He left the room laughing again, having no idea what his father was talking about, because he surely didn’t know about Sumi or any of the goings-on with her shop, but he had been thinking of doing that exact thing all morning.
Now Grace was here, insisting that she had business to discuss that couldn’t wait.
“Can I make a suggestion without you biting my face off?”
Ranar rolled his eyes, turning to face the bubbly human, but said nothing, silently holding out a hand for her to continue.
“I think we all agree that you have to sell the building, that’s the best choice.”
“Gosh, Grace. Thanks for weighing in with an opinion on that decision that has absolutely nothing to do with you. I’m glad I have your approval.”
“But moving past that,” she continued giving him a sapphire glare, “I think you should keep paying your business taxes. Don’t dissolve your LLC. Dump the property taxes, for sure, but the business . . . Ranar, youcanmake this work. The weddings alone —“
“The weddings aren’t enough, Grace.”
“Will youpleaselet me finish? I know you think this means you just have to throw in the towel and start selling peanuts on the side of the road, but you’re actually being kind of ridiculous.“ She glared.
“I was actually going to sell little journals bound with my molted skin. I was going to call it the Necronagacon.”
“Anyway. You know I have the contract for the Fall Festival. This coming year I was going to try to get the summer carnival as well. Cal is like a shark. He got a little taste of blood in the water, now he’s on a feeding frenzy. This is between you and me, no one outside staff knows anything yet, but we’ve already broken ground on an indoor facility. It’s going to bebeautiful. Log cabin style, with a wall of glass that looks out over the hills and the lake.”
She paused for maximum dramatic effect, and Ranar crossed his arms, wishing she’d get on with it.
“He wants to be able to compete with Enoch over at the winery for the winter events. That’s my focus this year. He wants me to hire in someone to run the CSA so that I can put all my energy into building the wedding business.”
“Congrats. That’s amazing. Dideveryone I know conspire to make me feel like a failure this week, or is it just a coincidence?”
“Oh mygods, Ranar. Just think of allll those winter weddings and banquets. This is what I do. This is whatyoudo. Having an in-house florist would be a huge win for me, and it would be a win for you, too. I know bitching about them is one of your favorite pastimes, but I also know that you secretly lovedoing weddings. You don’t want to admit being a masochist, but Iknowyou love them. We can put together packages, pre-designed based on your specs to streamline the workflow. And what have you always told me? Wedding season pays for the winters. Think about it. You’ve already been working your ass off every summer, it’s not like that would be something new. Let’s say it takes a year or two for our winter business to solidify, even though I promise that won’t happen. You can take the winters off until I start booking, actually get to spend time with Ruma when she comes home for vacation. The two of you can take a trip together, not worry about work.”
She was playing dirty. There was nothing that he would like to do more than escape the cold winters in Cambric Creek, even if only for a week or two, and Grace knew it. And hedidlove doing weddings. The work was methodical, and he loved having one singular concept to unify.
“Pleasethink about it. And we would keep the name! The name recognition is half of what I want — special events at Saddlethorne Farm, flowers by The Perfect Petal. Two multigenerational family businesses, born and bred right here in Cambric Creek. You know people love shit like that.”
“So I’m going to have to, what, work in the rain next to the pigpen putting together table arrangements?”
“You work at home. In the design room.”
They both turned at the sound of his mother’s voice, serpentining around the corner. Her hands were tightly clasped in front of her already, swaying from side-to-side in excitement, and he knew he was beat.
“You know we don’t even use that big family room since you and Nisa moved out. What is it doing? Just sitting empty. We can turn it into a workroom for you to do these events. You need to start thinking about yourself, Ranar. I know it’s easier to take care of us, but you need to take care of yourself as well.”
You need to find someone to take care of you for a change.If only it could be as easy as Pinky made it sound. Grace was right. It would be a huge win for her not having to contract in work for her events, and an all-inclusive wedding package including flowers would be a desirable bonus.Andyou won’t have to learn to be a short order cook at the diner or sell peanuts on the side of the road outside Cockatrice games. That’s a plus.
The business was barely worth the property taxes, but the property itself would ensure his parents would be taken care of for the rest of their years. The building would ensure that he had a paid-for roof over his head and a few years to fuck around and figure out what was next without depleting his savings.This is what’s next. You don’t need to burn money fucking around if you’re doing this.
Instantly, the wheels began turning. “We can set it up exactly like this place.” All three of them looked around, as if they were committing the space to memory. As if he would need to. He had spent more time in this room than he had probably in any other room in the world. “Mom, we could make it look exactly like this. The same layout. I can have this table brought over, with the same cut marks that have always been here. We can put the extra coolers in the garage.”
“The zoning —“
“Fuck the zoning,” he slapped his hand down against the counter to make his point, wincing when his mother smacked him with a rolled up newspaper.
“Language in front of a lady!”
“The zoning won’t be a problem,” Ranar went on. “Jack wouldn’t dare give me an issue about anything else, and if he does, I will deny it to his face. ‘What are you talking about, this is home therapy.’ We can do this. We can make it so that dad still has this place to come to every day. And, you know, I’ll be able to feed myself. That helps.”
“And if you need extra space for really big events, I can figure something out on site—“
“He can borrow space from his girlfriend.”
