by Joan Kilby
Slowly she came back to earth, washed up on a shore of twisted sheets and sagging mattress. She wanted to laugh, not because anything was funny but because she felt so wonderful. A giggle escaped.
He blew on her damp forehead and on her perspiring breasts. “That good, eh?”
She laughed out loud. And hugged him close. No matter what happened tomorrow or the next day, how he made her feel could never be a mistake or a cause for regret.
He lay on his back and pulled her close so her head rested on his chest. He wrapped an arm around her, idly stroking her hair. “Did I mention I love your hair? It’s so pretty, and soft like silk.”
“So is yours.” She ran her fingers through the near black shock of longer hair on top of his head. A hissing sound made her lift her head to listen. “I think it’s raining.”
“The forecast was for sunshine all weekend.” He tugged the cover up higher over them. “Maybe it’s just a passing shower.”
“Maybe.” The sound made the cabin cozier and she snuggled closer, placing a hand over his heart so she could feel the steady beat. He felt good, solid and safe. A yawn caught her unawares. It would be easy to go to sleep, warm and snug next to him. But it was also nice to lie here and chat companionably. “If you were in Seattle, what would you be doing right now?”
“Saturday night at…” He twisted his head to check the travel clock on his nightstand. “Two a.m. I’d probably be still out clubbing. Maybe thinking about going home.”
With a woman, no doubt a different one every weekend. On second thought she didn’t want to pursue this topic. “Are you worried about your fishing date with Robert tomorrow morning?”
“I’m trying not to have expectations. But now that I’ve been to his house, met my half-siblings, it would be hard to go away and pretend they don’t exist. If that’s what he wants I don’t have much choice.”
“You could tell them yourself. If Will, Taylor and Jodi are important to you.” Or if she was important to him. Obviously he could go anywhere he liked. It was a free country. But if Robert told him he wasn’t welcome in Cherry Lake or in his home, would Alex make a stand for her sake? Despite telling herself she had no expectations where he was concerned she hoped this wouldn’t be his last visit to her town. Bad blood between him and his father could make his presence here impossible.
He didn’t reply for a few minutes and she wondered if he was thinking the same thing. But when he finally did speak, he reverted to their earlier topic. “What would you be doing in Missoula?”
“Sleeping.”
“With a companion?”
“Maybe.” She tensed slightly then sighed. “Probably not.”
“Which is it? Tell me.” His fingertips stroked the sensitive spot behind her ear, his touch gentle.
“You wouldn’t understand.” For guys like him sex was like a sport. He played, showered and went on to something else.
“Try me.”
What the hell. She wasn’t ashamed or embarrassed about who she was. “I don’t do one-night stands. I tried it and didn’t like the way it made me feel about myself, or the guy.”
He kissed her temple. “How did you feel?”
“Depressed that I’d been part of a casual, transient connection that held little, or no, meaning.”
“I feel that way sometimes, too.”
She propped herself up on an elbow and tried to gauge his expression. “Seriously?”
“Yeah. The night before I came here I went home with a woman whose name I couldn’t even remember in the morning. I didn’t like what that said about me. Or about her.”
Emma lay back down, thinking about that. He sounded sad. Maybe she’d jumped to conclusions about ‘men like him.’ Maybe, like her, he was waiting for the right person to come along. “Have you been in touch with her since you’ve been here?”
“I haven’t thought about her once. I bet I’m not on her priority list since she hasn’t contacted me, either.”
Emma started to ask if he would keep in touch with her when he went back to Seattle, and then stopped. Why spoil tonight by making promises they couldn’t, or wouldn’t, keep? Even if it was a one-night stand, for her it was the exception to the rule. Making love to Alex meant a lot to her. Long distance relationships rarely worked out. Her mom and dad’s hadn’t.
She ran a hand from Alex’s shoulder down his biceps and across to his chest then lower to his belly ridged with muscle. Lower to where he was already stirring. He cupped her breast and kissed her, making a questioning sound in his throat. She replied with an affirmative ‘mmm’ and he reached for another condom.
