“Yep. Photo essay and journal. I’ve had it planned forever. The way I want. No settling. Like the Down Under book, only better. This is the one!”
“Wow, Nate, that’s wonderful news.” She was delighted for him. Stunned for herself. He wanted her to marry him, move to a strange place with him, and then he was going to leave her there by herself while he gallivanted over the globe for his photography? He never did do short work. Always in-depth. How long would he be gone this time?
Lloyd grabbed Nate’s hand as he slapped him on the shoulder. “Awesome. We’ll celebrate tonight!”
“Fantastic, Nate!” JoAnn blew him a kiss. “Congratulations!”
“This means I have to cut vacation short. I have to leave on Sunday…”
Sunday? Her mind stuttered and she lost track of his words. Sunday? The day after tomorrow? He was supposed to stay another week. They were supposed to drive to Idaho together. She was supposed to meet his parents.
She was supposed to have more time to sort out her heart and mind.
He’d promised…
JoAnn, Lloyd, and Olivia pumped Nate for details as they ordered and ate lunch. Kay was thankful her friends were used to her not saying much, because she was too off-balance to know what to say. She joined in the whirlwind party planning, but couldn’t have recalled a single thing Olivia jotted down on the shopping list.
She poked at a cold French fry on her plate, annoyed with her dismay.
She should be happy for him.
Why can’t you just be happy for me? I worked hard for this promotion.
Because we have to move again now. You get your dream job, but what about me?
Why can’t you just be happy for me? Why can’t you just be happy…
Kay shook off the shrill echo of her parents’ voices. Be happy. She was happy for him. Truly. Now she needed to be happy for herself.
“Nate?”
He turned, still talking.
She kissed him. “I’m so happy for you.”
Nate stared in surprise, as if he was seeing someone else. The others stared, too.
Was a voluntary display of public affection from her such a weird thing?
Then he beamed like a kid at Christmas, hugged his arm around her, and kissed her back, his joy flooding the kiss. “Thanks.”
The hot-cold rush of joy and dread churned through her again.
Kay’s cell phone rang. Too distracted, she answered without checking the caller.
A major mistake, as her mother’s impatient voice answered her hello. “Why haven’t you returned my calls? I’ve been calling you all morning.”
Oh, she didn’t need this. Kay sank into her chair and hunched away from Nate and the others. Maybe she should walk outside. “There’s no cell service where I’ve been camping. I’ve told you that before. What’s wrong?”
“Then why are you on the phone now?” Mother’s sharp tone rang with the accusation, liar.
Kay sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. “I’m at the marina for lunch. There’s service here.”
“You need to stop tramping around the country and settle down. Why can’t you ever go somewhere civilized? But no, you have to be like your father.”
“Mother, we’ve talked about this.” Tried to, anyway. Actual talking would have involved listening on Mother’s part. It’s my career. It’s my choice.
And I’m not like my father. Never.
“You’re talented enough you do not need to be wandering around painting pictures of rocks. Alone all the time. It’s ridiculous. I’ve told you time and again, someone could steal all your equipment. Assault you. And that nothing little school. You need to stop wasting your talents. You should have focused on your portrait work. But no, what do you waste your time on? Rocks. Dreary, dusty rocks all the time. It’s amazing you make a dime. If you had only taken that job in Boston—”
Oh, yeah, big mistake in attempting to be sisterly and talk to Claire about anything. Everything became ammunition. Hadn’t she learned this by now? Kay swallowed her anger and cut in on the repetitious acid rain of criticisms. “Mother, is there a reason you’ve been trying to call me today? Is Claire okay?”
“Claire’s fine, which you would know if you ever called your sister. Anthony is just under stress from his job, and you need to stop being so critical. I wanted to tell you I got married on Saturday.”
“To whom?” Saturday? Last week? An ache gripped her chest. Not that she could have gone, but being told of the event before it happened, not six days later, would have been nice.
