by Susan Wiggs
“I wasn’t—”
“Sure you were. It’s all right. Go, Olivia. Have a nice visit with your father.”
“Thanks.” She picked up her purse and shoulder bag.
He turned to look at her, and once again, she was bowled over by his lake-blue eyes, dark hair, shirt open at the throat. She could have sworn he wanted to kiss her. There was a moment of tension, and plenty more to be said, but not now. She unclipped her seat belt. Then, on impulse, she leaned over and kissed his cheek. Well, shoot, she thought. She wanted a kiss. The moment she felt his warm cheek with her lips and inhaled the scent of his shaving cream, she wanted more than that.
“For luck,” she said hastily, then got out of the car. If he said anything, she didn’t hear it.
Though aware of the doorman’s eyes on her, she stood on the sidewalk and watched Connor go. Downtown. To meet with his broker. It shouldn’t surprise her that he had a portfolio at such a young age. For someone growing up with no security or control at all, keeping control of finances was probably second nature. Seeing him each day at the camp, she often forgot he had a whole separate life she knew nothing about, other clients with other projects. He might even have a girlfriend, for all she knew, though a part of her would be devastated if he did.
Who was she kidding? All of her would be devastated if he did. He couldn’t, she told herself. No way could he look at her the way he just had if he had a girlfriend. The heat in his gaze alone would have constituted a betrayal.
Adjusting her shoulder bag, she turned and went into the building. “Miss Bellamy.” The doorman bobbed his head.
Her father had moved here after the divorce. As a child, Olivia spent the night only occasionally, perhaps after attending a Yankees game with him, a night at the opera or on the eve of the trip together. For the most part, it was understood by all of them that her place was at her mother’s, amid the muted luxury of the Fifth Avenue flat. That was where she had kept all her things, including her piano, her beloved books, her adored cat named Degas. Still, her father tried hard to make room for her in his life. His sleek, midcentury modern condo had a small bedroom just for her, with a built-in desk, bunk beds and a white shag rug.
Bypassing the elevator, she took the stairs. Her father, having been called by the doorman, stood waiting with the door held wide open. Although the day was warm enough for open windows, he wore a light cardigan. It was funny, she’d never seen him in a cardigan sweater before. It made him seem older. She didn’t like to think of her father as an old man. Until very recently, she’d simply thought of him as “Dad.” Now she had to wonder about him as a person, someone with urges and passions and motivations she’d never considered. What made him tick? He was a successful lawyer, a dutiful son, a devoted father, but what else? He’d always wanted to write. She knew that, but they’d never talked about it, and now she wished they had. She wished they’d talked about so much more.
“Hey, Dad,” she said, lifting up on tiptoe to kiss his cheek.
“How’s my happy camper?” he asked.
“Amazingly happy,” she said, “considering it’s Camp Kioga. Giving the place an extreme makeover is a lot more fun than camping.”
“What can I get you?” he said. “Lemonade? Seltzer?”
“I need to freshen up, and then I’ll help myself to something.” She visited the powder room, then afterward stopped in the kitchen, studying the selection in the fridge, helping herself to a bottle of plain seltzer. Then she joined him in the living room.
Her father sat back in his favorite wing chair. “So spill. Something about Camp Kioga must agree with you. You’re glowing.”
Three hours in a car with Connor Davis will do that to a girl, she thought.
She took a sip of seltzer and brought him up to date on the past several weeks. “It’s amazing, Dad,” she said, “how the place unlocks so many memories. For all of us. Maybe it’s the lack of technology. We have to entertain ourselves the old-fashioned way.”
“How’s Greg doing?”
“At first, not so hot.” She watched her father’s brow pinch together with disappointment. Though Greg was a decade younger than Philip, the brothers were close. She hastily added, “He’s doing better every day. All three of them are. I think a big part of Uncle Greg’s trouble was that he lost touch with his kids. When they first got to the camp, he and Daisy barely spoke, and he and Max were like two strangers. Now they’re paddling around in canoes, going fishing, playing games, reading books together. They’re going to be all right, Dad.”