Straddling him she took him into her mouth, tonguing and sucking until he was hard and the veins stood out. Then she placed her hands on his shoulders and sank onto him, taking him even deeper than before. She began to move in slow, languorous circles, loving how he felt inside her and against her. He leaned up and suckled her breasts, one hand holding her hip. The creak of the springs, the sound of their breathing and the soft slaps their bodies made against each other were the only sounds as they made love to each other again.
Tomorrow he would get together with his father and the outcome of that conversation would decide whether he stayed longer or left right away. If tonight was all they had, it would be enough. It had to be.
*
Alex gradually came awake to the birds chirping sweetly outside his window. Emma lay curled next to him, breathing deeply. His body stirred at the sight of her naked breasts and, beneath the sheet, the curve of her hip and long legs. He was tempted to stay where he was and make love to her again because who knew what the day would bring? But his father had said to meet him at the motel dock at six a.m.
He dressed as quietly as he could in shorts, a T-shirt and sneakers. In the tiny kitchen he boiled water for instant coffee.
Hearing the soft putt putt of an outboard motor, he grabbed his travel mug, pulled his hoodie on and went out into the gray light of dawn. The rain clouds had vanished and the sky was clear. Mist hung over the lake. Somewhere a loon called. As he walked down to the dock, Alex shivered and wished he had a warmer jacket. He was supposed to be in Mexico.
Robert was at the tiller of a fifteen-foot aluminum boat, wearing a heavy jacket open over a plaid wool shirt. As he approached the dock he pulled back on the throttle and nosed into the wharf where Alex was waiting. An ice chest sat in the bottom of the boat and two fishing rods lay along the slatted wooden seats. “Morning.”
“Looks like a good day for fishing,” Alex said, too heartily. Like he would know what a good fishing day looked like. He put a leg inside the boat, grabbed the side for balance and pushed off with the other.
He sat on the bench seat facing his father. Then when that was too confronting he twisted to look out at the water and sipped his coffee. Neither of them spoke as they motored past the pair of uninhabited islands and headed for the middle of the lake. He wasn’t responsible for making this expedition a success. It would be what it would be. So why did it feel as if his future was riding on the conversation they were about to have? All he wanted was for his father to agree to acknowledge him as his son.
After twenty minutes Robert looked around, judged by some unknown criteria that they were in a good spot, and cut the engine. He picked up one of the rods and brought the end of the line with the lure toward him. “Do you know how to bait a hook?”
“You’ll have to show me.”
His father flipped the lid off a coffee can and plucked a wriggler out of the dirt. He threaded the tiny worm onto the hook. “Make sure you double back so it doesn’t slip off.”
Alex grabbed the other rod and dug out a worm. “What kind of fish are we after?”
“Rainbow trout or Dolly Varden if we’re lucky but we might only get brown trout. Watch how I cast.” Robert drew his rod back and then flicked it forward. The line played out, sending the lure high into the air to land about thirty yards away with a quiet plop. Ripples spread in ever-widening concentric
circles. “Undo that catch on the reel. Hold the line with your index finger until you let go.”
It took Alex a couple tries before he cast far enough to suit Robert. When he had, Robert reached under the seat and got out a Thermos. He poured coffee into a mug and offered Alex a top up. “Now we wait.”
No, now we talk. Small waves lapped at the boat. The sky was gradually turning pink over the mountains. Cars moved like Dinky toys along Route 35. The quiet would have been peaceful if not for the questions swarming Alex’s mind. “Did you tell Linda you were going fishing with me?
“I told her I was going fishing.”
Not the same thing at all. “Will is going to wonder when I don’t show up at the orchard. I should have warned him I’d be late.”
“He won’t expect you there at the crack of dawn after the dance last night. It is Sunday, after all.” Robert sipped his coffee then sighed. “Well, what do you want to know?”
