“Millie and I will be over later this morning,” Grandma said.
Aunt Ellen and I walked over to the café through lightly-falling snow. It was a pure white day, both ground and sky taking on the appearance of an artist’s blank canvas, over which paint-slashes of deep brown and solid gray tree branches made a striking contrast. The air was still and you could hear the whisper of the falling snow. I tipped my face and held out my tongue for a moment, and Aunt Ellen laughed, catching my elbow in her free hand.
“You look extra pretty this morning,” my great-aunt told me, hugging my arm to her side. And then, “There comes Dodge and if I don’t mistake, the Carters’ big plow pickup.”
At those words electricity seemed to jolt through me, radiating from a central point. I followed the direction of her gaze and saw Dodge’s big winter truck, in addition to a growling blue diesel with a canary-yellow plow attachment, lifted to clear the ground at the moment.
“We better get that coffee perking,” Aunt Ellen said. She was wearing a crocheted white hat and matching scarf and hurried up the steps ahead of me; admittedly, I was lingering to catch the first glimpse of Mathias. From across the parking lot, I watched Bull climb down, while Tina’s husband Sam cranked open the passenger door; what if Mathias wasn’t with? What if he had slept in, decided it wasn’t worth getting up so early on a Friday morning…
But then I saw him bounding out of the truck; obviously he’d been in the backseat. He was wearing thick Carhartt bibs and the same gray wool hat as last night, and I imagined that the blue of his eyes was visible even with the distance separating us at the moment. The men met up with Dodge as one more truck rumbled into the snowy lot. Mathias caught sight of me and I saw him grin; he lifted one arm in a wave and I felt another bolt of lightning through the middle of me. I waved once, quickly, suddenly self-conscious as hell, and I almost ran into the café in Aunt Ellen’s wake. Inside, just seconds ahead of them, I shed my coat and scarf, agonizing over the static snapping through my hair. I smoothed my sweater and busied myself helping Aunt Ellen get coffee going.
The men came clattering in, stomping their boots, full of loud chatter and excitement over the day to come, spent crouched freezing around small holes drilled into the ice. Some things I would just never understand fully. My gaze was drawn again to Mathias, who hung his coat next to mine (unintentionally, as I clearly understood). Under his snow bibs he had on a thermal-underwear kind of shirt, dark blue and pretty darn form-fitting. The breath in my lungs became suddenly thin and insubstantial.
Just imagine what those arms would feel like wrapped around you…
Camille Anne Gordon. Stop it.
But oh my God, he’s so strong…
Here he comes.
Jesus Crimeny. Act normal.
“Morning,” he said, straddling a stool at the counter just across from where I was pretending to be busy making coffee. His cheeks were flushed from the cold, he was freshly shaved and still wearing his hat, from under which his longish hair was visible. He had curls on his neck; those and his dimple gave him a quality of sweetness that was belied by the devilish glint in his blue eyes. He leaned forward on his elbows and smiled at me, with absolutely no regard for what this did to my pulse.
“Morning,” I responded, and caught myself as I stood totally immobile, doing nothing more than smiling back at him. I turned abruptly back to the coffee maker and said over my shoulder, “This’ll be ready in just a minute.”
Bull came to join his son and wrapped a thick arm around Mathias. He roared, “Camille! Hi, sweetie. This here is the boy I’ve been so goddamn worried about, home at last!”
“We met last night,” I told Bull, smiling at him. I adored Bull. My eyes flickered quickly to Mathias, then away, as though he’d radiated a sudden sunbeam directly into my eyes. I said, “Home to stay, it sounds like.”
“Gonna start up a plow business,” Dodge said, taking the other stool, his bulk sandwiching Mathias against Bull.
“That’s the plan,” Mathias said. “At least for this winter. Skid Erickson and I have been talking about it since last spring.”
