What's Left Behind

by Lorrie Thomson

  “Hand jobs, bl—”

  “Celeste! I meant, above or below the waist?” She couldn’t fault Celeste for regressing to high-school talk and not realize Abby had slid down that slippery slope all the way into middle-school rhetoric. Abby’s cheeks tightened, and a flush bloomed across her chest. She yanked off her cardigan and tossed it onto the rest of the discarded tops. Sadie dashed for the sweater, pounced atop the pile. “Never mind. I’m probably worrying for nothing. Rob’s a complete gentleman.”

  “Sure, Rob’s a gentleman, emphasis on man. I’ve seen the way he looks at you.”

  “Think he’s noticed my secret weapons?” Abby said.

  “Girlfriend,” Celeste said, sprinkling a dash of city attitude. “Yesterday, everybody noticed your secret weapons. But that’s not what I meant. Whenever Rob talks about you, he gets this goofy grin on his face. He’s got a thing for you, Abby.”

  And she had a thing for Rob. Then why was she holding on to the bed post and rocking? She bit the flesh at the base of her thumb, thought of Tessa, and let go. She rubbed the smudge of lipstick off her thumb. “Can I ask you something?”

  An oven timer dinged in the background, one of the many bells and whistles that kept Celeste’s bakery running and her shelves stocked with pastries. “You’ve got ninety seconds.”

  Abby sighed.

  “Eighty-five.”

  Abby looked to the ceiling, exasperated with herself, not Celeste. “Do you think Rob’s seeing anyone else?”

  “Nope.”

  “You answered awfully fast.”

  “Seven days a week, Rob comes down for coffee and muffins at seven. Unless he’s out with you, he returns twelve hours later for his decaf. No one goes into his apartment, no one ever comes out. Kind of like Willy Wonka’s factory. Oh, yeah, except for that one time he brought his daughter by. Definitely a daddy’s girl.”

  “You met Rob’s daughter?”

  A buzzer thrummed through the phone line, then the creak of a stainless-steel oven door opening on its hinges.

  “Do me a favor and just go with it,” Celeste said, one of the phrases Abby herself used time and again over her many years of dating. So why was she getting all worked up about this one date? Why was she wondering when she’d get to meet Rob’s daughter?

  “I liked dating Rob unofficially better. Official means I could mess up. Official means I have something to lose.” Abby usually felt better when she came clean with Celeste. This time, her stomach tensed, as though trying to regain the balance of pretending not to care.

  “You’re not going to mess up.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Because,” Celeste said. “Rob’s the real deal, one of the good guys. That said, if you do end up boinking Rob, tell me all about it.”

  “I most certainly will not!”

  “Boink or tell?” Celeste said.

  “Love you,” Abby said.

  “Love you more.” Celeste hung up the phone, leaving Abby with a goofy grin on her face.

  Abby stepped into the one-and-a-half-inch heels, opened her closet door to check out her reflection, and frowned. She kicked off the low sandals and strapped her feet into the three-inch heels, turned from side to side. The extra inch and a half straightened her posture, lengthened her legs, and boosted her confidence.

  “I’ll show Celeste how much I can handle,” Abby told Sadie. “But the cardigan stays.” Abby eased the sweater out from under Sadie’s belly and past her swiping paws. Sadie angled Abby her best look of reproach. “Lily Beth always said a girl should leave something to the imagination.”

  Abby slipped her pocketbook onto her shoulder, the sweater over her arm, and opened her bedroom door to find Tessa with her fist raised to knock. “Sweetheart,” Abby said, as if she’d been calling Tessa that forever.

  The only thing that felt strange to Abby was the fact it didn’t. “I was about to go hunt you down.”

  Abby had been looking forward to her date all day, but she wanted to make sure Tessa was all right. Abby understood Tessa had last hurt herself during a time of extreme stress. She believed Tessa when she’d told her she wouldn’t do it again. But Abby also understood how hard it must’ve been for Tessa to share a secret, after having kept it to herself for so many years. And, frankly, the fact Tessa had chosen to share with her, of all people, humbled Abby. The sharing, the emotional responsibility, made her feel like a mother again.

  Tessa glanced at Abby’s pocketbook. “You’re going out?”

  A pang tightened Abby’s stomach, even though she was sure she’d told Tessa about her date. “I have plans, but I can cancel them.”