“Everything.” Alex could hardly contain his frustration that his father could even ask that. “Let’s start with how it came about that Will is older than I am. I’ve figured out that he must have been conceived before you met my mom but I’d like to know the background. Were you still seeing Linda while you were with my mom?”
Alex might play around as a bachelor but once he married he knew he would never have an affair. It was just the way he’d been raised. And maybe that’s why he played around so much, to sow all his wild oats before he settled down.
“I’ll start at the beginning,” Robert said as if it was a long saga. “Linda and I were high school sweethearts. We went together all the time she studied business at the state college in Missoula. When she graduated I asked her to marry me. Before we could set a date she got a job offer in Boston. Her aunt lived there so she had a place to stay. I didn’t want her to take it.” He held up a hand. “I know, it was selfish of me. But as the oldest son I was going to inherit the orchard. I had responsibilities. I couldn’t just up and leave.”
Yet he’d done just that a month or so later.
“Did she go?” Alex asked, although he already knew the answer.
Robert nodded. “She promised she would only stay a year, maybe two, just long enough to get experience, and then look for a job closer to home. During that period she thought we should take a break from our relationship. I was blindsided by the suggestion. I thought she using the job as an excuse to end it for good.”
Alex could see why he might think that. “Didn’t you talk it out?”
“The last few weeks before she left were very emotional. We’d fight, make love, then fight again. And yes, Will was conceived during those final weeks before she left Cherry Lake, not that either of us had any idea she was pregnant.” Robert threw Alex a glance and grunted. “For the record, we used protection, but no contraceptive is failsafe.”
All this tallied with what Alex already knew. His father had been in a tough situation, torn between the woman he loved and family duty. What would he have done under the same circumstances? He thought he knew what he would have done—stayed with his job.
Robert reeled in his line to check the bait. Alex did the same and a few minutes were taken up with replacing nibbled off worms. They recast. Silence descended over the boat. Fishing was something fathers taught their sons, Alex mused. Only they didn’t usually wait until the kid was thirty years old.
When his father didn’t seem inclined to say more, Alex prompted him. “Nate told me at the barbecue that you and he fought about the orchard after Linda left.”
“Another doozy of a battle.” Robert shook his head. “I was angry and restless. If I was stuck in Cherry Lake running the orchard I wanted to make it important. I tried to convince Nate to buy more land and plant more trees. But he was thinking about retiring in a few years and wanted to downsize. My sisters weren’t interested. Hal wasn’t much either. Nate didn’t think I could handle more trees on my own.” He snorted. “Red flag to a bull, that. Neither of us would back down. After weeks of wrangling, he issued me an ultimatum. His way or the highway. I chose the highway.”
Straight to Castlegar and Alex’s mother. “Why didn’t you go to Boston to be with Linda?”
“She’d made her choice and she’d chosen her career, not me. When she left I was under the impression we were through. Anyway, what would I do in a big city? All I knew was the orchard.”
“Mom said you got work on her family’s farm.”
“I arrived in mid-September during a late harvest of apples.” Robert’s expression softened. “After the pick was over Anya’s father kept me on to prune and do other odd jobs. He had three daughters and no sons. I was angry, lonely, alienated from my girlfriend and my father. Your mom was a haven of peace and calm.”
“She lived a sheltered life in her strictly religious community. Until you came along.” Alex gave his tone an edge, telling Robert what he thought of him taking up with his mother on the rebound. “She was only twenty.”
Robert held up an admonishing finger. “She was no lamb to the slaughter. No sir. She chafed at the narrowness of her life. A rebel waiting for a cause. I was her cause.”
“What do you mean?” His mother had told him so little about those days.
“She told me later that when I walked into that farmyard that first day looking for work she made up her mind right then and there she was going to seduce me. I’m sorry, but it’s the truth. Didn’t happen for a couple of months but she made the first move. Not that I protested. Your mom was a beautiful woman, warm, loving and generous. I was still hurting from Linda leaving and Anya consoled me.”