The coffee maker burbled cheerfully and Aunt Ellen came over with the basket of cinnamon rolls that she’d carried from the house. Men who I recognized as Tina, Glenna and Elaine’s husbands claimed stools and I hurried to line up mugs and pour coffee; when I got to Mathias, I felt his gaze on me, even though he was talking with his dad. They all thanked me but I was ridiculously tongue-tied and retreated to table three, just behind the row of stools at the counter, where I poured myself my own mug of coffee; I was just tearing open a second sugar packet when Mathias did a half-turn on his stool, so that he was facing me. He had pulled off his hat and his hair was a little wild; one strand in particular was sticking up from his forehead and I felt my fingers twitch, wanting to touch it, tuck it back into place.
“Care if I join you?” he asked. The others were arguing about lures and didn’t seem to notice when he moved without waiting for my response and sat down just across from me.
“Not at all,” I said, allowing a little sarcastic teasing into my tone, and he smiled again, his dimple flashing.
“So I’ve heard about you since last winter,” he said, clearly wanting to chat. I marveled for a moment but figured that he was just being polite. And probably wondering why in the hell I cared so much about his family’s ancestors anyway.
“I really love history,” I told him, stirring the sugar into my mug. I allowed myself to meet his eyes and tried not to gulp at the sight of him, no more than three feet from me. If only he wasn’t so freaking good-looking, I might be able to relax.
That’s a cheap excuse, I told myself. And you’re being a moron.
I went on, the words flowing forth, “Two winters ago, when I was still pregnant, I found this picture in an old trunk from our attic. It was really old, from 1875, and it was a photograph of a man standing by his horse.” I would not mention how I’d kept this beside my bed ever since. “The back of the picture said ‘Carter,’ so I ended up asking your sisters first and then your dad, and we think that the man is maybe the little brother of Boyd Carter, who—”
“Originally built White Oaks,” he interrupted and then immediately said, “Sorry, I have a bad habit of that. Keep going.”
“Yes, the one who built the homestead cabin too. His name, the little brother I mean, is Malcolm, and I also found this letter in the trunk, written by him—”
“Can you bring it to work tonight? You work tonight, right?” he asked, and I was not imagining the note of anticipation in his tone.
“You’re interrupting again,” I pointed out and he grinned, sending sparks all along my nerves. I added, “I do, and I will.”
“Sorry, I get carried away. Dad said something about a telegram too.”
“Yes, it’s very urgent-sounding and in it Malcolm said that he was searching for something. And that’s the last correspondence from him, ever since.” I paused to take a sip of my coffee; I also refrained from mentioning that I was hell-bent on discovering what had happened to him after that telegram.
Mathias leaped in with, “So you’re wondering where he ended up, right? That reminds me of why I used to spend all summer in that old cabin. My sisters think I’m crazy, but I love it out there and I like thinking about all the people who’ve lived in that space before me. It’s full of dust and bat shit and spiders now, I know, but there’s something about it. Did Dad tell you that I found an old ring tucked behind a stone in the fireplace? It was the most—”
“You did?” I was interrupting him this time, excited at this revelation. And also the fact that he wondered about who came before, the people that had lived in the cabin since the 1860s. “Will you show me?”
“For a small price,” he said, looking gorgeous if slightly wicked. Upon seeing my immediate wariness, he rushed on, “I’m just kidding. I was going to say that you can’t believe anything my sisters tell you about me. That’s the price.”
“Dammit,” he muttered, and irritated affection for his sisters was apparent in his tone. He implored, “Don’t listen to them. Shit, Elaine hasn’t tried to read the cards for you, has she? Don’t let her, she’ll tell you all sorts of crazy things and then expect you to make sense of them.”
“Like what? What sort of things?”
“Like that you have to heal something from the past to make sense of the future and all sorts of abstract hoo-ha that—”
I was laughing then, interrupting him to ask, “Did you just say ‘hoo-ha’?”
He smiled and laughed too, seeming a little shy at the same time, as the skin over his cheekbones flushed. He said, “Yes, yes I did. I try to use embarrassing words like that frequently.”
I studied him, my heart clipping along at a much faster than normal pace, aching to reach across the table and touch his hair. I curled my wayward fingers even more tightly around my mug. Bull, Dodge and the other men were rising, thanking Ellen, and Bull said to Mathias, “Boy, you about ready?”
