One Week in Maine

by Shayna Ryan

  A few minutes later I heard him open the door and then drop his bag in the living room. I turned, and through the open kitchen doorway I saw that he had some sort of long paper rolled up under his arm.

  “What’s that?”

  “Well, come take a look.” He unrolled it on my little dinette table and I joined him there.

  “What, exactly, am I looking at here?”

  “Blueprints,” he explained, and I detected a hint of pride in his voice. “I met with an architect, and then an engineer, and this is the final result.”

  “And…?”

  “And this is what we can do to turn the second floor of the Inn into our own private suite, just for us. We’ll wall it off here,” he pointed to part of the blueprints, “and put up a door so guests can still use the third floor, but the second will be all our own. I figure we’ll take out this wall here and expand my room into the master suite. We’ll wall off the bathroom entrance and put a new one here, so it’ll be our private bath. The kids’ rooms will be here, here and here, and with a little tweaking, we can fit a bathroom for them here. This room will convert nicely to a living area, and we can squeeze a small kitchenette over here.”

  “Kids’ rooms?” I echoed.

  “Yes, kids’ rooms,” he grinned. “Just because you’re not pregnant now doesn’t mean we shouldn’t plan for our family down the line. It’ll be a lot of work, but I can do a lot of it myself, and I’ll hire out what I can’t, like the electrical and plumbing.”

  “Will…” How could I break his heart and tell him this was all a waste? “You know I can’t move back with you,” I reminded him gently. I waited for his face to fall, but instead he only grinned wider.

  “I knew you’d say that, and that’s why I gave myself a full weekend to wear you down. I do so love a challenge, you know.”

  “Don’t I know it!”

  In my heart I knew that I wouldn’t change my mind but I couldn’t crush his dreams at that moment. He had gone through so much trouble to plan out our own little apartment at the Inn, complete with rooms for our possible future children. It was without a doubt the most wonderful gesture any man had ever made towards me, but that didn’t mean that I could cave on my decision to stay in Hartford based on that.

  “Tell you what…how about we put it away for now, grab some coffee and clothes, and then I’ll show you around Hartford a bit?”

  “Are you going to try to sell me on becoming a city boy?” he teased.

  “Hey, you can’t blame a girl for trying, right?”

  “No. But that girl should know that I’m going to win this one.”

  “You sound mighty confident about that!”

  “Oh, I am. I came here to bring you back to Maine and that’s just what I intend to do.”

  “You’re wasting your time with that one, Will,” I reminded him gently.

  “We’ll see. The weekend’s not over yet!”

  -21-

  The weekend flew by all too quickly. While we spent most of it in bed, we did manage to drag ourselves out of the sheets long enough to see some of the city. Despite his protests that he was a country boy at heart, Will appeared to be just as comfortable walking down the streets of Hartford as he was hiking through the forest, and it weighed heavily on my heart that he wouldn’t consider moving to the city. He seemed to transition to an urban setting far more easily than I fit into a rural setting.

  While it wasn’t a constant topic of conversation, he still prodded me multiple times a day about returning to Maine with him. Each time I firmly reminded him that I would not be moving to Maine with him, but it did nothing to dissuade him from trying to talk me into it all the same. The subject was beginning to wear on me.

  On Sunday night, worn out after a long day of fun in the bedroom, we ordered Chinese and watched a cheesy comedy on TV.

  “Can we go over the blueprints again after the movie?” he asked hopefully.

  Damn it. I was kind of hoping he had decided to let the issue drop.

  “Will…I’m not going back with you,” I reminded him once again.

  “Not even after all those tricks with my tongue?” Even though his tone was light, I sensed the hurt he was trying to hide from me. But I couldn’t uproot my life to move to Maine simply to spare his feelings.

  “Not even after all those tricks with your tongue, though those were fabulous, by the way. I don’t belong in a small town hidden away in Maine. You know that.”