  Tessa leaned against the door frame, reminding Abby how tired she’d get when she’d been expecting Luke. Not normal end-of-day fatigue. That would’ve been a pleasure. More like, scrape-self-off-chair-and-drag-to-bed-at-six exhaustion.

  It was already six-thirty.

  “Come in before you fall asleep standing up.” Abby moved aside, and Tessa slipped into her bedroom, where Sadie occupied the only chair. “Servant to a cat,” Abby said, and she patted her bed. “Second-best seat in the room?”

  “Oh, uh. I’m kind of on my way out, too. Just came to tell you.”

  “Really?” Abby said. Tessa had pulled her hair into a high ponytail, and her face glowed, freshly scrubbed, as though she’d washed up for bed. Only a skim of gloss shined her lips. She wore Bermuda-length shorts, a pink hoodie, and sparkly pastel flip-flops, her usual hang-around outfit. “Going anywhere special?”

  “Spinney’s?”

  Then she was dressed appropriately. “Food’s always great there. And they’ve a nice view. You may want to avoid anything fried, though. Not great for indigestion. Going with anyone special?” Abby asked, thinking Hannah the most obvious choice. She’d noticed the girls chitchatting by the dining room fireplace after Hannah was off work. And she’d seen them actively noticing Jordan, a good-looking young man in his early twenties who’d been visiting the B&B with his middle-aged parents.

  “An older guy,” Tessa said, and her entire countenance brightened.

  “J-Jordan?” Abby said, tripping over his name. Somewhere in her mind Abby acknowledged that one day Tessa would get over her son and find another man to care for. But not today. Certainly not while she was carrying Luke’s child.

  “No! Jordan’s cute. But this guy is way older.”

  Abby should call Rob, tell him Tessa needed her. Clearly the girl time they’d had this afternoon hadn’t been enough after their tree-side conversation. Tessa needed a lot more of her attention. Abby would find a suitably sweet romantic comedy, she’d pop popcorn, encourage Tessa to open up about her father.

  “C’mon, Abby,” Tessa said, putting on a fake air of annoyance. “You know who he is. Guy’s old enough to be a grandfather.”

  “Charlie!” Abby said, not because her brain had finally sputtered to life, but because the older man was standing in the doorway to her bedroom. A doorway through which, ever since Charlie’s two-years-ago expulsion, Abby hadn’t allowed anyone to trespass.

  Until Tessa.

  “Divider was open,” Charlie said. “Hope you don’t mind, I let myself in.”

  Abby had asked Tessa to close the pocket door when coming and going from the private wing of the house. She’d forgotten how conveniently forgetful teenagers could be when it pertained to house rules that inconvenienced them.

  Probably not fair, since Charlie wasn’t any good at following her rules either. Yesterday, he’d taken her dress selection as an invitation to ogle her, their shared grief as an opportunity to try and take her hand, their history as justification for throwing a towel over her and ushering her away from Rob.

  To the untrained eye, it might’ve looked as though Charlie had been acting the part of the overprotective mama bear, rather than the part he’d played for years. Never more interested than when Abby wasn’t.

  The crease in Charlie’s weekend khakis was fresh-pressed. His hair appeare
d casual and windblown, although Abby knew he bothered with hair gel to get that effect. He didn’t wear cologne, thank goodness. But, today, his aftershave carried a hint of lime, the spray scent he’d worn when they were teens.

  Charlie whipped out two boxes from behind his back. He handed the smaller beribboned tan box to Tessa, the larger to Abby.

  Abby untied the ribbon and flipped open the lid to reveal two dozen gourmet truffles. The type made with good dark chocolate and heavy cream, infused with vanilla, and finished with crystallized ginger. The variety she’d told Charlie she preferred when he’d, instead, presented her with that pathetic red heart-shaped box of waxy chocolates.Who the hell was dumb enough to give his pregnant girlfriend a jumbo heart when he was leaving her?

  She’d shared that thought with Charlie, too.

  “Better late than never?” Charlie said.

  Abby looked to the ceiling, making sure no tears would fall. She didn’t need Charlie’s too-little too-late apology. But she would’ve liked to travel back in time to give the-girl-she’d-been a big hug. Better yet, she would’ve liked to expel that girl from her heart and soul. “Thank you. You’ve quite the memory.”

