by Mary Simses
My mother brushed a strand of hair from my forehead. “Sometimes I forget that you’re an intelligent, grown woman and that I need to respect the decisions you make, even if they wouldn’t be my decisions.” She put her arm around me. “I’m just stubborn and set in my ways, Ellen…and I’m sorry for that.” She pulled me close.
“I love you,” she whispered.
I rested my head on her shoulder. “I love you, too.”
We held each other as a breeze blew through the windows, fluttering the curtains and sending the faint scent of salt water into the room. Above us, in a tree somewhere, a woodpecker tapped out a song.
I pushed the pedal to the floor as I pulled into Dorset Lane, a squeal coming from my tires. As soon as I saw Roy’s house, my hands went cold and an empty feeling seeped through me. The truck was in the driveway and the Audi was gone. He must have left. I banged my hand on the steering wheel in frustration, accidentally sounding the horn.
Maybe he’s still here, I thought, even if the Audi isn’t. I pulled into the driveway, left the car idling, and raced up the porch steps. Yanking open the screen door, I gave several loud knocks.
“Roy, Roy, it’s me, Ellen. Are you in there?”
There was no answer. Only a meadowlark singing in the field behind the house.
“Roy, open up please,” I said. “It’s Ellen.”
“He’s gone out of town.”
I turned, startled to see Roy’s neighbor at the foot of the porch steps. Dressed in a pink jogging suit, she was holding hand weights.
“I’m doing my power walk.” She sounded out of breath. “I usually do two miles a day.”
I stepped to the edge of the porch. “What was that? Did you say he left?”
“Yeah, about a half hour ago. Gone for a couple of weeks.” She bent down to tie the lace of her pink sneaker. “I’m taking care of Mr. Puddy, his cat.” She stood up. “He gets really upset and tears up the place when he’s left alone too long, but he’s fine with me. Roy says I’ve got the magic touch.” She picked up her weights and darted across the lawn toward the street. “See ya.”
“Yeah, see ya,” I said. A cloud hovered overhead, blocking the sun, and a breeze rustled the grass. I walked to the car.
The neighbor, now a couple of houses away, turned her head and called out, “Looks like you sure broke his heart.” Then she marched on.
There was nothing I could say. I got into the car, my eyes burning. I glanced at Roy’s house one last time—at the windows where I first called out “Mr. Cummings,” looking for Chet; at the ladder by the side of the house; at the bench where Roy and I sat reading Gran’s letter. And then I set the GPS for Manhattan.
I’d already driven down Bidwell Road and onto Route 20A, heading toward the highway, when I realized there was one more thing I needed to do for my grandmother. Or maybe it was for me. I needed to give her a proper send-off. And to do that I needed to drop her letter in the ocean. Roy said we all had to put this behind us and move on, and he was right. Maybe that was the way to do it. I turned the car around and headed back toward town.
In ten minutes I rounded the bend at the edge of town, and the ocean appeared. The salt air filled my car, and I was struck by the rich cobalt blue of the water, the meringue of white chop, and the sky full of seagulls. I thought about the different ways I could frame the picture in my camera lens.
I drove between the beach and the shops, passing the Three Penny Diner, Tindall & Griffin, and the Beacon Dry Goods store, passing the Wine Cellar and Frank’s Tailoring, once the home of the Irresistible Blueberry Bakeshop & Café in Gran’s painting. I drove through the town and all the way to the end of Paget Street, where the new house was being built.
I was startled to see how different it looked from the day I’d arrived in Beacon. The roof was finished and shingled now, and the pipes and wires and chips of lumber and other debris that had once lay scattered across the dirt yard were gone.
A white van and a tan Jeep were parked in the area in front, and between them sat Roy’s green Audi. He was here. He hadn’t left yet.
I bolted from the car and ran toward the back of the house, colliding with one of the workers as I rounded the corner. He dropped a coffee can and hundreds of nails went flying everywhere.
“Sorry,” I said, out of breath, as I crouched down and tried to scoop up some of the nails. I threw them back into the can. “Is Roy Cummings around?”