“And you?” he asked. “How are you doing?”
She set down her drink. “You know, it’s a funny thing. I was over Rand quickly. Too quickly. It was like getting a really bad hangnail. At first it hurts so much, you can’t think about anything else. But if you put the right kind of salve on it, the pain goes away so fast, you forget you were ever hurting in the first place.”
“Renovating the camp is the right kind of salve, then. Either that, or he wasn’t right for you in the first place.”
“Then why did I think he was?”
“Wishful thinking is a powerful force.”
Olivia had to wonder if it was just her pride that was hurt. That worried her, that she could be so superficial. She’d envisioned a life for herself and made choices that fed into that vision—the home, the husband, the family. But was it all, as her father suggested, wishful thinking?
“Have you been to see your grandparents?” her father asked her.
“I’m not sure I’ll have time today. I thought I’d call them. And Mother, too,” she added cautiously. It had crossed her mind to stop in and check on her apartment, but there was no need. Earl was keeping the place in order, watering the plants and looking after things there. And, all right, she was also unsure about taking Connor Davis there, giving him a glimpse of the way she lived.
She felt herself circling around the real reason she’d come here. Just say it, she coached herself. She took a deep breath…and chickened out. “I don’t know if I told you this or not. The contractor doing all the work is Connor Davis.”
Her father frowned, rubbed his chin. “Connor…that would be Terry Davis’s boy, then.”
“He’s not a boy anymore.”
“You think I don’t remember,” Philip said.
“Do you?” She was amazed.
“What kind of father would I be if I didn’t remember my only child’s first broken heart? I wanted to kill the little son of a bitch.”
“Dad. I never knew.” The phrase only child swirled in her head. “Well, I got over that one, just like I did the others,” she said. Liar. She was not over Connor Davis. Pieces of herself—important pieces—had been left behind, and she was only now coming to realize that. Excellent time to change the subject. “About the only-child bit. I need to ask you something. It’s kind of personal.”
“Anything. My life is an open book.”
He really seemed to mean it. She’d never regarded her father as a deceptive person. Yet secrets swirled around him, secrets and lies. All right, she pep-talked herself. Just come right out and say it. “I was wondering, Dad. About your days at camp.”
He grinned. “You’ll have to be more specific. I spent a hell of a lot of days there.”
She took a deep breath. The pause felt big and heavy, and it was. “Tell me about the summer of 1977.”
His expression softened to thoughtfulness. “Let’s see. I would have been a counselor that year. Why do you ask?”
“I found an old snapshot of you, dated August 1977, and I was curious.” She took a manila folder out of her bag and passed it to him.
His hand was unsteady as he put on his reading glasses and took the faded photo from her. “Well, I’ll be. I’d nearly forgotten…”
Something—maybe the softness of his voice or the mistiness in his eyes—told Olivia that he was lying.
“Forgotten what?” she prompted.
“Winning that trophy. I still like tennis.
I need to get back on my game.”
“There’s a copy of this picture in the Sky River Bakery. But you’ve been cropped out of it.”
“I…didn’t know that.”
“How close were you and Mariska Majesky?” Olivia asked, watching his face.
He turned the snapshot over. She knew it was blank except for the date.
“Terry Davis told me you two were an item,” Olivia explained.
“You showed this picture to Terry Davis?”
“That’s right. He lives in Indian Wells these days.” Olivia didn’t want to get sidetracked from Mariska. “She was very beautiful,” Olivia ventured. “Were you…a couple?”
He sighed and leaned back in his chair. “I guess you could say we were.”
“You were with her the summer of 1977,” she reiterated. “And later that year, you married my mother.”
He turned pale, his gaze avoiding hers.
“Oh, God. Daddy.” She’d wanted him to deny it. To defend himself.
