The Space Between Sisters

by Mary McNear

  “Me, too, sweetie,” Sam said, hugging her back. “Me, too.”

  CHAPTER 28

  Hmm, a little to the left, I think,” Poppy said, frowning at the photograph Win had just hung on the wall in the cabin’s hallway.

  Win nudged the frame, slightly to the left, and then stood back. “How’s that?”

  Poppy studied it again. “Now just a tiny bit to the right.”

  Win made an almost infinitesimal adjustment to its frame. “What do you think?” she asked, stepping aside.

  “I think it is . . . perfect,” Poppy said, with a satisfied smile. “And I’m so glad you chose that picture.”

  “Are you?” Win said, looking at the photograph in question. It was of Kyle sitting on the living room couch in their old apartment. (She’d already hung two smaller ones of the two of them together on this same wall.) “I don’t know,” she mused of this larger one of Kyle. “I sort of feel like I should have chosen a picture of him doing something important.”

  “Important like what?” Poppy asked.

  “Important like . . . summiting a mountain or something.”

  “I wasn’t aware that Kyle was a mountain climber,” Poppy said, with a trace of amusement.

  “No, he wasn’t,” Win said. “But he isn’t doing anything in this picture. He’s just kind of being.”

  “That’s true,” Poppy said. “But that’s life, isn’t it? Most of us aren’t doing something important every second of every day. Most of us are just kind of . . . going about our lives. And if you were Kyle, well, then that was a good life, wasn’t it?”

  Win nodded, thoughtfully, and made another minor adjustment to the frame. And then she smiled, because Poppy had reminded her of what she’d liked about this picture in the first place. She’d taken it of Kyle on a winter afternoon, somewhere between the two of them reading the Sunday paper and the two of them watching the Vikings game. It had been a lazy, slow, relaxed afternoon, an ordinary afternoon. But its ordinariness, she decided, was part of what she’d liked about it. And then there was Kyle’s smile. She hadn’t told him she was taking his picture. She’d just said, Kyle, and he’d looked up and smiled at her. That smile was the other part of what she liked about the picture. Because that smile was for her.

  “Are you happy with it?” Poppy asked, taking Win by the hand and leading her into the living room.

  “I am. But I’m exhausted, too,” she said, flopping down on the couch. “Who knew moving a few boxes could be so much work?”

  “It was more than a few,” Poppy pointed out, sitting down next to Win. Earlier in the evening, the two of them had carried all of the boxes Win had saved from her marriage to Kyle up to the cabin’s attic. They would be fine there, Poppy had assured her. And they weren’t going anywhere, either. They’d never be more than an attic hatch and a pull-down stair away. What was important, she’d told Win, was to do something—even if that something was only symbolic—to mark the end of that chapter in her life. When they’d come back downstairs, they’d hung up the photograph that she’d picked up at the framers yesterday. “See?” Poppy had said. “You’re not putting him away. You’re not forgetting about him. He’ll still be a part of your life. He’ll always be a part of your life. You’re just making room for other things to be a part of your life, too.”

  But as Win lounged on the couch now, she wondered what those other things in her life would be. There was work, of course; school had started and she was already learning the names of new students, preparing for back-to-school night, and designing lesson plans. Suddenly, though, it didn’t seem like enough. Maybe, in truth, it had never been enough. It had just taken Everett coming into her life, and then leaving it again, to make her understand this.

  “Win, just call him,” Poppy said, with that uncanny ability she had to read her mind.

  Win straightened up, abruptly. “I can’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I already left him a voice mail, and he didn’t respond.”

  This was true. A week ago, after much agonizing about what she would say to Everett, and much consulting with Poppy over it, Win had finally called him to apologize. When he hadn’t answered, though, she’d left a stumbling voice mail instead.

  “Look, if this is about your pride, forget it,” Poppy said. “It’s not worth it. Pick up the phone and call him. And if he doesn’t answer, call him again. And if he doesn’t answer that, we’ll drive up to the city and stake out the coffeehouse he hangs out at.”

