from home. Most of the cabanas were painted in happy Florida colors—peach and yellow and minty green. They were a welcome lift on rainy, gray days like this one. Susan’s shop, however, was a slate blue...which had perfectly matched Courtney’s mood when she used to work there.
No customers were browsing the racks of frumpy sweatshirts and slacks and off-brand rain slickers. Rain boots and galoshes were fashion statements everywhere in the country but here. The ones Susan was selling looked as exciting as a trip to the dentist. And not a pair of stylish jeans or pants to be seen.
There, sitting behind the cash register, was the Queen of Ugly herself, an underweight, middle-aged woman whose smiles were as thin as her hair. She had a crossword puzzle book in front her. Susan was great at crossword puzzles. People were a puzzle she’d never mastered though. She had no idea how to create a friendly atmosphere in her shop.
The jingling of the bell over the door made her look up. No welcoming smile on her face, and at the sight of Courtney in her dripping raincoat, Susan’s lips actually slid down at the corners.
“Courtney, what are you doing here? Don’t tell me you’ve come to ask for your job back. I thought your clothes were selling so well over at the Oyster Inn,” she taunted.
Good to see you, too. But Courtney was hardly surprised by the reception she was getting. Susan hadn’t been welcoming when she joined the chamber of commerce and avoided her at every meeting.
“They are,” Courtney said.
“Then why are you here?”
“I heard you might be selling your business.”
Susan’s lips turned so far down at the corners it was a wonder they didn’t slide off her face. “Who told you that?”
Jenna wasn’t exactly a favorite of Susan’s, either, so Courtney stayed vague. “I just heard it somewhere.”
“I haven’t decided for sure,” Susan said, at her huffiest. “But if I was going to, you can be sure I wouldn’t sell to you, you ingrate.”
Ingrate! Just because Courtney had quit and found a place to sell her clothing line. As if she should have been grateful for the way Susan had treated her when she was employed there. This shop was misnamed. It should have been Bitch Babes.
“You can’t discriminate against people,” Courtney informed her.
“I’m not discriminating. I haven’t decided. But if and when I do, I can assure you, you won’t be able to afford it.”
“Maybe I can.”
“Of course you can’t.”
She’d like you to give up and slink away. Don’t do it. “What are you thinking of asking?”
“More than you can afford. Now, really, I don’t have time to sit and talk to you. I’m very busy.”
Doing your crossword puzzle.
To prove how busy she was, Susan got up and parted the curtains to her back room and disappeared behind them. Negotiations over.
“Yeah? We’ll just see what I can and can’t afford,” Courtney muttered as she marched out the door.
Really, Susan was probably right. Those cabana shops were prime real estate. Courtney could never get Beach Babes without financial assistance. Getting a loan from the bank would require the use of hypnosis, and she was sure it would be beyond the scope of a Blue Moon grant, as well. Those grants were in place to aid Moonlight Harbor entrepreneurs but they didn’t stretch to the point of buying real estate for them.
“It sucks,” she said later to Annie and Moira as the three friends sat eating her dessert creation.
“But you have a shop,” said Annie’s daughter, Emma. She swirled the butter cookie crumbles and Caramelo M&M’s topping into her serving of sand pebble cream ice cream from Good Times Ice Cream Parlor.
“It’s not mine. I only sell some things there.” Courtney leaned over and squirted more whipped cream on Emma’s dessert, earning a grateful smile.
“Why won’t Mrs. Frank sell you her shop?” Emma wanted to know. “Doesn’t she like you?”
“She doesn’t like anyone,” Courtney said. “And no one likes her.”
“I wouldn’t want no one to like me,” said Emma.
“You don’t have to worry,” Moira assured her.
“Be kind and you won’t have that problem,” her mother added.
“Isn’t Mrs. Frank kind?” Emma asked.
“Not even close,” Courtney said, stabbing her ice cream with her spoon.
“Why?”
Who knew? “Because when she was a baby, the cow that gave out the milk of human kindness ran dry and there wasn’t any for her bottle,” Courtney said with a frown. “I truly hate that woman.”
“Mommy says you shouldn’t hate people,” Emma said.
“Your mommy’s right,” Courtney said. “I