by Jones, Gwen
I laughed. “You’re joking, right? I’m such an idiot I’m surprised you’re not already looking for an annulment.”
He took me in his arms, kissing my forehead. “Hmm . . . well, I think there’d be a slight issue concerning the consummation . . .”
Chapter Eleven
* * *
The Price of Infamy
FROM JULIE KNOTT’S JOURNAL
1 September
The sun’s barely up, and I’ve been awake and running around since four AM, putting into practice what I learned from my boots-on-the-ground tutorial on farmwifery yesterday. I’ve already fed the chickens and gathered their eggs, fed Betsy and her calf and led her out to pasture, picked more lettuce and tomatoes, as well as yanked out some rather persistent weedage from the herb garden I weeded just the day before. (Andy’s “herb garden” is a continent away from the potted mint I had kept on our sink for Mojitos). While I did this, Andy hauled vegetables to the truck, as we’re selling them at a farm market today, something we’ll do for every Thursday through at least October, or as long as the vegetables hold out. This was after spending the previous day picking, separating, sorting and crating them (and getting my shoulders scorched, shame on me), and after Andy introduced me to a particularly vile concoction of manure, gypsum and food scraps known as a compost. Thank God, this will be something he’ll take care of, at least at this stage, as it seems we’ll be growing mushrooms in it, and the compost has to be turned with a pitchfork by hand. Since it’s nearly ready, he hopes to move the process to the pasteurization stage by next week. I have no idea what that entails, but I’m figuring it has something to do with the nicest structure on the farm, a spotless, temperature-controlled shed next to the barn, which seems just the perfect place to cultivate a food grown in horseshit.
Like me, Andy’s flying by the seat of his pants, and the thing I’d like to know is why. The more time I spend with him, the more I can see that although he seems accustomed to a bit of ruggedness, there’s a definite worldliness about him that belies all this earthiness. For someone who’s lived abroad and on the high seas, it just doesn’t make sense why he’d want to hunker down on a farm in the woods. But that’s what I’m here to find out, not that it’s easy—I swear the man could win medals for caginess. I figure it has something to do with his parents, something he rarely talks about, perhaps when he moved with his mother to France, and the circumstances that led them to go there in the first place. I couldn’t help but shake my head, thinking of the numerous ways that parents screw up their kids. At this point, I can’t even judge how well he’s done for himself, as I really have nothing to gauge him against. He’s so tight-lipped about his past. Not like I’m not trying to wheedle it out of him.
Still, in spite of all my intentions and subterfuge, I can’t help feeling like I’ve drawn the short straw. Here I am, hardly two days married, and who’d have ever thought I’d be feeding chickens and cows, aching in places I never knew existed, and sunburnt not from falling asleep outside the cabana, but from picking peppers and tomatoes? Gone are my civilized TV star pretentions: pedicure, facial, manicure, silk sheath, and Ferragamos, stripped by nature and all her basic imperatives. Who needs a good mineral salts scrub when my blooming calluses are so much more apropos?
But enough whining. It’s time to get out of this bathroom and go rustle up some breakfast. More fruit and cheese, I’m suspecting, and right now I’d kill for a cup of joe. So I’m off to rub two sticks together and get the fire started. Ah, wilderness.
I FELT LIKE I was cheating on my husband.
Andy dropped off eggs for Uncle Jinks while I waited in the gas station’s parking lot inside a truck packed with more of the same. I took out my phone and, finally getting service, texted Denny:
Hey wanted to let you know I’m ok out here in the stix!
Half a minute later I got back: THK GOD! how r u? fukit im callin.
Two seconds later my phone rang. “Christ, Jules, why haven’t you called!”
Damn, it was good hearing Denny’s voice. “I wanted to, but there’s no service out at Andy’s place. Plus I get the distinct impression he doesn’t like cell phones.” There wasn’t any way I could explain it that would translate, especially after the sat phone incident the day before.
“Why? He doesn’t have you chained in the basement or anything, does he?”
“As far as I know, he doesn’t have a basement.”
“Exactly where did he drag you off to?”
