“Did you play anything growing up?”
“I skied, of course. Vail, and everything.” Kellan looked out at the water and Ashleigh wondered if she was reminiscing. “I was on my high school team. But I was only so-so. My brother was an all-star. He almost qualified for the Olympics.”
“That’s exciting.”
“But then when he didn’t, he got super depressed. I think he joined the Army just to get away from it all.”
“Sad.”
“It seemed so at first. But he loved the military. I loved the way he talked about it. Constant travel, always something new. It sounded awesome. I was sold by the time I was a junior in high school.”
“And?”
“And what?” Kellan asked.
“And was it what you thought it would be?”
Kellan’s smile said there was a story there and Ashleigh longed to hear it. “No, I guess it wasn’t. It was awful in ways I hadn’t imagined. War is crazy.” Her eyes filled with emotion and Ashleigh longed to comfort her, if only she knew how. “It was also wonderful in ways I didn’t expect,” Kellan said. “The people I met there, served with…there aren’t really words to convey how I feel about them.” She wiggled her eyebrows, breaking the moment and somehow undercutting the depth of her statement. “Come on, let’s go find your ancestors on the Wall of Honor.”
No doubt about it, the topic was closed for now, but Ashleigh hoped they’d revisit it at some point. She found herself wanting to know details about Kellan and her life, and that caught her off guard. It was just that she’d never known anyone quite like her, she rationalized. And yes, she was attractive. Almost objectively. Already today, she’d counted five women completely checking her out. None of them were subtle. It shouldn’t matter. They weren’t a couple. She had no grounds to be irked by the attention Kellan received, and yet she was somehow irrationally jealous.
“Do you know which section of the Wall your grandparents are on?” Kellan asked as they walked through the rows of the monument.
“I looked it up last night. My mother’s parents are on panels fifty-seven and two hundred fifty. My dad’s father is on panel one twenty-three.”
“Okay. Let’s start at fifty-seven and work up. Sound good?”
“Sorry if this is boring.”
The look Kellan dropped on her said she needn’t worry. “Are you kidding? I think this is cool. I’m the boring one here.” There was kind of a line forming, and Kellan directed Ashleigh in front of her. “This way, I think.” Ashleigh could feel her hand barely touching her hip as she guided her, half a step behind. “Here.” She stopped them and stood behind Ashleigh to make space for the other visitors. “What name am I looking for?”
All she could concentrate on was Kellan’s breath, warm against her ear, her voice soft and husky at the same time. She felt the heat between them filling the small space between her bare shoulders and the cotton T-shirt covering Kellan’s chest. She almost forgot which grandparent she was looking for. “McAllister. John McAllister.”
“I see it.” Kellan pointed high. “All the way on the left. Third from the top. Do you see?” She took a step to the left, bringing Ashleigh with her. “Here, is that better?”
Ashleigh nodded. It was all she could do. She could feel herself getting hot, and she knew it wasn’t a result of the day’s temperatures. It wasn’t really Kellan either, she told herself. It was simply that it had been ages since she’d had any kind of closeness with another human being. She took a deep breath to gain her composure and was careful to slowly release the air, hoping Kellan didn’t notice.
“Are you okay?” Kellan asked.
No such luck. And now Kellan’s hand was on her shoulder.
“It’s emotional, I’m sure,” Kellan said.
Emotional. Not really what she was feeling, but she took the out. “Thanks.” She needed to get a hold of herself and quick. Reaching in her purse, she took out her phone to snap a pic. Her grandmother would appreciate it later. “Sorry about that,” she said.
“No apologies necessary.” Kellan’s smile was genuine and Ashleigh found that looking into her eyes grounded her in the most unusual way. She was even able to completely focus on the next two panels as she found Catherine Leonard and Martin Buckley with ease. Dutifully she took photographs of her ancestors’ names to document the occasion.
“My mom will be excited to see her parents’ names on the wall, I think.”