The man peered at me, his quiet brown eyes coming alive for a second. “Hey, aren’t you the Swimmer?”
“Yes,” I said, nodding. “Yes, I’m the Swimmer. That’s me. But please, I need to see Roy Cummings.”
“I think he’s inside,” the man said with a shrug, and I ran off.
There were easily twenty workers in the house, installing kitchen cabinets, laying bathroom tile, putting up light fixtures. I went from room to room looking for Roy, but he wasn’t anywhere. Finally I ran downstairs and out the back door. And then I saw it.
The old dock was gone, and a brand-new structure stood in its place. The broken planks, missing handrails, and rotted boards had all been replaced with new, pressure-treated lumber. And a shiny black gate with fancy scrollwork had been installed. I looked toward the end of the dock and saw a man standing there. It was Roy.
Running across the sand, I jumped onto the platform and flung open the gate. Roy watched as I raced down the length of the dock, my shoes pounding against the wood. I got to the end and stopped.
“Hey,” I gasped.
He looked me up and down. “Hey yourself. What are you doing here?”
“I’ve been looking all over for you,” I said. “I thought you’d left.”
“Not yet,” he said. “I’m going in a little while. I have a meeting upstate, about a job.”
Oh, no, I thought. He’s going to get a job with another company and he’s going to leave Beacon. “You’re moving away?” I asked. I could hear the panic in my voice.
Roy tilted his head and squinted at me. “What?”
“Are you getting a job with another construction company?”
“Another construction company…” He shook his head. “No, I’m…Ellen, what are you doing here?”
I looked down at the brand-new boards under my feet. They felt strong, solid. I gazed across the water toward the beach, where a boy was throwing a ball for a golden retriever. Then I looked into Roy’s eyes. “I’m not going to marry Hayden.”
He squinted at me, a confused expression on his face. “You’re not?”
I shook my head. “No.” I held up my left hand and wiggled my fingers. “No ring. See?”
He took my hand and turned it from front to back. Then he let it go. “What happened?”
I thought about the Antler and the karaoke and my drunken speech. “You know, I’ve never had trouble holding my liquor in New York, but up here…that’s another story. I got a little tipsy at the Antler again last night.”
Roy grinned. “You didn’t.”
“Oh, I’m afraid I did.”
“Dead Presidents again, Counselor? Or was it Steeplechase this time?”
“Neither one. I wasn’t playing darts,” I said. Then I remembered my mother’s trophy. “Oh, but Mom was, and she won the annual summer tournament! I had no idea she could throw.”
Roy’s eyebrows shot up. “Your mother? Wow. I think I’d like to get to know her.”
“I’d like that, too,” I said, and I smiled. He held my gaze and we stood there for a moment.
Finally he said, “So what happened?”
I told him about the karaoke and my rendition of “Our Love Is Here to Stay.” “I think the Gershwins must have been rolling in their graves, but the crowd loved it. Maybe they were just rooting for the underdog.”
“They were rooting for the Swimmer,” he said.
“I guess. I don’t know. The thing is, the whole time I was singing I kept thinking about you and wishing you were there. And then I started saying all this crazy
stuff about taking pictures, and…I don’t know. But at the end, in front of everybody at the Antler, I told Hayden the wedding was off.” I could hear the water lapping against the dock pilings as Roy stood there, taking this in.
“Why did you do that?” Roy asked after a moment.
I took a deep breath. “Because I can’t go back to the way things used to be. I came here expecting one thing and getting something completely different. Everything’s changed. I’ve changed. And I can’t marry Hayden if I’m in love with you.”
He tilted his head. “What did you say?”
“I said everything’s changed now, and I can’t go back to—”
“No, I mean the last part.”
I took his hand. I took a deep breath. “I said I’m in love with you.”
He closed his fingers around mine. “But what about all that stuff you told me last night?” He looked down. “You said you weren’t in love with me.”
