Leaving Normal by Stef Ann Holm Read Free Book Online Page A

a different sort of "man" had she been given the chance.
    * * *
    Fred Miller drove the 1997 Ford Econoline van with
Hat and Garden
scripted in pink across the side. The big gas guzzler was filled with flower arrangements, and the interior air was perfumed like a hothouse.
    Absently, he sniffed his shirtsleeve and wondered if he smelled like flowers. Hard to say. He detected a hint of starch from the dry cleaners where he had his shirt laundered.
    A Big Gulp sat in the drinks console, and as Fred turned the steering wheel, crushed ice inside the cup sloshed up against the lid. Dr Pepper was a second choice over what he really would have liked to be drinking. He wished he had been sent in the direction of Target; he would've made a quick pit stop for a white-cherry slushy, but Natalie had him delivering to southeast Boise.
    Glancing at the road map he'd printed from Natalie's computer, he checked the cross streets, signaled and proceeded. The subdivision was fairly new, kept up nicely but didn't have mature trees. A yard needed a bunch of mature trees in order to attract squirrels.
    Squirrels were God's gift to the retired.
    At sixty-one years old, he was amazed by how much he depended on those squirrels to entertain him. He had a big yard up on the Boise bench and he could sit out there for hours and watch them. His favorite thing to view was when they'd lift the lid off the peanut box and take a nut out. He had often wondered how they'd figured that out. How did they know that the lid could lift up? There were bite marks on it, little tooth scratches so, at one time, they had thought to gnaw their way through the wood. Then one of them must have been smart enough to figure out that the lid came up. It was something that would remain a mystery to him.
    Hell, he had time to figure it out. He was in no hurry.
    He'd rushed all his life delivering mail. It was always hurry up and go. Now that he'd been retired, he did everything slow. He got up in the morning slow, he read the paper slow, he dressed slow, he drank his coffee slow, he ate his lunch slow… Everything he could do, he savored and he enjoyed.
    Making flower deliveries for Natalie wasn't a full-time job and, after Christmas, he probably wouldn't be doing it as much. He was bothered by the fact that his daughter insisted on paying him. He would have helped her out for nothing.
    While working for her got him out of the house, he liked his off-days, when he could take his time with all that he had to do.
    Scanning the mailboxes for the correct address number, he pulled over to the curb. Shifting the gear column into Park, he pressed down on the brake. This van was a fuel monster compared to his Hyundai Elantra with its sporty sunroof.
    He loved his car.
    AARP said that when a man retired he needed to trade up to one of those big luxury cars. To hell with that. He wasn't a Cadillac kind of guy. Not even a Buick Century kind of guy. An economy car did him just fine, although there were those rare occasions when he caught himself getting in on the wrong side to operate it. Old habits died hard, and the older he got the more he regressed to the old days. He'd used the passenger side for so many years to operate a government Jeep, he sometimes forgot the right way to start up the Elantra. And damn if it didn't get his Dutch up when he did that.
    Stepping out of the van, he ambled to the back, opened the door and got the iris arrangement. The thick cluster of flowers were a deep purple-blue with yellow eyes. The card read:
     

     
    Sarah's handwriting couldn't find its way out of a paper bag it was so sloppy. All he could make out was the "C" of the last name. The rest was one big squiggly line.
    As Fred took the walkway up to the front door, he thought whoever sent Iris some irises was pretty clever.
    He punched the doorbell and waited for an answer.
    The door opened and a woman stood in the opening. At first glance he assumed she was younger than she was by the nice shape of