They walked through the museum, examining the history of America and the great many folks who’d left their families in search of a better life. Ashleigh stopped by a small exhibit dedicated to emigrants from Ireland.
“Have you ever been?” Kellan asked.
“To Ireland? Yes,” she answered.
“Did you love it?”
Ashleigh took a second to think about the question, knowing the answer was so much more complex than she wanted to admit. “I did.” Kellan seemed to search her face, which surely revealed the conflict in her heart.
“I met my wife there,” she said. “My ex-wife, I should say.”
“Oh. Wow.” Kellan nodded. “That explains the look.”
“Yeah, well.” Ashleigh looked down to avoid eye contact. She didn’t want to discuss her relationship with Reagan today. Or any day, for that matter. Kellan was only here for the summer. She could certainly make it through a few weeks without looking like a pathetic failure. “Anyway…” She walked toward the building’s exit.
“Hey, don’t do that.”
Ashleigh turned around, continuing to shuffle backward toward the door. “Do what?”
“I don’t know. Walk away when you seem sad. Let me help you.”
“You’re sweet, but I’m okay.”
“Are you?”
She was, mostly. “I’ve been divorced for almost a year. According to Liam, and most certainly according to Reagan, my marriage was over long before that.”
“What if I don’t care about what Liam and Reagan think? What if I want to check in with you?”
“Why are you being nice to me?”
“What kind of question is that?” Kellan ushered her into a seat on a deserted bench overlooking the harbor. “You seem, I don’t know…sad, angry, annoyed. All of the above, maybe. I’m an outsider. Talk to me. It might make you feel better. It probably won’t make you feel worse.”
“I don’t even know where to start.”
“I could ask questions.” Ashleigh couldn’t help but notice Kellan’s eyes widen as she kicked the soles of her Vans together. “I have about a million.”
She smiled. “You do?”
“Uh, yeah.” Kellan picked up a pebble and moved it between her fingers. “Gorgeous blond divorcee, living with her parents, no dating prospects—that she speaks of, anyway. You bet I have questions.”
Ashleigh was flattered and touched that Kellan was trying to cheer her up. She ignored the flutter she felt at Kellan’s compliment and didn’t even allow herself to think the words were anything more than supportive. Still, it made her smile as she let her defenses slip away. She put a hand on Kellan’s shorts and gave her thigh a small squeeze. “Ask away,” she said.
“Really?”
Ashleigh couldn’t imagine what anyone would find interesting about her humdrum life, but she was enjoying the attention. “Why not?”
“Okay.” Kellan seemed to dig deep for her first question. “Here’s one. Did your ex move back to Ireland after you split up?”
“Ha! No.” She was laughing even though Kellan wasn’t in on the joke. “She lives around the block from me. In our old apartment. With her boyfriend.”
“Ouch.” Kellan covered her heart with both hands. “Didn’t see that coming.”
Ashleigh ticked her head to the side. “Me either, honestly.”
“Well, what can we do to encourage her to move back to her homeland?”
“Sadly, nothing.” She scrunched her nose up. “Reagan’s American. We met in Ireland during college. We both we
re in a study abroad program. Even though we were from different schools, everyone in the program hung out together. We had some classes in common. She was studying education too. We fell in love. After the semester was over, she transferred to Columbia to be with me. It was romantic.”
“Where was she in school before that?”
“Notre Dame.”
“And she can’t go back to Indiana now?”
“Well, now she’s in love with Josh. So it’s unlikely.”
“I’m sure there’s space for both of them.”
Ashleigh touched the fabric of her skirt, considering the sweetness in Kellan’s support. “It’s actually fine. I don’t hate Reagan. Or Josh.” She toyed with the hem to feel the stitching against her fingertip. “I just wish I didn’t bump into them all the time. It’s…awkward.” Although, even as she said it, she wondered if they felt uncomfortable at all.
“I can imagine.”
