign around to read Open.

She stood there for a minute and drew in a deep breath. Thyme, rosemary and ripe oranges blended with the lemon oil Grandmother Mack had taught her to use lovingly on the old wood counters. To some the store with its many additions might look like a hodgepodge. To Tibby it was home—and had been since shortly after her tenth birthday, the spring her missionary parents died in a Brazilian mud slide. She loved every nook and cranny of the rambling house and the store. Both were solid structures. Safe.

Happy as she’d once been in Brazil, fond memories were overshadowed by the frightening pain of loss. People lived to a ripe old age in Yaqui Springs. As Tibby ran water for the coffee, she took comfort in that thought.

A group of coffee-bar regulars, townsmen who stopped to sample her special blend and her cardamon or poppyseed rolls before they went to play golf at Bogey Wells, arrived before the coffee finished perking. They seemed unusually ebullient—Cole O’Donnell again?—but Tibby was too busy catching up on her work to eavesdrop. Besides, the point of her newly installed tea-and-coffee bar was to run itself. Ideally people filled their own cups and bussed the tables afterward. She made fresh rolls and sandwiches daily, placing them in a refrigerated case for easy access. She’d installed a small microwave in the alcove for her patrons’ convenience. If she was busy in the office, pharmacy or beauty shop, folks were more or less left on the honor system. Lara Mack had operated on trust, and Tibby saw no reason to change.

Midway through the morning, after the men had gone, she busily wrapped tomato-and-sprout sandwiches for the lunch bunch. Justine Banks, Yaqui Springs’s resident artist, strolled in, passing through to what was once the store’s sunporch. Last year Tibby had made it a pharmacy of sorts. She carried Band-Aids, ointments and a number of simple holistic remedies.

“My hay fever’s acting up,” Justine called. “That elder-flower tea worked wonders. And Pete asked me to pick up another bottle of purple-sage mouthwash.”

“Really?” Tibby poked her head around the corner. “I thought you said he wouldn’t give up his commercial brand.”

Justine winked. “I said he didn’t want to give it up. There’s a difference. To convince a man, you have to work things around to where it appears to be his idea. Remember that advice, Tibby. Someday when you get married, you’ll find it useful.”

“Married?” Tibby wrinkled her nose. “Me? When would I find time for a husband? That’s supposing a candidate just dropped out of the sky.” Tibby stilled, recalling a time she’d dreamed of marrying Cole O’Donnell.

Justine plucked a few more items off the shelves and carried them to the counter. “Did you know the O’Donnell boy is back in town?” she asked casually.

Tibby rang up the purchases without comment “Your total is eight dollars and forty-nine cents, Justine.”

The older woman handed her a ten. “Yale’s house has been closed up for weeks. Did you leave a May basket there? Lilacs mixed with lemon balm would freshen musty rooms, say, if someone planned to stay at the house awhile.”

Crossing her arms, Tibby sent Justine a withering look. “Somehow I don’t picture Cole O’Donnell as the lilac sort. Lavender, to remind him of a French boudoir, maybe.”

“What’s gotten into you, Tibby? It’s unlike you not to be neighborly.”

“Yale was my neighbor. If you want to take Cole a bouquet, here’re the shears.”

Justine pouted. “I’m offering to watch the store while you take something over. It’ll do you good to get out more.”

Tibby stripped off her worn serviceable apron. “Thanks for the offer, Justine. Otherwise I’d have to close the store while I run Mabel to the airport. This way, I’ll have plenty of time to stop and feed Ariel’s hounds. I’ll be back to relieve you by three.”

“But, Tibby. That’s not what I—” Tibby moved very fast, and Justine was left looking bewildered.

All the way to the Pulaski house, Tibby fumed. A testament to how upset she was, she fed the hounds canned food, instead of the kibble Ariel had requested. Darn. Too late now. Genghis Khan and Alexander the Great licked their dishes clean and looked as if they’d start on her toes next. They wouldn’t, though; Tibby knew the dogs were lovable. “Good boys. Tonight we’ll run,” she promised, refilling both water bowls.

Every time she fed and exercised the hounds, Tibby thought about getting a pet for herself. Evenings, especially this past year, seemed unbearably lonely.

Escaping two large dogs who hadn’t laid eyes on a human all day wasn’t easy. Tibby tossed tennis balls across the yard and quickly ran out through the gate. Still panting, she started her car and drove the four blocks to Mabel’s neat double-wide mobile home. So help her, if Mabel mentioned Cole even once on this trip, no matter how innocently, she could darn well walk to the airport.

“Sorry I’m late.” Tibby hopped out and opened the back of the station wagon. She brushed aside flower petals before stowing Mabel’s suitcase.

“You’re not late, child. It’s sweet of you to do this. I don’t know what any of us would do without your selfless generosity.”