I shook my head. “I was afraid of the truth. The truth can be pretty messy sometimes. I’ve hurt Hayden a lot. I know that, and it’s something I have to deal with. But I can’t help being in love with you.”
“What about New York and your career? What about grinding your teeth when you sleep?”
I laughed. “You know, I don’t think I’ve been grinding my teeth since I came to Beacon.” I thought about my grandmother and the money she left me, and I thought about Kenlyn Farm and the fragment of the blueberry plant I found there.
“And I’ve suddenly got this crazy urge to own a blueberry farm. Maybe start a bakery. I could sell great blueberry muffins and blueberry pies and…” I looked across the beach toward town and the statue of the blueberry lady. “Have you ever wondered why you don’t see blueberry croissants? Maybe I could make those, too. You know, I hear there’s an old blueberry farm for sale.”
A flying fish leaped out of the ocean, its body a jolt of silver against the blue water. Roy looked at me and smiled. “I think you’re crazy, Ellen Branford. But I love you.” He started to pull me toward him.
“Wait,” I said. “There’s something I have to do.”
I took my grandmother’s letter from my pocket. I unfolded the paper, smoothed out the crease, and gazed at my grandmother’s writing one last time. Then I walked to the edge of the dock and let the paper go. It fluttered in the breeze and settled on the water.
Roy came and stood beside me. “Maybe she’s finally found some peace.”
“I hope so.”
“I think she’d be very proud of you,” he said.
“You do?”
“Of course. I’m proud of you.”
“Thanks,” I said. We leaned against the railing for a moment, watching the breeze ruffle the water.
“The last thing I ever expected was to see you on this dock again,” Roy said.
I smiled. “Well, here I am. And I much prefer this dock to the old one.”
He laughed. “You like it?”
“It’s beautiful,” I said.
“I think the owner was afraid he’d get sued. You know, by that woman who fell in.”
“Oh, right,” I said. “That lawyer. You think she’d sue?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe. Maybe not. It could be…a conflict. Conflict of interest?”
I shook my head. “I don’t think so. Why would it be a conflict of interest?”
“Well, she just told the owner she’s in love with him.”
“No I didn’t. I…wait a minute. What?”
Roy was grinning.
“You’re the owner?” I said. “You?”
“C. R. Cummings Construction, LLC.” He put out his hand for me to shake.
I know I must have looked confused. He was trying not to laugh. “So you’re telling me you own the dock?” I said.
“The dock and the house. They go together, remember? I own them until I sell them, anyway. I know you thought I was a carpenter. And I am, but I’m also a general contractor. I own the company.”
I looked down the length of the dock to the new house, knowing now that it was there because of Roy, admiring it as if for the first time. “You’re pretty impressive, Roy Cummings.”
He grinned sheepishly. “Well, that’s what my meeting’s about later. I’m seeing somebody about a project. A huge piece of property with a lake, and they want to…oh, hey, we don’t have to talk business right now. I can think of better things to do.”
He looked into my eyes, took my hand, and pulled me close. Something inside me fluttered, like the heart of a caged bird suddenly freed and about to take flight.
“You know,” he said, “this might sound crazy, but I think I’ve been in love with you since the first day I saw you out here, when you were drowning.”
I pulled away. “When I was what?”
“When you were drowning,” he said matter-of-factly.
I put my hands on my hips. “I wasn’t drowning, Roy Cummings. I was never drowning.”
“I see.” He tried to suppress a smile. “Then why were you thrashing around in the water, looking panicky? Was that just to attract my attention?”
“I’ve never looked panicky in my life.” I threw back my shoulders. “Especially when it comes to swimming. When I was at Exeter—”
Roy pulled me toward him again. “Yeah, yeah, I know. You made it to the nationals.”
And before I had a chance to utter another word, his arms were around me, his face against mine. He kissed my forehead. I could feel the stubble of his beard and smell his aftershave as he brushed his face against my cheek. He smelled like the field of wildflowers where a farmhouse once stood, where blueberries grew and would grow again.