Good question. “Hard to say. It’s out in the middle of the woods. If you need to get ahold of me you could always leave a message on my phone, and I’ll pick it when I come into town. Or if it’s really important call that gas station number I gave you. Uncle Jinks will give us the message.”
“Uncle Jinks? Sound like a friggin’ cartoon character. Why don’t you just say to stop in Western Union and send a telegram? Or maybe get a homing pigeon and strap a message on its ass?”
“Denny, honestly, I’m fine. Andy has been more than . . .” I searched for the right word. “. . . accommodating.”
“Ohhh, now I’ve got it. You’ve just been too busy getting on it to call. I should’ve figured. After two years with that limpdick it’s like leaving the convent. And what a dick he actually is. Wait’ll I tell you what I heard.”
A door slammed; Andy was coming. “Oh damn—look, I got to go. You take care, and I promise to stay in touch.”
“Jules—what a minute—”
“Bye!” I rang off just as Andy opened the door.
He eyed the phone in my hand. “Letting them know you’re still alive?”
“I was just telling Denny where to find the body.” Damn; I was down to one bar. I dug into my purse for the changer. “Hey, you wouldn’t mind if I charged my phone, would you?”
“Why would I mind?” He eyed me curiously. “And why would you have to ask?”
“Well . . .” I shrugged. “I know how you feel about phones.”
“And how’s that?” he said, starting the truck.
I tried for diplomacy. “That they’re non-essentials. That you’d rather I didn’t use mine.”
“Really.” He seemed amused. “Have I ever said that?”
“Actually . . . no. But it’s the vibe I got.”
“Vibe.” He pondered that a moment before he looked at me. “Julie, whichever way I feel, it applies to me, not to you. If you feel the need to stay connected with your people—for lack of a better descriptor—back home, go ahead. As for me . . .” He leaned over and, brushing his lips against my neck, whispered, “You’re all I need.”
I’d like to have melted into the seat. I dropped the phone back into my purse, my hand on his rock-hard thigh. “Well, when you put it that way . . .” I gave it a little squeeze. “Perhaps I’ll worry about it later.”
He gifted me with the barest of flinches. “The least of your worries, I’m sure.”
Shameless, he was, giving me a look that smoldered. “So, how’s Uncle Jinks?” I said, godawfully steady for someone ready to rip her clothes off.
Andy raked his hand through his hair. “Just fine. He says he has a surprise for us, a wedding present, but we won’t get it until next week.”
“Really? Did he say what it was?”
“Now what kind of surprise would it be if he had?” he said, pulling from the lot. “He did say it’s supposed to be delivered next Friday.”
“Hmm . . . delivered. Sounds big.”
“Well, you’ll have a week to speculate,” he said as we drove out of town.
Which didn’t take long. Iron Bog was no metropolis. We entered again into thick woods, the Pines enclosing us in dissipating early morning cool. I could tell it was going to be another hot one, but with Labor Day Weekend nearly upon us, I knew days like this wouldn’t last for long. Not that in this pre-air conditioned world, I would mourn the sweat already collecting on my chest. Still, the breeze felt good through the opened windows, whipping my haphazardly clippe
d hair against my neck, the air currents ruffling my skirt. I put a hand to my thigh, staying the cotton from riding higher.
Andy’s hand closed over it. “You look very pretty today,” he said, squeezing my fingers. “But then I haven’t noticed a day when you didn’t.”
I almost laughed. “Sunburnt, no make-up, hair a wreck, covered in bites and starting to sweat—you sir, haven’t the highest of standards.”
“Beauty in the raw.” He lifted my hand to his lips and kissed it. “I prefer it in its most unadulterated form. Plus . . .” His hand slid to my skirt, lightly skimming my inner thigh. “I know what lies beneath.”
I shivered—trying to ignore the unintended metaphor. Better to focus on where his implication would trail to later. I caught his hand, lightly shuttling it away. “Down, boy—don’t drive us off the road. And by the way, just where is this farm market?”