“Not because there’s feelings, though. I mean there are feelings, but not those kind of feelings. It’s true that things were over for a very long time before they officially ended.”
“How long were you two together. Total?”
“Seventeen years. Married for twelve.”
“That is a long time.”
“Yes. And now I just feel, I don’t know, like a fool, I guess.” It was the first time she admitted it out loud. And to someone she hardly knew. Perhaps that detail made it easier. With Kellan she had nothing to prove. No guard to keep up to prevent everyone from seeing the particulars of her divorce hurt her ego as well as her heart.
“Why?”
She rolled her neck in three circles, wondering the best way to phrase what she felt inside before going with pure honesty. “She seems so happy now.”
“That doesn’t mean she wasn’t happy with you.”
Didn’t it, though? Ashleigh crinkled her eyebrows, openly challenging Kellan’s statement with the look. Kellan obviously understood the unspoken comment.
“What I’m saying is I can’t believe, over the course of so many years, you two didn’t have a lot of wonderful times together.”
“I guess we did.”
“Of course you did.” Kellan touched her knee with the back of her index finger. Logically, she knew it was just a small gesture of encouragement, but it made her heart pound anyway. She closed her eyes and forced herself to focus as Kellan continued. “Sometimes things run a course. Other times we just don’t know what we want until we find it, if that makes sense.” Ashleigh felt Kellan lean in close, pressing their shoulders together. “The bigger question is, why aren’t you dating anyone now?”
Ashleigh tipped her head all the way back and held it there, her gaze fixed on the clear sky above. “Oh my God. You sound like my grandmother.”
“Not at all what I was going for.”
“Also Liam. And Shauna. And my parents.”
“See, there’s truth in numbers. We can’t all be wrong.”
“Come on, let’s walk.” Ashleigh stood up simply because she was having trouble convincing her starved libido that Kellan’s small touches were nothing more than friendly reassurance. Walking side by side helped quell her ridiculous desire, but it seemed her body had a mind of its own, and a few paces in she hooked her arm through Kellan’s. Something about their interaction throughout the day felt deeply personal and emotional, and on the spot she gave herself permission to need the physical contact. “I wouldn’t even know where to begin with dating.”
“Who does?” Kellan shooed an overzealous pigeon from their path. “You just put yourself out there with the rest of us. It’s not easy for anyone, I don’t think.”
“Oh, please.” Ashleigh didn’t even try to cover her doubt. “Women have been scoping you all day. You know, I should be offended at their brazenness. I could be your girlfriend. Do they care? Nope. All day with the goo-goo eyes.”
Kellan bent her head in laughter. She’d obviously seen the looks.
“See, you even know it.”
“How do you know these women weren’t looking at you?”
“Because they were looking at you. I saw them. I have eyes.”
“I know. Gorgeous blue ones.”
Wait a second. She wasn’t crazy—this was friendly support. It couldn’t be flirting, right? She was truly at a loss and had no idea how to respond. “Very suave,” she finally said, hoping the chill words masked the excitement racing through her body.
Kellan tucked her hands in the pockets of her shorts, and with their arms still intertwined, the action pulled her just a bit closer. “I’m just stating a fact. You don’t have to believe me.”
They stopped at the end of the line for the ferry that would take them back to lower Manhattan. “That’s actually an opinion,” Ashleigh said.
Kellan turned and faced her, shaking her head. “Nah, it isn’t.”
Ashleigh could feel herself blush, and even if this was simply Kellan trying to help her out of a funk or restore her confidence, she appreciated it. “Are you hungry?” she asked.
“Thank God.” Kellan pretended to go weak in the knees. “Yes. Of course, I’m hungry. You never let me eat.”
“You should say something.” Ashleigh slapped her arm, almost scolding her for her politeness. “You like Italian?”
“Yes.”
“Great. Little Italy, it is.”