  He could hide his disappointment no more. “I think you just chose not to. You could, if you wanted. It’s a choice, Calista, and I don’t understand why you insist on choosing to not be together. I can’t leave Dottie, or my job, to move down here with you. I love you, and I know that you love me, but this is the one thing I don’t have room to compromise on.” His mounting frustration was evident, but he had to face the truth of our situation at some point and now was as good a time as any.

  “Of course I do. But I need more than love. I need family, friends and a job, and all of those things are down here for me, not up in Maine.”

  “You could find all of that up in Maine,” he argued, the tension rising in his voice.

  “You just don’t give up, do you?” I joked weakly. This was our last night together and who knew when we’d see each other again? I didn’t want to spoil it with a big argument, but he wouldn’t take no for an answer. Still, I couldn’t leave it hanging between us.

  “I don’t want to keep talking about it, so I’ll tell you one last time–I’m not returning to Maine with you tomorrow. It has nothing to do with how much I love you, and everything to do with me having a life of my own long before we met. I don’t mean to hurt you, and I don’t want to hurt you, but I need you to hear this: I’m staying here, Will, and nothing you say or do is going to change that. This is my home, and I belong here. I don’t want to waste any more of our time together picking it apart when it is what it is, okay?”

  “Okay, you’re right. I don’t want to spoil our time together either, but I wish you would at least think about it instead of just shutting me down every time. This is it, you know. It’s not my intention to give you an ultimatum here, but if you’re not coming back with me, then I think it’s time to make a clean break.”

  “What do you mean by that?” I demanded.

  “I mean that we can’t keep going like this. We need to be together or we need to stay apart and move on.”

  “We never said that we couldn’t date other people,” I argued. That was true, but I hadn’t gone out with anyone since I came back from Maine, and I was confident that Will hadn’t either.

  “That’s true, but I don’t want to date anybody else. I only want you.” He put down his takeout carton and pulled me close. “But I also can’t waste any more time being hung up on someone I can’t have. These last few months since you left have been hell for me, Calista. It’s not enough for me to talk to you on the phone a couple of times a week. I want to be a big part of each other’s lives, not just phone buddies.”

  “We could visit each other regularly then.” I didn’t want to let him go and I would give it a try if it helped. His appearance in my life had been just by chance but now that he was in it I couldn’t cope with the thought of him disappearing out of it completely. The mere thought of it was intolerable.

  “You know that won’t work,” he sighed, “which is exactly why we haven’t done it.”

  He was right, but maybe we were wrong for not giving it a shot. “But we haven’t even tried it yet!”

  “And I don’t want to. It’ll only make it worse, and you know it. And where’s the future in that? I want a wife and kids, someone to share my life with, and we can’t share our lives if we’re hundreds of miles apart. You’re just grasping at straws here.”

  “I can’t leave Hartford, not even for you,” I whispered as my eyes filled with tears. I was born and raised in this city and I had no intentions of leaving it. My life was here, not in the backwoods of Maine.

&nbs
p; “Then I guess it’s time to pull the plug on this. It’s not what I’d prefer but you’ve left me little choice. I can’t keep going like this, pretending that I’m happy without you. At least if we make a clean break I can have a chance to move on with my life.”

  “You’re really serious about this? If I don’t go back to Maine with you tomorrow, then that’s it, we’re through?”

  “Yes. We can’t keep torturing ourselves like this. If we’re not going to be together then we need to be done with it.”

  His words sounded so callous but it was obvious by his expression that this was hard for him, too. It wasn’t what he wanted to do, but it truly would be best in the long run for both of us. Part of me hated him for it, but part of me loved him all the more for having the strength to be the one to do what needed doing.

  “I can’t believe you’re doing this.”

  “It’s for the best, Calista. So what’ll it be? Are you coming with me or are we done, in all senses of the word? Not lovers, not friends, not phone buddies, but done?”

  I couldn’t believe my ears. He was really doing this.

