by Wendy Webb
“Five. I heard about the . . . lady. The woman LuAnn found when she opened up for the season. I think I may have seen her.”
Gary ran a hand through his hair. “Brynn, it had to be a dream. I’m not saying I don’t believe you—of all people, I’m going to believe things like this—but five’s locked up tight. Nobody is in there and won’t be all summer. LuAnn is superstitious about that kind of thing. She’s not going to open it up until they find out who the lady was and what she was doing here. It’s a matter of respect for her.”
I nodded, unconvinced. “Okay,” I said, taking a last bite of my toast. I looked at the clock. It was just after ten. I was meeting Kate at the ferry dock at noon to go to the island for lunch. “Thanks, Gary. I appreciate the talk.” I dropped my napkin on my plate and hopped off my stool.
“Anytime.” He winked at me. “And for what it’s worth, it’s been your first few nights in a new place. You’re going to have wild dreams. It’s normal. Don’t worry about it.”
I wasn’t so sure. I just hoped they’d stop.
Showered and changed, I headed off to the ferry dock a little early because I wanted to run a quick errand on the way.
As I opened the door to the bookstore, Just Read It, a bright-sounding bell tinkled, and Beth appeared from the back room.
“Morning!” she said to me. “It’s another perfect Wharton day!”
“Hey,” I said, warmed by her smile.
“No happy hour yesterday?” she said, chuckling. “The town nearly ground to a halt.”
“I know! LuAnn wanted to give our newest summer resident some breathing space to get used to things,” I said, not sure of how much to divulge. It wasn’t my story to tell.
“Jase was in here yesterday afternoon with Alice,” Beth said. “By now, everyone knows what’s going on. He asked me to spread the word, actually. Didn’t want anyone talking when he showed up here or there with her.”
“She’s a sweet lady,” I said.
“It’s a damn shame.”
We shared a moment then, both of us filled with empathy. Grief. Sorrow.
“So!” Beth lightened the mood. “Did you just come in to say hi, or can I help you find something?”
“Do you have a copy of The Illustrated Man?”
“Ray Bradbury, huh? Let me check.” Beth clicked on her computer and did a quick search. “We do!” she said, then led me into the science fiction section and pulled the slim paperback off the shelf. “This is one of my favorite books. I remember reading it in college, and it’s always stuck with me.”
I took it out of her hand, and mine started to tingle.
“Thanks,” I said, staring at the cover, which depicted a shirtless man sitting down, facing away from us, his back completely covered in tattoos. “I’ve never read it. I’m ashamed to admit that because I teach literature—”
“Oh!” Beth broke in. “You’re a teacher?”
“I am,” I said. “I teach at the U down in Minneapolis. I’ve heard about this book, but, I don’t know. I’m not really much into sci-fi, I guess, so it wasn’t on my radar. Someone”—I stumbled on my words—“recommended it to me recently, and I thought it might be a fun read.”
“It’s a collection of short stories,” she said, back at the register and ringing it up. “Do you know the premise?”
I shook my head. “No.”
“It was written in, I believe, the late forties or early fifties, and it starts with a prologue in which a homeless man—they called them ‘hobos’ back in the day—is sitting in front of his campfire eating his dinner of pork and beans when another man comes by. Our narrator thinks it’s sort of odd because it’s a warm summer night and the guy has a long-sleeved wool shirt on, buttoned all the way up to his neck. But whatever, he thinks. The man asks if he can spend the night by the fire with our narrator, who welcomes him. Getting ready for bed, the man takes off his shirt and reveals that he’s covered in tattoos. Beautiful, colorful, mysterious illustrations.”
I took a quick breath in. No wonder Jason and Gil had given Dominic that nickname.
“The man tells our narrator that he got the illustrations, as he calls them, from a woman who turned out to be a time-traveling witch.”
“Well, that’s never good,” I said, smirking.
