by Jean Stone
Jo hadn't cared what anyone said. Those who talked didn't know how much Brian loved her. How much he needed her; how much she needed him.
At least, it had seemed that way.
When Jo was in her last year of college, Brian and his older brother, Frank, had an argument, something about the family business. Brian announced that he was leaving town. He said he might go up to Montreal to work in a logging camp.
She'd thought it was a joke. But one week later Brian, indeed, was gone, and Jo was left to face final exams alone, and an uncertain future. Her mother said she should be glad he hadn't married her and left her the way Sam Lyons had left them.
Enough, she thought now and scooped up the mortgage papers and utility bills from the table. She stuffed them into a brown paper accordion file that she'd lugged around for weeks. Her hand brushed the edge of the large white envelope tucked in the back. She hesitated, then quickly withdrew her hand and snapped the elastic tie around the file. She did not need to look in the white envelope again. She did not need to examine, for the hundredth or the thousandth or the millionth time, copies of the documents she'd filed with the Boston Police, Missing Persons Bureau.
Scrawling a quick note for her mother, the way she'd done in high school, Jo raced out the back door, jumped into her Honda, and headed for town.
None of her old roommates knew that Jo and Brian had gotten back together. They no doubt would remember Brian's name, the boy Jo had known most of her life, the townie like she was.
But they would not remember that he'd gone off to Montreal, that he'd broken her heart, that she'd been devastated and had briefly considered suicide when she'd learned that, on top of everything, she was pregnant with his child. They would not have remembered, because Jo had never told them. She'd simply said they'd broken up and she wanted to move to Boston, anyway. Josephine Lyons, the Most Likely to Succeed, who, by age twenty-two, had succeeded only in having the two men she'd adored abandon her: first, her father, then the father of her baby.
The townsfolk had been right: Brian had been a lot like Jo's father. Maybe Jo had hoped she could hold on to the boy's love because she'd lost the man's. In any case, her love had simply not been enough.
Surely Lily had not remembered the details of Jo's loss, or known the depth of Jo's pain. If Lily had remembered, she never would have chosen a storefront that sat squarely between Sweeties, the town candy shop, and a store with a shingle that read ANTIQUES AND SUCH. FRANK FORBES, PROPRIETOR.
Frank Forbes. Brian's brother.
Jo made a U-turn in the middle of Main Street, and stepped on the accelerator without looking back.
“An abortion?” Marion had barked as the kitchen chair scraped the linoleum and she stood up in anger. “No! I forbid it!”
The sight and the sound and the emotion of it all on that long-ago day were as clear to Jo as if they'd happened yesterday.
She sat on a bench in a small park on the shoreline of Laurel Lake now. She remembered going there as a kid to wade in the cool, crystal water, to sit on the rocks and fish for trout with her grandmother, to languish in the peace. It had been long before the picnic tables and the trash bins and tourist comfort stations were installed, long before the lake was encircled by beautiful resorts and million-dollar homes. It had been long before Jo Lyons would have thought she'd wind up pregnant and unmarried, with nowhere to go.
It had been a mistake to tell Marion.
“Mother,” she'd said. “What do you want me to do? Brian is gone and I'm alone.”
“You're not alone, Josephine. You have me.”
“And you have your friends and your job and your church. You have West Hope, Mother. What will everyone say when your daughter becomes a single mother?”
Marion did not answer. She sat down again.
“Don't you see, Mom? It's the only way. I can't have a baby. If I do, I'll be stuck here in West Hope where everyone will talk about me and about my baby. And they'll talk about Brian, too.”
“You could make him come back.”
Jo shook her head. “I don't know where he is.”
“Then I'll find him myself,” Marion said.
And that was the first time Jo remembered getting angry with her mother. “If I thought you'd be such a problem I wouldn't have told you,” she shouted. “You will NOT tell Brian and you will NOT tell anyone. If you do, I will never speak to you again.”
She couldn't admit—even to herself—that she wouldn't survive being rejected by Brian the way her mother had been rejected by her father.
