Merrier With You

by Ellen Joy

  “I’m sorry if you were uncomfortable.” He stepped closer, but she instantly backed away.

  “I saw you.” She seethed the words through her teeth. “I saw you two together.”

  Matt ran the night through his head. They had dinner, went to the play, grabbed a drink at the tavern, he walked her home, and then they kissed. Which he thought was great, really great. “Wait... did you come to my place last night?”

  “When you two were together.” Katie grabbed the shovel and began to dig around the buried vehicle.

  He shook his head. “We were just talking.”

  “Must’ve been quite the conversation.” She picked up the shovel.

  “Let me just explain,” he said. He replayed the scene with Justine. Her hug. “It’s not what you think.”

  “I think you should leave.”

  “If you had stayed one second longer, you would’ve seen that—”

  “I would’ve seen what I should’ve seen from the beginning.” She stabbed the shovel into the snow.

  “I promise you it’s not what you think.” He couldn’t believe Justine had messed things up again.

  “You’re just like all the other guys.”

  Matt felt her insult, and became equally annoyed. He wasn’t like the others. Not to Justine, not to his family, and certainly not to her. “You were the one who stopped whatever was happening last night, remember?”

  “I would’ve never started had I known you had other intentions.”

  “What intentions are you talking about? I didn’t ask Justine to stop by.” Matt held his hands in the air. “You know what? I don’t need to explain myself to you.”

  “That’s so typical,” she hissed at him as he walked away. “You don’t owe anything to anyone. You only think of yourself.”

  He turned to face her. “Who are you talking about?” He waited for her to answer, but she said nothing. “Who are you really mad at?”

  As she stood there, he could see tears well up in her eyes. He had crossed a delicate line, even with her being as obnoxious as she was.

  “Nothing happened between Justine and me.” He stuffed his hands in his pockets as she stood mute. “But this isn’t about Justine or me, is it?”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Her eyes narrowed.

  “Why didn’t you ever call me back all those years ago?” Matt had wanted to ask this question for years.

  “What?” She shook her head. “Are you serious right now?”

  “Absolutely serious,” Matt said. “You just kept me hanging on, waiting for you. You didn’t even have the balls to break it off.”

  “I was a kid.”

  Matt was disappointed in her answer. “You used me back then, and you used me now, to get over your fiancé.”

  “I wasn’t using you.”

  “Then why didn’t you call me?” Matt held her eyes. “What? Is a fisherman not good enough for you?”

  “If you wanted us to work out so badly, then why didn’t you come to Minnesota and visit me?”

  “You never asked me.”

  Katie’s mouth opened, but she closed it again. She stood in the middle of the driveway, not saying a word, but there was nothing to say. He had been right all along. He waited for her to say something, but when she didn’t, he turned toward his truck. Nothing good would come from arguing when she couldn’t see the real problem.

  She didn’t trust him.

  As he got inside his truck, his phone began to ring and he looked at the caller ID. Camden Cove Police Department. He answered as he looked out at her still standing in the snow. “Hello?”

  “Matt, its Alex.” His friend’s voice on the other line sounded serious. “I think you should come down to the docks.”

  Fourteen

  Kate looked in the mirror. Her black eyes had faded into a light twinge of olive green. She wondered what her heart would look like if it were on the outside. She now knew what shame looked like.

  The hurt in Matt’s eyes when he walked away said everything. She had used him. And worse, she treated him badly. It was one thing to assume the worst, but to become so ugly to someone who had only been kind to her... always. Even the day Matt stole her heart, he had been nothing but kind to her.

  She could still remember how hot it was that day. She came out of the library with a pile of books in her hands. Her refuge from the mundane routine she had fallen into with Vivi that summer. As soon as she stepped into the sun, the heat hit her and sweat dripped down her face. She stopped walking and wiped the sweat off with the back of her hand, balancing the books in her arms.

  That’s when he pulled over.

  He rolled down the window and called out, “Your name’s Katie, right?”

  She slowed, wishing that of all the times to run into him, it hadn’t been on the hottest day on record in Maine. She was already drenched after walking out of the air-conditioned library and hardly a block up the street.

  “Um, yeah.” She didn’t want to admit it, hoping she could have a second chance run-in when she had actually showered and didn’t have her hair up in a rat’s nest on top of her head.

  “Do you need a ride?”

  Kate looked at him, embarrassed by her glistening exterior. “No, thank you.”

  He then introduced himself. “I’m Matt, Matt Williams. My grandmother is friends with your aunt. You’re the girl from Minnesota, right?

  She nodded, surprised that he still remembered her. “You’re the sea glass kid.”

  A smile grew as he nodded. “Are you sure you don’t want a ride?”

  Her sunglasses slipped as she studied him. The boy she had met those summers ago was no longer little. He was a young man. His green eyes drew her in. And his killer smile left her tongue-tied. His tan arms were defined with muscle she hadn’t seen in the sixteen-year-old boys back home.

  She absolutely wanted a ride. Then, all of her insecurities piled higher than the stack of books in her hands and she chickened out. “That’s okay. I can walk.”

