Summer Light: A Novel

by Rice, Luanne

  “What was that all about?” Martin asked.

  “I’m not sure.” May said, trying to remember every detail.

  “You’re still keeping that notebook?”

  “Yes,” May said, laying down her pen.

  “What good does it do?”

  May stared at him. She thought about Dr. Whitpen’s theory, that Kylie’s dreams were connected to Martin’s own story, but she kept it to herself. “It helps the doctors understand what’s going on,” May said.

  “What was that bit about the Blind Man, eh?” Martin asked. “There’s no constellation like that.”

  “I know,” May said, gazing out their window at the stars.

  Charlotte called to ask Kylie to sleep over the next night, and after thinking it over, May decided to let her go. She and Martin needed some time alone. Together they talked about their time apart, his Stanley Cup loss, what they hoped the summer might bring.

  “What are you doing up?” Martin asked, when he found her awake the next morning. They had tried to make up for what they’d been through during the spring, and the late afternoon and night before had been filled with touching, swimming, and amazing tenderness. Now he reached across the bed to grab her leg as she walked over to open the curtains.

  “It’s nine-thirty,” she said. “Do you know the last time I slept this late? It was—”

  But Martin had a good grip, and he pulled her right back onto the bed, rolling on top of her as she tumbled down. “Nine-thirty’s nothing,” he told her. “We have a chance to be alone and you’re not getting up till noon.”

  “But it’s beautiful out.” She pointed at the window where sunlight blazed through the crack between the curtains. “We should—”

  “Should nothing,” he said, smoothing back her hair and kissing her hard.

  “I’ll never be able to sleep till noon,” she whispered, feeling his hands on her shoulders, moving down the front of her body.

  “Who said anything about sleep?” Martin asked, kissing her neck.

  They made love, then Martin brought her coffee in bed, then May opened the curtains, then Martin closed them. When he returned to bed, May noticed him squinting and covering his eyes.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked.

  “I’m not ready for daylight yet,” he said, lunging toward her. “Get back under those covers, woman.”

  May wanted to ask him more, but she found herself lost in passion. Martin was intensely physical. He was rough with his upper body and gentle with his hands, and May let herself surrender to sensations she had never even imagined. Once he kissed her hard, then whispered into her ear, “Is that good? Do you like it like that?” and May was shocked to hear words. She had so totally forgotten herself, lost track of where she ended and Martin began, that she had felt her voice and thoughts and feelings merging straight into his.

  “It’s incredible,” she whispered.

  “Tell me,” he said.

  “With my body, not my voice.”

  The light had brightened, even through the closed curtains, as the sun traversed the sky, and May walked across the room to pull down the shades and make the room darker.

  “I thought you wanted sun,” he teased.

  “I don’t want to see or hear,” she said, shivering with excitement. “I just want to feel you.”

  “You’re wild,” he said.

  “Only with you.” She lay down beside him. Their separation had cleared the air, and now she felt closer to him than ever before. Kissing her lips, he placed his hand over her eyes. Unable to see, she felt his breath on her cheek, his arms surrounding her body—the sensations of his fingers on her skin, his lips on hers, were exquisitely intensified.

  May felt overwhelmed with the simple thrill of making love with Martin. She had never believed this kind of intimacy possible. They didn’t speak, and she couldn’t see, and she knew that she had surrendered sight and hearing for touch, for the chance to experience this level of trust and risk in her own bed with her own husband.

  As the days wore on, Martin and May got down to business as sort-of-usual. Reporters stopped calling to interview him. The memory of those terrible last few seconds in the game began to fade. Ray came over to talk, and the two men drank beer and had a postgame postmortem sitting on the porch.

  While living in Boston, May had worked out a system with Tobin involving the telephone and a fax machine, and this summer they perfected it from Canada. They agreed that Tobin would handle any new clients from June through September, and May would oversee the in-progress wedding plans from Lac Vert.

  One day, while Martin and Ray went fishing, May invited Genny and Charlotte over to visit. While the girls played outside, their mothers talked on the front porch.

  “How’s Ray taking the loss?” May asked.