He kissed the tip of my nose and then he moved his lips to mine and everything around me—the boards under my feet, the sigh of the ocean against the dock pilings, the blue granite sky—every single atom of existence outside of Roy and me quietly slipped away.
Epilogue
One Year Later
Grabbing the pot holders, I pulled the blueberry muffins from the oven. The aroma of cinnamon filled the air as I placed the two baking tins on a cooling rack. I think Gran would have liked my twist on her recipe—sprinkling the tops with cinnamon and sugar to make them even more crunchy.
Standing in the café kitchen, oven mitt in my hand and Cole Porter’s “Night and Day” playing in the background, it seemed hard to believe that it had been a year since my grandmother’s death and my journey to Beacon. I think she would be proud of what I’d done, and I know she would have loved the café, especially as I’d named it after the Irresistible Blueberry Bakeshop & Café of her youth.
There were touches of Gran everywhere. I could almost see the two of us dancing in this kitchen, the way we did in hers, while muffins baked and Ella Fitzgerald sang “Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered.”
As I walked into the front room, her painting of Kenlyn Farm welcomed me. I smiled at the images of the red barn and the little roadside stand and thought about how happy Gran would be to know that Roy and I had bought the farm and that some of the money she’d left me had found its way there. It would be a few years before the blueberry bushes we planted would bear fruit, but that was okay. We would wait.
Next to Gran’s painting hung the blackboard where I posted the specials. I took a stick of bright yellow chalk and wrote “Chilled Carrot Ginger Soup,” “Apple Pecan Chicken Salad Sandwich,” and “French Baguette with Smoked Ham and Brie.” Roy would want the smoked ham and Brie when he stopped by. We topped it with field greens and finished it with a Dijon mustard sauce that he loved. He would probably come in wearing faded jeans and his Red Sox T-shirt, poke his head in the kitchen or find me in the closet I called my office, and kiss me with his scratchy Saturday morning beard, all of which I would love.
Roy and I were getting married in the fall—just a simple wedding with family members and a few close friends. It would be perfect. We had booked the Victory Inn for the reception and the out-of-town guests, and Paul
a even threatened to buy new chairs for the roof.
An elderly couple rose from their table, leaving behind a copy of the New York Times. I picked up the paper, noticing a headline that read, CROFT POISED TO WIN COUNCIL SEAT BY LARGE MARGIN. I felt a little thrill of excitement for Hayden. The election wasn’t until November, but he seemed to have a lock on the seat for his district, which was no surprise to me.
I thought about the e-mail Hayden sent me a couple of months back. He told me he’d run into Tally at the New York City Ballet spring gala and that they’d begun dating. I wrote back, wishing him well and letting him know I had seen Jim, who had become a food critic for the Times. Jim had come up here in April and given the café two stars in a review he wrote for a series the paper ran on New England comfort-food restaurants.
Sometimes I think about New York and I wonder what my life would have been like if I had put my grandmother’s letter in the mail and never come to Beacon. Now I can’t imagine living anywhere else or being with anyone but Roy. It’s strange how my grandmother’s death, while so tragic, led me to something so wonderful. Maybe Roy was right when he said Gran sent me here to uncover her secrets. Maybe she sent me here to uncover my own as well.
I set down the yellow chalk and pulled my grandmother’s tin recipe box from a shelf behind the counter. Hand-painted blue-and-white flowers, worn and scratched but still visible, adorned the front. I ran my finger over the surface and opened the lid. My grandmother’s handwriting filled the yellowed index cards, her letters tall and elegant, directing the creation of breads and cakes, pies and pastries, cookies, and, of course, muffins. Even in the faded peacock-blue ink, her words lived on.
Acknowledgments
Many people assisted me in connection with this book and I am most grateful for their help.
My husband, Bob, supported me in every way while I wrote and rewrote and rewrote the manuscript. (“Are you still working on that book?” he would often ask, especially at one thirty in the morning.) In addition, as one of my first readers, he provided me with a huge sense of relief when he laughed in all the right places.