They ate outdoors, and as the sun set, the heat broke. Over red wine and pasta, they philosophized about life and love, family, the summer ahead. Ashleigh inquired about the small scar on Kellan’s temple and learned it was the result of a grade school ski pole duel with her brother. Kellan asked what it was like to teach high school math and whether she found it fulfilling. And while the conversation never got as personal as it had earlier in the day, the foundation of those talks made Ashleigh feel comfortable in a way that was deep and fresh and utterly unexpected.
Perhaps because they had both allowed themselves to be vulnerable, the playing field was balanced. Or maybe it was simply that it felt good to talk freely and not stress over anticipated judgment or expectation. Maybe it was just that when Kellan looked at her, she seemed to really listen. And God, it didn’t hurt that she had the most unbelievable green eyes Ashleigh had ever seen.
When the check came, they split it down the middle, each tossing a card into the billfold. As the server left to run the credit through, Ashleigh opened the ferry app.
“There’s a boat in twenty minutes. We could probably make it,” she said checking the schedule against the time.
“That ferry can’t be convenient for where you live.” Kellan slid her card into her wallet. “I appreciate you coming to me, but I know it must be a pain for you to get there.”
“I usually grab an Uber or a Lyft.”
“I could do the same and come up by you. We could take the subway from Park Slope. I’m sure that was the original plan.” She led the way out of the trattoria courtyard, holding the door as they passed through the main dining room and out onto the narrow street. “It shouldn’t always have to be you coming to me.”
“It’s sweet of you to offer,” Ashleigh said. “And I might take you up on it sometimes, depending on where we’re headed. But most days, I drop Granny off at the senior center on my way out, so this works. Plus”—she paused for dramatic emphasis in the middle of the sidewalk at the ferry stop—“the Beanery coffee. It’s only been a few days, and I’m hooked. I may never be the same again.”
“It is good. I’ll give you that.”
“How do you like your aunt’s apartment? The building itself is gorgeous. The lobby was something else. Does the apartment live up to the grandeur?”
Kellan nodded. “It’s very nice. Small, though. It’s only a studio. But the view is amazing. You should come up and see it.”
Ashleigh wasn’t sure if the invite was generic or specifically intended for tonight. She was afraid to ask, but more than that, she was afraid of the answer. With a full glass of wine coursing t
hrough her, she didn’t trust herself alone in private with Kellan, especially after Kellan had been so sweet to her today. And maybe they had flirted. But what if she had misread those signals entirely? She was rusty when it came to romance, and she couldn’t take being shot down and then having to see Kellan for the next two months. Better to play it safe.
“One of these days I will,” she responded. “I want to meet Blue.”
“I’m going to hold you to that,” Kellan said. As they disembarked from their final passage of the day she added, “You should see if there’s a car nearby.”
“Okay, I’m going to put in your address and see what comes up.”
“Good thinking.” They walked along the path, which was peopled with a few late evening joggers and folks walking their dogs. The shops and restaurants were catering to sparse crowds. Even Brooklyn Beanery was almost empty. On this quiet Monday evening in late June, the atmosphere was vibrant and chill and Ashleigh wondered if that was always the case. Something about the lovely evening and easy company gave her peace beyond words. She could happily end every night just like this. Except right now, she didn’t want it to end.
In front of Kellan’s apartment, a black Toyota matching the plate in her app was waiting for her. She ignored the sadness over having to leave as she walked to the car and turned around for a last look, absorbing it all before she spoke.
“This whole neighborhood is really beautiful. I’d like to spend some time here. Would you be okay with that? If I penciled it in to the schedule?”
Kellan opened the rear passenger door for her to get in. “You don’t even have to put it on the chart. Surprise me.”
Ashleigh paused by the door before she slid onto the seat, only half kidding when she replied, “You know I can’t do that.”
“We’re going to work on your definition of spontaneity. By the end of the summer, I bet you’re doing all sorts of things you never envisioned.” Kellan’s eyes sparkled and she winked as she closed the door, tapping twice on the roof as a signal for the driver to go.
Brooklyn Summer Page 7