  “A little better every day. The name Martin Cartier was pretty touchy that first twenty-four hours.”

  “He blames Martin for losing?”

  “They all do,” Genny said. “He lost the puck instead of putting it away.”

  May frowned, wanting her friend to rise above blaming her husband.

  “Athletes always need a scapegoat,” Genny told her. “I’m sure you’ve noticed by now. Ray’s been it plenty of times, and so have all the others. Everyone makes mistakes. But that one…”

  “It was big.” May remembered those awful last seconds.

  “He just stopped in mid-ice,” Genny said. “Ray said, if he wasn’t so mad at him, he’d be worried.”

  “Why worried?”

  “Well, it was as if Martin was paralyzed or something. As if he just went numb.”

  “I thought that, too.” In her mind, May could see Martin driving down the ice, then just halting—his arm cocked and ready to shoot, with the puck already on its way to the Edmonton goal. “His father mentioned something to me the time I went to see him. He said Martin’s been favoring his right side.”

  “They go back and forth.” Genny laughed. “Depending on what’s hurt. There’s always something.”

  “So I shouldn’t be concerned.”

  “Not unless he wakes up one morning and can’t move. That’s about the only thing serious enough to keep Martin off the ice.”

  “Okay,” May said.

  Then, offering Genny some tea, May headed for the kitchen. Following along, Genny stopped to look at some old pictures in the living room. She caught sight of Martin’s mother’s collection of needlework pillows, displayed all along the back of the sofa.

  “Agnes always kept busy,” Genny said. “Knitting, needlepointing, doing cross-stitch. She showed me how to make a sampler once.”

  “Did you make one?”

  “I started it.” Genny said, looking around the room. Her gaze traveled over all the walls, the mantel, and the bookshelves. “Hmm. That’s funny.”

  “What?”

  “There used to be a cross-stitch picture hanging in this room. Dark blue thread on fine muslin, I think. It showed two baby animals, and I loved it so much. It inspired me to try my own. Agnes made it when Martin was born.”

  “I wonder where it is,” May said.

  “I wonder.” Genny scanned all the walls of the room as if the picture would suddenly reappear. “It hung here forever.”

  Martin borrowed Ray’s uncle’s truck and drove to the local nursery to buy up all their rosebushes. He wanted May to have her own rose garden up here, just like the one in Black Hall. The growing season was about a month behind Connecticut, so most of the bushes he picked out were full of buds.

  Kylie had come along for the ride. While Martin loaded sixty rosebushes into the truck bed, Kylie played with an old basset hound lying in the shade.

  “Careful now, he bites,” called the nursery owner, Jean-Pierre Heckler.

  Martin put down the rosebush he was carrying and went to retrieve Kylie.

  “He doesn’t bite me,” Kylie said.

  “Well, he bit me,” Jean-Pierre told her, pointing at his foot. “Last
night he smelled so bad I kicked him right out the door. And he grabbed my foot—”

  “What are you doing with a dog who bites?” Martin asked, staring down at the old hound. He was tied to a fence post, lying in a shallow hole he’d dug himself, his face creased with wrinkles. His fur was white around his eyes and muzzle, and when he panted, his tongue was so long it hung into the dirt.

  “He used to belong to Anne’s father,” Jean-Pierre explained. Martin listened. He had gone to school with the man’s wife, Anne Duprée, and Martin vaguely remembered that her father had owned a small farm southwest of the lake.

  “Did Mr. Duprée die?” Martin asked.

  “Yes, last winter. We sold the farm, but of course the new owners didn’t want a mean old dog. He’s bad for business, growling at all the customers.”

  “Poor old dog,” Kylie said, squirming to pull away from Martin. He couldn’t believe, looking into the hound’s droopy eyes, that he would bite anyone, but Martin wasn’t taking any chances.

  “What do I owe you?” Martin asked, reaching for his wallet.

  “Well, I’m going to give you a ten-percent discount,” Jean-Pierre said. “On account of the honor you’ve brought Lac Vert. Anne is very proud of you. Next year, even greater victory! You’ll win the Stanley Cup for sure.”