The next morning Jo left for Boston. She had the abortion the following week in a brightly lit clinic that was as cold as the ice on Laurel Lake in winter. She had been alone, without her mother, without even a friend, in a city that seemed as far from West Hope as if she'd landed on the moon.
And now there she was, sitting by the water, knowing if she left West Hope, this time it would be for good. She'd have to tell Lily she couldn't work with them, that something had come up—business, of course.
She'd have to say, “Sorry,” then wish them luck. She'd tell them she'd see them in the fall, the third weekend in September, unless they were so angry with her that they changed their tradition.
She'd have to miss out on the fun. But it would be more rational than working in a shop next to Brian's brother.
Then Jo thought of Elaine, who managed to go on despite that she'd been humiliated by an unfaithful husband in a town that loved to talk. Elaine, like Jo's mother, had held her aching head high.
Did Jo have that kind of courage?
Could she reveal that Brian was missing? Could she bear it if people, like the police—and like herself in her most secret heart—assumed he'd left of his own free will, that he'd simply, boldly, utterly ditched her?
Would Jo have the strength to argue they were wrong, that he must have been kidnapped, killed, or was suffering amnesia? On her best days, even Jo thought those suppositions were absurd. But it hurt less to believe them.
His brother Frank might know.
Did she dare risk finding out?
Jo stood up and took a last look at the lake, a last breath of the cool air. Then she walked back to her car, and wondered why facing the truth was often so much scarier than living with the unknown.
The clapboard shops had been freshly painted, mostly in white with black or deep green shutters, many with window boxes bearing plump red geraniums, some still adorned with the red, white, and blue buntings of last week's Fourth of July. A parking lot behind the string of shops looked newly expanded, no doubt to accommodate the swell of summer people who began their mornings with hearty bed-and-breakfast fare, then went into town to stroll off a few calories and spend more than a few dollars.
Jo parked and got out of her Honda with renewed determination. She told herself it was a good time to start a business in West Hope: The economy there was getting stronger. She told herself she wouldn't obsess about Brian or make a fool of herself in front of Frank, no matter what he told her or how much he knew.
She would hold her head high like her mother, like Elaine. She would not lose her dignity over a mere man.
Averting her eyes from the back door of Antiques and Such, Jo opened the latch on the door next to it. She stepped into a large, dark room that was cluttered with heaps of cardboard boxes and had a strong scent of sandalwood. She sneezed. Then she called out to Lily.
A door across the room opened. “Josephine! Is that you?” Lily stood in the doorway, her small frame silhouetted by the light that seeped in from the street. “Isn't it divine?”
Jo laughed. “No. It's dark. And it stinks in here.”
“Oh, stop. Wait until you see.”
Jo heard a snap, then the room was lit. Amid the boxes was more dust than Jo had ever seen except at her Aunt Amanda's, who'd been a hermit for thirty years until she died at ninety-eight or ninety-nine.
“God,” she said. The room was about a thousand square feet of mess.
“We'll find someone to get rid of this stuff,” Lily said, waving her hand as if dismissing little kids from school. “Look beyond it, Jo. It will be our workroom. And our storeroom. Now come see our showroom.”
She had labeled every area as if the deal already had been made, as if Jo had agreed and they were indeed in business. Jo stepped through the maze of boxes until she reached the doorway.
Lily was right. The “showroom” had potential to be a lovely shop. On either side of the wood-carved front door were broad, full-length windows shaded by canvas awnings that offered a soft, welcoming light and an allure of privacy. Gently scalloped trim decorated the perimeter of the room; a lingering scent of gardenias or jasmine added to an ambience of femininity. Unlike the back room, it was not at all unpleasant.
“It was an aromatherapy shop,” Lily explained. Apparently the aromatherapy business had been cast aside in lieu of changing trends, mainly this one, if Lily had her way, of second weddings that needed to be planned.
“I think the walls should be dark,” Lily said. “Navy-blue, maybe. Something to contrast with the whites and pinks of the gowns.”
Jo laughed. “I thought Sarah was the creative one.”
