by Maisey Yates
“Did you have something to say?”
“No.” She felt weird and caught. “I just...” She hated this. This weird in between. The way he made her feel in between. The woman she was, the woman she’d been. Because it shouldn’t be possible. Because she had ample experience steering conversations the direction she wanted to. Because she had all the experience she could possibly want with good-looking men. And she didn’t do tongue-tied. Didn’t do dumb, ridiculous staring at a nice pair of arms. Because arms were just arms, and if she wanted them wrapped around her, she didn’t have any problem asking for it. And if she didn’t, she had no problem looking away.
She also wouldn’t look away out of embarrassment. If she wanted to look, she would look. There was no call making this weird. And she mentally was. So, she was going to stop that right away.
“So how did you end up as a handyman?” She wasn’t feral. She knew how to have conversations with people.
“Well, there came a point when I realized that I was good at a hell of a lot of things, and the collection of those things was quite handy.”
“Right. Great.”
“So you really went and became exactly what you wanted to be?”
“Almost,” she said. “I’m first chair. This principal position is open. I’m hoping for that.” She wasn’t quite sure why she told him that. Maybe because he’d said she wasn’t confident last time they’d talked, and that was patently ridiculous. So if he needed to see a little bit of confidence, she was happy to show it.
“Well, I’m my own boss,” he said, setting the hammer down and turning to look at her. Something glinted in his eyes that made her feel...it made her feel, which she wasn’t that big on.
“Good for you.” He hadn’t mentioned a personal life at all. And hadn’t asked about hers. And she was trying to figure out if she would have asked someone else. Because what she wanted was to treat him the way that she would anyone. Any friend that she ran into. Of course, you had to be careful. Because people could have just gone through a breakup or divorce or something like that. So there were definitely pros and cons to asking about somebody’s personal life, even if they weren’t an ex-boyfriend.
Not that that mattered. It was just she wanted to be no more or less curious about him than she would have been about anyone.
Her phone started buzzing in her pocket and she grabbed onto it, her heart slamming against her chest when she saw the familiar phone number. “I have to take this.”
She pushed to answer, quickly walking out of the house, out the front door so that she could get some privacy. “Hello?”
“Hello, Hannah.”
It was the Board of Directors for the Boston Symphony Orchestra. She knew Peter’s number and his voice well enough that she didn’t have to ask who it was.
“How’s the weather in Boston?” She hated herself for that inane salvo into conversation, but she also didn’t want to jump right into asking him about the principal position. Even though they both knew that was why he was calling.
“Getting to be too warm already. How is your family? I know that losing someone is tough. And often sorting through years of possessions isn’t any easier.”
The scarred floor of the Craft Café swam into her vision. Walking in when she’d been a child and had run to the candy counter. Shuffling in as a teenager, knowing Gram would make her knit. Coming in today, knowing Gram wouldn’t be there.
And she shoved it to the side.
“Yeah.” She nodded, focusing on one fluttering leaf on the tree in the front yard. The sunlight filtered through it, and it wiggled on its branch as the wind picked up. “Definitely tough. But we are making progress. And everything is on track, so... I’ll be home in September just like we talked about.”
“Good. I’m glad to hear it. In regards to that, I wanted to be the one to call and tell you that we decided to go with Ilina Voychek for the position of principal violinist.”
“Ilina plays in LA.” The words fell from her lips before she could process them. Before she could make sense of what he had just said.
“She did. But she indicated to us that she was ready to make a move and... She came out and played with the orchestra. We were very impressed. She has a lot of experience.”
I have a lot of experience. It’s all with you.
She didn’t say that, though. Because she felt like the sky was caving in on top of her, pressing her down into the ground. It was impossible. It was just impossible.
She had done everything. Absolutely everything. Gone to the preferred school, put in the hours. She had... She had given up everything to end up in this position before she was forty. And now she felt like there was no guarantee she would ever get it. Ever.
To be passed over for someone who wasn’t even part of the Boston Symphony...
It didn’t matter that she’d seen it before. It didn’t matter that these things happened. They didn’t happen to her.
Because everything went her way. She did the work. And she was... She was special.
That sounded so stupid when she thought it, but it had to be true. Because how else could everything she’d done be worth it? She’d paid the price for her destiny. And the asking price was steep, but she’d done it.
It didn’t make any sense. That she could lose this. This position that was absolutely hers for the taking.
“You’re still a very valued member of the orchestra. And of course your position in first chair is secure.”
“And I appreciate it.”
“I wanted to take the time to call you myself. Before it was announced anywhere.”
“Thank you.” She took a deep breath, and stared at that leaf like it was the thing that had betrayed her. “I have to go. I have a... There’s a handyman here fixing things. And he needs direction.”
She hung up, and felt like there was a vortex beneath her feet. She couldn’t breathe.