“Olivia, this is ancient history. It all happened before you were born. I don’t see how it can possibly matter now.”
She took out another picture, this one printed off at the Avalon Public Library. She had found it by searching the archives of the Avalon Troubadour. The caption read Sky River Bakery Celebrates 50th Jubilee. Pictured are owners Mrs. Helen Majesky and her granddaughter, Jennifer Majesky.
It was an excellent likeness of Jenny, showing off her dark good looks. Next to the old snapshot of Mariska, it highlighted the striking resemblance between mother and daughter.
Olivia watched her father’s face. He went ashen, and sweat gleamed on his forehead. The shock was staggering him, she could tell. Prior to this moment, he had no clue, she was certain of that.
“Her name is Jennifer Anastasia Majesky,” Olivia told her father quietly. “She was born on March 23, 1978.” The data was easy enough to obtain. Connor had asked the chief of police, Rourke McKnight, who was a friend of his. “See that necklace she’s wearing? You can’t make it out in the picture, but there’s a pendant on it that matches this.” She handed her father the silver cuff link.
She forced herself to sit quietly as he took it all in.
He slowly lowered his hands, as though forcing himself to face her. “Are you sure?” he asked.
She knew what he was asking. Are you sure she’s my child? “No. That…being sure…is your job.”
He took out a handkerchief and dabbed his face. “And Mariska?” he asked. “Is she back in Avalon?”
“No. According to Chief McKnight—the chief of police—she took off when Jenny was three or four and never returned.”
“My God, Mariska,” her father whispered. He lowered his head to his hands, and rested his elbows heavily on his knees. He looked diminished, somehow, as though the revelation had destroyed some vital part of him.
SKY RIVER BAKERY JAM KOLACHES
½ cup softened sweet butter
1 small (3-ounce) stick of softened cream cheese
1-¼ cup flour
a small jar of jam—choose apricot, raspberry
or apple
a sprinkle of powdered sugar
Beat the butter and cream cheese until light and fluffy. Add flour, then roll the dough out on a floured surface. With a sharp knife, slice into squares about 2 inches across and place these on a lightly greased cookie sheet. Place a small spoonful of jam on each cookie and loosely fold opposite corners together, pinching at the edge. Bake at 375° for 15 minutes. When cool, sprinkle with powdered sugar. This recipe makes about 2 dozen cookies.
Twenty-Two
September 1977
Camp Kioga was officially closed for the year. Philip Bellamy was among the last of the counselors to depart. His parents had dropped him off at the train station in town and by dinnertime, he’d be in New Haven. He went to wait for the Number Two train headed for New York City. Matthew Alger was on the platform, too, sitting on a bench with his girlfriend, a Barnard student who had worked in the Kioga kitchen all summer.
“Hey, Alger,” Philip said. “Hey, Shelley. You guys headed back to the city?”
“I am,” said Shelley. “Matt’s staying in Avalon for his internship in city administration.”
Alger shook back his shaggy, Bee Gees–style blond hair. “I just came to the station to say goodbye to my best girl.” He slid his arm around Shelley.
Philip felt a pang of envy as he watched them. He’d been forced to say goodbye to Mariska in private the night before. Even though he wanted to shout his love for her to the world, she had to remain a secret until he untangled his life and freed himself from Pamela. He’d gone over the plan in his head, again and again. Get through fall registration. Tell Pamela their engagement was off, return to Avalon, propose to Mariska. Simple, he thought. But not easy.
He didn’t kid himself. Things were about to change radically for him. Sure, he was supposed to go to law school, but that wasn’t what he really wanted to do. What he really wanted was to write. He’d finished two short stories over the summer and was considering submitting them to the Yale Literary Review.
He caught a glimpse of his reflection in a big glass-framed poster for that new hit movie, Annie Hall. He was wearing a good shirt and school tie because he wouldn’t have time to change when he got to campus tonight, and there was an official dinner. As class treasurer, he couldn’t miss it.
