The Spring of Candy Apples (A Sweet Seasons Novel) Read online

  Isn’t this just the generic site?

  Yeah, but look for a little picture of an umpire at the bottom.

  Found it.

  Click on him.

  Candace did as instructed and it took her to a page titled Referee News and Updates. The whole thing was jam-packed with information and featured a huge banner across the top that said “Don’t forget to get your Irish on!”

  Wow.

  Yup. Now you know.

  Wish I’d known sooner.

  Sorry.

  So, how are those rehearsals going? Any problems?

  Ha ha. Not telling U what R talent is.

  Pretty please.

  Not even for sugar on top.

  Meanie.

  A new IM window suddenly popped open. Candace stared at it for a moment in surprise. She fired off a quick message to Josh.

  Kurt wants to talk. Fill U in l8r.

  Good luck.

  She switched back to Kurt’s window and the sentence that was making her shake:

  Can we talk?

  OK, she typed.

  I’m sorry.

  4 what?

  U no.

  Tell me.

  Breaking up.

  In IHOP?

  Anywhere.

  Oh.

  Candace could feel her heart pounding. What was Kurt trying to say? Her mouth was dry, and she couldn’t help but think of the conversation with Becca. What if Kurt wanted to get back together? Would that be the wrong thing to do?

  Wanna get back together?

  Maybe, she typed. It was a lame answer but it was the best way to draw out the conversation and give her time to think, and maybe get some answers from him.

  Why maybe?

  Why back together?

  Miss U.

  Miss U 2.

  Then why maybe?

  We want different things out of life.

  So?

  That makes things complicated.

  Complicated isn’t necessarily bad.

  No, but it’s . . . complicated.

  Candace stared at the screen, frustrated. This would be easier if they could talk face-to-face or at least over the phone. The texting was a buffer, though, for both of them. We probably need it, she thought.

  Do you love me?

  She jumped as she read his text. When they had been dating neither of them had even mentioned the L word to each other. Now he wanted her to answer without first declaring for himself. That had to be cheating.

  I care for you, she typed.

  Not the same thing.

  No, it’s not.

  So, you don’t love me?

  No, do you love me?

  I don’t know. Not sure what love is.

  At least that’s honest.

  {shrugs}

  So what’s the point?

  I don’t know . . . but I’d like to try again.

  A sudden suspicion filled her.

  Is this about your sister getting married?

  No. Why?

  You dumped me 10 min after telling me she was getting married. Now the wedding’s getting close and u wanna make up.

  Forget it.

  No . . . U started this.

  There was no reply. Candace waited for a full minute before asking the question she really wanted the answer to.

  Why did U break up with me?

  I can’t be the guy you want. I’ve tried, but I can’t.

  I’m sorry.

  Me 2.

  Kurt signed out, and Candace just stared at the screen. This was what closure felt like, and it felt rotten. She closed the window and saw the conversation she’d been having with Josh. His status indicated he was still on line.

  Still there?

  Always. U OK?

  I think it’s over over with Kurt.

  Sorry or congratulations?

  Both, I think.

  Then consider yourself commiserated with and congratulated.

  Will do.

  Need me 2 come over?

  Yes, but I should go 2 bed instead.

  Cool enough. C U tomorrow.

  Hasta.

  Ciao.

  8

  Candace arrived at The Zone and stared at the sea of green that greeted her. All the referees were wearing green shirts. Most of the players wore green as well. In case anyone didn’t have enough green, the shops sold green T-shirts, green baseball hats, plastic hats, and shamrock jewelry and buttons galore.

  Mascots dressed as leprechauns handed out gold-colored coins. The coins could be used to buy things throughout the park. In order to get one, players had to solve a riddle posed to them by a leprechaun.

  She made it to the costume warehouse and managed to snag a shirt. She was wearing a green tank top just in case. The last thing she wanted was to be pinched on her way to the costume warehouse.