  She turned before he could say anything else and walked away, but as she did, her bundle of books slipped from her hands and tumbled to the ground. Covers opened like butterflies, pages splayed in the grass.

  Matt cut the engine before jumping out of the car, and helped collect the books off the ground.

  “I haven’t read this one.” He held up My Travels with Charlie. “You’ll have to let me know if you liked it.”

  “Have you read Steinbeck before?” She picked up the rest of the books from the ground. Books filled with adventures she had only dreamt about.

  “For school, but I liked him.” Matt shrugged. “Do you?”

  She nodded as he continued to stand there. Her throat tightened up, unable to continue a conversation.

  “Are you learning to surf?” Matt asked, pointing to one of the books in her hands.

  She looked down at the pile and felt as though he could see inside her soul from her choices. She looked back up at him. “I don’t have a surfboard, but I saw that you can rent them at the beach.”

  “I could teach you.” Matt blocked the sun’s rays with his hand and looked out toward the harbor. “Tomorrow morning will be high tide. We can meet at Perkin’s beach. Where I took you before.”

  At first, she didn’t answer; just bit her bottom lip to keep from smiling too widely. He remembered her from collecting sea glass. A bead of sweat rolled down her forehead, slipping onto her ear. What did she have to lose?

  “That would be incredible.”

  His smiled as he asked, “Are you sure you don’t want a ride?”

  For the rest of the summer, they spent every day together. She remembered the urgency to see him, that feeling of wanting to be near him, even if it was only for a second. Just to see him. She thought of nothing else but him. She fell in love with Matt Williams that summer.

  Now, as she looked at her reflection in the mirror, she realized she never stopped loving him.

  Just then, a buzzing b
roke out. Everything in the house turned back on, taking over the silence and stirring her out of her thoughts. Without stopping to think, she picked up the phone and dialed the 1-800 number on the back of her ticket.

  As soon as someone picked up, she said, “I need a flight out of Portland as soon as possible.”

  MATT STOOD, SPEECHLESS, looking at the one corner of Maggie Mae still visible above the waterline. Alex Martinez stood by his side as the Coast Guard investigated his boat.

  Matt rubbed his beard with his hand. Justine’s words haunted him.

  “Do you know anyone who would want to do this?”

  Matt shook his head. “Nope. I haven’t heard anything.”

  Matt didn’t need to lead him to Freddy Harrington. If Freddy was involved like Justine said, then the connection would be revealed at some point. Plus, Matt wouldn’t mind getting to him before Officer Martinez. In the meantime, what was he going to do?

  “I’ll call some other marinas and see if they’ve seen anything.” Alex pulled out his radio. “If you hear anything, you need to let me know. Don’t follow some old fisherman’s code when it’s your livelihood on the line.”

  Matt nodded as he looked at Maggie Mae. Things couldn’t get much worse than this. Everything he had worked for had literally sunk into the harbor’s waters. It would cost tens of thousands of dollars to fix her. He hoped insurance would cover it.

  His eyes traced the harbor’s shore to Katie’s cottage. Even with everything happening around him, he couldn’t stop thinking about the way he’d talked to her. It wasn’t fair to bring up the past. The fact was, he didn’t even care about his boat at this point. She was all he cared about, and now he had lost her again.

  Fifteen

  Kate’s flight was in less than three hours. She needed to pack, clean up, and throw her luggage in the van.

  As soon as she stepped outside, the view of the harbor made her stop. The sight of Camden Cove, even as her life spun out of control, still stole her attention. She noticed Matt’s boat missing from the harbor, as other lobster boats bobbed in the water as the tide crept in. Seagulls swept through the sky in the wind. The chiming of the church bells off in the distance reminded her of the time, and the beauty shattered as the reality of heading back home hit her.

  As soon as the van was cleaned off, she threw her luggage in the back. But the familiar grinding of steel against the pavement, crunching in the background made her freeze.

  The plow was coming.

  “You’ve got to be kidding me.” She slammed down the lift gate and rushed to the driver’s seat. Once inside, she swiveled the rearview mirror to see what she already knew. The orange oversized truck barreled down Riverside Road. The bane of her existence since coming to this sleepy town would plow her in if she didn’t move it.

  She threw the minivan in reverse and slammed her foot against the gas. The plow continued on its path, roaring down the street, thrusting the snow onto the sidewalk and into driveways. She took her chances and gunned it. The tires slipped in the cold mess, sending the van toward the embankment on the other side of the driveway. With only a few yards to go, she straightened the wheel and returned her foot on the gas. She needed to make it out.

  Then she heard the roar of the plow’s horn, warning her of its presence. It only made her press the gas with more vigor. The van’s wheels jumped the embankment and pulled back into the driveway. The plow continued to move forward, metal screeching as the truck began to brake. She only had a few feet before the three-ton blade of steel would be on top of her. And then, just when she had a glimmer of hope, the minivan slid back into the side of the driveway, slamming deeper into the snowbank. The high-pitched screech of her tires spinning masked the sound of the plow’s horn.

  The plow roared to a stop, pushing snow against its blade in the middle of the driveway, burying the rear end of the van that she’d spent an hour shoveling out.