  “You mean we’ll stalk him?” Win clarified.

  “Yes. But in a totally nonthreatening way.”

  Win laughed. “Pops, he already thinks I’m crazy. If we do that, he’ll think I’m even crazier. I’m just going to let things . . . run their course,” she said, with a shrug. She noticed then that Poppy had a smudge on her cheek, probably from their trips up to the attic. “You have a little dirt on your face,” she said, reaching over now and rubbing it away with her thumb. “There,” she said, when it was gone.

  Poppy smiled at her. “You are going to make a good mother someday, Win.”

  “I don’t know about that,” Win murmured. “I didn’t have a very good role model, did I?”

  “Are you kidding? You don’t need a role model. You were born to be a mom,” Poppy said, loyally. “Look how responsible you feel for everyone in your life.”

  “Oh, that reminds me,” Win said, jumping up. “I have something for you.” She went over to the mantelpiece, took down an envelope, and handed it to Poppy. Poppy, curious, opened it up and slid out a sheet of paper.

  “What is this?” She frowned.

  “It’s the deed to the cabin. I’ve had it put in both of our names. Now, before you say anything—” Win began, but Poppy interrupted her.

  “Win, no. It’s your cabin. Dad gave it to you—” she started.

  “Would you just listen?” Win said. “It wasn’t Dad’s decision to make. And if Grandpa and Grandma had known he was going to do it, they wouldn’t have liked it. They would have wanted us both to have it.”

  “Win, that’s really nice but—”

  “It’s not meant to be nice. It’s meant to be fair.”

  “It wouldn’t be fair, though. Because I haven’t helped you pay the taxes, or any of the other things you told me about, either. You know, the tree removal and stuff like that.”

  Win blushed, remembering their argument. “Don’t worry about that. After all, I have been living here. I should have been paying for those things.”

  “And what about the money I already owe you for this summer? For groceries and gas?”

  “Let’s figure that out later,” Win said. “Right now, you need to think about what you want to do next. I mean, do you want to keep living here with me? Or do you want me to buy you out? Or . . . do you need more time to mull things over?”

  “I, I think I need more time. But I have figured out a couple of things,” Poppy said. “I want to stay in Butternut. I want to be with Sam. And I want to go back to school.”

  “College?” Win said, surprised. Poppy nodded. Win considered this. She had spent years urging Poppy to get her degree, but now she was more circumspect. Everything she’d thought she’d known about Poppy before she’d had to revisit, and she couldn’t pretend anymore that she had all the answers. Still, she could encourage her.

  “Pops, all of those things sound good. And the rest of it”—she shrugged—“the rest of it will fall into place.”

  Poppy looked down at the deed again, and then looked back up at Win. “I’ve been thinking about something else, actually. About trying to help other women who’ve been . . .” Her voice trailed off.

  Win waited. She hadn’t heard Poppy say that word yet.

  “Other women who’ve been raped or sexually assaulted,” Poppy finished quietly.

  Win felt her eyes glaze over with tears, but she kept her voice steady as she said, “I think you’d be good at that, Pops. I really do.”

  �
��You think so?” Poppy said, pleased. She’d been to a support group in Duluth the week before, and while she’d hadn’t said much about herself—that, she hoped, would come in time—she’d been impressed by how sensitive and skillful the group’s facilitator had been.

  “Absolutely,” Win said. “I think you could really make a difference in people’s lives.” And she thought about what her grandfather used to say about Poppy, that she was more than just a pretty face. Yes, she was. Even if some people couldn’t see past it, she was still so much more than just a pretty face.

  Now Poppy folded up the deed, put it back in the envelope, and set it on the coffee table in front of them. “Thank you,” she said to Win, indicating the lease. “And thank you for this summer.” And now, when Win tried to interrupt her, to wave her thanks away, it was Poppy’s turn to shush her.