Mathias nodded at his dad, finishing off his coffee with a gulp and then tugging his hat back over his hair, curls still sticking out along the back. I bit my bottom lip.
“What time do you work tonight?” he asked then, smiling just for me. Or at least, I pretended that he was smiling for that reason.
“At five,” I said.
“Well I will see you then,” he told me, rising and pushing in his chair; for a moment he curled one hand over the back edge, looking down at me as I stared right back up at him, unable to stop. His eyes were beautiful, such a striking blue and framed in thick black lashes, his straight black brows almost stern above them. I had the sense that he was just as caught off guard as me by this unexpected undercurrent that was even stronger than it had been last night.
“See you later, sweetie,” Bull added.
Mathias looked back at me as he zipped up his thick coat, appearing nearly twice as imposing in all of his winter gear. I studied him with no smile, just absorbing his expression, which was every bit as somber as my own. Then he smiled as he wound his scarf and I felt everything inside of me leap, blood and heart and senses, towards him. I watched through the wide front windows as the six of them made their way back to their trucks; I was pressing my fingertips to the glass before I realized what I was doing. Out in the parking lot Mathias bent down and scooped up an armload of fluffy snow, throwing it over his brothers-in-law. Even through the glass and with the heater running, I heard their shouted threats as he laughed and darted away; Sam caught him around the waist and they wrestled around, almost tumbling to the snow. I giggled.
“That Mathias has always been crazy,” Grandma said, coming into the café carrying Millie Jo, stamping snow from her boots.
“Cwazy!” Millie parroted, and I reflected that they were both right, as my heart was going crazy just watching him.
***
This evening Tina and I were supposed to work the dining room and Elaine the bar, but when I got there at quarter to the hour, I found the space empty of anyone but Mathias. He was wearing faded jeans and a black turtleneck sweater, and he held out his hand immediately when I came through the swinging door. I stopped and everything within me sprang fiercely to life; I had been on pins and needles driving my pick-up around the lake, knowing I would see him this evening, maybe even as soon as I got to White Oaks. And here he was, with sexy five o’clock shadow and his dimple flashing, holding out his right hand, palm down and curled into a fist.
“Hold out your hand,” he said, indicating with a tilt of his head in the direction of my hands, clinging to my server apron. I had begged Ruthie to come out to Shore Leave to fix my hair, and so Tish had driven her over in Mom’s car, the two of them excited that winter break from school was fast approaching. Tish was a senior this year, along with Clinty. Ruthie had a crush on a boy in her grade, and they updated me on all the gory details that a big sister should know. In the meantime, Ruthann twisted my hair into an elegant knot on the back of my head, using the iron to add a little extra curl to select strands that she freed and artfully arranged. My sisters had agreed I looked good, also finding gold hoop earrings for me.
Wordlessly I obliged and held out my hand, taking in every last detail of Mathias’s face, also noting the way his jeans fit him like a cowboy’s and that his turtleneck sweater emphasized his shoulders really, really well. He held his fisted hand over mine and then, to my surprise, used his other hand to catch mine from beneath, holding it steady as heat galloped up my arm and then all through me. Watching my eyes, he dropped a small metal object into my cupped palm.
“The ring!” I said, taking it instantly between my index finger and thumb, holding it close. It was a smooth gold band, no more than a quarter of an inch thick.
“It’s engraved,” he said, leaning over the bar beside me, and I tipped it at once so I could read the tiny words on the inside rim.
“‘My heart is yours for all time,’” I read, and felt a chill. My eyes flashed to his and I said softly, “Oh, wow.”
He shook his head, grinning at me as though in teasing, but something in his eyes was serious. He said lightly, “All right, I admit I thought it was a little bit romantic too. Back when I found it. If you don’t mind complete clichés.”
“Clichés!” I repeated, almost indignantly, letting it rest on my palm. “No. This is heartfelt.”
