a dozen or so lobsters crawling around on the ground. “I’ll pay for those,” I say quickly.
He follows my gaze and looks over his shoulder. “They’re fine.” He gives a casual shrug. “I was just bringing them to my mechanic. He’s doing a rush repair job on my car.”
“You pay for repairs with lobsters?” I ask, and head toward the escaping crustaceans.
He gives me a look that suggests I’m insane, but there’s a smile playing on his lips. “You’re obviously not from around here.” He walks with me, his long legs slowing to pace with my shorter ones. A cold breeze rushes over me, and goose bumps form on my skin as I fix the top button on my blouse. Has it been open all this time? Was that why his gaze lingered there a moment too long?
Oh, please, you are so not his type.
“You’re right. I’m not a local and where I’m from,” I pause and rub my thumb and index finger together. “we pay with this thing called money.”
“Money?” He scratches his head like he’s searching the recesses of his mind. “Oh, you’re talking about those strange coins called loonies and toonies.”
I laugh at his teasing. Hot and funny. That’s not something I come across every day—or ever. My field is dominated by serious men, but Nate here not only gives me all the girly tingles, he makes me want to flirt back. Too bad I’m not very good at it.
“Sometimes we even use bills,” I say. I glance at the angry lobsters trying to make a run for it and drop to my knees to help Nate gather them up. After today’s long drive, I stopped at the docks instead of driving straight to the B&B, thinking I’d treat myself to a seafood dinner.
“I haven’t had lobster in years,” I say, almost to myself. Gram always cooked mine, saving me from having to plunge the crustacean into a pot of boiling water. I laugh softly, recalling the time Gram wrestled with the world’s meanest lobster. Not that I can blame him for being nasty, not after what we did to him.
“This one time, someone told my grandmother,” I pause and jerk my finger toward her abandoned house on the hill. “To put the lobster in the freezer for five minutes before cooking. It was supposed to make it go to sleep before we dropped it in the pot. Hypothetically, it’s a more humane way of cooking them.” From my crouched position, I glance up at Nate, and block the afternoon sun from my eyes.
He shakes his head. “It’s not.”
“I know that now,” I say. “My God, I’d never seen such a pissed off lobster in my entire life.”
Nate laughs out loud, and I smile. But as I think of Gram, guilt hits like a sucker punch, and my throat squeezes so tight the gripping pain nearly debilitates me. I hate that I’d stayed away so long, that I wasn’t here for her when she needed me. After her death a little over a year ago, my mom flew to Nova Scotia to bury Gram next to Grandad. I might have been tied down in a project, but I would have left it for Gram’s service. Not that mom had one—didn’t think it was necessary. How could she ever think that? Gram deserved that and so much more, from all of us.
I still feel like I haven’t had a chance to say a proper goodbye. Gram was the only one I could ever really talk to, the only one I ever shared my dreams with. Mom, of course, would hear nothing of me becoming an artist and steered me toward academia. She and Dad are research professors at the University of Victoria.
The reality is I’m a daydreamer, a girl with her head in the clouds. At the end of the day, I love what I do. There’s nothing like using mathematical modeling and computational methods to formulate and solve problems. I truly love the beauty in patterns, shapes, proofs, and concepts. G. H. Hardy once said, “A mathematician, like a painter or poet, is a maker of patterns.” I guess that’s why my hobby and my research go hand in hand.