Follow My Lead Episode 27
“I wondered if you would mind keeping this on the counter for your customers to register their interest.”
Lydia brandished the clipboard with its printed sheet of neat columns.
Sylvia took it, squinting.
“So they add their name and e-mail address . . .”
“Or their full address if they don’t have an e-mail address,” Lydia replied.
Sylvia had found her reading specs now and reached for a pen from under the counter.
“Let me be first, to encourage everyone else.”
She filled in her details, then reached under the counter again, this time producing a jar holding screws and rubber bands.
She emptied them out and gave the glass a quick polish with a duster.
From a shelf behind her she drew pens out of a carton and popped them in the jar.
“There. We’re good to go.” Sylvia positioned jar and clipboard beside the till, then turned her gaze on Lydia.
“How will it work? Where will you get the news from?”
That was the big question.
“I’m hoping a lot of it will come to me by word of mouth.” Lydia grinned in mischief. “Or through you.”
Sylvia feigned offence.
“And here was me thinking we’d bonded over Michael Connelly.”
The doorbell pinged and Sylvia got ready to serve one of her regulars, but not before casting a last appraising look at Lydia.
“You seem different today. More energetic.”
Lydia smiled back at Sylvia.
“Maybe it’s because things are looking up work-wise. I sent off a few features ideas to some old contacts before I came out, which seem to have been well received.
“I’ve had a better idea for my novel, too. Forget romance. It’s going to be a thriller!”
Lydia was still grinning as she ambled along the road to the farm.
Sylvia was right, she thought. She did feel more like her old self. She’d even go so far as to say she was happy.
She had to be honest, though, and acknowledge that it wasn’t only because of the hopeful signs around her work.
The hour she spent doing yoga with Cyrus each morning always put her in a good mood.
She wondered what they would do once the weather became more unsettled. She would hate to miss out on it. It had become an important part of her day.
As had Cyrus himself, she realised.
And both of those notions, she realised, suggested a longer-term future here in Thornville.
But that was a thought for later, she decided, turning into the yard of the farm shop.
Her conversation with Tony was almost a rerun of the one with Sylvia.
As ever, she couldn’t leave without a leisurely browse of the shelves.
She picked up a jar filled with honey.
“That’s our summer blossom honey,” Tony told her. “Delicious on toast.”
“You keep hives here on the farm?” she asked.
He explained about how they moved their locations as the seasons changed, to allow the bees to forage for different nectar.
“Aren’t bees fascinating?” she said, impressed. “I’d love to learn more.”
Tony was ringing up her purchases on the till, but paused, a jar of honey in his hand.
“I could arrange for you to spend some time with our beekeeper, if you’d be interested.”
“That would be fantastic!”
She was almost out the door when he called her back.
“I’ve just remembered – I have our first item for your newsletter. Have you ever met Dawn?”
She had. Dawn was the shop manager, and the daughter of the family who ran the farm.
“She’s been running this place for the last five years or so, but she’s just heard she has a place to study medicine at uni.”
“Good for her. That’s quite a career pivot.”
“I know,” Tony agreed.
“She waited till she was certain it was what she wanted to do. But we’ll have to advertise for a new manager.”
“And you don’t fancy it?” she queried.
“Too much responsibility. Part time suits me.”
“I’m at my own career pivot point. Maybe I should apply for it myself,” Lydia joked.
Tony tipped his head.
“Why not?”
Lydia laughed.
“I’ve no experience, apart from a love of deli food.”
He shrugged.
“I don’t know how long you plan on staying, but you should think about it.”
“Maybe I should,” she muttered as she closed the door behind her.