“Sixteen isn’t quite so old as you might think,” Kevin pointed out, and she knew he was scratching his head the way he did when he was seriously considering the pros and cons of an idea. “There’s a lot ahead on that road. If we did this, we couldn’t just give up if the going got tough.”
“Going has gotten tough before, and I haven’t given up,” she said. “Don’t forget Jay’s shoplifting phase.”
“A gag golf tee from Sports Authority. I hardly think that constitutes a ‘shoplifting phase.’”
“So you condone it.”
“No!”
“Not even a little?”
“Of course not.”
“You’re not okay with golf tee theft but uncool with, for example, smoking weed.”
Kevin sighed. “I wouldn’t put it in those words, no.”
“There you go.” She shrugged, even though he couldn’t see her. “One may be aruguably more damaging than the other, but right is right and wrong is wrong, and we encourage right and don’t put up with wrong. Right?”
“You lost me a little.”
“We wouldn’t condone either activity.”
“Correct.”
“We’d have ramifications for both.”
“Yes.”
“So … there. I’m not saying it will be easy or anything. But I’m saying I just really don’t see how we can do anything but take her in. She’s in trouble. We can save her.”
“Will she be a bad influence on Jay?”
Colleen had thought about that. It was her primary concern. The last thing she wanted was to upset her neat little applecart by exposing her child to any sort of danger. But she really and truly thought that Tamara was acting out of boredom and loneliness, not inherent delinquency. With a little—no, a lot—of love and care and attention, that behavior could surely be gotten under control.
And Colleen would make it absolutely clear to Tamara that one toe over that particular line would carry a very stiff penalty.
“I think she’ll be a good influence on Jay,” Colleen said. “And vice versa. Neither one of them ever had a sibling before. It might be kind of nice for them to see what that feels like, to have a peer in the house when the adults go batshit.”
“I’ve never gone batshit.”
She smiled to herself. “Do you remember why I had to take over the argument with the cable company?”
He hesitated. “They’re idiots.”
“So you’re in?”
There was a long pause. This was a lot to ask him. Then again, Tamara was his blood. There should have been less for him to think about than for Colleen. “Are you sure about this?” he asked.
“I’m sure.”
“This isn’t just the wine talking?”
“What wine?”
He laughed, but kindly. “The wine you obviously had before you called me.”
“Kevin, I swear, I didn’t have one drop of wine. And yes, I’m really really sure about this. What do you think?”
That familiar exhale. He was in. “I’ll talk to Chris.”
“Just make sure that when you do, you’re careful to make it clear we’re not saying he’s doing a shitty job.”
“But he is.”
“I know, but if he thinks we’re trying to just take over because he’s so bad at it, he’ll keep her just to prove something. But he won’t prove anything except that he’s the world’s worst dad.”
She could picture Kevin nodding before he said, “Gotcha. And agreed.”
“Okay, and Kevin?”
Pause. “Yes?”
“One more thing.”
Even longer pause. “I’m afraid to ask.”
“No, this is a good thing.”
“Okay.” He chuckled. “Hit me.”
“I love you,” she said, and felt tears forming in her eyes. “I really, really love you. I am so grateful to have you in my life, I can’t even tell you.”
“Aw, babe. I feel the same way about you. Double back.”
She smiled and put her head down. “Really? You never wish you’d married … someone else?”
“Never,” he said firmly. “Never ever.”
“Thanks.”
“You come on home, now, okay? I miss you. I want to show you just how glad I am to have married you.”
* * *
THE NEXT MORNING was bright in that way that it seems to get only after a lot of rain. Everything was crisp and clear and brightly colored. Optimism surged in Colleen, even though she was feeling like the business side of the trip had been sort of a bust.
So when she saw a thrift store in a strip mall when they’d stopped at Piggly Wiggly for food and drinks, it didn’t really inspire much hope, but she had taught herself a long time ago never to give up an opportunity like this, because there were weird stories of outrageous fortune all the time. Maybe there was a painting of kittens in here, or that “Hang In There” poster with a copy of the Declaration of Independence behind it. You never knew.
Of course, the minute she walked in, she felt like she knew. Nothing would be here. It smelled like every thrift shop everywhere, and the front displays—usually indicators of what they were most proud of—were of tired Madame Alexander dolls and American Girl–compatible accessories (versus American Girl–authentic accessories, which had taken on a lot of value in the past few years).
The elderly female clerk, with tall white hair and shabby chic clothes, could have been at the counter of any thrift store anywhere in America. Colleen felt like she’d seen her a million times. The woman didn’t even raise her eyes when Colleen walked in, and barely registered her vague, “Just looking.”
She poked around a little bit, passing the old paperbacks and a section of saggy furniture and frayed wicker rocking chairs. But one section, right in the midst of it all, had a load of smaller junk. An old gas can for five dollars that she knew was worth forty-five but not worth stinking up the trailer, and an ornate old screen door that would make a really cool mirror. The price on it was eleven dollars. Sold. She’d mirror it for about seventy bucks and sell it for maybe two hundred. If she could part with it, that was. It was really gorgeous.