“What do you mean, to whom?” her mother’s voice rose testily. “William, of course. “
“Congratulations.” Mother was back with him again? Kay rubbed her forehead.
“Melissa, aren’t you done with the phone calls?” A muffled male voice came through the phone.
“Thank you. We’ll be in Miami until the twenty-fourth and then be on the cruise until the seventh. Claire has all the details. When will you be going home?”
“The schedule I e-mailed you hasn’t changed. My phone battery is running low. Got to go. Have fun.” She hung up on her mother’s next shrill complaint.
Everyone was looking at her oddly.
“My mother remarried, again. She wanted to let me know.” She powered off her phone and jammed it away in her bag.
Don’t worry. Be happy. The bouncy advice jangled on in an annoying loop in her mind. Olivia’s determined voice chimed in, I’ve been afraid to be happy. A heavy, suffocating sensation crushed in around her, and she had to fight the urge to gasp.
She looked up to see Nate studying her with concern.
She fixed her smile back in place. Was that what she’d been doing? Settling for contentment and losing out on happiness, just to avoid the chance of pain?
Hasn’t worked so well, has it? So, what are you going to do about it?
Chapter Twelve
Kay hoped the smile fixed on her face looked happier than it felt. Thank goodness for dark sunglasses.
Everyone around her had chattered on in happy unbroken conversation about Nate’s news all through finishing lunch, to shopping for the party, and down to the dock.
Now, the boat ride back to camp left Kay with altogether too much time for replaying the hurt over her mother’s call or dwelling on the radically changing situation with Nate. What choices.
Nate sat quietly beside her, arm around her shoulders. JoAnn sat beside Olivia, who was softly talking nonstop.
She imagined calling Mother back: Hey, Mother, by the way, Nate asked me to marry him, and I think I will, and we’ll live in Oregon in the middle of nowhere. And no, you don’t know anything about him. And yes, I’m going to marry and move away with a man I really don’t know and who’ll never be home. Just like you.
She shuddered. Oh, please, she wasn’t like her mother.
Nate gave her shoulder a squeeze. “Okay?”
“Shouldn’t have eaten all the French fries.”
Their relationship had changed forever, and she was an idiot to think she could hang onto the way it had been, and the changes made saying no harder and saying yes more unnerving.
Five days ago, she had known clearly who she was and what she wanted. Now? She had turned into this waffling, confused moron who apparently couldn’t think herself out of a paper bag anymore.
Not true, really—the downward spiral had kicked in with a vengeance in March, when she had stepped out of the taxi at the airport and couldn’t make herself get on that flight to Boston.
She hated being like this. She was an adult. She had her own distinct opinions. She had decided what she wanted with her life, hiked herself out of a life of doubts, and done it, hadn’t she?
The more Kay found herself accepting Nate’s intrusion in her life, the more the acceptance confused her—okay, to be honest, frightened the crap out of her. She hated how he’d upset the whole careful balance she had built. So maybe she was in a rut, but it was a safe rut and her very own
.
But he deserved an answer, and her safety cushion of time for decision had just been amputated.
You’re being like your mother, like your sister. Complaining, indecisive…
No, never.
So, be the decisive person you thought you were and decide. Nate or not?
“…but I think, after Vegas, I’ll go to the condo in Myrtle Beach. He—” Olivia looked down at her bare fingers. “He’ll go to the house in New York. He has meetings coming up. He’ll think everything is normal and I’ll eventually come home. That I won’t do anything, like always. This time, he’s wrong.”
Listing pluses and minuses might help. Kay created countless similar mental lists. On the minus side: she would have to sell the condo, the school counted on her, she’d be out of a job, she was scheduled to attend shows. And moving, all the things to pack and ship. And furniture, they each had their own place, they would have so many duplicates. Who would give up what? The house looked big, but hers and his couldn’t possibly all fit.
And wedding plans? If she said yes, that raised all sorts of issues. Where and how and what and who. Her stomach rolled. Oh, yeah, the French fries had been another poor decision. She couldn’t do the whole Bride’s Magazine-Martha Stewart Wedding thing her mother adored and her sister Claire had endured.