“If you say so,” he said, again with a teasing tone, but his blue eyes held mine. He asked, “Did you bring the picture?”
I set the ring carefully on the bar, alongside my apron, and lifted my purse from where it was hanging against my right side. I withdrew the journal-sized notebook I’d found to keep the picture from getting bent on the way here and carefully extracted it to hand to him; Mathias pored over it at once.
“‘Me and Aces,’” he read. “Holy shit, this is a find. I don’t mean to be inarticulate, but shit. And Dad thinks that this is Boyd Carter’s little brother?”
“I would really like to find out what happened to him,” I said. “I feel like—” but here I stumbled to a halt, embarrassed; words seemed to pour from me in his presence, without my intending it.
“Feel like what?” he asked, still leaning over the bar but looking at me again. I felt the warmth of his gaze like a touch.
“It’s stupid,” I said.
“It’s not,” he insisted. “What?”
I picked up the ring and for whatever reason slipped it over my left index finger; it was a little snug there, not moving beyond the middle knuckle. I said, “I feel like I’m supposed to find out what happened to him. I don’t know exactly why. I’ve been a little obsessed with it since finding the picture.”
He said, “It’s not stupid at all. You sound the way I used to when I would go on about who had built what in the cabin, like the fireplace. That’s how I found the ring, monkeying with the stones in it.” He studied the ring on my hand and said, “It isn’t supposed to fit on that finger, you know.” And as though I didn’t understand, he tapped my third finger. He had very strong-looking hands, wide and long-fingered, and I had the sense that he wanted to keep his fingertips on me just as desperately as I wanted him to; wordlessly I slipped the ring into its proper place, where it fit snugly. Mathias caught it between his thumb and index finger, not exactly touching me, but all of the breath in my body lodged in my chest, almost painfully.
“See?” he said, and his voice was a little hoarse. I studied his eyes, which I realized glinted with flecks of topaz in their depths, like gold dust beneath creek water. And just like that, insanely and yet with bone-deep certainty, I knew I had kissed him before.
“Boy!” we heard Bull calling in his gravel-pit voice, and I turned instantly away from the intensity that was churning in my blood.
Mathias straightened and I busied myself tying
my apron, extra tightly, as though to punish myself for such absurd and irrational thoughts. It was sleep deprivation, most likely. My overactive imagination. Bull pushed through the swinging door and said, “The party of twenty is on the way, and so is Tina. You two all right until then?”
“Dad,” said Mathias with certainty. “I haven’t forgotten how to pour a drink.”
“As though you’d forget such a thing at college,” his father joked. “And I see you found the picture. Ain’t that something? Hi, Camille. Hon, you’re so pretty you almost hurt my eyes. Look at you.”
It was great to have an excuse to be flushing; my cheeks burned brightly. Flustered as hell, I still managed to respond sincerely, “Thank you.”
It began to grow busy after that, Tina arriving for her shift no more than a couple of minutes later, breezing in with an air of merriment. She hugged her brother, telling him, “It’s so good to have you home, Matty-pants.”
“Already with the nicknames?” he asked her, sounding pained. Facing away from them as I topped off the salt shakers on the dining room tables, I let a smile spread over my face.
“What about Bratty-pants? Hah! Remember that one? You were such a whiny little shit.” Tina was laughing.
“Why do I put up with this? You want a snake bite?” he responded and I peeked over my shoulder to see Mathias catching Tina around the forearm as she laughed and struggled against his hold. He said gleefully, “Remember those?”
“Sam said you threw snow all over him this morning,” Tina said, freeing herself from his grasp and reaching to rough up his hair. “And that you guys caught your limit.”
“We did at that,” he said and looked over towards me; as I was still peering over my shoulder, our eyes met and held.
“Hey there, Camille!” Tina called over. “I’ll be right there to help you.”
The evening was busy and as Mathias was tending the bar, I had many lovely excuses to be near him, if for no other reason than to grab the cocktails I needed for my tables. I had never been quite so encouraging of my customers to keep drinking.
Winter at the White Oaks Lodge Page 10