He flashed a portentous smile, so effortlessly sensual it was a wonder I didn’t swoon. “On Route 70. A big market with lots of different farmers, where you rent a table by the day. My father had always gone on Thursdays, so they saved the same spot and day for him every week, and now for us. You’d think with the Shore traffic he would’ve gone more than one day, but . . .” He shrugged. “Guess it cut in on his drinking time.”
“You say that so easily,” I said, “but it’s got to hurt.”
He shrugged again. “Nothing I can do about it now. Anyway, it’s a pretty busy market, even without the holiday Shore traffic, so we ought to do all right. Did so last week, at least.”
Such a master at changing the subject, I once again noticed. So I would, too. “Anybody there you know?”
“A few, and the rest I’ve heard of. Ray should be there.”
“The Fire warden.” His mouth crooked. “Yeah, him. Selling the last of the blueberries, I guess. Plus his wife makes these incredible pies and jam. You’ll like her. Celia’s her name.”
“Really.” Visions of Ma Kettle danced in my head. “Maybe we could pull up the rocking chairs and swap recipes just like good farmers’ wives.”
Andy sniffed. “Maybe you could swap marketing strategies. ‘Celia’s Blues’ has an output of eight hundred pies a day, and during harvest season her jamming operation takes on thirty employees.”
I was properly chastised. “Well, spank me. Sorry for being so small-minded.”
“Everyone’s allowed a lapse now and then,” he said, slowing for a light. “Never thought perfection was easy to maintain.”
“You’re too, too kind,” I said. Not to mention a serial evader. I thought to give it another go. “Did you and Ray go to school together?”
“Sure, back in the Dark Ages. Practically grew up as brothers.”
“Really. I supposed you missed him after you and your mother went to France.”
“Yeah, I did.” At that he winced. “We wrote each other for a while, then lost touch. Though he did come over one summer while we were in college to go hiking in the Pyrenees.”
“You nature boys you. Can’t keep you out of the woods, huh?”
“Oh, I didn’t go. I was working and couldn’t get away. Though he did stay with my mother a couple of days. Now, him, she liked.”
“She didn’t like any of your other friends?”
“Let’s just say she had a thing about Americans in general.”
“Yet she had married one.” Interesting. “You know, I’ve heard so much about the weeks and weeks of vacation Europeans get, yet you weren’t allowed a couple days off for a friend you hadn’t seen since you were kids? That seems kind of harsh.”
“Nothing I could do about it. I was at sea.” He looked up ahead. “Hey—there’s a Wawa. How about some coffee?”
A rhetorical question; he was already turning in. “Sure.”
Evading again, but wasn’t that just so like him. And realizing that made it odder still. As I waited while Andy ran in the convenience store, I couldn’t help thinking how strange it was seeing him in so workaday a setting. Seeing him filling two cups with coffee, paying the cashier, scanning the headlines on the newspaper rack, holding the door opened for a woman with a stroller. So much more routine than see him birthing a cow or bringing down a rabid raccoon, crossing through his peach orchard or cutting a naked swath through the lake. I couldn’t help marveling, in the few days I’ve known my husband, how fast the outsized had become mundane, and how even ordinary actions became fresh and mysterious and inordinately fascinating. When he came back to the truck and handed me a coffee, his fingers brushing mine, the memory of the night before returned in such a rush I was almost ashamed how much I wanted him. How strange is that? this wave of lust, this immediate craving I didn’t know what to do with. Funnier still how I caught his gaze as we pulled back onto the road, and his eyes widened ever so slightly, almost as if he completely understood. Truth was he did, because all at once he veered off onto a smaller road, then onto one of the hundreds of sandy trails etching the Pines, traveling far enough to veer again into a clearing and behind an old shed, where he stopped and opening my door, pulled me into his arms.
“We are thinking the same thing,” I whispered, baring my neck so he could kiss it. “How is it you could read my mind?”
“Like species seek out their own,” he said, slipping my panties from me, opening his fly. I gripped his shoulders as he lifted me up.
I gasped like I always did. Yet with him inside me it seemed so natural. “Are you saying I’m just like you?”