  Wearing an official green-striped ref shirt, she stowed her stuff in the Locker Room and headed for the Candy Counter. She slowed as she approached. Standing in front of the door, arms crossed over her chest, was Lisa.

  Candace briefly considered trying to slip past, but there was no way the other girl wasn’t waiting for her. Candace took a deep breath and halted three feet away.

  “Hello, Lisa.”

  “Candace.”

  “What do you want?”

  “I want you out of my way.”

  “From where I’m standing, you’re the one blocking the entrance.”

  “I’m talking about Kurt,” Lisa said, eyes blazing.

  “Look, Kurt and I have broken up. What more could you possibly want?”

  “Your head on a silver platter.”

  “Sorry to disappoint you, but I’m not John the Baptist.”

  “What?”

  “Never mind,” Candace muttered. “Look, it’s over, he’s free. Have at him.”

  “He’s still in love with you.”

  “No, he’s not,” Candace fumed. “And even if he were, that wouldn’t be my fault. Maybe instead of spending all your energy harassing me, you should spend a little bit on trying to win him over.”

  She stepped forward, every muscle tensed, and for a moment Candace thought Lisa was going to hit her.

  “Ladies, violence is never the answer,” Josh said, interposing himself smoothly between them.

  “What are you, her keeper?” Lisa asked.

  It was uncanny how many times Josh seemed to come to her rescue. Candace wondered if he had somehow managed to tag her with a GPS sensor.

  “Technically no, I’m my brother’s keeper. And let me tell you, that’s a job,” Josh joked.

  For one terrible moment Candace thought Lisa was going to hit Josh instead. Her own fists curled at her side. Turn the other cheek, she urged herself, even as she realized that if Lisa laid a hand on Josh she would drop kick her into the next Zone.

  “This isn’t over,” Lisa hissed.

  “But it should be,” Candace said, doing her best to keep her voice even. “Seriously, the only one standing in your way is you.”

  Lisa turned bright red and then turned and stalked away.

  “Thanks, Josh.”

  “It’s okay. Try not to let her bug you. I know she’s a pain and she makes you miserable, but imagine how she must make herself feel.”

  “You’re right. I wouldn’t want to be in her twisted, angry shoes.”

  Josh chuckled. “I’m sorry, I like that. Angry shoes. Quite an image.”

  Candace smiled. “Thought you’d like that.”

  Candace went inside the Candy Counter and was soon up to her elbows in green candies and pastries. A pastry bag filled with green icing exploded in her hands, and she was still covered in it when a group of leprechauns entered the store.

  “Top of the morning to you,” one of the leprechauns said.

  “But it’s afternoon,” Candace said.

  “Top of the afternoon doesn’t sound as good,” another leprechaun pointed out.

  “We could try top of the evening,” a third s
aid.

  The whole thing would have been hysterically funny if Candace hadn’t had a pounding headache.

  “Sorry guys, I’m having a bad day,” she said.

  “We can make it brighter,” the first one assured her.

  “You know the history of leprechauns, right?” the second asked.

  “I can’t say that I do,” Candace answered.

  “Ah, leprechauns are tricksters.”

  “Really. And we have a wonderful trick for you.”

  “What?” Candace asked, taking a step back.

  The third leprechaun handed her a small cylindrical bit of metal. “We promised Lisa that we would deliver this to you, a gift from her to you.”

  “What is it?” Candace asked as she took it from them.

  The first two shrugged, tipped their hats, and left the store. The third one hesitated. “I don’t know for sure,” he admitted, dropping the Irish accent. “But it looks to me like a stem cap for the air tube on a tire.”

  Candace felt sick in the pit of her stomach. She looked at it more closely. It did look like that.

  “She better not have hurt my parents’ car,” Candace whispered through clenched teeth.

  “Do you want to send a message back?”

  Did she ever. She was pretty sure if she did, though, she would get fired. “No message,” she said.