  “What the heck do you think you’re doing?!” the driver yelled out his window. “Are you trying to get killed? Snowplows have the right of way!”

  Kate jumped out of the van and yelled back, “Don’t you people have any decency? You saw that I was coming! Can’t you do your job without torturing those around you?”

  The man continued shouting as he rolled up his window, putting the truck into reverse.

  She screamed into the sky, “Why must the universe punish me?!”

  She kicked the snow around her and then pounded the side of the minivan as the plow drove away. She threw her head back and growled a scream. She yelled into the gray sky, but the sea held more rage. Its waves crashed into the granite cliffs, muting her wrath, and it just made her even more mad.

  The tears came even though she fought to keep them at bay. She did not want to cry. She did not want to be defeated, to be pathetic. She didn’t want to be a victim. She no longer wanted to be that Kate.

  The noose wrapped around her chest.

  What now?

  Kate fell backwards and sunk into the snow. It enveloped her and muted everything around her. All she could hear was her breath—it was short and quick, and low on oxygen. She laid there and tried to focus. One. Two. Three. Breathe.

  She counted again, but it didn’t help. The noose was too tight.

  She thought about going back, seeing Eric, having to tell everyone about the engagement, going back to work and then moving her stuff out and into her mom’s place. She still hadn’t even told her mom.

  Did she calculate her self-worth by being attached to a man?

  And suddenly Kate realized her biggest problem was her.

  How badly did she need the fairytale to be happy?

  She sat up on her elbows from the cold cocoon as the snowplow grated down another road. She wiped away the snow from her face. She wasn’t going to apologize for wanting it all, but she certainly wasn’t going to wait for a knight in shining armor to come around. She needed to figure out what would make her happy on her own.

  She brushed off as she stood, and went directly inside. She grabbed her torn-up journal. If she was ever going to find happiness, she would have to face her demons. With the last of the blank pages, she began to write. The words poured out of her. She wrote about things she’d never allowed herself to say out loud, or even admit. She wrote about her fears, her assumptions, and her doubts about herself.

  She wrote about Eric.

  She wrote about her parents’ divorce.

  She wrote about what she wanted in life.

  Then she wrote about Matt.

  When the words stopped pouring out, she looked out at the horizon as the clouds opened up and a ray of sun, like a torch from the heavens, lit the water below.

  And then different words came itching out of her pen and her story suddenly changed.

  The noose loosened. She took a deep breath.

  Thoughts spun around her head and her blood began pumping through her veins. Things she had only dreamed about starting to be planned out on paper. Exciting dreams she never felt worthy of, nor dared to plan out.

  Then, the house phone began to ring, jolting her out of her thoughts.

  She rushed to the kitchen. “Hello?”

  “Katie.” There was only one other person who called her by that name. Vivi. “Katie, I’m coming home early to see you before you leave.”

  Tears welled up in her eyes, not because of sadness or shame or pain, but from joy. True joy. “I can’t wait.”

  MATT WATCHED AS HE had Maggie Mae towed toward the marina in Portland. There, she'd get fixed up as good as new. The only question he had was, how long would it take before he could go back out on the water? Maybe with it being the off season, they'd be able to get right to work on it, but Matt figured it'd be the opposite.

  As he watched Maggie Mae head north and disappear from view, he didn’t think things could get much worse for him. His boat had sunk in the harbor. His ex-wife’s fiancé might be on a mission to destroy him. And the Coast Guard wanted to talk to him about his
own involvement in the sinking of his ship.

  He’d handle the problems with the boat and with Freddy. He wasn’t worried about the Coast Guard, and knew they were following procedure. What he couldn’t handle was the possibility of Katie never understanding how he felt about her. Did he go for broke, and go back? Try to make her understand? Should he tell her the truth. That he was in love with her, and didn’t want to lose her ever again.

  He looked at his empty slip at the dock. Why would Katie stay? Especially after everything with Justine. Sure, nothing happened, but the history and the drama seemed to linger and continue to haunt him. Last night was just a preview of the years to come. Who would want to deal with that? He didn’t want to deal with that. All he brought to the relationship was an overbearing family and deep-seated struggles from past relationships.

  “Mr. Williams, we won’t take up too much of your time,” said the officer of the Coast Guard, “but we’d like you to come down to the office and answer a few questions.”

  Matt stuffed his hands in his pockets and nodded. “No problem.”

  He looked over to Katie’s cottage. It had been hours since their fight. He wondered if that was the last time he’d see her. He followed the officer back down the dock toward the parking lot.

  She was better off without him.

  ELIZABETH SAT IN HER favorite spot at the bakery and watched Camden Cove from the window. She cupped her hands around the fancy hot cocoa Frank had given her, but it was David’s almond biscotti she dipped in the cocoa that she really came for.

  Through the window she noticed Kate, walking down the street with a certain determination that was new. Her chin was up, her hair floating behind her as she pounded down the street. She swung open the door to the bookstore and went inside. Elizabeth hadn’t even finished her biscotti before Kate came back out with bags in her hands. She turned on her heel and went inside the Camden Cove Country Store, right next door.