“Story of my life,” Bettina sighed. “My last boyfriend said the same thing about me.” She glanced around, then said in a low voice “Frederick asked me out. Do you think I should go out with him? What do you think of him?”
Coral tried to think of a polite answer. “Er, well, I think…you should take it slow. Especially if you have a history of taking it fast. Get to know him. Go out to coffee with him before you dive in all the way. See if you even like him.”
Bettina nodded. “Good advice.” She took her plant back to the front desk.
All right, enough stalling, she thought. She turned back to the last two obits that she needed to type up. After that, she’d type of a list of announcements for the “About Town” section. Then she’d call up The Blue Moon Junction Garden Club to get the details of the upcoming Blue Moon Junction pie bake-off.
By the time she was down with all of that, Frederick would no doubt be back, alternating between editing cow pictures and leering down her cleavage. What did he expect to see there, anyway? Dancing mice? It was the same cleavage she’d had the day before, and the day before that.
Instead of typing up the obits, she fished in her purse, pulled out her zebra-striped cell phone, and dialed the number that she’d saved in there. It was the number of the newsroom editor at the New York Daily Gazette. She’d met him at a journalism job fair a month ago, and he’d given her his card, after hitting on her at the bar. “I’ve never been with a big girl before,” had been his cringeworthy pickup line.
Yes, she was that desperate. If she could get hired, she’d find a way to hide from his sloppy advances. Anything beat this tiny little backwater newspaper, where she was doomed to spend her days writing up crop reports and weather stories.
“Hello, Mr. Espinosa?” she said.
“Yes, who’s this?” he snapped.
“Coral Colby. I met you at the journalism job fair, and you told me to call you.”
“Who?” he barked irritably, and her heart sank.
She paused a second, and then hung up the phone. She wanted to smack herself for even trying. At least Frederick hadn’t been there to offer to “cheer her up”.
She was distracted by the sound of loud arguing coming from the front of the building.
“Tramp!”
“Dried up old prude!”
“Ladies, please!” The two women yelling insults at each other sounded as if they were well into their seventies. That last voice belonged to Bettina.
Well, this promised to be more interesting than the obits, and she had until five to get those finished.
She pushed back her chair and strolled to the front of the newspaper’s office. The newspaper was housed in a low-slung brick building on Main Street, and most of the reporters and photographers worked in one big open room. The newspaper’s publisher and a couple of the editors, had offices tucked away on the side of the room. The reception’s desk was at the front of the room facing the street.
An older woman, a wolf shifter in a pink floral dress and pink sneakers stood there. Her hair was done up in a complicated waffle-weave beehive which was undoubtedly sculpted on a regular basis at the Kurl Up And Dye salon down the street, and there was a pink floral braid woven into the beehive. She was seventy if she was a day.
The object of her ire was Maybelle Briard, the newspaper’s librarian, also a wolf shifter.
“What is that thing in your hair?” Maybelle demanded of the woman, pointing at the pink braid. “And what would your mother say?”
“I visited her Saturday, and she thought it was very pretty.”
“That’s because she’s blind,” Maybelle glowered at her.
“Mind your own business, nosy parker. You always were a busy-body. Oh, hello! Coral Colby, there you are.” The woman marched over to her and stuck out her hand.
“I’m Blanche Briard. Maybelle is my cousin, but please don’t hold that against me.” She shot her cousin a dirty look. “She’s been jealous of me since high school, because I was always more popular with the menfolk.”
“That’s because she was a hussy with the morals of an alley cat,” Maybelle scoffed.
“Better than having your legs locked at the knees. Marigold asked me to keep an eye on you, and report everything back to her as soon as she gets home,” Blanche said. “She’s married to my nephew.”
Marigold was best friends with Ginger, and, since she was also so pregnant she was ready to pop, she and her husband had accompanied Ginger and her husband on their babymoon.
“Why does she want you to report back to her?” Coral asked. “What would there even be to report? We’re in Blue Moon Junction, where nothing ever happens – what’s so funny?” Maybelle, Blanche, and Bettina had thrown back their heads and were literally howling with laughter.
“Well, bust my britches, that’s a good one,” Maybelle said, wiping tears of merriment from her cheeks.
“It sure is,” Blanche agreed. “Just give it a little time here,” she added to Coral. “You’ll see.”