Her Naughty Holiday

“Good luck this week,” Ruthie said, taking Clover by the arms. “Let me know what you decide about the nursery. I’d hate to lose my job here, but I’d also love to be friends with a millionaire, so whatever you choose, I’m on your side.”

“Soon as I know, you’ll know. Be safe.”

“If I have to.” Ruthie grabbed her jacket just as her father stuck his head through the office door.

“Hey, girls.”

“Sexist,” Ruthie said. “Try again.”

“Hello, ladies?”

“Elitist.” Ruthie pulled her jacket on and zipped it up. “One more try.”

Erick dropped his chin to his chest, and Clover covered her mouth to stifle a laugh.

“Greetings, my fellow Americans,” Erick said, his eyes rolled heavenward as if praying for patience.

“Better.” Ruthie nodded her approval. “But only because we are Americans. You can’t assume that about everyone.”

“Are you ready to go, Ruthless? Please say yes.”

“Ready,” she said. “Just let me refill my water bottle real quick.”

She walked out of the office with her water bottle in hand, a normal errand but for the little wink she gave Clover as she walked past.

“How are you, Erick?” Clover asked, hoping that question didn’t sound as awkward to his ears as it did to hers. Now that Ruthie had planted the idea in Clover’s head of asking Erick out, she was having trouble making eye contact with him. And that was too bad. She really liked his eyes.

“I’m good. Ready for a few days off this week. You?”

“I hate days off,” she said, sitting on top of her desk. “I’m about to get too many of them for my taste now that we’re closed for the winter.”

“Will you be climbing the walls by Tuesday?”

“No, but check on me again in late January when I’ve run out of busywork,” Clover said. “Takes me a couple months to remember how to be lazy.”

“It wouldn’t take me nearly that long. But hey, thanks for giving Ruthie the whole week off. I know you could use the help cleaning up and locking things down.”

“It’s fine. She needs to see her mom and everything we have to do can wait until Ruthie gets back. I won’t be in much this week, anyway. Gets too lonely around here when she’s gone.”

“Tell me about it. I’ll be going nuts this week, too. Clean bathroom? No dishes in the sink? No bras hanging off the shower door? God, why doesn’t my kid leave more often?”

“You know you’ll miss me,” Ruthie said from the doorway.

“I do?”

“You do,” she said, punching him in the arm. “Come on, I’m ready as I’ll ever be.”

“You got everything?” Erick asked as he raised his hand to tick items off on his fingers. “Meds. Phone. Charger. Your homework. Sunscreen.”

“A Taser, a laser, a can of mace, an actual mace, a hunting knife, yes, yes, yes. I have everything I need for a week in LA. Let’s go, Pops, we’re going to be late.”

“Bye, dear,” Clover said. “Have fun or whatever it is that you do that’s like having fun.”

“Thanks, Clo. I left Sven’s number on your desk.”

“Sven?” Erick repeated as he grabbed Ruthie by her jacket collar and led her from the office. “Who’s Sven?”

“Nobody,” Ruthie said. “Just a male escort I hired for Clover.”

“Is that in your job description?” he asked.

“Yeah, of course. What do you think I do here all day?”

“Your daughter is weird, Erick,” Clover called after them, considering moving back into her desk nest.

“You don’t have to tell me that. Have a good Thanksgiving,” he said, gently force-marching Ruthie out to his truck.

“You, too,” she said. After Erick and Ruthie had gone, Clover forced herself to reply to her two emails.

To the first—the five-million-dollar buyout offer she’d received from PNW Garden Supply’s CFO—she replied with a simple I’ll let you know on Monday. Happy Thanksgiving.

To her sister’s email she replied with a smiley face emoji and a Great! Can’t wait to see everyone!

She made sure to fill the email with unnecessary exclamation points to mask her incredible sense of dread about the whole shebang. All her family—her parents, two siblings, their spouses and seven kids under one roof for an entire day? There was not enough punctuation in the world to fake how much she was not looking forward to that.

Kelly replied to the email almost immediately.

Mom wants to know if we’re going to be meeting anyone special on Thursday, Kelly wrote.

Clover picked up a trowel and considered stabbing her laptop with it so she wouldn’t have to reply.

Instead she simply ignored the email and got to work cleaning. Potting soil and wheelbarrow went into the storage shed. Ferns back into the greenhouse. It wasn’t the right time of year to trim a lemon tree so she moved it to the opposite corner of the office where it could spread out a little more until she could trim it down again to a more indoor-friendly size. And all the while she thought about what she would do with five million dollars and all the free time anybody could want.

Five million was a lot of money. Not enough to buy the world but plenty to go into her retirement account and leave enough to start a new company. But with the noncompete clause in the PNW Garden Supply offer, she wouldn’t be able to start another nursery in Oregon. She could move to Northern California and open a nursery there. Then again, that’s where her parents lived, which meant instead of hearing about how she needed to get married and have kids ASAP and STAT on major holidays, she’d hear it every single week.

Or she could stay in the Mount Hood area and open a landscaping business. Not quite as much fun as a nursery but it was still working with plants. Or she could take a few years off. Or she could move to Hawaii. Or Alaska. Or she could spend the money on male escorts for the next five years.

“You are not calling Sven,” Clover said to herself. “Even if he is half-off this week.”

Clover went to the sink and considered sticking her head under cold running water until she calmed down or drowned. Either would be preferable to her current confused, miserable and muddled state of mind. Instead she just washed all that potting soil off her hands with her lava soap and a nail brush. As she was drying her hands she saw headlights in the parking lot. After six already? She couldn’t believe so much time had passed that it had gotten dark. She needed to head home and get to work cleaning her house. The deck needed to be cleaned off, too, in case the weather was clear enough to grill outside or use her fire pit for s’mores. Her nieces and nephews would make s’mores over that fire pit in the middle of a snowstorm if their parents would let them. She better get someone to fix the loose boards by the pit.

So much to do, so little desire to do any of it.

“Knock, knock.”

Clover turned around and saw Erick sticking his head in through the workroom door.

“Oh, hey,” she said, tossing her hand towel on the counter. “What’s up?”