Summer at Willow Lake

by Susan Wiggs

  He didn’t give her a hand. He simply grabbed the ladder and carried it to the main utility shed. Olivia had to hurry to match his long strides.

  “You can lean the ladder against the building,” she told him. “It’s all got to be cleaned out, anyway.”

  Connor nodded. “I need to peel off some of this stuff,” he said, unzipping his jacket as he strode back to the Harley, the chains on his boots ringing with every step. “It’s hot.”

  She stood and watched as he unbuckled and unzipped the military-style jacket and chaps, draping them over the handlebars of his bike. Underneath, the white T-shirt molded to his body, outlining the cut of his pecs. His arms, thick with muscles, already looked tan from working outside, even though summer had barely begun. She glanced away, determined not to appear too interested.

  She felt perversely satisfied that he had not recognized her. On the one hand, it was nice to know she had transformed herself from the gawky, overweight girl she had once been.

  On the other hand, it was infuriating to see how intrigued he was by her new look. Because no matter what she looked like on the outside these days, that incredibly insecure girl was not so very far away. She was a part of Olivia, living just beneath the surface of polish and confidence.

  Only she was older now, and she didn’t let her feelings show. She sidestepped to put some more distance between them. “You know, no one’s called me Lolly in years,” she said, her voice sounding lightly amused. Casual, as though he was an old acquaintance rather than the person who had ripped out her heart and left it bleeding on the floor. “When I went away to college, I switched exclusively to my given name.”

  “I never knew your name was Olivia.”

  There’s a lot you never bothered to learn about me, she thought. “It’s the name I was born with. Olivia Jane Bellamy. Sophisticated, huh? Not really a kid name. One of my cousins christened me Lolly. She was just learning to talk and couldn’t say Olivia, so Lolly’s the name that stuck.”

  “You never told me that story. When I was young, I thought all rich kids had names like Binky and Buffy and Lolly, and asking why made me look ignorant, so I never asked.”

  “How did you wind up in Avalon?” she asked him.

  “A guy’s got to live somewhere.”

  “That’s not what I’m asking.”

  “I know. After that summer—”

  She knew which summer he meant, but she didn’t make him say it—The summer I destroyed you.

  “After that last summer, my dad got pretty…sick. It…just made sense to stick around.”

  “I’m sorry about what you had to deal with,” she told him. It must be horrible to lose a parent, she thought. Maybe she should tell him so, but the words stuck in her throat.

  “We all deal with things.”

  “All righty, then,” she said with forced brightness. “How about we take a look around and I’ll tell you about my project.” She was aware that he probably knew Camp Kioga as well as she did. “When was the last time you came up here?”

  “I never come here. Why would I?”

  She figured it was a rhetorical question that didn’t need an answer. Hurrying, she led the way to the deck of the dining hall, which projected out over the lake. The weathered wooden stairs creaked, and the railing felt as wobbly as a loose tooth. Connor took a small notebook from his back pocket and scribbled something. When they reached the deck, she shaded her eyes, looking for Freddy and Barkis, but saw no sign of them. When she turned to Connor, she was startled by the slightly insolent way he was studying her.

  “You’re staring,” she said, feeling his eyes trace her body and trying to deny the sensation.

  “Yeah,” he said, resting his hip against the deck railing. “I am.”

  At least he was willing to admit it. “Don’t,” she said.

  “Why not?”

  She folded her arms. “It makes me uncomfortable.”

  “If being stared at by a guy makes you uncomfortable, you must spend a lot of time squirming.”

  This, she supposed, should be taken as a compliment, yet she didn’t feel flattered in the least. She knew he was wondering how the fat chick nobody liked had turned out to be her.

  “What’s going on?” he asked.

  “I came to fix up the place. My grandparents want to celebrate their fiftieth anniversary here.” She pointed at the lake. “They were married on the island, under a gazebo that isn’t there anymore. I have until August to get this place ready for a hundred guests.”