  As soon as her break arrived Candace headed for the parking lot. Sure enough, the left front tire was completely flat and missing its stem cap. She heard someone walking nearby and she turned to ask for help.

  Her heart sank when she realized it was Kurt. He looked at her in surprise.

  “Do you need help?” he asked, eyes moving from her to the tire.

  “Yes, please.”

  “I’ve got a compressor in my car, I’ll get it,” Kurt said.

  Candace nodded.

  He was back in a minute, and soon the tire was filling with air.

  “Did you run over anything?” he asked.

  “No, but I have a pretty good idea what happened,” Candace said grimly as she handed him the stem cap.

  “Do I want to know?”

  “Probably not, but you deserve to know. Lisa did it.”

  “Lisa. Why?”

  “She blames me for the fact that the two of you aren’t a couple.”

  “But that has nothing to do with you.”

  “So I’ve tried telling her. Somehow, though, even though we broke up, I am apparently standing in her way.”

  Kurt’s face darkened. “I’ll have a talk with her,” he said.

  “Thank you.”

  Kurt finished inflating the tire, replaced the stem cap, and stood up. “So, have you reconsidered what we were talking about last night?” he asked.

  She swallowed. He was standing less than a foot from her and pinning her with his magnetic eyes. She was still attracted to him, there was no denying it. For just a moment she thought about closing her eyes and kissing him. It would be easy. But six months down the road we’d be right back here.

  “Can you look me in the eyes and tell me that you and I will ever be right together?” she asked.

  He stared deep into her eyes, looked like he was about to say something, and then turned his head away. “No,” he whispered.

  “Then I think it’s time we stop trying to pretend for ourselves and each other.”

  He nodded. “You’re right. Well, I guess this is it.”

  “Yes.”

  “Thanks, Candace. I’ll never forget you.”

  She felt herself begin to tear up, but she refused to cry in front of him. “Same here.”

  She thought about hugging him, but it just didn’t feel right. She wasn’t sure they would ever really be friends. They had never been on that path, and something told her they never would.

  The irony was that they had been dating for almost a year, and she felt like she hardly knew him. There had been instant attraction between them, but not much else. She hadn’t even realized he’d had a sister until a few days before. She wondered if he knew any more about her than she did about him. They were a couple of strangers who fell for each other but remained strangers until the end.

  As she watched him walk across the parking lot, she whispered, “Who was that masked man?”

  The next afternoon, Kurt, The Zone, and Lisa seemed worlds away as Candace stood on stage trying to capture the spirit of Aldonza.

  “Better, now take it from the beginning and remember to project your voices,” Mr. Bailey instructed.

  Keith, who was playing Don Quixote, groaned. Next to him, Reed, playing sidekick Poncho, made a face. For once Candace smiled at Mr. Bailey’s direction. She might have trouble with blocking, emoting, and remembering her lines, but she had no trouble projecting. She could bounce her voice off the back wall of the auditorium. It was an unexpected and happy result of her extensive practice with screaming at the top of her lungs. She and Tamara had played a screaming game as children that had come in handy during The Zone’s Halloween events. Tamara didn’t have any problem projecting her voice either. Compared to the two of them, it was as though everyone else in the play was whispering.

  “How do you do that so well?” Keith asked.

  “You have to speak from your gut instead of your throat,” Candace said. “It’s like putting more force behind the words, but not shouting. The goal is to make the person in the back of the room hear you.”

  “I’ll never get it,” Reed said.

  “Sure you will. Probably about five minutes before the curtain goes up opening night,” Candace teased.

  “You’re in a good mood,” Keith noted as they took their places for the beginning of the scene.

  “I’m actually kinda enjoying this,” Candace admitted. No one could be more surprised than her by that. She was starting to get more comfortable with the play. It helped tremendously when she started looking at the deeper meaning of the stories, the characters, and their motivations.

