Page 1 of Finding Basil (Foggy Basin Season Two)

Chapter One

The grimy city. He’d heard it called that so many times, he couldn’t count, but he’d never really noticed how grimy it truly was.

Not until he had to lie once more, until he had to tell another half-truth.

His name was Herb Buffet. He’s a genius in marketing, graduating top of his class ten years earlier, got a job immediately with a company that desperately needed a good marketing plan.

They’d paid well for him, and he’d taken the job. Herb wondered why he hadn’t investigated what the company did before taking the job, but all he saw were those six figures of salary, and an added seventh figure for a bonus if the company’s numbers jumped after he’d joined them.

They had. Public perception was everything. That was one of his very first lessons.

And the perception he’d had to bolster was that the company wasn’t purposely buying small businesses just to dismantle them for big competitors.

It was all a coincidence. Big companies gave out big jobs, more jobs, so it was a good thing, even if they were buying the small businesses to dismantle them. But they weren’t. Trust us .

Looking out of the window of his high-rise condo, seeing the city under him, the people, the cars, the businesses that were all on the chopping block, he’d had enough.

So, what did he want to do with the rest of his life? Wasn’t that the big question?

He’d saved some money for retirement, and saved some besides that, even though he’d spent plenty on the condo and the three cars he had to have the second he’d seen them. He could buy a little business in some small town and make a go of it, living a slower, cleaner life.

Herb was thirty-seven years old, young for starting over, old for trying to figure out how to do that. He sat at his computer while a movie played on his gigantic television over the gas fireplace and tried every search he could think of to find a new goal, a new dream.

Or maybe his first real dream. All he’d wanted before was to make a ton of money.

Running his long fingers through his sandy hair as each of the searches proved fruitless. Real estate…used car dealership…schoolteacher…

Sure, he could do any of those things, but did they appeal to him? Not really. Buying and selling homes came with problems. He didn’t think he could stand pushing people into mortgages that he knew they couldn’t handle.

Used cars were more of the same of that sort of thing.

And he cared little for kids, so being a teacher was out, too.

After a while, he played around with the computer, avoiding the credits of the movie that was over and he hadn’t watched a full minute of it. Seeing the credits would mean picking a new movie, and that, at the moment, seemed as difficult as picking a new life.

Decisions. More damn decisions. So many. Too many.

He closed the laptop and used the remote to turn off the television, then used yet another to turn off the fireplace. It was March, and not half as cold, but he enjoyed having it on, it reminded him of simpler times and simpler places.

Moving…moving to the country. He dreamed of that. Hey! A dream! He finally had a dream.

After opening the laptop again, he typed in country homes for sale, and didn’t add a location. Maybe, just seeing the prices would make him rethink it all.

Well, not one price were any worse than the exorbitant price he’d paid for the apartment on the fourteenth floor, overlooking the river. Not close enough to smell the river, and where he lived near the river, it wasn’t exactly safe enough to casually walk next to, but he lived by it, nonetheless.

The view. That was what was important.

Well, no more. He wanted a home in the country with a 360 - degree view. Herb wanted a simple life that let him wake at noon and drink coffee on a peaceful porch as he watched deer run by.

There were many towns on the lists he researched. All the best small towns in the previous few years. Unable to pick one to start house shopping, he stood and got a glass of Glenlivet and started tossing darts at his favorite thing in the apartment. His dartboard.

“Okay, let’s do this,” he said as he matched the towns with the numbers in his head. He closed his eyes to make it fair and tossed the dart, hearing the gentle chunk of it landing in the dartboard's cork.

He saw the number nine. “Foggy Basin it is.”

Typing the name into the search engine of the real estate site, there was a home that caught his eye.

It was a two-story farmhouse with dormer windows on the roof, trees all around it, and there were twenty acres that went along with it, as well as the furniture, not that he’d probably keep the furniture.

The house was yellow with white trim, exactly what he thought a farmhouse in the country would look like.

The price was just under a million dollars, which was a steal for that kind of home in the country. The land was zoned for farming and business along with residential, and whatever he decided to do with it, he should be able to run a business right there.

