Chapter Three

      The restaurant down the street had blocked its secondary exit with a Dumpster again. Why didn’t some of these businesses take his inspections more seriously? A knock on his door startled Chad out of his paperwork. He looked up from the report he’d been writing to see Nick Nelworth standing in his doorway. “Hey, Mr. Owens. Chief Bradens said you had something to ask me.”

       Jeannie’s son had that legs-too-long amble of every teenager, but it was the way he always hung his head that caught Chad’s attention. George was right; life had beaten Nick down a lot more than the boy would let on. The kid had lost his dad to a car crash in the first grade, and then his home had burned—all before he even hit everything high school would throw at him. How could Nick hope to have anything but a dark outlook on life, even with his mother’s high-voltage optimism? From what Chad remembered, mothers and thirteen-year-old sons barely spoke the same language as it was.

       He didn’t really know Nick, hadn’t known him at all before the fire, but felt an instant recognition now. Anyone could easily see the kid was quietly unhappy. And why not? Chad recalled hating every minute of middle school, and he’d had none of Nick’s traumas to overcome. Annoyed as he was at George’s scheming, Chad couldn’t tamp down an urge to help the boy. “Hi there, Nicholas. How’s it going across the street?”

       Nick rolled his eyes—those same big eyes of his mother’s. “Mom’s all weird about it. She’s talking really fast and forgetting where she put things.”

       The image of Jeannie Nelworth bouncing around her store hadn’t left his mind since the meeting. “Your mom’s excited about the place?”

       “Yeah, something like that.” Plug wandered in, nuzzling Nick’s hand. “Whoa, Plug, that doesn’t belong to you. Don’t go getting Mr. Owens’s forms all slobbery.” Nick raised his hand out of Plug’s reach—which didn’t take much effort, because Plug never jumped up for anything—and put the handful of forms on Chad’s desk. “Mom said to give you these…and these.” He reached into his back pocket and reluctantly produced six very bright, very sparkly yellow pens. The promotional kind with “Sweet Treats” written on them in the pink swirly script that was Jeannie’s logo. Nicholas looked about as eager to be handing those out as Chad would be to use them. “They have the new address on them and the website.” He said in the monotone of a boy repeating an instructed script. Chad wondered if there was anything more repugnant to a thirteen-year-old boy than to be the distributor of sparkly pens.

       Chad scooped the pens up, noting with horror that yellow glitter came off onto his fingers. “They’re very…yellow.” He raised an eyebrow at Nick, hoping to let the boy know he wasn’t expecting an endorsement of anything so cute.

       “Yep.” Plug began inspecting Nick’s hand and back pocket, evidently thinking glitter might prove tasty. “They are.”

       Chad slid out of his chair and came around to the front of his desk. He squatted down to scratch Plug between the ears. “Can you keep a secret?” Nick hunched down as well, and Plug rolled over on cue, to make sure they didn’t miss scratching his big belly. “Don’t tell your mom, but I’m not a fan of glitter. On anything.”

       The boy’s eyes widened, then narrowed in a laugh. “Me, neither.” Hadn’t Jeannie given a thought to what a boy’s life was like surrounded by all those perky pastels?

       “Perfectly understandable. Not that I have to ask, but man-to-man, what’s your position on yellow polka dots?”

       The boy looked as if he were asked to reveal state secrets. “You mean Mom’s car?” he nearly whispered. After a long pause where both of them looked at the offending vehicle, Nick said, “Someday I’m gonna have to learn to drive in that thing.”

       Chad could feel Nick’s embarrassment even as he tried to hide it. He was a grown man who never cared what people think, and he’d surely hesitate to climb into Jeannie Nelworth’s Jeep. He was surprised to discover his hand had landed on the boy’s shoulder. “I feel your pain, kid.” He said it in a teasing tone, but he actually meant it. He wanted Nick Nelworth to know one person understood his predicament and how hard the world was as a thirteen-year-old boy. “Maybe we can talk her down a couple of shades by the time you hit fifteen.”

       Nick laughed. “Man, I hope.”

       The more relaxed look on Nick’s face refused to let Chad keep his distance. Kids were not his strong suit. He gave the safety talks every year at school and did the driver’s ed pre-prom speech about drinking and driving, but that was more because he had the time to do these things. With all the other crew volunteers, he viewed this as payback for staying off the engines. Not only that, but life had handed him too many reasons to make fire prevention a personal cause.

       But this? Even George had to know this one-on-one teen stuff was way out of Chad’s job description. “Plug’s getting too fat, even for him.” He rubbed the hound’s round belly, eliciting a lazy canine moan of satisfaction. “He needs more exercise, don’t you think?”

       “He’s pretty big, that’s for sure.”

       “Plug needs to walk off a few pounds, wouldn’t you say? How many days a week are you free after school?”

       “I’ve got math club Tuesdays and Thursdays, but nothing the other days.”

       “George and I are too busy to give Plug any regular exercise. Do you think you could help us out by walking him? Twice a week, maybe? For pay, of course…say, seven dollars a week?” Plug was George’s dog, technically. George should be doing this. Chad should not be anywhere near this, and yet here he was and nearly glad of it, besides.

       “I think. That is, if Mom says it’s okay. She’s gonna be up here every day working on the store, anyway.”

       Chad tried to ignore Nick’s eyes, and what they did to the spot below his throat. He stood up before something stupid came out of his mouth. “George already asked your mom. You’re hired. When can you start?”

       “Now.” Nicholas shot up beside him. “I could start right now.”

       “I had a feeling you’d say that. Which is why I happen to have Plug’s leash right here on my desk.” Chad nudged the hound with his foot. “With this kind of enthusiasm, we’ll get you fit and trim in no time, Plug.”

       Nick attached the leash after