“Nope. No good has ever come from a time-traveling witch. Right after getting the tats, the guy realizes they’re not just simple illustrations. They’re enchanted. They move and tell stories. Creepy, scary stories.
“The man tells our narrator not to look at him during the night, not to watch those illustrations tell their stories. And especially, he’s not supposed to look at the one empty spot on the guy’s back because his own story will materialize there. But, of course, he looks, right? Who wouldn’t? He can’t help himself. And the rest of the book consists of the stories told by the illustrations that come to life as the two men are lying by the fire.”
“Wow,” I said, gazing down at the book in my hands. “I can’t wait to read it.”
“One of the stories still blows me away,” Beth said, leaning in toward me. “It’s about this family who lives in what’s basically a smart home. Bradbury calls it a Happylife Home. The kids’ room is a virtual-reality chamber. Let’s just say things end badly.”
My mouth hung open. “You said it was written when?”
“I know! That’s my point! All of the stories have a common theme about the conflict between technology and humanity. Just like we’re dealing with today! It’s totally amazing he came up with that more than seventy years ago. Hardly anyone had televisions for crying out loud, and he’s writing about the dangers of virtual reality.”
“Wow,” I repeated. “Who’s the time traveler? That witch or Ray Bradbury?”
“Exactly what I’ve always thought.” Beth gave me a warm smile. “I knew I liked you for a reason. Come on back when you’ve read it, and we’ll talk some more.”
I slipped the book into my bag and headed off to meet Kate at the ferry dock. After the strangeness of the past few nights, a conversation about my favorite thing—books—brought me back to myself. I would make sure that conversation would continue over the course of the summer.
CHAPTER NINE
I was standing on the deck of the ferry, spray lightly sprinkling my face. Kate and I had just taken off from Wharton’s dock, headed to Ile de Colette, a twenty-minute ride away, for lunch. I couldn’t quite remember the last time I had been to Colette, but I knew it to be a laid-back community of a few hundred year-round locals that swelled tenfold during the summer tourist season.
Visitors could find high-end resorts, campgrounds, and everything in between. At the marina, you’d see multimillion-dollar yachts next to battered fishing dinghies. While Wharton was more Cape Cod, Colette had a hippie vibe.
One of the more popular bars on the island, Jimmy’s, had partially burned down years before, and the owner had just put up a sort of quasi circus tent over the whole thing and never bothered to rebuild before reopening his doors. It wouldn’t be unusual to see campers clad in swimming suits and shorts, no shoes, sitting at the bar or waiting for one of the two showers in the bathrooms.
Celebrities seeking an out-of-the-way vacation frequented Colette with no threat of paparazzi or prying eyes. Movie stars in baseball caps and jeans, trying to blend in, would be spotted bicycling around town; musicians who regularly sold out arenas would take the stage at Jimmy’s on random nights, surprising patrons with an unplugged show; bestselling authors would rent houses on the water for inspiration.
Colette’s streets housed a handful of small funky restaurants, one known for breakfast, one known for locally sourced dishes, another known for pizza, still another extremely high end, along with a coffee shop where most locals congregated in the morning.
And the beach. It was famous for being the only beach on all of Lake Superior with water so warm that anyone could comfortably swim. With its rocky bottom, it was shallow enough to walk out the leng
th of a football field before feeling the familiar sting of the ice-cold lake. It was, in a way, surreal, walking into the Great Lake in what felt like bathwater until passing an invisible boundary where the temperature would plummet.
On the ferry, just a minute out of Wharton, my whole view changed. Standing on the deck, I could see tree-covered islands dotting the wide expanse of Lake Superior, its water undulating as though it were alive. Wharton got smaller and smaller as the ferry chugged along.
“I never get tired of this,” Kate said, stringing an arm through mine as we gazed out over the vast expanse of the water, islands of pine and rock dotting the horizon.
“It’s . . . I’m searching for the right word,” I said. “Majestic comes to mind.”
