Just after breakfast, Lauren stands in front of the mirror and slips on her seersucker blazer. Even in the heat of summer, she still needs a jacket in the air-conditioned office.
“Come on, kids. Your backpacks ready?” Her shoulders hitch the blazer into place and she turns half way around, studying her reflection. Tan skinnies, tapered at the ankles, black cami and the jacket define her closet in one word. Functional. Her hands reach behind her neck and clasp on a sterling silver necklace. A sparse wardrobe works, being basic enough to cover temporary assignments where no one would notice how little she actually has. She brushes her long-overdue-for-a-cut hair off her face and spritzes it with hairspray. It falls in a wave just to her shoulders.
“Let’s go, Grandma’s waiting!” Lauren calls out as she leans close to her reflection. The kids are thumping around in their bedrooms. She puts on foundation, blush and light lipstick.
“Hurry, hurry!” Hailey scoots past her door, lifting a backpack. “Get your stuff into the car.” The kids know the routine. So does her mother, babysitting for her. Everybody pitches in, keeping them going. Lauren will miss this if they ever move south. They will be alone.
“The money will help,” she told Kyle when he argued that he’d be working full-time all week learning to manage the diner, so she didn’t need to temp. “A little to pay down the credit card, a little for at the beach. Ice cream money,” she answered. Most to pay off the new washing machine. There is no getting ahead, just catching up.
“Stenil Insurance, please hold. Stenil Insurance, may I help you?” Monotonous, but a distraction, at the very least, from her thoughts. It keeps her marriage in limbo, and therefore alive. The job is tolerable except for that phone. Everything she does there, all her office tasks, are interrupted by the telephone. When it rings, which seems to be whenever she steps away from her desk, she knows what a dog on a leash feels like, doing an about-face all day. Come Lauren. Heel. And she sits back down and puts paper clips in the drawer, straightens a pile of folders, stacks pens neatly in their cup and aligns the damn phone with the edge of the desk, all while taking a message.
The office is two blocks from the diner, but Lauren packs a bag lunch and walks to The Green every day at twelve o’clock. She knows it would mean the world to Kyle if she stopped in, just once. If she took a stool at the end of the counter and ordered a grilled cheese sandwich. It would mean they had something to work for. Hope is as close as a sandwich.
Today Lauren sits on the shaded bench beneath the old maple tree. Cars drive past behind her, and a town employee pulls down the red, white and blue holiday streamers from a bandstand to her left. She finishes her juice and packs her wrappings into her brown lunch bag when she hears footsteps, and Kyle’s arm reaches around her with a double scoop chocolate ice cream cone. She looks up at his face first, because, well, it is either that or let a memory wash over her, and those aren’t helping her much lately.
“Shouldn’t you be working?” she asks, taking the cone. “It’s your busy time.”
“Hey, I’m the boss,” he asserts with feigned seriousness. “Jerry’s got everything under control,” he adds then. “I told him I needed to run an errand.”
“Oh.” She licks the melting ice cream around and around before it dribbles down the side of the cone. “When’s he leaving?”
“Today’s his last day. But he’ll be home for a couple of days, if I need him.”
“That’s good.”
“How’s Stenil?”
“Boring. What a long week.” She wants to take the kids swimming, not sit at that desk all afternoon. It is Wednesday now, and she still needs to stop the newspaper delivery for their vacation. And buy sunscreen. She bites into her cone.
“You look nice today,” Kyle says.
“Thanks.” His words make her feel funny. Modest even. A piece of summer slips between them then, traffic sounds, people’s voices, birdsong. Summer becomes palpable in their silence.
“Well. I’ve got to get back,” Kyle says. He leans forward, elbows on his knees, nervous hands fidgeting in front of him.
“Okay.” Lauren studies his back, taut beneath his shirt.
“I just wanted to see you, that’s all.” His head turns back to look at her and she is glad she wore her sunglasses. Sometimes her eyes feel so sad. After a moment, he stands and touches her shoulder. “Take care.”