“Yes,” he said. “Yes.” He gripped the rail of the truck bay and held me against it, my hand fisting a knot of his hair. I arched my back, pulling him in as his fingers dug into my hip, hoping he’d fall further and deeper inside me. Then I couldn’t think anymore, my body alive and my mind spiraling, just as his was I’m sure, feeling his thrum inside me.
Later, our fingers curled around each other’s as we set off down the road, not saying anything at first, just holding on, maybe a bit too tightly. After a few miles I sighed and lay my head against his shoulder, and we returned to our coffee, sipping it companionably. At a light he kissed my temple.
“You’re good for me,” he murmured.
That took me by surprise. Was I supposed to say something? I couldn’t think of an answer. Then the light changed and we went on down the road.
Good as contrast to what? For him to know, a little voice said, and for me to find out.
THE FARMERS’ MARKET was a joint venture of several local farms, and was comprised of a couple dozen long tables that carried any assortment of goods—grown, baked, bottled and sewn. Situated in a shady spot off busy Route 70, a popular Shore road in one direction, and toward Philadelphia on the other, it was barely six-thirty by the time we found our table under the umbrella of a big oak and proceeded to set up. The market also had a snack bar and frozen custard stand (and happily, a bathroom), so I was looking forward to lunching on something beyond Andy’s farm fare, even if it had to be a hot dog. Shortly after we hauled the last flat of tomatoes to the table another truck, this one all polished chrome and red paint, angled into the spot beside us.
“Andy!” a man called from the window of it.
A little while later I clasped hands with Ray, a tall, lithe cording of tan and muscle in a Fire Service uniform, and his blonde wife, Celia, so svelte and sophisticated I wondered if she just drove in from the Main Line.
“So this is the new Mrs. Devine,” Ray said, his friendly gaze raking me. “No one could accuse Andy of dragging his feet.” He gave my hand a hearty shake.
“Or settling for the girl next door,” said Celia, placing her cheek to mine. “Welcome, Ms. Random Access.” She leaned back, eyeing me inquisitively. “So, you didn’t chase him out West after all?”
A chill shot down my spine. “What do you mean?”
“Sweetie, you’re the talk of the town,” she said, briefly turning to two workers unloading pies and preserves out of their truck, setting them atop a check-covered tablecloth trumpeting: Celia
’s Blues. “My sister does mornings for Prowler Traffic—maybe you heard of her? Barbie Coyle?”
Does mornings was apt. No one could banter double entendre with the deejays better than Barbie “Doll” Coyle, or “Bouncin’ Barbie,” as Richard had referred to her. I recalled the night we watched her strip off her bra atop the bar at a Delaware Avenue club. Of course, the next day he signed her.
But that hardly mattered at the moment. “Why? Did she say something about me?”
Andy shot me a warning look as she shuttled me aside. “The dish is your fiancé went back to his wife—you know, the one you stole him from?”
“What?” I cried. “He was never married. Where’d she hear that from?”
Her face screwed. “How long have you been off the grid?” She pulled out her phone and, tapping an app, brought up phillyak, a gutter gossip site Richard loved to troll. “Look at what Jake the Snake said yesterday.”
I took it from her, aghast: Where in the wide, wide world of sports is JK? How random is it if she left P-town for the Left Coast, to once again wrench the regal R from the arms of his once and future wife?
“Jesus Christ,” I said, handing it back, barely able to breathe. “It’s so not true. It’s just gossip.”
“But that hardly matters now, does it?”
“Of course it does!” A few people looked in our direction, and we ducked behind the nearby frozen custard shack, an overhead cooling vent drowning extraneous conversation. “You have any idea what this’ll do to my professional reputation?”
“And that should matter now because . . .?” She raised a tentative brow. “Didn’t you give that all up when you married Andy?”
“Yes, of course, b-but—” Good Lord, I was practically sputtering. “But I never meant—”
“To give it all up forever? Hey sister, I hear you. No one knows that better than me.” She glanced to her husband, enmeshed in conversation with Andy. It was a glance filled with resignation, and I actually felt for her, especially since I knew it was a portent that’d never apply to me.