“Yes,” Lily agreed, “but it's my money.” Her tone wasn't bitchy but lighthearted. Jo did not doubt that Lily would remember not to challenge Sarah. She'd tried that a few times over the years. It never had worked.
Jo went to one wall that held a dusty, gold-framed mirror. She ran her finger around the beveled edge and looked at Lily's reflection. Unlike the tiny lines that already etched the edges of Jo's eyes, Lily's face still seemed porcelain, doll-like, unscathed, as if she'd never frowned or fretted or even cried. Botox, perhaps? They were, after all, over forty. And Reginald had left her all that money . . .
“Do you miss him?” Jo asked suddenly. “Reginald?” As unaccustomed as Jo was to speaking about matters of the heart, Lily had always been open, unashamed of her emotions. It had seemed childlike when they were young; now Jo envied her the ability to embrace her humanness.
Lily moved toward the glass. “I cried my tears,” she said. “I really did. The poor dear loved me muchly. But he was my third husband, after all, and I've learned that life goes on.”
Jo nodded.
“You never married,” Lily said. “I found that so odd.”
Jo was startled. She turned and looked at Lily, at her gentle, girlish face. “Did you? Well, not everyone is right for marriage.”
“But you are so beautiful.”
“And what does beauty have to do with marriage?”
Lily laughed and waved her thoughts away. “You could have had your pick of many men, Josephine. You wouldn't have had to work. You know, you wouldn't have had to bother about making a . . . living.” She wrinkled her nose and said the word as if it were something foreign and quite distasteful.
Jo didn't point out that if they opened the business, some people might consider it “work.” Instead, Jo laughed and said, “Oh, Lily, don't ever change. I think your job on earth is to remind the rest of us not to take life too seriously.” If Lily understood, she gave no indication. “Now show me the upstairs. And the adorable apartment that will save you the commute.”
The second floor was small but cheerful, with nooks and cubbyholes tucked here and there and windows in surprising places. From the living room there was a view of the center of West Hope and the white church and the town green and the gazebo where the school band once played on holidays, but which had been converted to a visitors' center that now dispersed maps of walking tours and discount coupons to the shops and restaurants. Jo smiled and wondered if she'd ever looked down on her hometown—no pun intended. She thought about the apartment on Shannon Drive, up on the fourth floor, the highest thing to high-rise that West Hope had allowed to be constructed.
“Come see the kitchen,” Lily called out from another room.
Jo followed a hallway maze until she reached a tiny room that had been painted buttery yellow and had white cabinets.
“Isn't it so pretty?” Lily asked, though Jo knew it did not—could not—compare to the penthouse palazzo in Manhattan where Lily had lived with Reginald. She wondered if Lily really would be content there, and for exactly how long.
“It's darling,” Jo replied. “It looks like you. Small. Dainty.”
Lily laughed. “You're such a goof,” she said. “It's a perfect pied-à-terre where I can hang my new chapeau when I'm here and not in town.”
Then they laughed together because, well, it was what they did best.
“Hello? Are you upstairs?” It was a man's voice, a deep, distinct man's voice.
Jo's laugh stopped abruptly. She backed against the wall as if sucked there by a magnet.
“Oh!” Lily exclaimed. “That must be our new landlord.”
Lily did not have to say to whom the voice belonged. It was Frank Forbes, who sounded so much like Brian that the brothers might have been twins.
Skipping past Jo, Lily headed toward the stairs. “Come and say hi,” she called back.
But Jo stood immobile, frozen to the wall. She shook her head. “I'll catch up with you later,” she said.
If Lily was surprised she did not show it. But then, Lily always took life at face value; she never showed distress. Perhaps her parents dying when Lily was only seventeen had taught her the art of letting go of tragedies, the big ones and the small. And perhaps she'd learned to differentiate between the two. Maybe that was what accounted for the lack of tiny lines edging Lily's eyes.
Yes, Jo reminded herself, she would do well to follow Lily's lead and not make life so intense.
But did that mean she had to face Frank Forbes that very moment?