  “You show up here, out of the blue, demanding that I do the one thing you know I can’t, and now you’re making it an all-or-nothing proposition? Not a good idea, Will.” I pulled away from him and stood up. “If that’s the way it’s going to be, than you might as well go now, because I won’t change my mind about this, not even when you spin it like that.” I didn’t appreciate being pushed into a corner about it, and I thought he was being selfish with his take-it-or-leave it demands, even if deep down inside I knew he was right.

  “Are you sure?” His eyes blazed dangerously. “Because once I go out that door, Calista, I’m not coming back.”

  “So go,” I shrugged defiantly. “That’s your choice, not mine. I’m not the one ruining everything!”

  “This is what you want?”

  “No, Will, this is what you want. What I want is for you to stop being so unreasonable!”

  “It’s not unreasonable for me to want to be with the woman I love,” he responded coolly as he hoisted himself off the couch. “What’s unreasonable is to think that we can continue on like this, talking on the phone now and then, like it’s not killing me to be without you.” He walked to table and grabbed his blueprints and bag. “Last chance, Calista. If I go out that door, I’m not coming back, and I don’t want to hear from you again. It’s not because I want to force you to do something you don’t want to, but as we stand now, it’s destroying me.”

  “So go, then,” I challenged. My heart jack-hammered out of control as I called his bluff.

  “Goodbye, then,” he said softly as he stepped out and closed the door behind him. I waited for him to come back and knock on the door again, but as the minutes ticked by, he never did.

  I guess it wasn’t a bluff after all.

  I watched for his call or text all night, then all the next day. I cried intermittently, until I could cry no more and drifted off into a fitful sleep, then I’d wake up, check my cell phone, and cry some more. Sometime that afternoon I broke down and texted him, unable to stand it any longer.

  I’m sorry. Let’s not do this. Just call me, okay? But he never responded. As one day turned into the next, I understood that he really meant what he said. If we couldn’t be together, he wanted to break it off completely. His decision wounded me deeply, even though as the days passed I accepted his decision. No use tormenting ourselves with the love we could never have; better to break all ties and try to move on. I just didn’t think that I could move on, after him.

  With Christmas only days away, I should have been preparing for my trip to Boston with my parents to spend the holiday with my sister but instead I wallowed in my own misery. Each day without him in my life was harder, not easier, and I wondered if I had made a terrible mistake.

  -22-

  Pure white snow blanketed everything in sight, and the roads were a bit slick so my trip took longer than expected, even though I had allotted extra time for the winter travel. Everything was bathed in the harsh glow of a full moon reflecting off the fresh snow, giving it an eerie glow. It was the perfect Christmas night.

  I made my way through the familiar little downtown and laughed out loud when I saw Ginger’s café decked out for the holiday with garland and colored lights in the windows. It was closed, of course, as was everything else at this hour on this day. The main street was eerily empty.

  As I made my turn off of the main street, my pulse quickened with excitement. Even though I was quite confident in the outcome of this trip, I couldn’t quell my nervousness completely. What if something had changed, and this was all for nothing?

  The Brixby Inn was breathtakingly beautiful now that snow covered its long forgotten yard and the dark evening sky hid the Inn’s neglected condition. As I pulled down the driveway, I caught sight of one lone spruce decked out in Christmas lights in the front yard. I smiled to myself when I saw it; no doubt Will had taken the time to put the lights up for Dottie’s sake.

  I parked and made my way up the shoveled walk, careful not to slip on any of the underlying ice. The sound of the snow crunching underfoot blended with the rapid pounding of my own heart that thundered in my ears.

  Before I lifted the heavy brass knocker to announce my arrival, I took a deep breath to steady myself. I was taking a huge leap of faith here but nothing in my life had ever felt so right. It didn’t make it any less unnerving.

  I held my breath for what felt like an eternity but finally the door swung open. There he stood, and his eyes widened in surprise when he saw me.

  “I thought you were at your sister’s for Christmas?” he gasped.

  “Nope, just taking a little road trip instead,” I replied with a shrug.