Maybe Nate had ideas. Wishes. Mother had always controlled every last detail of her weddings, and Claire’s, but Lloyd had planned with JoAnn and had enjoyed it. She vaguely wondered what the theme had been for Mother’s wedding. Probably had been lovely. Mother’s weddings always were.
What if Nate wanted all those bells and whistles?
She shuddered.
The alternative, ducking the question and only living with him, was useless as a solution. She’d still have to move, still lose a job, still rearrange her whole life, and still be alone. No, if she did choose Nate, she wouldn’t dither halfway between.
“…and after that, I can’t think that far ahead today. I have an uncle in Florida…”
More important, what about living under one roof together? They had never spent more than a half hour at a time in anything with real walls and a roof, if you didn’t count the marina cafe or a grocery store. The essential casual camp atmosphere was a vacation mood. Sure, the sex was great, and he always capped the toothpaste, rinsed and separated the recyclables, and could even cook, but what about the other real-life issues? Toilet lids. Checkbook balancing. Laundry. That house would be one massive, disruptive renovation zone…Children?
And all his traveling. Could a man with Nate’s wanderlust ever truly settle in one place? No matter what he’d sworn? Was she going to leave her comfortable home only to be left alone in an alien place? Where would she work? He couldn’t guarantee she would find a teaching position. And his, Don’t worry about it, babe, I have it covered, only stressed her out more. Be totally dependent on his income?
Be totally dependent on him?
“…haven’t worked since we married. He didn’t want me to.” Olivia laughed. “Honestly, playing hostess and doing everything R.J. wanted was a full-time job in itself. I could go back to nursing, I suppose. I’m an excellent hostess. Know anyone who needs one slightly used trophy wife for party planning?” Olivia’s voice caught, and tears tracked down from behind her sunglasses.
JoAnn hugged Olivia, and Olivia crumpled and sobbed against JoAnn’s shoulder.
Nate tightened his arm around Kay.
Kay pressed a hand to her churning stomach. She only had today and tomorrow left.
But choosing yes, choosing Nate…she would have so much time to paint, free from the iron rule of the clock and calendar. Wasn’t that something she longed for? She loved teaching, but weren’t there days she could really live without the rigid schedule, the petty bickering among staff, the clueless parents who should have settled for raising goldfish rather than kids?
What if she moved there and hated the place? The house was intriguing and the land was scenic, but what if? Ignoring the traumatized-snail-out-of-her-shell aspect of being alone in his house while he tramped around the world, wouldn’t that be so much more what she was used to, him being away? She had her art to keep her busy. She could explore. She could let herself enjoy the renovation of the house. Choose things to make the house hers as well. She could ease into this living together under one roof business.
You know, you could move there and find you love it.
When they got back to camp, she would get a grip, she would write down her lists and she would talk to Nate and stop this drifting self-doubt.
****
Nate’s wild elation had fizzled to a pitiful squeak of its former self on the ride from the marina. Yep, instead of the triumphant excitement he should feel over being asked to join the expedition and having the opportunity to bring to fruition the vision he’d had for so many years, he just felt tired.
What had he been thinking, agreeing to drop everything and run off on this expedition? He’d wanted to give up his rambling life. He’d sworn that to himself. No more. Then Bev calls, says the magic words “Kincaid” and “Antarctica,” and the yes zipped out of his mouth without any consideration from his brain.
This just meant more traveling. More lonely nights. More being away from Kay. And damn it, he had to leave Kay early. No leisurely trip to the City of Rocks and to Oregon to spend much needed time alone together. Shit.
Now he’d have to do what he’d been avoiding: push Kay, without pushing her. Yeah, this was going to suck. Because of his own big mouth, he was out of time. No more putting off talking to her until an optimal moment.