If he looked back, he would have seen her turn on the bench, imagining him pulling the thick white apron over his head, flinching when it touches that massive bruise on his arm, firing up four griddles, his hands reaching for spatulas and orders and food and dishes. When she reaches for her handbag, she notices his notebook on the bench. She opens it in her lap, reading his notes on planning menus for two weeks, who not to buy tomatoes from, keeping the meals light if the heat wave continues. And there are coffee things, too, things he’d like to try. Lattes and cappuccinos. Coffee flavors, and an outlined menu of pastries. She looks back up, but Kyle is gone from sight and in his place comes the memory she resisted before, of Neil coming up behind her with an ice cream cone, one day on the beach, not too long before he died.
“Is this ethical?”
“Yes,” Eva says. “Well, no. But it is, kind of.” They walk along a tended, flower-lined stone path to an imposing shingled two-story cottage perched on a rocky outcropping facing Long Island Sound. Eva punches her code into the lockbox on the front door. “I mean, I told the owners I have a client I wanted to show their home to. And I do.” She turns to Maris behind her. “You’re my client. Right? I did rent you a cottage.”
“But I’m not looking to buy a cottage. Though this charmer could definitely tempt me.” Two white Adirondack chairs sit on a grassy side yard facing the sea.
“The furniture alone could sell me. It’s just what I want in my redecorating.” Eva unlocks the door and they go inside. “Come on, you have to see this.”
“It feels a little like we’re breaking in though. Snooping around illegally.”
“Hey, it’s not like we’re Bonnie and Clyde. I did list the house for sale. So we’re kind of window shopping, admiring the goods. They’ll never know the difference.”
“Wow!” Maris says as they turn into a dining room anchored with a large painted table, around which white wicker chairs are set. The built-in hutches are painted the same sea-green as the table, which has a huge vase of hydrangeas filling its center. A stained glass chandelier hangs from the ceiling.
“Now we’re talking,” Eva says.
“Oh yeah. Casual beach chic. This stuff is top shelf, Eva.”
They move into the living room, walking past the blue and white striped upholstery on the chairs and sofa. Lace table runners line the coffee and end tables, topped with huge shallow bowls filled with perfect seashells. Knotty pine paneling lines the wall with the stone fireplace, and tall French doors finish the far A-frame wall looking out at the blue waters for as far as the eye can see.
“I like the way they bring lace into the look. With that view, it makes me think of sea breezes. Pretty lace curtains and things like that,” Maris says. They walk through the kitchen with its mix of old and new. Granite countertops and beadboard walls. Stainless steel appliances and painted glass-front cabinets. She turns around in time to see Eva lifting her cell phone at the room. “You’re taking pictures?”
“Just getting ideas. I want to show this to Matt. Do you think I can pull off something like this in my decorating?”
“Actually,” Maris says as she looks into the bedrooms at the whitewashed picture frames and lighthouse lamps, “a lot of clients will be coming into your home office to make their summer vacation rentals. Or to buy summer homes. So the office has to be business, but you can give it a cottage flair.”
“Exactly,” Eva agrees. She opens a dresser drawer and takes a quick look, then lifts the top of a jewelry armoire beside it. The earrings inside are a jumbled mess.
“Hey, what are you doing?” Maris asks a few seconds later
.
Eva turns to Maris, a little startled and holding a pair of amethyst stud earrings to her ears. “Pretty, aren’t they?” she asks casually.
“Pretty and not yours. Really, Eva. Put them away already, what if someone sees you?”
“Fine,” she says, turning her back to Maris and catching another glance inside the armoire. Seeing things like this, this treasure of a life all contained, intrigues her. How many Christmas mornings are held in this jewelry box? Or moments of an anniversary, or a quiet birthday celebrated over candlelight, a velvet box wrapped with a bow on the table. So many memories must unfold with each glimmering piece. She raises her hand to the armoire as though returning the earrings, but closes her fist around them before slipping them into her pocket. A long glance around the room then is more to still her heart than to observe the decorating. Finally, with a decisive breath, she walks through French doors on the other side of the room and lets out a low whistle at the balcony’s rattan chairs with overstuffed cushions, throws casually draped over the arms. She grabs her cell to snap another picture. “I found a great shop in Westcreek. It’s used furniture, all stripped and redone. Which is basically what—”
“Cottages are furnished with. Secondhand stuff.”