  “Next year,” Martin said, letting Kylie go as he counted out the money.

  She reached for the dog, and he licked her hand. Grabbing the rope, the nursery man yanked the dog away. “All I need is for this mutt to bite your girl,” he said.

  “He won’t bite me,” Kylie insisted.

  “He’s very old. Too old. The vet is coming soon, if you know what I mean,” Jean-Pierre said. Martin felt ice in his veins.

  “You mean you’re putting him to sleep?” Kylie asked.

  “He’s got arthritis, bad teeth, a terrible disposition,” Jean-Pierre Heckler said. “It’s for the best.”

  “Can we adopt him?” Kylie asked.

  “You don’t want this dog,” Jean-Pierre said. “Believe me. Now, you want a nice pet, I can give you a kitten from out back. Our big tiger just had a litter—”

  Martin watched Kylie inch toward the old basset hound. He could smell the dog’s breath from where he stood. Kylie reached out her hand, and the hound craned his neck so she could pet his head. He squirmed under her touch like a happy puppy, and Martin heard himself ask, “What’s the dog’s name?”

  “Thunder,” Jean-Pierre told them.

  “Hi, Thunder,” Kylie said.

  “The kittens—”

  “She wants Thunder.” Martin watched the old dog slobber over Kylie’s hand. Kylie laughed and stroked his long ears.

  “He’s a mess,” Jean-Pierre said quietly, so Kylie couldn’t hear. “Can’t control himself—goes all over the house. We let him sleep outside, and then he howls all night. He’s a one-man dog—turned mean and surly the day his master died. Believe me, Martin—let the vet do his work. It’s best for everyone.”

  Martin thought back. One day Genny had taken her kids and Natalie to the Lac Vert dog pound, behind the municipal garage on Mountain Road. The Gardners adopted a young shepherd, and Natalie picked out an abandoned beagle, telling the woman in charge that she and her father would be back for him before the weekend.

  She had begged Martin to let her get the dog. They could train him together, and he could keep Martin company when she went back to California. Martin had said no. The hockey season was long; the dog would be alone while Martin was on the road. His situation wasn’t like the Gardners’, with lots of people to play with the dog every day.

  Natalie had been devastated. Sneaking away one morning, she had ridden her bike to the pound. She named the dog “Archie,” and all that summer she never stopped begging Martin to reconsider. One morning he got a call from the woman who ran the pound. Obviously not a hockey fan, she spoke to him with venom in her voice, telling him to pick up his child.

  “These roads are dangerous,” the woman had said. “She has no business riding her bicycle up here by herself.”

  “I’ll come get her right away,” he said.

  “Don’t let her come back,” the woman warned. “This dog has been here all summer, and he’s being put down tomorrow. She won’t find him here again.”

  When Martin picked Nat up, she started to cry, clutching Archie’s neck. Breaking her grasp, Martin had pushed the dog away, getting bitten on the hand in the process. With Natalie weeping inconsolably, Martin had driven away, aware of the woman’s cold stare.

  Remembering Natalie’s sorrow and anger, Martin watched Kylie now. He saw her kiss the basset hound’s ear, and he watched the dog’s droopy-eyed gaze widen. The dog licked Kylie’s face, revealing gray-pink gums missing lower teeth.

  “How about a new puppy, Kylie?” he asked. “Or one of those kittens?”

  Kylie shook her head. “I want Thunder.”

  “Okay, then,” Martin said. Then, turning back to Anne’s husband, “Would that be possible? I mean, it sounds as if you don’t intend to keep the dog.”

  “We don’t, but neither do you—honestly, it would be an insult for us to give you this mangy animal—”

  “He’s not mangy,” said the little girl, and although it was Kylie speaking, Martin could swear he heard Natalie’s voice.

  “I’ll be happy to pay you for him,” Martin offered.

  “That’s not necessary.” Jean-Pierre was shaking his head. He helped Martin load the last rosebushes into the truck, as Kylie climbed into the cab with Thunder.

  “Why is his name Thunder?” Kylie asked.

