Stay?

Laura looks at Nate with question. Usually whenever he had something important to say, he’d just say it. “Um…okay, sure.”

She shakes off her confusion and follows him, leaning into him as he puts his arm around her.

Nancy greets them with a smile. “Macaroni salad right over here.” She points to an empty spot on one of the tables. She offers a hand. “I’m Nancy Howard. Since I don’t recognize you, I’ll assume you know my kids who are around here…somewhere…” Her eyes drift over the park and finally spot Jen and Kyle. “Well, there’s two out of three.” She chuckles and gets the attention of a man near her. “And this is my husband Dan.”

The broad man offers his hand as well. “Welcome.”

Laura nods and smiles at Nancy. “Yes, we know Kyle and Phil and Jen from JetStream concerts, so…when Kyle invited us, we figured it would be fun.”

“Oh, it’s always a blast.” Nancy laughs. “You can’t get away from the Mitts family without having a blast, let me tell you.”

“Is there anything I can do to help?”

“Well, as soon as Jen gets back over here, you can help me organize the rest of this food, and Nate…if you don’t mind, I think Con and Mike might be able to use a hand with tables.”


Carson gives a little grin. “Yeah, well, I wasn’t about to come on my own.” There wasn’t too much action going on around the spot they were sitting, but he liked it that way.

“Talked to Jason the other day…he wondered when you’d be coming back to work. I told him I didn’t know. I guess they miss you around there.”

Carson cocks his head to see Misty’s face. He was glad they missed her…it proved she had a place at TJY and was important.

His gaze drops though as he thinks of himself. He wished he would have been important enough to stay, but…he’d screwed up, and now needed to find a job, and pretty quick. He was already late on his rent.


“…yeah, I think you should.” Con takes the other side of the picnic table and helps Mike slowly move it toward the others. “He’ll probably buck ya about it.”

“Well, I was thinking if there was more of a reason…if the money went to something else, or something like that, maybe he’d be more willing.”

“Could be.” A pain in Con’s shoulder causes him to almost drop his end of the table. “Ooh, set ‘er down a sec.” Pausing, he rotates his arm, grimacing. “Getting back into work this past week kinda strained this thing more than it needed.” He rolls his eyes. Glancing to the side, he spots Nate and waves him over. “Hey, we could use your muscles over here!”

Bret laughs and turns his car around, heading for an open spot in the park’s parking lot. Once there, he and Charlotte get out and head slowly across the grass to where he’d seen Con. Now spotting him with a couple other guys, Bret approaches a little more cautiously.

“They put you to work wherever you go, don’t they?”

Con spins around and seeing Bret, a wide grin spreads. “Bret. What are you doing here?”

Bret shrugs. “Me and Charlotte were just driving by and we thought we’d just stop to say hi to ya.”

Mike can tell that Bret must be a friend of Con’s, so he jumps right in. “Stay, eat! There’s going to be plenty of food.”

“Oh, no,” Bret declines. “We don’t want to barge in on anything.”

“No, really,” Mike prompts. “A friend of Con’s is a friend of ours, and there’s going to be too much food for the rest of us to eat.”

Con nods his agreement. “Come on…stick around.”

Bret bites his lip and looks at Charlotte. They hadn’t had plans anyway – they’d just been playing the day by ear. “Well…?”


Jen returns Katie’s hug and gives her a big smile. “Hey, you. I’ve talked to you a million times, but it feels like forever since I’ve seen you.” She grins and takes Katie’s left hand. “Ooooh, it’s gorgeous!”

Scott grins as he slings his arms around Katie from behind. “I think the wearer is even more goreous.”

Jen looks up at him, her smile widening. “Just keep that perspective and I think you’ll be the winner.” She looks back to Katie and laughs. “I’m glad you came too. There’s always a lot of relatives here, but to tell you the truth, I know you better than most of my cousins.”

Glancing to the side as Jamie comes, she looks up at her. “Hi, Jamie.”

Scott nods to her too, chuckling a little. “Saw they put Con to work already. I was going to go help, but…with him moving things around, I have a feeling I’d just get in the way.”

A loud shriek and a huge splash turns many heads toward the corner of the park. Kyle was standing with his hands on his hips at the edge of the pool, someone in the water splashing around. He’d obviously thrown Tommy in.

Turning and throwing up both hands, Kyle yells to whoever is listening. “Pool’s open!”