  “Not as good as yours,” Charlie said. “My warning to you, Tessa. Never cross Abby. She holds a grudge like nobody’s business. She never forgives.”

  “That’s not fair.”

  Charlie pressed a hand against the door frame, as though he might step into her bedroom, and Abby blocked his path.

  “Not fair,” Charlie said, “but it’s true.”

  Tessa came up behind Abby and placed a hand on her shoulder, as if to comfort her. Then Tessa stood on tiptoe and kissed Charlie on the cheek, as though she were trying to placate him, too. “Thanks for the truffles,” she said. “They look awesome.”

  Despite Abby’s and Charlie’s promise to put Luke before them, Luke had, time and again, ended up between them, trying to bring them back together.

  Was that what Tessa was attempting?

  Abby had told Celeste there was no Team Rob. But was Tessa rooting for Team Charlie?

  It was obvious, now that Abby had figured it out. Tessa was the gossip who’d told Charlie about Rob. Abby had a spy in her ranks, sure as the days when Luke had, upon Charlie’s not-so-veiled requests, chronicled her personal life.

  “Truce,” Charlie said. “Would you like to join us for dinner? We could agree to disagree about your lack of forgiveness and your propensity for unfairness. All while overeating.”

  “That’s quite an offer. Thank you, but I have a date.” Abby didn’t mean to sound spiteful, but the tone crept into her voice, and she couldn’t say it displeased her.

  “Rob?” Charlie said, and Abby nodded.

  With one glance, Charlie took in her outfit and reflected his disapproval. So his next comment threw her off. “He’s a lucky man,” Charlie said, diffusing her anger. And then he pulled her into a hug, a ploy to whisper in her ear. “Temperature’s dropping fast. If I were you, I’d wear the sweater.”

  That was all Abby needed to leave the damn cardigan with Sadie.

  Abby sat across from Rob at the Lobster House, hiding behind her menu and trying to ward off the late-day chill and errant nerves with covert gulps from her glass of Sam Adams. The rich aroma of seafood and drawn butter filled the air. Cold beer sluiced into her stomach, and the alcohol rocketed to her brain, lending a hazy quality to her thoughts and reminding her how little she’d had to eat today.

  A wagon-wheel chandelier hung above her. She wasn’t worried the fixture would fall, but she couldn’t shake off the awareness of a heavy weight hanging over her head. She couldn’t stop thinking about Tessa going off with Charlie on a Sunday visit, as though she were a child of their divorce. Or, as Luke had been fond of saying, a product of not-together parents.

  How easily Charlie had stepped into his role of the father. How easily Tessa had stepped into the role of the daughter.

  Where did that leave Luke?

  Abby didn’t know how she felt about that. She took a gulp of beer and cared a little less about untangling the knot of her emotions. Tiny white lights were strung around the room’s perimeter. In an hour or so, the sun would set and the dim bulbs would fire to life. For now, the sun hung low over Casco Bay, shining way too brightly for what she had in mind.

  Rob leaned his tanned forearms against the table. His direct gaze tumbled her heart. “Thirsty?” he asked, and then he sat back and took a conservative sip from his glass of beer, as if to both gain a wide view of her swigging and show off his restraint.

  Abby set down the menu. So much for her cover. “Uh, hum.” She took a slightly smaller sip, and a shiver jostled her shoulders.

  “Cold?”

  “Not really.” A second twitch shook her frame.

  “Got an idea.” Rob got up from his chair, slid onto the bench seat beside her, and slung his arm around her shoulders. With a slight flex of his bicep, he gave her a squeeze. His body heat warmed her arms, trickled through her chest, pooled in her jeans. She ordered her hips not to move. That only cranked her imagination into overdrive.

  Abby pictured peeling off Rob’s jeans and lowering herself onto the wooden bench beneath him. She imagined the electric sensation of Rob moving inside her, his energy coursing through her veins. Ridiculous, there wasn’t enough room on the bench. Abby’s throat and tongue went dry. She took another swallow of beer and gazed out over the bay, rather than risk looking Rob in the eye.

  Horny?