“Want to take a ride there? Taylor’s with Alison until dinner, and I’m showing a home in a half hour and have to fly. But if you can stop by my place at two, that’ll work.”
“Sounds good. How is Taylor doing anyway?” Maris asks. “Have you patched things up?”
“Definitely. We played Bingo on the boardwalk last night and she won a jigsaw puzzle, which we worked on till midnight. Matt, too. Hey, have dinner with us tonight. She loves talking to you and we’re all going to miss you—”
“When I leave, I know. Dinner sounds really nice. Maybe we’ll finish that puzzle too.”
Eva locks up the front door and they walk the beach roads back toward Maris’ cottage. Tall oak trees throw pools of shade on the warm street. “And I want to show you some picture frames Theresa gave me. She said they’re from my birth family. I guess they gave her a few family things during the adoption.”
“No kidding. Well that’s nice to have.” Her cell phone rings and Maris checks her caller id. “It’s Scott. I better see what’s up.”
“Go ahead, I’ve got to run. See you at two?”
Maris nods and answers the call.
“Are you wrapping things up?” Scott asks.
“I drove to my dad’s house yesterday. It’s all in order and locked up there.”
“Good. Now what about that dog?”
Maris opens her porch door and heads inside, the dog prancing with happiness at seeing her. “That dog’s name is Madison, Scott.” That dog that follows her around with hoping eyes ever since she arrived in Connecticut. Hoping she’ll keep her, hoping she’ll go for a walk, hoping she’ll throw a driftwood stick. She looks at the German Shepherd sitting on the tiled floor. The heat has her panting now.
“Madison, all right. But there’s no way we can have a pet here. It’s too much.”
“I know. Eva and Matt promised to hold her until they find her a home.”
“So you’re ready to leave Friday afternoon then?”
“Listen, I was thinking.” She’s been thinking about her new line of beach denim sketches, about Eva’s decorating, about the pretty marina and the salt marsh. Thinking about everything but Chicago. “I’d love to show you around a little. How about if we leave on Sunday? There’s a seafood place you’d like here. I’ll ask Eva and Matt to come with us.”
“It won’t work, Maris. I’ve got to be in court Tuesday.”
“Oh. I guess we won’t have time. All right, then.” She turns around and her eyes sweep the kitchen. She sees the hours spent there with Eva, talking and planning. And the times she watched the sun come up with her coffee. And the morning with Jason. Where has it all gone? Time seems like such a dream, the way it eludes her.
Maris walks through the living room past the plaid overstuffed chairs and painted end tables. On the porch, she listens to the birds and a distant boat motor, to footsteps behind a baby stroller, its tires gritty on the beach road. Two women walk side-by-side, their voices deep in conversation. She doesn’t know how she can ever sit herself in her car, fasten her seatbelt, turn the ignition and drive away.
One thing is certain. She can’t drive away this afternoon to shop with Eva. Her last hours in Connecticut have to be immersed in walking the boardwalk, taking an afternoon swim, breathing the salt air. She goes back to the kitchen, to the sun streaming in through the white shutters, to the mismatched cottage dishes stacked on the kitchen shelves. She picks up the phone and leaves a vague apology bowing out of shopping on Eva’s answering machine.
And the afternoon opens up before her. It will be a long time before she can feel so close to her mother again, can feel her presence here at the edge of the sea. It’s one of the hardest things about the thought of leaving, the thought of some sort of goodbye to even memories. Going upstairs to change into her bathing suit, she passes the painted cabinet at the bottom of the staircase and sees the dvd there. Her father had transferred all their home movies to it, and she had asked the local camera shop to add the 8mm footage found in the attic in a box of baby things. All that is left of her childhood home are scenes to watch on a screen now. She decides against going to the beach, and brings the dvd into the dining room and slides it into her laptop.