He needed to be back at camp now and pull Kay aside, but Lloyd was doggedly easy on the throttle. The tan rocky landscape baking under the glaring sunlight hardly seemed to move along. JoAnn wasn’t saying anything this time, but her thin-set mouth and tapping finger showed she was also fuming over Lloyd’s slow speed.
He looked behind, to the marina now lost in the distance of the long narrow lake, and ahead, where the landmarks that would lead them home to their camp were not yet in sight.
Damn it. He needed more time.
The crazy thought of telling Lloyd to turn the boat around so he could call Bev and tell Kincaid thanks, but no thanks, pinged around his brain.
Definitely crazy. No way. Shoot down the chance of a lifetime? Bev would freak.
This job would make his name, yet…he needed more time with Kay.
The chatter over his news had settled, which was fine. Olivia’s short burst of tears had ended, but the quiet let Kay, Olivia, and JoAnn withdraw into their own troubled thoughts. Kay was too quiet, withdrawn with a prickly confused hurt in her face under the forced smile she’d worn ever since getting off the phone with her mom.
A call from Kay’s mom shouldn’t make her go all strained and distant, especially about a wedding. He contrasted his call to his mom, with all her happy scattered questions and tumble of news, gossip, laughter, and asides to Dad with the golf match loud on the television in the background. Mom and Dad had been thrilled for his news.
The sinking hollow in his chest deepened.
My mother remarried, again. She wanted to let me know.
Wait. Her mother hadn’t told Kay ahead of time? Hadn’t invited her?
To whom?
Hadn’t even told Kay who?
She’s better off in Tucson…What could be so bad that Lloyd would say she was better off in Tucson than being with family? His family might be a little flakey in other’s eyes, maybe more than a little, but damn, he could count on every last one of them if he needed to, down to second cousins twice removed. Well, maybe not that distant, but damn, no one in his family would ever not tell their own daughter they were getting married.
Better count your lucky blessings, Quinn.
And an amen to that. He knew families could be screwed up, but it pissed him off to see Kay so hurt. Shit. What an idiot he was for not being more curious why she didn’t talk much about her family. He
’d be rattling on how he was spending Christmas at Mom and Dad’s, or how he wished he was going home for Thanksgiving—and she’d never mentioned spending any of those traditional moments with her family. She’d celebrated with friends or had gone on painting trips alone. She’d always spoken so animatedly about her travels and work that he’d never focused on the underlying fact she was nearly always alone.
You knew there were problems. You ignored them. You told yourself she’s just quiet.
What if Kay thought his family flakey when she met them? They’d love her, but what if she didn’t like them? His sister’s husband jokingly likened the family to a pack of golden retriever puppies, overwhelmingly happy, but without the slobber. Yeah, Zeke was a fun guy, but weird.
No, he’d shared enough about his family over the years to Kay. She had to have an inkling of what they were like and how he felt about them.
Unlike himself, who’d never pushed to know more.
And he’d now messed up getting her to meet them.
Finally, finally, the dog-shaped boulder of Coyote Point came into sight. They rounded the point and wound their way to their cove and the bright, haphazard camps tucked in among the wispy trees and brush.
Kay caught Nate’s arm as he was about to hop over the side of the boat with two of the grocery sacks. “Nate, could we talk a minute?”
Absolutely. Yes. He would make this right. Somehow. “Sure. Give me a sec with these.”
However, Lloyd grabbed Nate the moment they stepped onto Spider Camp’s beach and dragged him off into the rounds of backslaps and beers and toasts and the telling and retelling of the whole story. They gave him no chance to duck away with Kay, and the festivities got underway like a runaway roller coaster.
****
Not only was seriously talking seriously difficult, it was proving hard to schedule as well.
Nate caught Kay’s eye and shrugged in question.
Kay waved him off and picked up an overlooked sack of groceries. Later would be fine, when the novelty and excitement settled. She didn’t want to talk with an audience around anyway, and Nate needed to enjoy this moment of triumph with his friends—their friends. Olivia was smiling now. Their friends threw whole-hearted effort into celebrating Nate’s good news and cheering up Olivia.
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