“Two accidental pregnancies in the space of three months,” Alex mused. “The odds against that must be astronomical.”
“Your mom told me she was using birth control. I took her word for it, which was my bad. Turned out her ‘birth control’ was some hippie dippy herbal concoction.”
Alex digested that. His mom hadn’t confided that morsel of information, either, but it made sense. When he was growing up she used organic this and natural that, often believing claims of efficacy that to him seemed dubious.
Robert sent him a swift glance. “Do you want the whole, unvarnished truth, even if it’s unpalatable?”
“Yes,” Alex said without hesitation. He needed to know, even if it turned everything he’d always believed upside down.
“Your mom and I liked each other very much, even thought we were in love for a while. But we were too different. If she hadn’t gotten pregnant I would probably have been home by Christmas. I wasn’t what she was looking for, and deep down I was still in love with Linda. But she did get pregnant. Up in the mountains, among her community, that was all she wrote. I’d made my bed and I had to lie in it.”
Not all the Doukhobors were that strict but Alex knew his mother’s family belonged to one of the really religious sects. He could well imagine his maternal grandfather’s hardline reaction to his daughter getting pregnant outside marriage vows. Robert could have taken off anyway but he hadn’t. Credit to him for sticking around.
“Unbeknownst to me, Linda was also pregnant,” Robert went on. “She came home to Cherry Lake when she found out only to learn I’d disappeared and left no forwarding address. Rather than lose her job, she went back to Boston. With her aunt’s help, she had the baby and kept working. No one in Cherry Lake except her parents knew about Will until she returned five years later.”
“And you just what, stayed away for years without getting in touch with your family?”
“I called a few times when I knew I’d get my mom. Told her I was fine. But no, I didn’t go home. I felt…” Robert gazed down at the fishing reel in his hands. “To be honest, I felt kind of embarrassed that I’d gotten myself in such a predicament.”
A problem. A predicament. An embarrassment. That’s what he’d been to his father. Still was. He tried to stretch his legs in the confines of the boat. There wasn’t enough room.
“No fish around here.” Robert started
to turn the tiny handle on his reel. “Bring in your line. We’ll move to a different spot.”
Alex reeled in. Robert started the engine and they motored a little closer to shore. They recast, the reels spinning out in the quiet morning. “So was it all bad with my mom?”
“No, not at all. There was much that was good, at least in the early days.” Robert poured the dregs of the coffee into his cup. “We moved off the family farm. I found work driving a truck. Eventually I got a job managing a cherry orchard. I put Linda and my family out of my mind and settled into a new life.” He chewed on his cheek. “I did my best to make Anya happy.”
She hadn’t been happy though, Alex knew. He’d always thought it was Robert leaving that had made her unhappy but maybe instead it was finding herself in a de facto relationship that should never have happened.
“How did you end up back in Cherry Lake?” Alex asked.
“I was homesick. I wanted to come back here to live but your mom wouldn’t hear of leaving her family. For someone so set on rebelling, once she had a baby she gravitated back to her mother and sisters. Her father never did accept the lifestyle she’d chosen but during the day, when he was out working the fields, she hung out with the women.” He shook his head. “Then one day I called home and found out my dad had had a heart attack. Hal was working the orchard by himself and struggling. I had to go home.”
“Of course.” Alex gazed into the lake. It must have felt like the answer to Robert’s prayers. A way out of a life he didn’t really want. Not that a father’s illness was anything he would have wished for.
“It was only supposed to be for a few weeks but it soon became clear that Nate couldn’t go back to work any time soon.” Robert sighed. “A month turned into three, turned into a year. I went back and forth between Cherry Lake and Castlegar, spending the week at the orchard and going home on the weekend.”
“I remember that. It must have been hard.” Alex couldn’t imagine being separated from a child of his. “You brought me a small present every time you came home after being away.”