She nodded. “I thought it would do you good, getting out on the water.” As we both took in the view, she pointed out a cormorant soaring past. It alighted on the water and floated, bobbing up and down on the waves.
“This is fun,” I said, smiling at her. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d said those words.
As we disembarked, walking down the dock toward town, we chatted, catching up on the past few years for both of us. Her new husband was the police chief in town, and I got to hear about her cousin Simon’s current project, the newly opened ballroom at Harrison’s House.
“And no word from Kevin?” I asked her, referring to her ex-husband, whose cheating had caused her to come to Wharton a couple of years earlier when their marriage fell apart. I had been at their wedding. Never liked the guy.
She shook her head. “It seems so long ago now that I was married to him,” she mused. “Like it was another lifetime.”
I knew that feeling. I was single myself after two decades of couplehood. My old life had stopped when my mom got sick. I dropped everything and everyone—including him—to care for her. The long stretches of time apart while I tended to my parents took their toll on both of us, and when I was asked about our breakup, that was what I told people. But truthfully, he was angry at me for us being apart and resentful when I was home. After watching my mom fight the battle she would ultimately lose, I was left with the searing resolution that life was too short to be unhappy for even one moment, if you could possibly help it.
I did some soul-searching and realized I hadn’t been happy in my relationship for a long time. Years. I loved the man, but I just didn’t like him very much. So, after talking it over with my mother, I started looking for an apartment, something I hadn’t done in twenty years. When I got the keys and opened the door for the first time, before my things arrived, the big empty room seemed to mirror what I felt inside.
Ultimately, I didn’t find the happiness I sought. I was still unhappy, but now I was lonely, too. I didn’t know whether I could get my old life back again. Or if I even wanted it. Suddenly, I had no tether. No moorings. I was floating, like that cormorant, going where the waves took me.
Kate and I were seated at a table in a dockside restaurant so we could watch the boats come and go while we had lunch.
Salads ordered and a bottle of wine opened, Kate raised her glass to me. “Here’s to your summer in Wharton,” she said. We clinked glasses, and each took a sip. “How do you like LuAnn’s?”
I chose to sidestep the strangeness of the place. It was a bright, sunny day, and that odd occurrence in the still of the night seemed faraway and unreal.
“It’s like a little soap opera already,” I said. “I met Jason and Gil right away.”
“Simon knows Gil from way back,” she said. “They’re a great couple.”
“They are,” I agreed. “Do you know what’s going on with them?”
She furrowed her brow. “No,” she said, a look of concern washing over her face.
Not believing I was betraying any confidences since Jason had been introducing Alice around town, I told Kate about their somewhat unusual living situation.
“Wow,” she said, shaking her head. “I can’t believe Simon didn’t tell me. Maybe he doesn’t know, either. And Gil’s okay with it?”
“More than okay. He was the one who suggested it.”
“Wow,” Kate said again, sipping her wine and staring out over the water.
“I know. It’s truly a beautiful thing they’re doing.”
It illustrated the point that love is love is love. It seemed rather lacking in my life just then.
“Have you heard from Robert?” Kate asked me, referring to my former partner of twenty years.
I shook my head. “Not lately. I’ve heard he’s dating a twenty-five-year-old yoga instructor.”
Kate bowed her head. “Namaste.”
We both burst out laughing. “You’ve gotta laugh about it, or you’ll cry,” she said, refilling my wineglass. “I totally get it. You’ve had quite the year.”
She wasn’t kidding. Images from the past year of my life flashed through my mind then, like scenes from a movie.
Robert and I storming through the house, yelling at each other. Me sleeping in the guest bedroom when I was home to escape his simmering resentment about me being away so much, and my incredulity that he could possibly feel that way when I was taking care of my dying mother. Talking with my mom about my relationship, and finally, after years of just being happy-ish, making the decision to leave when she urged me to do so.