  On the surface, Man of La Mancha seemed like a story about a crazy guy who lived in a fantasy world. The story was a lot more intense than that, though. It was about knowing who you were, personal integrity, and fighting to improve the world and the lives of those around you. They were all themes that intrigued her.

  She was really beginning to relate to Aldonza. On the surface, they had nothing in common. From an emotional standpoint, though, they were both struggling to understand who they were and what they wanted out of life. Don Quixote gave Aldonza the courage to change. She felt like in her life The Zone had done that for her. She was a very different girl than the one who had taken a summer job there. She was getting used to the changes and starting to enjoy them.

  Tamara had been right all along. It was better to embrace the spotlight, especially when you seemed to be stuck in it.

  Candace closed her eyes and took a deep breath, allowing herself to become Aldonza. She opened her eyes and saw Don Quixote and Pancho instead of Keith and Reed.

  “Action!”

  They ran the scene again and finished just before the bell rang. “Great job everyone. See you tomorrow,” Mr. Bailey said.

  Candace hopped off the stage instead of taking the stairs and smiled at Tamara.

  “You are in a good mood,” Tamara confirmed.

  “Life is great.”

  “Good. I like you like this, all up and hyper.”

  Candace snorted. “I’m not hyper. Hyper is Becca.”

  “No, insane is Becca. She’s a dot to hyper.”

  “Fair enough.”

  “So, wanna do something tonight?”

  “I thought you had plans with James?”

  “He’s got a late meeting,” Tamara said, making a face.

  “Aw the hazards of dating a businessman,” Candace teased.

  They headed for Tamara’s car. “Every once in a while there’s a harsh reminder that he’s not a student,” she admitted.

  “How have your parents been coping with the fact that you�
��re dating an older man?”

  Tamara smirked. “Pretty well. They think James is all that.”

  “Don’t you?”

  “Of course I do,” Tamara said, rolling her eyes. “It just sucks when they gang up on me.”

  Candace laughed at the image. “Wow, your parents must really like him.”

  “Love him. I mean, think about it. He’s mature, responsible, patriotic, and a Chris tian. He has a career, and he comes from money, so they know he’s not a gold digger. He isn’t snooty either, which of course they like. On top of that he’s crazy about their daughter and hasn’t tried to punch out any of the insane relatives. What’s not to love?”

  “Well, when you put it like that, I’m surprised your mom isn’t picking out china patterns,” Candace teased.

  “Who says she’s not?”

  “Are you kidding?” Candace asked as she climbed into Tamara’s car.

  “No. It’s cool, though. James knows I don’t want to get married until I’m twenty-one. That gives us three years to date.”

  “Either that or it gives your mom three years to plan a wedding,” Candace said.

  “Don’t joke. I’m not your average teen. I know what I want out of life, and I know who I am. I love James, and I’m going to marry him. There’s no need to rush that.”

  “You don’t think he’s going to get tired of waiting?” Candace asked. “After all, he’s older, probably ready to settle down.”

  “Please. If a man really loves you, he’ll wait as long as it takes. Look at Jacob in the Bible. He had to work for fourteen years to be able to marry Rachel. Real men don’t give up because things are difficult or take time.”

  It was probably one of the most profound things she had ever heard Tamara say, and she was quiet a minute as she thought about it.

  “Earth to Candace, you still with me?” Tamara asked finally.

  “No, I’m here. Just thinking, that’s all.”

  “Cool, while you’re thinking, tell me where we should go tonight.”

  “Let’s go to The Zone. I haven’t eaten dinner there in months,” Candace said.

  “Okay. I think you’re crazy for wanting to go to work on your downtime, but who am I to complain? Besides, I’ve been meaning to get my season ticket holder trading card.”

  “I’ve seen it. It looks good.”

  “What, do they use the same picture as they do for the ID?”

  “Yeah.”

  Tamara rolled her eyes. “I had hat hair that day. Surely we can do better than that.”