  “No, seriously,” she said. “You took me in when my life was falling apart. You gave me a place to live. And you supported me, even when you didn’t always want to,” she added, with a smile. But then she turned serious. “I never could have gotten through all this stuff—Sasquatch, the breakup with Sam, and dealing with everything else—if it hadn’t been for you.” She reached to hug Win and Win felt her eyes mist up again. She was determined not to cry, though. There had been enough crying for one summer.

  Dusk was falling outside the living room windows now, and a new chilliness, a harbinger of fall, was setting in. It was Win who finally spoke. “Pops, aren’t you supposed to meet Sam soon?” she asked, interrupting their hug.

  Poppy checked her watch. “Pretty soon.” Sam was dropping off his kids with their mom, and afterwards, he’d asked Poppy to come over to his cabin. “Are you okay here by yourself, though?” she asked Win.

  “Yes, I’m fine. And don’t come back here on my account, either. Not when you two could be in bed together.”

  Poppy’s face turned pink.

  “You are so cute when you blush,” Win said, hugging her again.

  After Poppy left, Win found herself in the kitchen, surveying the contents of the top utensil drawer. It was out of order; a nutmeg grinder had, strangely enough, migrated up from the bottom drawer where she’d put it earlier in the summer. “Poppy,” she murmured. And then she smiled. The girl did have a sense of humor. She started to remove the offending item, and then stopped. Nope, she was not going to do this. She dropped it casually back into the drawer. Life is too short to spend your time rearranging utensil drawers, or linen closets, for that matter. And here she had to give Poppy credit again. Because among the other things she’d done this summer was to nudge Win away from her too zealous reverence for order.

  But what to do on this chilly night? she wondered, closing the drawer. What she really wanted to do was text Everett. But you haven’t heard back from him, her rational voice said. She ignored it, though, and texted him anyway.

  Win: I miss our nights on the boathouse roof.

  And before she had even put her phone down on the kitchen counter, it vibrated.

  Everett: I miss them too.

  She started to text back, then called him instead.

  Four hours later, she was sitting on the front porch steps, wrapped in a wooly sweater, when he drove up.

  “It’s too late to watch the sunset,” she said shyly, as he sat down beside her, “but we could watch infomercials.”

  “Or not,” he said, smiling his sleepy-eyed smile at her.

  “I thought you hated me when you didn’t answer my voice mail,” she blurted out. Then, self-consciously, she pulled her sweater closer around her, and pretended to study the branches of the nearby birch trees, which were glowing brightly in the light from the front porch.

  “Win, I didn’t hate you. I could never hate you. I just didn’t know what to do.”

  “But you were mad at me,” she said, stealing a look at him.

  “No, I wasn’t. Okay, I was. But by the time I got home that day, I’d cooled off. I wasn’t angry anymore. I was . . . I was sad for you. How could you think I was coming to see you as part of some plot to get closer to your sister? And how could you not know what an amazing person you are in your own right?” She felt her heart tighten in her chest.

  “I don’t know . . .” she said. “I lost track of myself, I guess. Does that ever happen to you? Do you ever get caught up in the past, in your childhood, and forget you’re not back there anymore? That you’re not that person anymore? That you’re actually years and miles away from those days?”

  “Yes. It happens to me every time I go back to Nebraska. Especially since I sleep in a bedroom there that still has my old model airplanes hanging in it.”

  He leaned forward and kissed her, putting his hand gently but firmly on her back. This kiss was different from that first awkward kiss on the porch before Mary Jane’s wedding. This kiss was more self-assured, sexy, even. This was a part of him she didn’t yet know. Hmmm, there was going to be a lot to discover about Everett.

  He pulled away. “I forgot. I brought you something,” he said. He brushed his hair out of his eyes. Oh, she’d missed that. She’d missed him, even more than she’d realized.

  “What is it?” she asked as he pulled a narrow rectangular box and a book of matches out of his jacket pocket.

  “You said you didn’t like fireworks, but you did like sparklers.” He took one out of the box and handed it to her and then he held a match to it and it crackled to life, throwing sparks in a small but beautiful frenzy.