Sooner or later, it would be inevitable.
After all, didn't she want to know if Frank knew about Brian?
She walked to the kitchen window that overlooked the parking lot. She closed her eyes and felt the familiar squeeze of the town and its expectations. Then she decided that, yes, seeing Frank Forbes later would be preferable to seeing him sooner.
5
From the bleachers at the outdoor training ring, Andrew watched his daughter look ahead, flatten her back, lean forward, lift up from the saddle, then push her weight onto her heels. The horse jumped over two fenceposts, landed safely, trotted on. Andrew resumed his seat, sensing from his taut muscles that he'd gone through Cassie's paces as if he were the one atop Big Bailey, Cassie's favorite horse at the West Hope Stables.
“She's a natural.”
Shielding his eyes against the sunlight, Andrew looked at the woman who sat a few feet away. She was dressed in a light denim sundress and wore a baseball cap. He did not recognize her. “She's my daughter,” he said. “Cassie.”
“I know,” the woman said. She looked at him and smiled, her pale peach lips soft against healthy white teeth. She had the smooth edges of a country girl, not sharp angles like Patty.
Andrew returned the smile. He wondered if she were a “Real Woman,” someone who would help him get past page one of his first column, which was due in less than two weeks. Clearly, he needed some proper “field work.” Clearly, he needed to find a woman.
He slid across the bench, closing the wood-plank gap between them. “Do you know my daughter?” Andrew asked. He supposed it was a thinly veiled pick-up line; “Lame,” Cassie would say, but though John Benson thought otherwise, Andrew Kennedy was out of practice.
“I've watched her progress since she's been coming here,” the woman replied. “She's a wonderful athlete.”
Andrew grinned. He was glad he had shaved that morning, that he'd put on a fresh shirt and relatively clean jeans. “When we moved here from the city, this was all Cassie wanted. ‘Can I ride a horse, Daddy? Please. Please?'” He laughed. “For weeks that was all I heard.”
He thought he was being quite entertaining.
The woman smiled again. “She doesn't look like a city girl.”
“We've been here five years. S
he's adapted well.” The woman nodded and looked at Andrew. She had delicious skin that looked well cared for. “Do you have a daughter who rides here, too?” he asked. Lame again, but what the heck.
“My daughters—both of them—used to ride. They've grown up and left West Hope now. But my husband and I have kept their horses here. We enjoy riding, too.”
Husband.
Oh.
Andrew cleared his throat. “Well,” he said, “that's nice.” Then he introduced himself and she introduced herself, and he knew he didn't need to remember the woman's name.
6
After Lily had kiss-kissed Jo and flitted away to drop off the rental car and catch the train back to the city, the thought of going home did not appeal to Jo. Marion would have returned from the library trustees meeting and would be going through her mundane tasks of reading mail, watering plants, cooking dinner—the kinds of things Jo had never wanted for herself. She'd wanted excitement, productivity, take-out food grabbed on the run between the office and the theater. She'd wanted life, lived to the max.
She had tried to convince Lily to stay long enough for dinner, but Lily was eager to return to Manhattan and close up her apartment (“For the time being, Josephine, because nothing is forever”). Lily told Jo she'd signed the lease on the storefront, despite the fact that Jo had not yet confirmed she'd be part of the business, that she'd move back to West Hope and be part of the “fun.”
“You will, darling,” Lily cooed. In the meantime, they'd need people to fix up the shop to look like the booming business it was not. Sarah and Elaine surely would know some local handymen or handywomen, Lily said, and gave Jo both of their addresses, which Jo had among her clothes and her furniture and her stuff in Boston, the stuff that sat idle, awaiting Jo's decision as to where it should be shipped.
Lily went off with her trademark butterfly wave, saying, “Remember, darling, think happy second-wedding thoughts,” and Jo said, “Oh, sure,” because what else could she say? Lily seemed determined—she'd offered to “fund” the business, including salaries, for up to a year. She was so upbeat, so excited, that, as usual, Lily made it hard to say no.