  “I don’t blame them for wanting to celebrate. I don’t know anyone who’s been married that long.”

  His statement made Olivia feel wistful. It was a rare thing, to love someone that long. It warranted a celebration. From where she was in her life right now, a fifty-year marriage seemed impossible. How did it happen that two people fell in love and stayed that way, growing old together, not just keeping their bond intact, but strengthening and deepening it through all the trials and triumphs life had to offer? She found herself wondering if she would ever celebrate such a milestone, if she’d ever meet a man she wanted to grow old with.

  Given her track record, the likelihood was as distant as the moon. She glanced at Connor, who appeared to be checking for wood rot. She thought she saw—yes, she wasn’t imagining it—a telltale gleam through his dark, glossy waves of hair. In one ear, he wore a very small silver loop. My Lord, she thought. He’d kept the earring. She wondered what it meant. Was it because he liked having an earring, or because she had—

  “I don’t see anything to worry about here,” he said.

  “Let’s go down by the lake and take a look around,” she said, telling herself to quit thinking about the earring, and things that had happened years ago, things that didn’t matter now. She led the way along footpaths that were overgrown with sticker bushes that scratched at her bare legs.

  “Let me,” Connor said, eyeing her legs. He pushed ahead so he could hold the long, thorny fronds out of the way to let her pass.

  Memories of summers past waited around every turn—midnight pranks, the dazzle of nature in full bloom, the sights and sounds of campers singing and talking around a crackling fire. She studied Connor, his big, broad form cutting a swath through the wilderness. She wondered what sort of memories this place evoked in him. Was he reliving past glories or remembering the darker, more difficult times?

  She pointed out the sagging boathouse and dock, and a timbered, Adirondack-style cabin, set off by itself beside the lake. It was the camp’s most comfortable cabin, originally built to house the camp’s owner. It had running water and utilities year-round, a river-rock fireplace and wood-burning stove. In the winter, even when the rest of the camp was closed, it was accessible by snowmobile, and sometimes by road if the snows weren’t too bad. “This is the cabin I want to redo especially for my grandparents when they come in August for their anniversary,” she told Connor.

  “All right.”

  “My uncle Greg spent Christmas here one year, when his wife threw him out.” She flushed, wishing she hadn’t blurted that out. “Sorry,” she said. “Too much information.”

  “So how is it you’re in charge of the whole renovation?” he asked, diplomatically changing the subject.

  “And here you thought I was destined to spend my life lying around eating bonbons and reading Town & Country.”

  “I never said that.”

  “I bet you thought it.” She was used to people having low expectations of her.

  “Nope,” he said simply. “I figured you’d be married by now, driving the kids to preschool in Darien.”

  It wasn’t for lack of trying, but she knew she wouldn’t tell him that. “I’m not married,” she admitted. “No kids, no house in the suburbs.” Although she was quite sure she knew the answer, she asked, “You?”

  “Never married.” His gaze touched her in a strangely intimate way, considering he was simply walking beside her. “Not seeing anyone, either.”

&
nbsp; Which, of course, was her invitation to offer him the same information. She didn’t, though.

  “And didn’t you want to be a teacher?” he asked.

  Startled, she almost tripped over a tree root. She couldn’t believe he remembered that old dream. She barely remembered it herself. As she reinvented herself and rebuilt her life around the new Olivia Bellamy, the idea of teaching school had gotten lost in the shuffle. “I started a business in Manhattan. I’m a real-estate stager.”

  He looked blank.

  “When a property’s up for sale, it’s my job to make it look as appealing as possible. Usually, it’s a process of decluttering, picking fresh paint colors, rearranging furniture or bringing in new pieces.”

  “And people pay for this service?”