During the next hour, the home on Birch Lane comes to life, as do the day trips to state parks and Stony Point. One long-ago Christmas Eve, her mother sits on their brocade sofa with Elsa, her sister who lives in Italy. Their eyes sparkle, their heads tip close together in the telling of some delightful secret. They are definitely sisters, with the same facial features, the same strong jawline, the same wide-set brown eyes. Watching them feels like looking in a mirror, though Maris has more of her aunt’s dark brown hair rather than her mother’s auburn.
Time unfolds on her as a toddler wearing a red velvet Christmas dress, sitting on her aunt’s lap. A beaded necklace hangs around Elsa’s neck and Maris reaches her small fingers to it, lifting the beads and letting them fall again. Behind them, a cherry clock sits on the fireplace mantle, nestled in the greens of Christmas.
She pauses the movie to study her aunt’s face on the computer screen. This woman tried to sustain a fragile tie with her after her mother died. Maris touches her gold star pendant. Too fragile, apparently, to withstand the emotional swells of a broken family. The lifeline became lost at sea.
Time stops after her mother died, with no one filming for a long time then. Which, in a way, only extends the sadness of the death, keeping it central until Halloweens and birthdays finally return several years later, leading to Maris’ graduation. And the dvd closes with the early scenes the camera shop added at the end. Though they come out of sequence now, they are still new to her, and what matters is that the two scenes bring her mother to life once more. Moments together are captured. Maris and her mother on the beach that breezy September day, followed by her Christening. Every seat around the dining room table is full. The men wear suits, their ties loosened and their jackets off. The women wear dresses and jewelry. Dinner plates have been cleared away; wine and coffee remain behind as the film silently animates laughter and conversation.
But something doesn’t make sense. She reverses the disk, backing everybody up. The dining room glitters with the crystal chandelier twinkling over the table, dessert plates and flickering white candles set in place. A large wall mirror with beautiful etched scrollwork curving around its corners hangs behind the table.
Yes. There. A woman’s reflection passes over the mirror.
Maris pauses the image on her computer. Reflected off to the side in that mirror is her Aunt Elsa. She wears a suit of rich brown, with the same color silk scarf wrapped beneath the jacket and up around her neck. A large gold pin accents her lapel and her thick hair is pulled back in a low twist.
“Oh my God.” Maris leans forward, squinting. “That’s me.” She backs the film up to the scene of the christened baby in her mother’s lap. The baby who is obviously someone else then. Is it a cousin? Elsa’s child?
Maris replays the entire Christening segment, then pauses it to be absolutely sure. Old photo albums hold snapshots of her wearing that same nautical dress at her second birthday party. There is no mistaking that this little girl framed by etched scrolls is her.
She stands and walks around the room, back and forth, back and forth, all the while staring at the frozen scene of her aunt holding her. Finally she hits Play and the film ends with the christened baby held lovingly in her father’s arms, the gown beautiful against his navy suit.
The baby who is not Maris after all. The home is hers, as are the parents. She even recognizes the gown as a family heirloom, so the baby has to be family. If it is Elsa’s child, why would her father keep the reel of film in an attic box? And her aunt is never filmed holding the baby; it is always, always her mother. The way she holds her, the way she fusses over her with such mother-daughter affection made Maris think she was the baby.
But she obviously is not. In the last scene, her mother leans close to her father holding the infant while she smiles intimately at someone behind the camera. Probably, Maris now realizes, at herself. Maybe holding her aunt’s hand, maybe rubbing her tired eyes.
It takes every bit of effort to stop looking at the movie, to tear herself away from the second child her mother apparently had. Maris goes up the stairs to her bedroom, ties back her hair, puts on gold hoop earrings and slips on sandals. All her life she has done this, moving around, never staying too long in one place, and now she understands that it is to keep one step ahead of some shadow, some fear. It always comes to this. She has to leave.
Blue Jeans and Coffee Beans Page 10