He stuck his hand in his pants pocket and jingled his change in nervous impatience. His fingers encountered the silver cuff link, and it comforted him to know Mariska had its mate. Pacing up and down, he leaned out over the tracks, as if spotting the train would make it come sooner. He checked his watch, paced some more. Several others arrived, vacationers heading back to the city after Labor Day, people with kids and luggage, sunburns and spots of pink calamine lotion on their mosquito bites.
Amid the growing crowd, he saw a slender woman with dark, shining hair, hurrying toward him. His heart gave a leap. “Mariska?”
“Philip,” she said, sounding a little breathless.
She looked pale, tired, yet still achingly beautiful. Instantly he cast about to see if anyone was watching. Too risky. He couldn’t swing her up into his arms the way he longed to do. Keeping his hands at his sides, he said, “I didn’t know you were coming to the station.”
“I can’t put this off any longer,” she said. “I need to tell you something.”
The expression on her face sent a spike of ice through his heart. He knew already. Before she said a word. “Mariska—”
“Let’s sit down.” She gestured at a bench on one end of the platform, next to the newspaper vending boxes. The New York Times headline was about the launch of the second space shuttle orbiter, while the Avalon Troubadour proclaimed Camp Kioga Ends Forty-fifth Season.
“What’s the matter?” His chest felt funny, as though he’d just swallowed an ice cube whole.
She sat with her knees pointed toward him. “I think it’s time we both faced facts.”
The spike of ice in his heart radiated its cold agony outward. Though the morning sun warmed the train platform, Philip had to fight against an assault of shivering. “Baby, we spent the whole summer facing facts, and the fact is, we fell in love.”
Her face was a calm mask, the face of a stranger. “I suppose we did, for a while. We had a good time, Philip, but we let things go too far.”
“That’s crazy,” he said.
She winced at the loudness of his voice, and cast a quick glance around as if to make sure no one had heard. “It’s not crazy,” she insisted, her voice a half whisper. “What’s crazy is pretending this is going to work out. Pretending we are going to work out.”
“What are you saying? Of course this is going to work out. We have a plan.”
“It’s a bad plan, and it was stupid of me to go along with it. We don’t belong together, Philip. We never have. It just felt that way for the summer.”
Her words pounded at him. “I don’t
believe you.” He reached for her hand, but she snatched it away. “Something happened,” he said. “Last night, you—we—” He couldn’t find a way to describe how close they’d been without making it sound crude and cheap.
“Last night I was still lying,” she said, her gaze holding his with eerie steadiness. “To you, and to myself.”
“No. You’re lying now. You’re scared because I’m leaving. But oh, baby, you don’t have to worry about me. I made you a promise, and I intend to keep it. Of course I’ll be back.”
Her gaze was steady as she looked at him. “That’s why I’m asking you—telling you—to respect my wishes and stay away. I don’t want to be your girlfriend anymore, Philip. I had fun with you this summer, but things went too far.”
“We fell in love.”
“That was just something I said. Something we both said,” she explained, sounding weirdly older than her years, “but we were both wrong. It was something that was never meant to last, and now it’s over. I have other plans for my life. I’m going to travel, see new places, meet new people—”
“Of course you are, baby. With me. Didn’t I say I’d take you anywhere you wanted to go?” Philip could hear the desperation in his own voice. He hated the sound of himself begging her, but he didn’t know what else to do.
“You’re not listening,” said Mariska. “I don’t want to see the world with you. You’re a nice guy, Philip, and this summer was great, but now it’s done. I should’ve had the guts to tell you sooner. Summer is over, and so are we. You need to go back to your life, and I need to get on with mine.”
“I don’t have any life without you,” he said, his voice taut with intensity.
“Now you’re being dramatic.” She clutched her purse against her stomach. Her thumbs, the nails bitten down, worried the strap as she spoke. “You have school, and all your friends and any future you want for yourself. And your fiancée, Pamela.”