  “Everett?” she asked him, after she’d watched the sparkler burn down with a childish delight. “Can we start over again, you and me?”

  He smiled at her. “I think we just did.”

  CHAPTER 29

  You might want to save some of those for our paying customers,” Sam said, amused, as he glanced over at Poppy. She smiled and bit into another strand of licorice. She was sitting on the counter at Birch Tree Bait, her legs dangling over the side, watching Sam cash out the register. It was a Friday night in mid-September, and he’d dropped the kids off with Alicia that evening. And now . . . now he and Poppy had the whole weekend together. Thinking about this, Sam emptied out the cash drawer a little faster.

  “You should see them together, Sam,” Poppy said, returning to the conversation they’d been having about Win and Everett. “They’re taking it slowly. And it’s adorable.”

  Sam looked up. “So . . . it’s happily ever after?”

  “I hope so,” Poppy said, and, impulsively, she held her arms out to him. “Come here,” she said. Sam stopped what he was doing and came into her arms. He pulled her against him, and she wrapped her legs around his waist and kissed him, her mouth sweet with the taste of Red Vines, a taste he was really beginning to love.

  “Have you given any thought to my offer?” he asked finally, kissing her neck instead of her lips. Poppy was planning on applying for the spring semester at University of Minnesota Duluth, but right now she was looking for a job. And Sam wanted her to work with him at Birch Tree Bait again.

  “I’ve thought about it,” she said. “But do you think it’s a good idea?”

  “Seeing you more? I think it’s a great idea.”

  “No, I mean, I thought you didn’t want to have a relationship with someone who worked for you.”

  “This is different. I wouldn’t be dating one of my employees. I’d be hiring my girlfriend.”

  “‘Girlfriend,’” she mused. “I like the way that sounds.”

  “Do you?” he asked, pulling her closer. “I’m glad. But Poppy, what are we still doing here?” He looked at his watch. “We only have . . . forty-three and a half hours left before I pick up the kids.”

  She laughed, and ran her hands up under his work shirt. “I think you said something about closing out the cash register,” she reminded him.

  “I did, didn’t I?” he said, leaving her reluctantly and going back to his work. But while he was doing this, Poppy was looking around the store, speculatively.

  “Sam,�
� she said, hopping down from the counter, “I think I would like to work here, at least until school starts. “In fact”—she grabbed his hand and pulled him out from behind the register—“I think I might have a few suggestions.” She led him over to a nearby wall. “What color is this?” she asked, tapping on it.

  “It’s green.”

  “It’s dark green.”

  “It’s Benjamin Moore’s ‘Balsam’ if you want to get technical about it,” he said. “And I thought, under the circumstances, it was appropriate.” He nodded in the direction of the windows. “You’ve noticed the pine trees out there, haven’t you? All one million acres of them?”

  “Yes, I’ve noticed them. But this color makes it so much darker in here than it needs to be. How about a nice, bright, sunny yellow?”

  “Maybe,” Sam said, looking around.

  “And the coffee counter,” she continued, pulling him over to it. “Right now it’s just Byron and his cronies who hang out here, but if you painted it a nice color, and put in more comfortable stools, and added a tea selection—herbal would be nice—maybe it wouldn’t be only men who wanted to spend time here.”

  “That’s probably true,” Sam said, surveying the area. But she was already dragging him down one of the grocery aisles. And Sam laughed, because he could see it in her eyes. The excitement. He knew that feeling. He’d felt it the first time he’d come here as a prospective buyer. He was barely through the door of the old place when, in his mind, he was already knocking down walls, tearing up floors, and putting in windows. Poppy’s plans seemed a little less dramatic, but she was no less determined about them.

  She stopped in the produce section, if you could actually call it a section. It was more of a produce corner, and a rather limited one at that.

  “I know what you’re going to say,” Sam said, quickly, trying to preempt her. “But most of the renters stock up on their produce at the IGA in town. If they forget something, like an onion, or they want a few more apples, or a bunch of bananas, then we’ve got this.”