  Their waitress, Janet, came to take their orders. One of Phippsburg’s seasonal residents, Janet taught high-school English, and found summer waitressing relaxing by comparison. With her hair piled on top of her head and her big smile, Janet looked closer to thirty than the fifty years she admitted to.

  Abby considered asking for a shot of tequila. Instead, she settled for the mussels. Rob chose the lobster dinner and, just as Abby was finishing her first beer, ordered them two more.

  “Warming up?” Rob said. His voice made Abby think of campfires and wood smoke, deep warmth in the chill of a night forest.

  “Starting to.” Of course, she could sit on top of him. That would take care of the space issue, and save her tailbone from the abuse of the wooden bench.

  Rob liked to talk while he worked, that much she knew. Did that mean he’d also like to talk during sex? Would he take verbal notes on the grade of her body, the way he’d mapped her yard? Would he ask to view her from every angle, the way she wanted to study him?

  “So, about yesterday,” Rob said, and Abby stiffened. She thought they’d put their little Charlie misunderstanding behind them, between their cryptic speeches and the mind-clearing, hail-pelting labyrinth walk. Then he’d asked her out.

  “Sorry about getting to your place late. I’m usually ridiculously punctual.”

  “That’s okay.”

  “It’s not. I don’t let my crew get away with being late. Ever. Kind of have a thing about it.”

  Something in Rob’s voice made her look him in the eye. Not quite a catch in his voice, but a slight alteration to his usual breezy tone.

  “Was something wrong?”

  “Kind of. Not really.” Rob took a swallow of his beer. More than a sip, but short of a gulp. He ran his thumb over the edge of his beer label.

  “Rob?”

  He gave a slight chuckle, but she wasn’t buying it. “Ex called me to the house again . . .”

  Through her beer buzz, Abby noted the use of the word again, the antecedent the in place of the possessive her. Did Rob still consider his ex-wife’s house his home? Abby seemed to remember a previous call when the electricity had inexplicably failed or a circuit breaker had tripped. Or was it the plumbing? Rob’s ex sure seemed to consider her house their home.

  “Maintenance issue?” Abby asked.

  “Grace.”

  Automatic, Abby’s heart dashed to her throat. “Is she all right?”

  Rob rubbed her back. “Oh, yeah, she’s fine. It was j
ust . . . ex overreacts sometimes, as in a lot. Grace had a boy up in her bedroom, and Maria walked in on them.”

  “Oh, wow. That must’ve been a shocker. Hard to underreact to that one,” Abby said, remembering the time she’d walked in on Luke and noticed a pair of tan feet with ten bright-blue toenails poking out from beneath his comforter. Then, a few months later, Abby had gotten down on her knees and invited the high-school principal’s shaking daughter to come out from under Luke’s bed. Different girl, pink toenail polish.

  Sure, Abby had been frazzled. But clearly not as horrified as she should’ve been. She’d slipped a box of condoms into Luke’s college trunk. She’d threatened to give a demo, if he had no idea how to use them. Yet, a small voice at the back of her mind had played the ill-conceived reassurance. Boys being boys couldn’t get pregnant.

  A girl being a girl was still someone’s daughter. She should know.

  How was Tessa’s father handling all of this? Abby had been planning on giving him a call. But, frankly, she was hoping he’d phone her first.

  Rob took a deep breath, held the inhalation a beat before the exhale. “Yeah, Grace has a good head on her shoulders, but I still came down on her pretty hard.”

  Rob shared the tale with Abby, from his ex-wife’s overwrought call to his daughter’s relationship with the buddy-turned-lover. Behind Rob’s words, Abby saw a dad having a hard time watching his only baby grow up. A dad struggling with the inevitable letting go.

  Not the same as losing a child, but Rob could relate. Once a parent, always a parent.

  “I’m not sure who was more embarrassed, me or Grace. But I had to let her know I’m worried about her getting pregnant.” Rob turned his gaze from the label he’d one-handed shredded into table scraps. “Worried about her getting hurt, too.”

  “Ah, my visitor’s story hit close to home.”

  “Guess so.”

  “It’s not every day your late son’s pregnant girlfriend lands on your doorstep.” Sadness washed over her, overriding her attempt at a flippant tone. “Grace is lucky to have you for a dad.” Tessa hadn’t shared much about her relationship with her father, but Abby could bet it wasn’t this sweet. Not sweet enough to keep her from leaving.