Her hands were shaking, and she opened the door, standing there for a moment, knowing that she couldn’t face Josh. Josh of all people, who was here during this crushing low. She grabbed her purse from the hook and dug her cigarettes and lighter out of it, then shut the door, lighting one and collapsing onto the porch step, each breath of tainted air promising to bring some kind of emotional relief that it ultimately couldn’t deliver. Not when she was so close to a breakdown.
She heard the door open behind her, and looked even more determinedly off to her left, drawing a deep, smoke-filled breath before letting it out slowly, willing the nicotine to do its thing, and if not the nicotine, then the routine beauty of the habit itself.
“You still do that?”
She didn’t look at him. Instead, she took another defiant pull on the cigarette.
“I thought that was just something to do in high school to seem edgy.”
“I don’t do it to seem edgy,” she said, archly. “I do it because I like it.”
“Hey, do you. But you know they make patches for that.”
“Do they make patches for annoying exes?”
“What’s up?”
“Nothing. Just intrusions from home.” She was not in the mood to have the discussion. And he didn’t...he didn’t deserve this. It was way too good.
Man, first he got to deliver his shower monologue to her, and now he was actually present while she was losing the thing that she broke up with him for.
This isn’t why you broke up with him. It was more than that. And the reason is still solid.
Also, she hadn’t lost anything. She hadn’t. It was just the possibility of something.
But it was her goal. It had been for so long. And it felt...
It didn’t matter what it felt like.
It wasn’t fair. That much was true.
“Right. You have a... A husband? A boyfriend?” Her scalp prickled. She was genuinely shocked that he ha
d asked the question. The one that she had been avoiding asking him. And annoyed. Because now was not the time.
“No,” she said. “By choice, thank you.”
“I wouldn’t have thought anything else.”
She wasn’t going to ask him now. Because she didn’t care. She didn’t care about anything. She ignored the strange, messy sensation in her chest that told her she might be lying.
“I have to go practice.” She stabbed her cigarette out on the porch step and stood. “Just finish up in here. I’m going to be upstairs.”
“Will the pounding disturb you?” The way that he asked that... She could tell he didn’t actually care.
“No,” she said. It probably would. But she wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of knowing he had the power to annoy her. Just like she wouldn’t let him know that she was crumbling inside.
Because she just didn’t let people see her crumble. Much less him. Never him.
She walked past him, into the house, up the stairs, and into the peacock blue bedroom that she had been sleeping in. She closed the door firmly behind her.
Her violin was resting in its case, on the mantel. She swallowed hard and picked it up, unzipping the case and taking out the bow, tightening it before taking out her rosin and making sure it was coated with just the right amount.
She lifted the instrument up with her left hand and braced it underneath her chin, holding it there with no hands while she finished fussing with the bow. And then she played.
Long slow notes at first, then fast and electric. She played until she couldn’t breathe. Played with her eyes screwed shut, so she could ignore the tears falling down her face. And she wrapped it all up in music.
The music filled up the room, and she waited for it to fill her up too. But it didn’t.
And when she finished, she let her arms fall to her sides, holding the instrument tightly in her hand. And she didn’t... She didn’t know what this meant.
If Ilina Voychek was just as special as she was, or more, then what did that mean? What did any of it mean?
This was like falling into an abyss. This not knowing.
Not having any idea what was in her future anymore.
How could she even find solace in music when this was all wrapped up in music?
There’s no reason music is all you should be able to do.
She remembered her grandmother’s voice. And she frowned. She placed her violin carefully back in its case, along with its bow, and began to pace the length of the room. She could still hear Josh moving around downstairs. Which meant she was going to be on bedroom exile for a little while longer yet. She had no desire to see him again. Not when her eyes were red and her face was still wet from her tears.
He was still downstairs. And the only escape from this room would be to go up.
She opened up the bedroom door and went up the curved staircase that led to the attic. She pushed the door open, and was yet again surprised by the sheer volume of things stacked into the tiny space.
“Okay,” she said, looking around. “Do you have answers for me up here? Because you always acted like you did when you were alive. And you said I was too focused and too intense. But I was right, you know. And you wouldn’t know anything about that. Because you decided to do something, you decided to get married and have kids, and you didn’t even keep on doing that. So really, what would you know about the kind of commitment it takes to see something through?”
She had the thought of going back to the Craft Café. Going to see Lark. But she didn’t think she could handle that right now.
She felt spiteful and mean even knowing she was just talking to her grandmother’s ghost that way. But she was so angry. She was angry and she didn’t know how to have that conversation with another person. Because she had spent so much of the last nineteen years handling every thing by herself. And things had been good. They’d been fine. She didn’t need anything. She didn’t need anyone. She had only needed her music.
