Read Online Josie Day Is Coming Home by Lisa Plumley - Free Book Online Page A

sensible was a reaction to seeing Jenna
or anything, Josie assured herself as she approached the customer service
counter. Her perfect sister didn’t have a thing to do with it. She just wanted
to make sure she’d have hot water later. For a shower. Or a bubble bath. Or a
Cup O’ Noodles for dinner. That was all.
    Waiting in line, Josie stared at the utility company’s
public service advertising. A poster about cost per kilowatt hours hung to her
left. Another explaining low-flow showerheads was tacked up beside it. She
tried to lose herself in the dancing water drop mascot pictured on the poster,
but it was no use. The same old question kept poking at her.
    Are you going to go see Mom and Dad ?
    The truth was, Josie didn’t know. If she was going to live
in the same town with them, maybe she might as well…. No. For now, the answer
was no. If her parents found out she was here in Donovan’s Corner, they could
track her down themselves. If they didn’t….
    Well, if they didn’t, at least then Josie would know where
she stood. Once and for all.
     
    The old-timers were the first to notice.
    In retrospect, Luke should have expected that. But he
hadn’t. He’d been too busy forking up his last bite of Frank’s famous cherry
pie when the hubbub started. By the time it spread to his rear-corner booth, it
was a full-on scandal—and all the retirees at Frank’s had front row seats.
    “You ever seen hair like that?” one of them asked.
    “No, sireee. ‘Cept in a movie.”
    “Me, neither.”
    “Desiree probably did it down at the salon,” Byron
Hill, Desiree’s husband, volunteered. “She’s always cooking up something
crazy for them gals. Says it’s ‘hair art.’”
    Skeptical chortles followed. Then nodding and murmuring took
over. Whatever they were looking at, it had them transfixed. Swallowing his
last bite, Luke gave in to idle curiosity. He squinted toward the diner’s big
plate glass window. He couldn’t see a thing past the clump of gray-haired male
retirees congregated in their usual booths.
    “That hair can’t be real,” one of them
said, pointing outside. “Not with a color like that.”
    Luke only knew one woman with unbelievable hair color. A
weird prickling sensation whooshed through him. He told himself it was probably
just a surge of impatience to be done with waiting for that one particular
woman to give up on Blue Moon. He motioned for his check.
    “Whoo-whee! Is that one of those belly button shirts?
I’ve seen ‘em on the Jerry Springer show, but—”
    “Not lookin’ like that, you haven’t.”
    A moment of silence. Then more murmuring.
    “Damn,” old man McKee said, mopping his brow with
a napkin.
    Luke consulted his scrawled-out guest check, then dropped a
five dollar bill on the table. Enough with the mystery. Nothing ever happened
in Donovan’s Corner. If he knew the locals, they’d probably spotted Marianne
Wilson on her recumbent bike. Any deviation from the norm passed for scandal
around here. He slurped the rest of his coffee in a single gulp.
    “Well, belly button shirt or not, it can’t beat those
shoes.” One of the retirees chuckled. “Those are the damndest things
I’ve ever seen. How do you think she stays upright?”
    “Ballast,” another retiree said knowledgably.
“Plenty of ballast.”
    A hushed appreciation of feminine “ballast”
followed.
    Luke, being male, deigned another look outside. He was as
big a fan of “ballast” as the next guy. And he had a sneaking
suspicion….
    “Will ya’ look at the way she walks?” Byron
sounded awed. “Just like Marilyn Monroe.”
    “Yeah,” breathed another retiree. “Or Jayne
Mansfield.”
    “Quit yer gawking, you old coot.” Luanne, the
waitress, whapped Byron upside the head. “You’ve got a wife at home. Or
did you forget?”
    “No. Sheesh.” Byron rubbed the back of his head.
    The rest of the men looked away for a minute, wearing
sheepish expressions. Then McKee pointed