  Without waiting for an invitation, I stepped through the doorway and wrapped my arms around his neck. He wrapped his arms around me and held me tightly, and I knew that everything was going to be okay.

  “I can’t believe you came for Christmas!”

  “Well…about that,” I began with a sly grin. “I did indeed come for Christmas, but I may have overpacked.”

  My comment piqued his interest immediately.

  “Just how much did you ‘overpack’ for this trip?” His voice was strained as he tried to restrain his optimism.

  “Hmmm…let’s just say that I don’t usually haul a trailer full of all of my remaining worldly possessions for a quick holiday visit.”

  Will’s hands flew to his mouth in a gesture of disbelief as his eyes lit up. “Does this mean you’re…are you really…you’re going to stay? Permanently?”

  “If you’ll still have me.”

  He let out a whoop of glee, picked me up off the ground and swung me around. “Best Christmas present ever!”

  “What’s all the…Calista!” Dottie shuffled towards us and Will put me down so I could greet her. I hugged her gently as she babbled with excitement.

  “…just in the middle of Christmas dinner but there’s plenty! What a wonderful surprise this is! How long are you here for?”

  “Well, Dottie,” Will clasped my hand in his and we stood as one to tell her the news. “I’m actually here to stay. With your permission, of course.”

  “It’s about time,” she grinned. “You could have knocked me over with a feather when Will came back without you last time! Of course you’re welcome here! I told you, you’re family now. Now come join us for our first Christmas dinner together!”

  Will gave me an encouraging smile as he squeezed my hand, and in that moment, I knew that I had made the right decision. It didn’t matter if I lived in the city or the middle of nowhere. Home was wherever he was, and the rest didn’t matter one little bit.

  -23-

  “You need anything?” Will called as he stuck his head out the front door to check on me.

  “More roses,” I mumbled as I examined the flower bed I was working on. While Will worked on making the changes necessary on the second floor
to turn it into our own private suite, I worked on the grounds of the Inn. Bit by bit I was taking back the wild, over grown gardens. “No, I’m fine, thanks,” I called back to him.

  “Are you sure you don’t want a glass of water or something? Maybe take a break for a few minutes?”

  “All right,” I relented. I knew he wouldn’t give up until I gave in, so I hoisted myself off the ground with a grunt and made my way to the front door.

  “I worry about you in this heat,” Will commented as he held the door open for me.

  “Relax. We’ve been through this a hundred times already! I’m three months pregnant, not nine. You don’t have to treat me like I’ll break at any minute.”

  “I know, but it’s so hot out today!”

  “It’s 82 degrees today, Will, not 102.”

  “Okay, okay…but just make sure you’re drinking enough fluids, okay?”

  “Yes, Doctor,” I mumbled as I accepted a glass of ice water from him. “So how’s it going upstairs?”

  “Good. But I need you to make a decision on the baby’s room colors because I plan on starting on that soon.”

  “We’ve got months yet,” I reminded him gently. Ever since we found out that I was pregnant, Will had been acting as if the baby would arrive at any moment and I was made of glass.

  “I know. I just want to take care of you, you know?” He moved behind me and wrapped his hands around my stomach, which hadn’t even begun to swell with the life within me yet.

  “You do take care of me,” I reminded him gently. I closed my eyes and enjoyed the light trail of kisses he left down the back of my neck.

  “It is my job now, Mrs. Holbrook. I take my husbandly duties very seriously, you know.”

  “Indeed, Mr. Holbrook.”

  We had been married for four months. It had been a small ceremony in the backyard at sunset, when the early spring flowers were in bloom and the last of winter’s snow stubbornly clung to the darker recesses of the yard. Blue acted as our Justice of the Peace, but I would have wanted him there even if he wasn’t qualified to preside over the ceremony. He was a good friend to us both and was becoming more and more like extended family. My sister and parents drove up to witness our union, and to finally meet Will for the first time. They adored him instantly and were happy to give us their blessing.