The home was in an area close to the town called Foggy Basin.

The name brought so many visions to his mind: misty mornings that were cool, even in the summer; lazy, sweet-smelling air.

He pictured the people who lived in the town, all waving as he drove past, smiling, inviting him to early dinners.

No, suppers. The people who would live in a town called Foggy Basin would call the evening meal supper .

After emailing the realtor for the property, adding a bid for the place, sight unseen, he opened another tab and thought it out again.

What business do I start?

Blank. Then some more blank. Then a little more blank.

Finally, he typed in What business should Herb open?

Then it came up with a hundred results, all centering on, what else? Herbs.

Herb sat back on his terribly expensive sofa, sighing as he was about to give up the search. Maybe he’d just…

Wait. Herbs. He sat up again and opened one link from the search. In it, he saw a happy family showing off the little pots of herbs they sold. Happy customers, happy employees, beautiful green products, all lined up on shelves in a quaint little shop.

“Herbs?”

He had farmland. He had the zoning. He could easily enough work off his name. Sure, it was cheesy, but cheesy worked. He pictured the selfies the kids would take, the fun business cards, the impeccably decorated little shop…

“Herb’s Herbs.”

Laughing, he fell back on the sofa again and laughed harder while he thought of it.

Herb’s Herbs.

He went to bed after rinsing out his thick crystal glass and dreamed of it. A happy place that smelled of oregano, thyme, and rosemary. People would come in, buying the plants, and if they didn’t have a green thumb, he’d offer the cuttings, both fresh and dried.

When he woke, he found his offer had been accepted. “That was fast.”

That didn’t worry him a bit. Not everyone could afford the place, of course. He offered nearly the asking price as well, so he made the plans he needed to move from the city and finally go to a place in the country, where he could finally relax.

The following day, he gave his notice at work, suppressing the urge to take the raise they offered him if he stayed, put his condo on the market and started to pack.

As he looked at all his expensive, modern furniture, and couldn’t see it in the new house. It didn’t scream farmhouse. It was perfect for the high-rise condo.

The place was furnished, after all.

He got on the phone to a guy that did estate sales and had all the furniture cleared out of his apartment exactly three days before he was set to leave.

After handing the keys to the realtor, he checked into a hotel for the few days he had left at work and organized the movers to pick up his boxes of personal items from the storage container later that evening.

Drinking a glass of champagne, he stretched out on the king-size bed and flipped through channels until he found another movie he’d likely ignore.

“Well, Herb, we’re about to move to the country,” he toasted himself. “May I have nights of soft breezes and days of slow movement.”

The next few days went by in a blur. Rushing, appointments, phone calls by the dozens. All that furious activity did was make him yearn to get to the quiet home in Foggy Basin.

Herb was exhausted, but still energized at the time of his departure. Almost a thousand miles to drive, and he was ready for it as he got into his Jag and headed east.

The stereo played his Leaving the City playlist he’d made the night before, when he’d been unable to sleep a wink. Road songs, leaving your lover songs, joyous songs, and melancholy ones all played while he tapped the leather steering wheel with his fingers.

Passing big trucks, little cars, and even two buses, he drove for hours before he stopped to piss and refill his cup with surprisingly good coffee.

He couldn’t help but smile at all those he came across at that truck stop, and he even winked at the clerk behind the counter where he paid.

She looked exhausted at the gesture, however, and he wondered how many times the thin blonde dealt with that in a day.

After leaning in, he confessed, “I’m not hitting on you, I promise. I’m just in a great mood.”

“Oh. Wow, okay, no one’s ever said that before.”

“Glad to be your first and hopefully the first of many. Have a beautiful day.”

As he practically skipped back to his car, he threw smiles at all the weary travelers in the parking lot, including one mother who was trying to contain her two little kids. Their license plate was from a few states away, so it was likely the kids had been cooped up in the car for hours on end.

She was exasperated, and they didn’t care a bit.

When she saw him smile at her, however, she smiled back, even as she sighed. The trip, no matter how long and tedious, must have been for good reasons.