  “You’d be surprised. I’ll show you what I mean.” She led the way back to the dining hall, knowing the best way to get rid of his skepticism was to show him. Walking over to a corner table by the window, she said, “Help me move this. We want to set it at an angle so it catches the morning light.” She shook out a vintage oilcloth she’d found in a cupboard. “I try to use things that belong to the owner because that gives the space an air of authenticity. Sometimes I rent furniture and accessories. This summer, I’ll keep my eyes peeled for bent willow and Adirondack furniture. I go to a lot of estate sales, too.” She cringed inwardly when she thought of the vintage tansu chest she’d rented for Rand’s place. It had looked so perfect as a sideboard.

  She finished spreading out the tablecloth and added a few other simple touches—the jar of wildflowers she’d picked while taking Barkis for his walk at sunrise. A pair of thick china coffee mugs and a checkered napkin.

  “It’s mostly smoke and mirrors,” she told Connor. “For each property, I try to picture who the ideal owner will be, and then I create his or her fantasy.” She folded yesterday’s newspaper and laid it on the table. “I worked on a listing in Greenburgh not long ago, and I had this vision that it would sell to one of the Nicks. It had ten-foot ceilings and everything was larger than life. So I staged the whole place to appeal to a star athlete.”

  “And?”

  “Kwami Gilmer bought it the same week the listing went on the market.” She climbed up on a chair to let down the drapes. The fabric was dry and brittle with age and disuse, and when she pulled the cord, a cloud of dust went up, causing Olivia to sneeze.

  “Careful there,” he said. “This chair is rickety.” He hovered nearby as though ready to catch her if she fell.

  She cleared her throat, intensely aware of the cutoffs and tank top she was wearing. “I’m fine. And thank you. I don’t usually require rescuing more than once a day.” Very carefully, she stepped down, ignoring his chivalrously proffered hand. Then she straightened the chair, fluffed out the drapes and waited for the dust to settle. The tableau now resembled a café table with a view of the lake. Vintage posters, she thought. Vintage Catskills posters from the Borscht Belt days would awaken that ache for the sweetness of summers past. “All right,” she said, “you get the idea.”

  “You’re into creating other people’s fantasies.”

  “I suppose you could put it that way.”

  “What about your own?”

  “My fantasies?” She tried not to choke on the dust. “Never gave it much thought.”

  And boy, are you ever a liar. In her mind, there was a fantasy as vivid as the sky over the mountains. And it wasn’t the trust-fund-baby, celebutante lifestyle some of her friends and cousins favored. Instead, Olivia fantasized about a big, rambling house with a wraparound porch and sturdy old rosebushes, a sunroom and music conservatory, cookies baking in the vintage oven, kids laughing and playing in the backyard. And of course, the husband. A big, laughing man who would swing her around and nuzzle her neck when he got home from work. It was funny. In the fantasy, he wasn’t anyone in particular.

  He was just someone who loved her. Someone who would hold her at night, who would make her laugh and keep her safe, witness the passage of years by her side, grow old with her.

  “So what do you want?” Connor asked, breaking into her thoughts.

  She felt her cheeks flush, and wondered if the yearning she felt was written on her face. Then she realized what he was asking.

  “Let’s go over the plans. This place is going to require a lot more than decluttering and flying the old flags, and we’ve only got one summer.”

  The notes and sketches she and Freddy had made were spread on a long table and pinned to a wall. “I have more family members coming up to help,” she said. “My cousin Dare is a professional event planner, so she’ll be in charge of the celebration itself. My uncle Greg’s a landscape architect, so he’ll be working on the grounds. His daughter, Daisy, just finished her junior year in high school, and she and her brother, Max, can do…whatever needs doing. Detail work. The goal is to make this place look like the camp in everyone’s mind,” she said. “The kind of place people dream about—”

  “As opposed to the camp as it really is.”

  “Such a cynic,” she said. “I thought you liked camp.”

  “I did like camp. For the most part.” A small, delicate muscle twitched in his jaw.

  Olivia tried to read his expression, but she simply didn’t know him anymore. “Should I be looking for another contractor?”

  “You’d be crazy to look for another contractor.”

  She pretended to be unimpressed by his self-confidence. “And why is that?”