The utter devastation of my mom’s death, followed two months later by the news that my beloved malamute—whom Robert had kept along with everything else—woke up one morning paralyzed because of what turned out to be a tumor on her spine. I held one paw and Robert held the other as the vet gave her the injection, with us both telling her how much we loved her as she slipped away. In a heartbreaking way, it melted the iceberg between us. Civility crept back into our relationship. I think the beloved dog we shared would’ve liked that.
And now, the icing on that cake was my own indecision about returning to a career I loved, but just might have run out of steam for. The lost look in my dad’s eyes, and how childlike he was becoming.
“It felt like an assault. It really did. While it was all happening, I had an appointment with my doctor, who’s known me for more than twenty years. She asked what was going on in my life, and I told her.
“She just stopped, put my chart on her desk, and said, ‘You win.’ I asked her what that meant, and she said, ‘Patients tell me about the stressors in their lives every single day. I have never heard of anyone who has dealt with the breakup of a long-term relationship, moving, starting a new life, caregiving for a dying parent, the loss of that parent, career uncertainty, and the loss of a beloved pet at the same time.’”
Kate just stared at me. “Oh, Brynn. That’s totally unreal. It’s like the universe came after you, in all the places that you live. And love.”
I nodded, the ever-present tears welling up yet again. I brushed them away.
“Did she suggest anything?” Kate asked.
“She asked me how I was coping, mentioned something about PTSD, and asked if I wanted antidepressants. I’m giving them a try.”
Kate nodded and squeezed my hand. “How’s your dad holding up?”
I shook my head and shrugged. “Better than I thought he would. I really wasn’t sure if he was going to make it a day without her.”
“A marriage like theirs . . .”
“I know. Once in a lifetime.”
I could see my parents at their local watering hole, telling stories together, making everyone laugh. I’d never seen a love like theirs. Never had anything close to it. They were true soul mates, blessed to have found each other.
“My brother rented a house in Cornwall, England, for the summer,” I said. “That’s where my dad’s ancestors are from. He’s always wanted to go. They’re going to spend a few months looking through cemeteries and chasing down living relatives, too.”
“A distraction,” she said.
“That’s exactly what Jason said.”
“And you came here.”
I nodded. They ha
d asked me to come along, but I really needed a break. My own distraction so I could focus on putting my life back together.
“This place can cure what ails you,” she said. “I know. I came here broken and found the love of my life.”
“Nothing like that on the horizon for me,” I mused, picking at my salad. Anything to lighten the mood.
“I hear you’re living down the hallway from the talk of the town,” she said, grinning at me.
I could feel the heat rising to my face.
“You’re blushing!” she laughed.
I couldn’t help laughing, too. “He is ungodly handsome,” I said. “But despite that, he’s a really nice guy. Easy to talk to once you get over his . . .”
“His what?” Kate giggled.
I put my head in my hands. “Face. Chest. Shoulders,” I admitted.
I looked up to see Kate wagging her finger at me. “Just be careful,” she said. “Nick’s got his eye on him.”
“What?” I put down my fork. “Why?”
“It’s not a big deal, or I would’ve said something earlier, but Nick is sort of quasi watching him because he matches the description of a man involved in”—she hesitated for a moment and took a long breath—“something down in the Twin Cities.”
I felt a gnarling in the pit of my stomach. “What is it?”
Kate shook her head. “I can’t talk about it. I shouldn’t have even said anything.”
“He’s a person of interest in something? Kate, I’m living down the hall from this guy. We share a shower, for the love of God. Does LuAnn know?”
“She knows,” she said. “When Nick saw him around town, he pulled her aside. It’s not usually done, but, hey, we’re all family here in Wharton, right?”
“What did she say?”
“She said it was ridiculous,” Kate said, taking a bite of her salad. “You know LuAnn. And, for the record, Nick is not officially concerned about this guy. Don’t worry.”
“He’s really nice, Kate.” I said the words, and I meant them, but how much did I know about Dominic? Nothing at all, really. Just some pleasantries shared over coffee.