She went over to the stack of fabric, where they had mined their quilting objects from. There was another bin, nearby, but it didn’t have only fabric in it. It had trinkets.
She wondered if Lark had seen all of this yet. She thought, briefly, about taking the box to her sister but she couldn’t face...anything. Not right now.
She knelt down and opened the top.
There was a stack of old photos inside. The top one had a picture of a man with a mustache, wearing suspenders and blue jeans, holding a clearly deceased creature by the leg. The label read: Jason Dowell with Bobcat, 1919.
“Great. Great for you, not so much for the bobcat.” There were more pictures, of The Dowell House in other stages of construction. Also a picture of an old barn with hides tacked to the outside. Fittingly labeled: Skunk Hides, 1918.
The best photo was of a man standing on top of a tree branch, his hunting dog on the branch as well. He was pointing his gun off into the blank space. Labeled, William Wesley Dowell, 1922.
She was fairly certain that was her great-grandfather.
If nothing else, her ancestors were certainly... Well, something.
She pulled the next picture out, finding more animals, buildings and men holding weapons. But there was another photo, smaller than the others. And she paused.
It was a young woman, her dark hair cut short, pinned into waves that framed a heart shaped face. Her lips were dark, and though the photo was black and white, it was easy to imagine that they were a deep red. She was standing in almost a ballet pose, wearing low heels, and a dark colored dress that fell down past her knees, with a dropped waist, and a spangle of shining beads over the fabric.
Very familiar looking fabric.
“The Party Dress.” She touched it, and then turned the picture over, looking for a label as comprehensive as the others. But there was only a date. 1923.
She stared at the girl, at the dreamy look on her face. If she was a Dowell, then she was definitely an odd one in the middle of all these outdoorsmen. In the middle of all this... Practicality.
In many ways, Hannah had always considered herself practical. It wasn’t that she didn’t take the steps to make her dreams happen. She did. But there had to be more. That magic. The kind of magic that had a girl who might’ve been part of this suspenders-wearing family choosing a dress that looked like this. Something frothy and beautiful and ornate, that wouldn’t have been at home here in Bear Creek.
“Maybe you weren’t at home here either.”
She shrugged off the vague disquiet that asked her if she knew where in the world she was at home now.
12
His mother says our child will be a bastard. And I know she is right. That there is shame I will bring on our child if I insist on raising him. I cannot tell my mother at all. I fear her disappointment too much.
Dot’s Diary, July 1944
Mary
Lark was still at The Miner’s House when Mary arrived for quilting night.
“I’ll be out in a minute, Mom,” her daughter called from the kitchen area at the back.
The Closed sign was turned, but the lights above the bar still glowed with warmth. And Mary paced around the room, taking in the changes that Lark had put into place since the last time Mary had been in.
She’d been busy the last few days—volunteering for morning reading for preschoolers at the library, taking Peyton to her evening ballet class and picking her up and making sure Joe had all of his gear together for the three day trek he was taking into the woods to take pictures.
Joe had wanted her to go, but she had too much to do here to go sit around in nature. She didn’t have an interest in photography and she’d never been one for camping. She liked the outdoors, but it was something her father had always seen as being pretty foolish when a body had running water and electricity at home.
She agreed.
Plus, she didn’t like sitting around being idle.
Lark had a display with local art under a glass case, and shelves with handmade ceramic mugs and local honey.
There was jewelry hanging from pegs, that Mary was sure Lark herself made. Tapestries hung from the walls, painted with images of naked women draped in flowers and sitting in fields with wolves.
There was a sweetness to the art, but something confusing in it too. Like her youngest daughter. Lark was sweet and always had been. She’d run errands with her without complaint, had spent time gardening with her, twirling and laughing in the sunshine. She hadn’t helped with chores but she’d followed along, chattering behind her while she cleaned.
And when she wasn’t sweet...she was a tempest. But it was part of all that Lark was.
But when she’d left home, she’d stopped all that. Like whatever thread had connected them had been decidedly cut when she’d left Bear Creek.
That was when she’d changed, and Mary had never been able to tell if it had been maturity or college.
She looked around the room even more closely, looking for clues about her youngest child. Who she was, why she was here.
If Mary were another woman, another sort of mom, she might have just asked her. But that kind of heart-to-heart stuck in her throat, and she never knew quite how to approach it.
When the girls had talked, it had been to Addie.
That stuck in Mary’s chest and burned. Addie had passed her over, and she’d come back just in time to teach her daughters the language of femininity, something Mary felt utterly clueless to.
Addie had made it so she couldn’t quite relate to her own daughters. If she’d never come back...
If she’d never come back they’d have had Mary’s influence and maybe then it would have been easier.
But then maybe Avery wouldn’t have become the wife and mother she was.
Maybe Lark wouldn’t have found so much sweetness.
Maybe Hannah would have had less of a sense of adventure.