“At Lowe’s. The best place in the world. Well, other than the plant store. And my favorite dive karaoke bar.”
Dell released a shudder at even the idea of a Portland dive karaoke bar.
“So not actually the best place in the world, then.”
“Oh, shut it.” But it wasn’t even said with much heat. Dell told himself he didn’t find that somewhat disappointing.
But he bit back a smile when he heard her mumble, “I bet you love the lighting aisle, too.”
Ignoring that—so what if he did?—he led them around a corner to his favorite spot.
“Here.” He nodded to the shelves in front of them. “This is all their remainders and reclaimed. Leftovers, odd sizes, things that don’t fit elsewhere. Stuff recycled from somewhere else. I normally get wood for my pieces from somewhere in this corner. Probably not the best place to get what we actually need for your shelves, since we’ll need enough for consistency. But you can look around and tell me if there’s anything that speaks to you.”
The corner of remainders at the lumberyard wasn’thisvery best place. That would be his house, followed by Luca’s cabin, followed by the stretch of sand at the state park up the road from Greyfin Bay where he took his morning runs, more rugged and less crowded than Greyfin Beach.
Still, this corner of the world was up there.
Mae leaned down, picked up a square chunk of reclaimed cedar to examine it.
“Your pieces? You mean the things you make in your workshop?”
As Dell made another hum of assent, a glint of gold caught his eye. Leaning down to the bottom shelves had finally knocked the chain she always wore free from the confines of her T-shirt. It was possible he’d spent an embarrassing amount of time wondering what kind of pendant hung from that chain, always locked away underneath fabric, resting on top of her skin.
He saw now that there were actually several pendants, all tiny, all gold, knocking against each other in a petite bundle. It was difficult to make out what they were, they were so small and intricate, and he needed to stop staring at her chest, like, pronto, but if he could only shift an inch closer?—
Flowers. The pendants were, of course, flowers.
“What kind of things do you make?” Mae, blessedly, was still examining the block of cedar.
Dell shrugged, blinking away.
“Small things easy to ship, these days. The question is”—he lifted a board of red oak—“What’s your plan for the shelves? I’d imagine you want them pretty uniform. Do you want them painted? Stained?”
Mae bit her lip.
“I was originally thinking they’d be all white. I want the store to look bright and clean, you know? But now that you’re making them, and we’re here…” She placed the hunk of cedar back on the shelf. She took a minute before she spoke again. “This is all so beautiful. I don’t think I want to paint them anymore. Just show the natural wood, you know? And maybe they don’t have to all be uniform, either.”
Dell nodded. He liked the sound of that.
He liked the sound of that a lot.
“How thick were you picturing the shelves themselves?” he asked, already plotting.
“Maybe…” Dell determined he should just stop looking at Mae at this point. Being that she was clearly going to be chomping on that damn lower lip for the entirety of the trip. Being that her eyes lighting up over reclaimed wood was too much for him to handle just then. “Not super thick on the shelves themselves, but maybe we could get some of these thicker reclaimed pieces for floating shelves that I could put on the wall next to the counter? To display cards or candles or whatever other merchandise we’ll feature. Or to display picture books in the children’s area.”
Things we’ll feature.Most of the time, Mae used the singular when talking about the shop.I’ll put the children’s area over here.But sometimes she slipped into thewe. And Dell always wondered what that meant, exactly. Who theweentailed.
Because he was pretty sure her graphic designer friend back in Portland wasn’t planning on moving to Greyfin Bay any time soon.
“I like that,” he said out loud this time. Floating shelves with reclaimed wood were always, in his opinion, a good idea. He liked picturing 12 Main Street full of natural wood. Maybe it would offset the hipster wallpaper enough that the rest of Greyfin Bay wouldn’t hate it, either.
In the end, they grabbed a variety of remainder and reclaimed pieces, for either floating shelves or Dell’s own projects; he’d keep track of the receipts. After lusting after some mahogany for a while, Mae ended up choosing a gorgeous knotty alder for the actual bookshelves. She’d truly been sold when a worker who happened to amble by told her it was more sustainable than other hardwoods, being more abundantly in supply, especially in western Oregon. At which her eyes had gone wide in gratitude. “Oh, good. Oh damn, I wasn’t even thinking about that.” And then, to Dell, eyes serious: “I’m not setting out to have some, like, ancient redwood kind of shelving in my store, you know? I don’t want any part of that shit.”
To which Dell found himself laughing.
“George is right,” he assured her. “Alder’s a sustainable choice.”
“Perfect,” she said, eyes steeling in resolve. “Let’s go spend a shit ton of Jesus’s money on some alder.”
