Changes

by Judith Arnold

  Chapter Four

  As days went, this was not Nick’s worst. He’d met with the town manager at ten-thirty to discuss next year’s budget, enjoyed a fruitful phone conversation with the high school principal about the after-school tutoring program he’d established there, reviewed the schedule at the community center gym, met with two drop-outs he’d been counseling and got them signed up for GED classes, and talked to someone in the state’s Department of Youth Services about a local girl with substance abuse issues who belonged in therapy and not the juvenile justice system. “Find me a good rehab program her family can afford,” he’d argued. “You can litigate her DUI later. First, let’s get her detoxed.”

  All in a day’s work.

  He tried not to think about the atypical way his day had begun. He tried not to think about Diana Simms, with her eyes the color of the ocean. He tried not to think about the damned song playing in a never-ending loop inside his skull.

  Changes? Sure, he could use some changes in his life. A higher salary would be a nice change. A little less caffeine, a little more exercise. A new shower curtain for the bathroom in his house. What he’d really like would be to install glass sliders above the tub, but he’d need an upward change in his salary to afford a glass-sliders change in his bathroom.

  None of the changes he’d welcome had anything to do with Diana, though—not given that her life was in Boston and her finger was adorned by that blinding diamond engagement ring.

  At around six o’clock, he left his cramped, windowless office at the community center, locked up and headed for his car, calculating how bad the traffic would be if he detoured to the big-box home repair store down on Rte. 1 to look at shower curtains before driving home. Not that the shower curtain was a major change, but maybe if he bought a new one, he could silence the song he’d heard playing on the jukebox at the Faulk Street Tavern Saturday night—and continued to hear playing in his mind ever since.

  He climbed into his car, started the engine and turned on the radio. Bass-heavy Metallica blasted through the speakers, and he let it surge over him, praying that it, too, might drown out the David Bowie song. He turned the radio’s volume up so high, he didn’t hear his cell phone ringing.

  He felt it vibrating against his thigh, however. Pulling it from his pocket, he peered at the screen, turned off the radio and cursed.

  He should just ignore the call. But it was hard to ignore your mother—even when she had left scars across your psyche that would never fade. Sighing, he thumbed the connect icon and lifted the phone to his ear. “Yeah?” His voice emerged as a growl.

  “Don’t be like that,” his mother said. “It’s been ages since we talked.”

  He took a minute to subdue his reflexive anger at the sound of her voice. “I’ve been busy,” he said.

  “One of the shutters fell off in front of the house. A living room window. I thought maybe you could stop by and rehang it.”

  Sure. There was nothing Nick wanted more than to do freaking repairs for his mother. “Like I said, I’m really busy.”

  “Nick.” Her voice took on a familiar wheedling tone. When he was a kid, the syrupy sweetness of her voice had made him feel loved, made him feel as if she would keep him safe and protect him from his father’s wild temper. Not anymore. Now, when she said, “I’ll make you dinner. You can come, hang the shutter, and I’ll make manicotti. You love my manicotti,” all he could think of was that he loved her manicotti a hell of a lot more than he loved her.

  Still, she was an older woman, living alone. Her body was worn down by time, loneliness and the abuse his father had inflicted on her. The old man had specialized in discreet punches and slaps, leaving bruises no one could see, and emotional abuse that left bruises no less real, even if they were also invisible—the fear, the caution, the constant anxiety that one wrong word or gesture might change the abuse from emotional back to physical.

  Nick had a master’s degree in social work. He knew about domestic violence. Growing up, he’d had a front-row seat in the boxing ring of his home. So from a clinical standpoint, he could sympathize with his mother.

  But he’d fought in that arena, too. He’d fought harder than his mother ever had. His sympathy had limits.

  “Hire a handyman,” he spoke into the phone. “Someone who knows how to hang shutters.”

  “I can’t afford—”

  “I’ll pay for it,” he said, thinking again about how much he’d like his salary to ch-ch-change. “Look, Mom, I have to see someone right now. I’ve got to go.”

  “Call me,” his mother whined. “Come visit. I’ll cook something nice.”

  He rolled his eyes, muttered good-bye and tapped the disconnect icon. And cursed again.

  He was in no longer in the mood to shop for a shower curtain. Nor was he in the mood to drive home and listen his mother’s plaintive voice alternating with the Bowie song on that audio loop in his mind. He wasn’t even in the mood for a blast of Metallica.

  He tore out of the community center parking lot, his tires spitting loose pebbles behind him. Instead of heading west toward his house or south to the shopping district on Rte.1, he steered to Atlantic Avenue, the road paralleling the retaining wall, the beach, and the ocean beyond. The sky to his right was fading to dark as he cruised north, the last light of dusk bleeding out of the day. Although the evening air was cold, he rolled down his windows and let the sea breezes whip through his car.

  A cigarette would have helped—if he still smoked. A glass of something strong—if he wasn’t driving. A mother he could trust—if he could swap his own mother for a better one.

  The houses along Atlantic Avenue were tightly packed, barely a sliver of space between one and the next. Land was precious this close to the shore; a large yard would spike the already prohibitive costs of ocean-view properties even higher. Further north, Brogan’s Point featured plenty of mansions owned by gazillionaires. Along the stretch of the Atlantic Avenue closer in to town, though, single-family homes nestled shoulder to shoulder with triple-deckers, summer rentals, and rambling old houses transformed into quaint bed-and-breakfasts that catered to New Yorkers and folks from Western Massachusetts who came to enjoy a long seaside weekend in a town they could reach in just a few hours.

