A New Hope Read Online Free PDF

girl, never found my niche. I’ve taken some college courses, never found a degree program. But boy, can I organize the house! And I know how to change the oil in the car, landscape the yard, bake a soufflé, hang wallpaper. The joke around the family is that since my mother has always been at the company, working with Dad, I am the only housewife in the family.”
    “Landscape? Ever have a garden?”
    “I rented a small house and planted flowers around the border.”
    “You’d like my mother’s garden,” he said.
    “I saw your mother’s garden. A small farm! Looking at it made me hungry!”
    “We grow things for a living,” he said with a smile. “What was your last job before coming here?” he asked.
    “I worked in a department store in the bridal registries. But I needed a change.”
    Then it came to him suddenly. “Jesus, what a dunce! Dysart Trucking!”
    “That’s right,” she said. “You’ve heard of them?”
    He grinned. “We use them, Ginger. They take our crops to market. They’re a good-size company.”
    “Locally,” she said. “My dad started with one truck.”
    “My grandfather started with a small grove and a few sheep and a lot of debt, but every time he had two nickels to rub together he bought more land.”
    “He invested in himself,” she said.
    “He invested in his sons. My dad has the grove and sheep and potatoes, Uncle Sal has grapes, Andreas has a couple of fishing boats. As you no doubt noticed, there’s quite a lot of family.”
    Then his phone vibrated in his pocket. He pulled it out and looked at it, sent the caller to voice mail, put it back in his pocket. Lucy. They’d gone out a few times. She’d like to go out a few more. Time to move on.
    “I don’t mind if you take that call.”
    “That’s okay, I’ll call back. So, everyone works in the trucking company...”
    “Except me. I’m willing to help out but I don’t have any talent for it, except maybe washing rigs.” She laughed. “I’m very good at all the things people don’t get paid much for—cooking and cleaning, that sort of thing. I suppose when my parents are very old and infirm and I’m an old maid, I’ll be the one to take care of them. And all your family is involved in the farm?”
    “No, only a couple of us. Peyton is here, Ginny and Ellie are homemakers and their husbands are not farmers, Mike will be a professor married to a professor, Sal is a CPA for a large winemaker in Napa. He’d like to buy a vineyard someday. I guess, named for Uncle Sal, it makes perfect sense. He’s good with numbers and has a very good nose. They’re all pretty successful. My parents pushed us hard.”
    Through dinner they talked about their families, some of their childhood experiences, what movies and books they liked. He told her he was a part-time teacher and she told him about her three best friends from high school and how they’d all left Portland for big careers. He made her laugh and he was mesmerized by her sweetness and charm. They had a cup of coffee but neither wanted dessert. Two hours had flown by. She told him that as apology dinners go, this was the best she’d ever had.
    “So,” he said, “what is it you like so much about this little town? Why do you want to stay?”
    “The people have been so lovely. And that flower shop—it’s perfect for me. I’m around people sometimes but I spend a lot of time alone, making up arrangements, cleaning up the cooler and back room. I need that time—time to think. But I shouldn’t have too much time or I get caught brooding.”
    “And what does a pretty girl like you have to brood about?” he asked, flashing his dimples.
    “Peyton didn’t tell you anything about me?”
    “Come to think of it, she told me you’d had a bad year and made me promise I wouldn’t be a wolf.”
    “Well, we have maybe a couple of things in common. I’m also divorced. Just over a year.”
    “Is that so? I’ll tell you mine if you tell me yours?”
    “You