She went and lifted the door and started to take it to the register—imagining Tamara and Bitty’s faces when she came out with a door—when the bottom snagged on a lace tablecloth and pulled everything from the table onto the floor.
“Sorry!” she called to the clerk. “I’m picking it up.” She started to pick up the things—brass candlestick holders, broken costume jewelry, a Fiesta ware bowl that, miraculously, hadn’t broken—but when she got to a dirty ziplock bag of utensils, she paused. Every once in a while, a piece of real silver made it into a bag like this and would be well worth the four-dollar price tag.
She unzipped the bag and started looking through the pieces. Every one of them was the same pattern. Carved roses, front and back, intricate but filthy. She took one out. Tarnish. So they were silver-plated or—please, God—silver. She turned one over, looking, hoping, for a hallmark, and there it was.
She took out her phone and Googled a couple variations of description until she found it: Baltimore Rose by Schofield. Sterling. 1905. An entire set, or close to it.
She’d hit pay dirt.
All but forgetting the door—she’d wanted to take her find and get away with it as soon as possible—she went to the clerk and tried to remain calm and casual despite a thumping heart, while it took seemingly forever to ring up the purchase and take out a calculator to figure out the twenty-four-cent sales tax. Colleen would have told her, but she probably wouldn’t have believed it, and it would only have delayed the transaction further.
Finally the receipt was handed over, and Colleen burst out into the Carolina sunshine and took a deep breath. Weepy webs of kudzu hung from the trees behind the mall, swaying in the wind. She felt like they were congratulating her.
She had just paid for her trip tenfold.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Bitty
Last night was rough. Especially for Colleen and Tamara. We got stuck in the rain and had to hang out in the trailer with nothing but candlelight and several bottles of spiked whipped cream. I’m still not quite sure how they worked, though it was good stuff. Whipped cream fills me up so fast (in high school, I’d actually had an idea to start a Reddi-wip diet because it was filling and satisfying), I barely had any, while those two just went to town with it. Now, I don’t know how a bottle of that stuff compares to, say, a bottle of wine or a decent amount of vodka, but by the looks of it, it was pretty strong.
And by the looks of them this morning, it has a lingering effect. I just hope they’re okay back there with the car moving, because the last thing Colleen needs is vomit all over her new stuff.
Anyway, I ended up at the wheel, since Colleen is anxious to just end this trip now, and the more miles she can sleep through, the better. At least that was the original plan.
But here’s the thing. I got to thinking about my conversations with Colleen regarding my marriage and my regrettably stupid handling of the Blake situation. God, what a child I was! So out of control, spoiled, selfish. And it went on, boy, my self-pity over his leaving clung to me like a spiderweb walked into in the dark. I couldn’t even find all the strands of disenchantment.
Naturally, I thought of him over the years. Many, many times. You can’t have a platonic marriage like mine without harking back to the big love of your life, who wanted you fiercely at all times. I’d felt thoroughly loved by Blake … until he left. Stupid how I made that about me, when he had so much serious stuff to worry about. Colleen was right about that—she’d tried to point it out, but I wouldn’t hear it. Then and now. Poor me. That was all I could think.
Honestly, I probably deserved all the angst I suffered as a result.
So these were the thoughts that were chasing themselves around in my brain as I drove and that highway hypnosis took over, lines flipping under the car, boom boom boom boom, until sometime after the Florida/Georgia line, and almost in Savannah, I saw the exit that I remembered (how?) from the one and only time I’d gone to Blake’s parents’ house with him.
As I recalled, it wasn’t that far off the highway, and it was only a few turns, but it would still be insanely selfish to take the exit while those two slept in the back, expecting to wake up well closer to home.
But what the hell? It was a beautiful day, the sun was shining but not burning, the top was down, the air was clean, and this was the chance in a lifetime—and, let’s face it, I had absolutely no other plans. I still wasn’t sure where I was even getting off this ride. Certainly not where I’d begun, in Henley, but maybe in Lumbarton, where I could rent a car and—what, slink back to the place that had already deemed me persona non grata?
No, I didn’t want to go back to Winnington until I had a divorce settlement and a moving company, which meant this world was my oyster. I needed to keep my eyes open as I drove—figuratively, in addition to literally—because anyplace along the way could have been my new home. Savannah? Charleston?
Lunville. That was where he lived. The sign said 35 MILES. I pulled over gently, so as not to rock the trailer too much, and pulled up Google on my phone. Punched his name in, and there it was, on Maple Street, which I’d remembered, since it’s hard to forget when someone actually lives on Maple Street.
This was a hell of a chance to take. A really stupid chance. He was undoubtedly married and maybe even unrecognizable. Maybe I was unrecognizable. Maybe it would be just a huge awkward exchange, but I was okay with that. I know that’s hard to believe—I wouldn’t believe it myself, as I’ve never exactly been Zen about embarrassing situations (see cat rescue, previously)—but this was one of those chances that not only felt worth taking, it felt necessary. So, with no questions about the integrity of my mission, I drove on, following the turn-by-turn instructions until I pulled up in front of a vaguely familiar Victorian house, dark blue, with a cheerful porch and a big black shiny Ford 150 out front.