  He kept heading north until he reached the driveway to the Ocean Bluff Inn. The entry was flanked by short stone pillars topped with lantern-shaped lights. As he steered up the winding drive to the imposing white clapboard structure spread across the grassy ocean-view bluff for which it was named, he slowed the car, took a few deep breaths and shook his head, hoping to clear it.

  He cleared some of the anger, some of the static. But the damned David Bowie song remained.

  Why had he driven to the inn? Diana probably wasn’t here. Or if she was, she might be with her fiancé, that clean-cut dude who’d been with her at the Faulk Street Tavern on Saturday night. That proper gentleman who’d planted a massive chunk of crystalized carbon on her ring finger.

  Nick was an idiot to have driven to the OB. Seeing Diana made no sense.

  Except that not seeing her made even less sense.

  He shut and locked his car—the oldest, shabbiest vehicle in the guest lot—and walked to the front steps, his footsteps crunching on the crushed shells and sea-smooth pebbles that paved the path leading to the building. He climbed three shallow steps to a broad veranda furnished with a few heavy wooden Adirondack chairs and rockers. It was still too early for the inn to put lightweight wicker furniture on its front porch; winter hadn’t released New England from its grip yet. The green tips of daffodils and crocuses were beginning poke through the soil and a few trees were dotted with leaf buds, but no one would be shocked if the region saw a few more inches of snow before spring officially arrived. Winter usually took its time departing from Massachusetts.

  Nick crossed the porch to the heavy oak door, swung it open and stepped inside. He was immediately embraced by the heated indoor air. The in
n’s lobby was small and welcoming, the walls painted a soft white and adorned with framed seascape paintings and photos of old sailing ships, the hardwood floor covered with thick patterned area rugs. Along one wall ran a counter of polished oak—the hotel equivalent of Gus’s bar, he thought with a wry smile. A bowl of apples stood at one end of the counter, an urn holding brightly colored flowers at the other. Halfway between them, a clerk in a dark blue blazer and khaki trousers was stationed. The clerk eyed Nick curiously, then asked, “Can I help you?”

  “I’m looking for…” Nick paused, hearing a woman’s voice emerging through the arched doorway leading to a parlor off the lobby. Diana’s voice. “I think I found her,” he said, moving toward the doorway.

  Diana stood in front of a window in the parlor, her back to Nick, a cell phone pressed to her ear. “No,” she said, her voice tight with tension. “I’m sorry you feel that way, but—” She listened for a moment. “I will when I’m ready,” she said. Another pause. “Peter. Don’t be this way. It’s not—I’m fine. Really. Right. Okay. I’ll call you tomorrow.” She lowered the phone, jabbed her finger against the screen and muttered, “Screw you.”

  This must be the evening for unpleasant phone calls—and Nick shouldn’t have eavesdropped on Diana’s. She’d hidden herself inside this small parlor, which was furnished with overstuffed chairs and a sofa, a floor-to-ceiling bookshelf stacked with weathered hardcovers, and a fireplace with an ornately carved mantel. Maybe she’d hoped for privacy. But if she’d truly wanted privacy for her phone call, she should have gone to her room. The parlor was a public space, sort of.

  Nick gave her a moment to simmer down, then cleared his throat. She spun around and gasped. “Oh!”

  “Sorry—did I scare you?”

  “No.” Even from across the room, he could see the tension seeping out of her spine, her shoulders relaxing as she let out a long breath. “You just startled me a little. What are you doing here?”

  Good question. “I…was pissed off,” he said.

  Her huge eyes clouded with concern. “At me?”

  He gave her what he hoped was a reassuring smile. “No, of course not. But I thought…” God, this was going to sound odd, no matter how he expressed it. “I thought seeing you would cheer me up.”

  “And instead, you found out that I was pissed off, too.” She slid her phone into her purse. “I guess you overheard that argument.”

  “Just the tail end.” He smiled again. “Maybe you’re pissed off, but you’re cheering me up.” It was true. Simply standing in the same room with her eased his tension, deleted his mother’s phone call from his memory, and muted the Bowie tune.

  Diana took a step toward him, then halted. The room wasn’t large. One more step and she’d be close enough for him to touch her.

  “You want to grab some dinner?” he asked.

  It didn’t seem like that complicated a question, but she took a full minute to mull over her reply. “I was going to eat here at the inn,” she said. “I’ve been doing these tasting menus.…” She bit her lip, then shrugged and smiled. “The hell with that. Let’s go somewhere else. You must know some good local restaurants. That place where we had coffee this morning—”

  “Riley’s. Great for breakfast, not so great for dinner. You like seafood?”

  “I’d better, if I’m spending time in Brogan’s Point.”

  “I’ll take you to a good local place. No atmosphere. Lobster right off the boat.”

  “It sounds perfect. Let me run up to my room and grab my coat.” She neared him, then moved right past him, denying him the chance to take her hand or brush a stray lock of hair back from her cheek. Just as well. He had no business wanting that kind of contact, that connection. She was a visitor, a Boston woman. Already taken.

  “Go ahead,” he said. “I’ll wait down here.”

  He followed her into the lobby and watched her walk up the grand stairway to the second floor. The main building had four floors, so he assumed there must be an elevator somewhere. But Diana was a jogger. It figured she would take the stairs.

  Five minutes later, he watched her descend that double-width stairway like a debutante—one wearing tailored slacks, a wool coat and a colorful silk scarf rather than a gown, but just as regal, just as elegant. Just as beautiful.

  She was smiling.

  And she wasn’t wearing her diamond ring.