  “He had a brother, Lightning,” Jean-Pierre said. “Their names were sort of a family joke. All they liked to do was eat and sleep! Those big sleepy eyes, their short legs. They’d lie on the porch and birds would steal their food. Pigeons would sit on their heads.”

  “What happened to Lightning?”

  “My father-in-law went to the hospital and never came home, and old Lightning refused to eat or drink. Wasted away and died. Thunder and Lightning. They were quite a pair.”

  “You miss your brother,” Martin heard Kylie whisper to the old dog. “And your master. That’s why you’ve been in a bad mood.”

  “Got quite an imagination, that one,” Jean-Pierre said, pointing.

  “She has a big heart,” Martin said, keeping an even temper as he climbed into the truck and backed down the driveway. Next time he wanted rosebushes, he’d visit Green Gardens, north on the lake road. Anne Duprée had been a nice girl in school. Martin couldn’t picture her married to someone who’d kick her father’s dog. No wonder the old hound had bitten him.

  But then, a dog had bitten Martin once.

  Overnight, May had a new rose garden and an old dog. Taking her coffee outside to watch the sunrise and walk through rows of just-planted rosebushes, she thought about life: how impossible it was to see around corners and up hills, how every day was filled with the unknown.

  “Come on, boy,” she said out loud to her companion, the elderly and as yet unknown basset hound Thunder. Thunder padded through the recently overturned earth, sticking his considerable nose into furrows and under leaves, huffing and puffing as he walked at May’s feet.

  The sun was peeking out from behind the mountain, spreading diamond light down the rocks and onto the lake’s green glass surface. Deer grazed in shadows across the lake, unseen by Thunder. May walked slowly, to keep from scaring them. Rabbits scattered into the underbrush, and she found herself thinking about the missing cross-stitch picture, wondering which sort of animals Agnes had stitched.

  Sitting in the gazebo, May looked around. The old dog stood by the water’s edge, as if contemplating a swim. Martin had expected May to resist the dog: his bladder problems, his halitosis, his dandruff, his missing teeth, and his need for special food.

  But May had seen only Kylie’s love for her new dog and Martin’s care for Kylie. It had touched her beyond words. Then Martin had told her about Natalie and Arc
hie, how he had let the chance to let his daughter have a dog slip by once before. Thunder was a sweet old creature, saved by Martin from veterinary death, but what May found ineffable was how her husband and child had become a team.

  “Here, boy,” May called softly now. “Thunder…c’mere, boy.”

  Thunder looked over his shoulder, his eyes drooping and bloodshot. He had gotten stuck in the mud. Paw-deep and sinking to his knees, he gazed helplessly at his mistress’s mother.

  “You can do it, Thunder,” May said, setting her coffee mug down on the gazebo bench.

  The dog let out a mournful bay, then took a long drink of lake water. He shook off his ears and jowls, soaking May from ten feet away. She kicked off her sneakers and wondered how hard it was going to be to pull a sixty-pound basset hound—with a reputation for biting—out of the mud. Looking around, she happened to glimpse the rose garden.

  The sun, half hidden by pines on the mountainside, was striking the rosebushes. A thousand new buds, in scarlet, crimson, vermilion, pink, peach, and pearl, were straining toward the light. They were tiny flames licking the sky, ready to explode into bloom. Martin had started planting them the minute he got home, and he hadn’t finished until after dark.

  The smells of dirt, coffee, wet dog. May felt so happy, she couldn’t contain the feeling. Dew covered every stick of wood, each blade of grass. She started to roll up the legs of her jeans, but then she found herself taking them off. Peeling off her sweatshirt and blouse, wearing nothing but her underwear, she stood alone on the steps of the gazebo where she had married Martin.

  Walking down to the lake, she felt the cool mud between her toes. Thunder wagged his tail as she approached. Reaching her arms around his torpedo-shaped body, May eased him out of the mud. She started to turn, to place him on the grass, but he started to whimper and point his nose toward the water.

  “Want to swim?” she asked.

  Thunder didn’t reply, but his front paws began to paddle. May slid him into the lake, and he glided forward with all the sleekness of a sea otter, a sailboat, or a very young puppy. May followed right behind.