“I’m not bitter about it, Mom, I’ve told you before. Besides, one of these days someone will make an offer on the practice and we can start looking for that condo for you back in Seattle, too. I thought Tommy would have had a few queries by now but it is what it is. And to answer your other question, I like being on my own. Nobody to take half the bed, or sneak the last piece of toast from my plate, or complain that I leave the toilet seat up. Admit it, I’m a confirmed bachelor and you need to get used to it.” He picked up his stethoscope from his desk and looped it around his neck thinking of the best excuse to end the conversation, but she was having none of it.
“David, you don’t want to spend your life alone. I want grandchildren. When you put your dreams on hold in Seattle to take over your father’s practice, I hoped you’d find a local girl, fall in love, marry, and start a family. You’d be a great father. Everyone says so. Look at how you are with little Connie. I want that for you, darling. I want that for me.”
“I don’t want to get involved with someone and lose them when I have to move again because as much as you might like to think differently, that’s still the plan. I remember all too well what happened last time.” Everyone thought he was heading for parenthood expect the woman he had hoped to marry. “Put on hold then, and that’s the problem now. I’m still on hold until I sell the business. Sorry, Mom. I have to go. Patients are waiting. Talk to you later.”
He hung up the phone even though she continued to protest. How could it still hurt after all these years? Elise had been the love of his life. Both doctors interning together, he thought they had everything ahead of them. Work hard, climb the medical professional ladder and be the best in their chosen field. Make a name for themselves.
Until his mother called him home. It seemed that Elise’s goals were more important than the love they felt for each other and the future they’d planned out. Nothing like being dumped for a spot at a top private practice to show him he was better off alone. It was a valuable lesson he wouldn’t forget in a hurry, and the underlying reason he wouldn’t fall for anyone until he was settled where he wanted to be.
No chance of being hurt that way again. With his humiliation and his father’s battle with cancer, it’d all been too much to deal with. David’s mind gave him the same advice he’d give a patient. It might hurt now but it will get better. Trust me on this. But his heart didn’t agree. He’d given too much to his relationship with Elise and now he didn’t have anything left for anyone else.
Certainly not for a wild-haired hippy girl with ideas that didn’t gel with his own.
Chapter Ten
Saturday was her first full day in the shop and April couldn’t be happier. She’d made sales, met new friends, had queries about her decorating service thanks to the lovely display in the front room, sold some recycled products, and things could only get better from here. Wildflowers and Lace was now a working business on its way to stupendous success if she had any say in it. Her father would be proud of her. April would make sure of it. Plus, she’d managed to get most of the kitchen painted last night and tomorrow she planned on doing the bathrooms ready for Monday morning. Everything was coming together so well.
“They’re gorgeous, aren’t they?” April handed the bunch of flowers to the young man standing in front of her. He’d come in with bright red cheeks and stumbled out his request just as she’d started closing the shop.
“Some flowers for my girl, please, that don’t cost too much but look real pretty.”
She’d shown him an arrangement of roses threaded through with baby’s breath and shiny green leaves but it was the button daisies that made him smile. “I’ll take the white ones, please.”
April had wrapped them in pretty pink and white paper with a silver ribbon trailing around the stems, attached a card and watched him walk out the door with a spring in his step. A warm glow settled around her. This was the reason she wanted to open her shop in the first place. To make people happy with things she loved to share, the good feelings that everyone deserved and encourage love wherever she could. She could just imagine him handing the daisies over to his girlfriend and the smile that would lift her lips into a happy curl. The way they would hold hands and talk about their future together.
She picked up the loose leaf that had fallen from the posy when she was wrapping it and threw it in the trash can. It was time to bring in her wares from the sidewalk and get ready for the cookout.
As she looked at her closet for a dress to wear, she wondered if David would be there. It sounded like it was going to be quite a gathering from what her sister had said. The perfect opportunity to make new friends and contacts for her business. At last, after traipsing from place to place to chase the current dream, she felt like she was home, the place she wanted to put down long, deep roots and make her mark. Gone for her were the days of flitting from one thing to another. Not that her family would believe her but April had the perfect opportunity