  He leaned back, crossing his ankles, hands behind his head. “Because in the first place, you won’t find anybody in a fifty-mile radius. And in the second,” he said, “you need me. Not somebody else.”

  “I need you. And how do you know that?”

  “Because I remember you, Lolly. It’s all coming back to me now and I know exactly what you want.”

  Nine

  “I have to hand it to you,” said Olivia’s cousin Dare. “I didn’t think you could pull this off, but you’re actually doing it.”

  The camp’s extreme makeover was well under way. Just as he’d said, Connor Davis did know what Olivia wanted. He’d brought in heavy equipment and an experienced crew, and had already made visible progress. He also knew every subcontractor in the county—plumbers, electricians, painters, roofers.

  Dare stepped out of the rental van and surveyed the main part of the camp compound, her eyes bright with appreciation. Olivia had always regarded her cousin as a slightly older, slightly better-adjusted Bellamy than Olivia had ever been. The daughter of Aunt Peg and Uncle Clyde, Dare was one of those people who made life look fun and easy. She’d sailed through college, dated effortlessly and had launched a successful career as an event planner. She looked like Barbie’s shorter, more likable sister and dressed with a breezy sense of style. So many reasons to envy her, and yet Olivia adored Dare.

  “Come on, you guys. Check it out.” Dare slid open the panel of the van, and Uncle Greg got out of the driver’s side. Greg had two kids of his own—ten-year-old Max, and Daisy, who was seventeen. They were Olivia’s youngest cousins, and the fact that their parents were on the verge of divorce resonated painfully with Olivia.

  “My Lord,” she said, beaming at Max. “Look how tall you are. I guess I won’t be winning any more games of one-on-one against you. Where’s your sister?”

  Daisy emerged through the rear door of the van. As sunny and cheerful as her namesake, she beamed at Olivia. At seventeen, she was heartbreakingly adorable, with silky blond hair and cornflower-blue eyes. It was hard for Olivia to see the troubled girl Greg had described on the phone when she had called to ask for his help with the project. The Daisy he’d described was struggling in school, sneaking out at night and sneaking back in, reeking of cigarettes and booze. The Daisy he’d described was having just as hard a time with her parents’ breakup as Olivia had with hers.

  “Hello, you,” Olivia said, hugging her. She didn’t smell of anything but youth and trendy body splash. “I’m so gl
ad you decided to come.” Barkis came to greet everyone, squirming with delight as Max hunkered down on the ground to play with him.

  “What a cute dog!” Daisy exclaimed.

  “Thanks. I adopted him from a shelter.”

  Daisy looked around at the camp, and suddenly seemed overwhelmed. “So this is it.”

  “Yep. You never got to come here when it was up and running.”

  “What are we going to do all summer? I mean, like, besides fixing the place up?”

  “There’s a piano in the dining hall,” Olivia said. “A library and rec room. All the board games you’d ever want.”

  She watched her cousins’ expressions turn dubious. “Did you explain to them that they’ll be spending the summer unplugged?” Olivia gave her uncle a nudge.

  “Yeah, but I don’t think they believed me.”

  “Unplugged means no TV, no Internet, no cell phone service. We won’t even have regular phone service for another week or two. They keep putting me off. There’s one radio station that comes in when the wind is calm.”

  The kids’ eyes widened. “Welcome to the gulag,” said Dare.

  Max and Daisy headed off to explore the bunkhouses. Olivia and Dare lingered with their uncle, organizing the luggage and supplies. There was one working electric cart, which they would use to deliver the bags. Greg was her father’s youngest brother, the baby of the family. He had been the fun-loving uncle, the prankster, the one who never took anything seriously. Now that he was an adult and the father of two, Olivia suspected that wasn’t working so well for him. “How long do you think they’ll last?”

  “I have a feeling they’ll surprise us,” he said. “They’ll be okay.”

  She and Dare exchanged a glance. “How about you, Uncle Greg?” Dare asked. “Are you okay with this, too?”