No, not the same one he had in college. But completely consistent with Blake. I knew it was his.
My heart was pounding, and to be honest, part of me wanted to turn back and run. This could really be a fool’s errand. I knew that. But the curiosity was deep. If nothing else, it would make a good story for Colleen when she woke up—and for a diary.
I parked and scrambled in the glove box for a piece of paper. On the back of a duplicate check, I wrote, “This is Blake’s house, I’ll be out soon,” and taped it to the steering wheel with a Band-Aid from the first-aid kit that of course Colleen had.
And I went to the door.
I had to knock twice and was about to give up and leave—part of me wanted that, I think—when it opened, and there he was.
There is no I would have known him anywhere because he looked exactly the same. There was no way not to know him. I wasn’t, however, sure the same could be said of me, and I was overwhelmed by a sense of insecurity and worry—what would I say? “I don’t know if you remember me, but…”—until his surprise wore off enough for him to speak.
“I’ll be damned.”
“It’s possible,” I said.
“What the hell are you doing here?”
“Great question.”
He glanced behind me, at the car and the trailer, and frowned. “That’s … yours?”
“Um, no, it’s—it’s a friend’s. I was driving and I saw the exit for your town and, well, I’d been thinking about you and just thought I’d stop by and see how you are. You know, how your life’s gone, what you’re up to, if you have … kids … or—”
“I’m fine, I’m a mechanic, I don’t have kids or—” He smiled. “And I never would have seen this coming in a million years.” He took a step back. “You, uh, you want to come in?”
“Sure.” I glanced back at the car. They’d be fine. It’s not like someone was going to come steal them. “For a minute, I guess.”
He ushered me in and offered me water because he had to go to the store but hadn’t so it was all he had. I took it. Water was about all I could deal with at that moment. Also that was a point for him, I was glad he wasn’t drinking beer at the very stroke of 5 P.M. like so many overgrown, underdeveloped frat boys I’d known. Or like Lew, who drank Macallan 25 neat throughout the day like he’d been prescribed it.
We sat down on the couch and talked, small talk, for I don’t know how long. It seemed like forever, given how little we were actually saying. It might as well have been the Sunday morning news, a lot of filler material and human interest stories, but not a lot of meat.
At one point, I thought I heard the distinctively thin slam of the trailer door, but no one came up to the house, thank God. I wouldn’t have imagined Colleen would do that, but she might have been irked enough with the detour to do just about anything.
So it turned out, he’d never been married, though he’d been engaged for two years. To a woman who was nothing like me, so scratch that old wives’ tale—he either didn’t have a type or he never wanted to be with someone like me again. He’d dated like anyone else, had a few jobs before opening up his own repair and body shop, which did really well, thanks to some NASCAR connections he’d developed. His brother had married Blake’s high school girlfriend—another imagined scenario to scratch—and now they lived just down the road, but Blake had taken his parents’ house because he wanted to restore it to its original glory and he had the time and skill to do so.
No, he’d never gone back and finished college. He could have, he acknowledged. Still could. But what was the point now? He was doing great. He didn’t need it.
His regrets about college had nothing to do with his education.
“I’m sorry,” I told him when he said his mother had passed away just three months after his return. “Not just for your loss, because that’s obvious, but I’m sorry I made the journey harder for you by … by punishing you for doing the only right thing.”
T
he small talk came to a screeching halt as we started talking like real people again.
“I’m sorry it hurt you so much.”
I held up a hand. I couldn’t bear for him to apologize to me for anything, given what he’d gone through. “Please. Seriously.”
He splayed his arms, universal signal for Okay, whatever you say, and a tense moment passed.
“Well, I’d better go,” I said, standing up. “This was a crazy impluse, but I really just had to see how you were doing. I was really in the neighborhood, and strangely knew where you lived but not your phone number. I—I’ve thought about you so much.”
“Me too.” He touched my nose and looked down at me.
And suddenly all the awkwardness dissolved. That small gesture, and I melted. It was I who made the first move, without even thinking—and with years of inexperience and uncertainty under my belt since I’d last been intimate with any man—I snaked my hand up behind his neck and pulled him toward me, into a kiss.
Luckily he seemed to want the same—and I’m telling you, there were fireworks. It was bliss. It was like all the wrongs over the years bled away and left one tender new right, and this was it.
I sank against him, allowing him in, his mouth, his tongue, his breath, his soul. He reached down and pulled my shirt up and nudged his hand under the elastic of my undies and down. I already knew I was ready for him, but he smiled against my mouth when he felt it, and I felt a surge of even more desire for him.
“Let’s go in the bedroom,” he said, so quietly I almost couldn’t hear him.
I swallowed. “Okay.” But I didn’t want to move. I didn’t want his hands off me for even a second. I didn’t want his mouth more than an inch away. I needed him inside me, not following me for an impossibly long ten or fifteen seconds into the bedroom and onto the bed.
He must have known, because he slipped his fingers into me, worked me for a moment, then eased me down to the floor. There wasn’t time to go anywhere else. There wasn’t a minute to be wasted. Even if we had all day, or all week, or all year, there wasn’t a moment to be wasted. So much time had already been lost.
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