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The door to the Ol’ Pickaxe swings open, and snow pours through the doorway onto the floor. A floor that was still damp from the last load of snow that had fallen onto it and melted before Bea had a chance to get it outside.
Bea sighs. It’s one of those days.
The thing about running the only hardware store in a rural town is that you’ve got to stay open in bad weather. In fact, that’s probably the most important time to be open - when people need to grab chains for their tires and covers for water pipes so they don’t freeze and burst in the night. And, of course, the road salt.
The Pickaxe does best in the winter, and while that’s great for the accounts book, it’s not great for Bea.
Not that anything at all is particularly great for her these days.
Well. That’s unfair, considering she narrowly escaped death-by-cult recently, but aside from not being dead, things aren’t great. And if she’s being completely honest, today is one of those days where not being dead really feels like a negative.
So when snow pours through the open door along with freezing air, and a sodden Mae, Bea can’t find it in her to do anything other than sigh for a very long time. At least a minute.
“It’s pretty cold out there,” Mae says, ignoring her sighing so as to better eye the quickly melting snow.
“Gosh, I had no idea,” Bea says dryly, abandoning her sigh to grab one of the towels she keeps behind the counter in the winter.
“Here,” she says, tossing it to Mae. “You look like you’ve already caught hypothermia.”
“Hypothermia is the one where you can’t feel your toes, right? I might have that one,” Mae says, wrapping the towel around her head like a scarf.
“That is not why I gave you that towel,” Bea says, shaking her head.
“And yet here I am, turning it into a winter fashion statement,” Mae says, kicking at the snow.
“You’ll be in magazines before you know it. Possum Springs’ first model.”
“We’ll have the world’s first hardware-modeling business,” Mae says. “I’ll model your towels and, like…sell the road salt. I’m gonna make the road salt sexy.”
“I believe that you would definitely try to do that,” Bea says, and Mae laughs.
“I can’t believe you don’t have faith in my ability to model. You’re crushing my dreams over here, Bea.”
“I can’t believe you think I’d willingly open up a hardware store,” Bea counters.
“Fair point. Although I’ve always thought you’d end up with this place, one way or another. It’s like, part of my mental image of you. Bea, at the Pickaxe. Slinging towels. Carrying road salt. Hosting plays.”
“And chasing you with a broom,” Bea suggests, more to get Mae to shut up about the Pickaxe than anything else.
“Alright, alright,” Mae says. “But seriously, does your dad even visit the Pickaxe anymore? It seems like you’re in charge of everything here.”
“He does what he can,” Bea says, shrugging. “It’s complicated.”
“Everything is, these days,” Mae mutters.
She scuffs her shoe on the floor, towel sliding off of her head, forgotten.
“Sorry,” Bea says after a few tense moments. “I-“
“No, it’s fine,” Mae sighs, “Seriously, I shouldn’t have pushed. It’s not my business, I get that. It’s just…after the last few days, I feel like you know me as well as I do, and I still don’t know that much about you. Which is fine! That’s how relationships are, sometimes. Friendships. Whatever. It’s not always equally reciprocal, I get that, so. Sorry.”
Bea doesn’t really know how to respond to that. She knows that she should open up. Tell Mae about how the store reminds her dad too much of her mom. How he tried to run it himself and just. Couldn’t.
She doesn’t say any of that, though. Sometimes telling Mae everything is easy. Other times, she wants to keep all of her secrets hidden away forever. No reason anyone else should know her weaknesses, none at all.
It is, after all, a bad day. So she focuses on something else, anything else, and asks, “Relationships?”
“Friendships! Or…whatever,” Mae says, avoiding her eyes.
“Okay,” Bea says, because she doesn’t exactly want to deal with ‘relationships’ right now either. ‘Whatever’ already sounds troublesome enough.
“Right,” Mae says firmly, like they’ve agreed on something. Which they might have. Maybe.