PERHAPS IT WAS TOO MUCH EXPECTATION. Perhaps it wasn’t possible for anything to live up to what they’d fantasized, each of them over the long lonely nights of the past five years. From the moment they walked into her house and sat at the dining room table, with her mother’s old crystal candlesticks lit, awkwardness descended upon them that seemed impossible to undo.
“I’m glad it’s not so hot out,” she said inanely, as he pulled cartons from the bag.
“I hope the food is good,” he said, opening the fried rice, as she uncovered the Kung Pao chicken.
“Their food is usually wonderful,” she said.
Then silence. They each filled their plates. He picked up his fork, waiting, while she unwrapped her chopsticks.
“Ruth,” he finally said, as they both looked at their plates of food. “How many times have you read Gatsby?”
“Oh, probably a dozen or so.”
“I’ve only read it twice. But I read it so slowly I think I’ve probably got it memorized.”
She nodded and couldn’t help thinking of when Gatsby, after waiting years to see Daisy again, finally met her for a cup of tea at Nick Carraway’s cottage.
As if he were reading her mind, Thomas said, “Do you remember the scene where Nick watches Gatsby looking at Daisy, and is surprised to see the expression of bewilderment on Gatsby’s face? He wonders how Daisy could ever live up to Gatsby’s expectation? I’m afraid…” His words ran out, and he sat there shaking his head.
A tender laugh escaped her. “Oh, Thomas, I’ve thought the same thing. I’m the creation of my letters, as are you. For five years we’ve talked mostly of books.”
“It’s more than books, Ruth,” he said very quietly, looking at her intensely.
“I know.”
“I’m not a very educated man,” he said with a worried look. “To be honest, Ruth, I’m almost embarrassed to admit this, but before prison, I didn’t really read much.”
“Oh?”
“I never really stopped long enough to take the time. Truthfully, I was never much of a student, and I didn’t like what I had to read. But being in prison, there was nothing else to try to stay involved in the outside world, so I started picking up books.”
“And the first one you read was Outlander and you couldn’t believe that suddenly you felt as if you were living in 18th century Scotland.”
He smiled in astonishment.
“You told me that at our very first book meeting. I couldn’t forget because as you found out, it was one of my favorite books, too.”
He picked up his fork and took a bite of food, as she dug in with her chopsticks. He let out a long moan of pleasure. “I haven’t had good Chinese food in…well, you know. I missed out on so much when I was free. I’m almost embarrassed to admit this, but I had an easy life and I was never very ambitious. But now, I don’t want to miss anything.”
“I know what you mean. Now that I’m feeling better, I feel like I have this second chance at life.”
“I bet you can’t wait to get back to the store. You must really miss it.”
“I do. I’m going back tomorrow.”
“You don’t look happy, though.”
“The morning I left the hospital, I decided I was giving up the store.”
He put his fork down. “You can’t be serious. Listen, if it’s money—”
But she put a hand up, stopping him. “Let’s not go there right now, okay?”
He hesitated, then nodded. They ate in silence for a few moments.
“Were you ever married?” she asked, wondering why it had never occurred to her before.
He smiled slowly, then shook his head. “Engaged twice, actually. But in the end neither one felt right and we broke it off.”
“What did you do for fun?” she asked.
“Running your own business—just my mom and me after a while—there’s never much time off.” And then he looked at her and laughed. “But I guess you know about that. Really there were just Sundays, and Saturday nights. But most Saturday nights I was pretty worn out. On Sundays I’d go watch a ball game or play cards. Nothing particularly exciting. Or intellectual. You know how it is when you’re young, and you’ve got money in your pocket. The years begin to race by and before you know it, you’re not so young anymore.”
“What happened to your parents’ business?”
“After my mother died it was sold, along with the building. I got a little nest egg from it I’ve been hanging on to, just in case. No one’s particularly eager to hire an ex-con, that’s why I’m all the way out in Pine Island. The owner had a kid who got in trouble years ago, and my parole officer knew him, so he was okay with it. I’m not living there anymore, though. I found a rooming house not too far away and I’m paying a bit more than everyone else, so she was willing to have me for a while. We’re going month to month, so we’ll see. A simple, boring life, but I’m not complaining.”
“Are there things you can’t do?”
“I can’t leave the state. I have to report to my parole officer every few weeks. I can’t move without notifying him, or change jobs. It’s kind of like being a teenager again. And I need to live a squeaky clean life, which is scary, because I told you about some of the problems I’ve had at the garage. But I’m trying not to dwell on things that could go wrong.” He let out a long sigh. “You know, it took me a long time to forgive myself. For what I did to my mother, which in the end was worse than her being robbed in the first place. For ruining my own life. I wasn’t a bad person, Ruth, I hope you can believe that. I wish there was some way I could prove it to you.”
“I think sometimes, Thomas, good people make bad choices.”
“It’s funny, but that’s what my parole officer said to me.” There was a long pause, then he said, “In truth the prison, unto which we doom ourselves, no prison is…”
“That’s Whitman,” she said, stunned.
“You mentioned once he was your favorite poet. I can’t say I understand everything I read of his, but there were a few that hit me. That line, in particular.”
“It’s so true. How many of us make our own prisons, then live our lives within those walls.”
She looked at him sitting across from her, the candlelight flickering across his face, his brown eyes filled with caring and expectation. Was she going to continue living in the prison of her own past? She reached across the table and he looked down at her hand, then slowly his own hand drifted across the tablecloth until their fingers touched. Then he took her hand, and held it, squeezing, smiling.
It was all there in his eyes, his affection, his kindness, the promise of a future. And with it the realization that had been swirling in her head for days now. It was time to really let go of the past.
So she began to tell him everything.
42
THE DAYS THAT LED UP TO THE CONVENTION were busy ones for Lucy. Several nights each week were usually taken up with book club meetings, either in person or via Skype. In the brochure she was crafting to take to the convention she’d excitedly added to the cover: Now With 30 Book Clubs in 10 States! Inside she put a brief summary of the novel, along with her growing bookseller quotes and reviews. She was going to have five hundred printed up to give out at the convention.
Each day she also surfed the web for more book bloggers and sites where she could get some publicity, if someone was willing to read her book. Every once in a while she’d Google her name or title, amazed to find it mentioned in chat rooms and online book sites she’d never heard of, wondering how they’d heard of her. It was thrilling to see that word was spreading.
She went back to The Raptor Center often with Colin to check on their wounded eagle’s progress. And he was making some improvement. Just yesterday Kit again tried to spread his wings, and after releasing his talons from the branch finally lifted in the air, hovering a moment before landing awkwardly on the ground just a few feet from where he started. It wasn’t much, but Colin’s beaming smile was reward enoug
h for her.
She worked furiously on the new novel, the scenes spilling from her as she stood in the shower each morning, or drove to bookstores, her recorder filling up until she could get back to the cabin and type them up. Part of it was spending so much time with Colin, and the other was that she was researching online what to expect if they decided to move forward and build a life together.
Colin wanted to read passages and hinted each morning after his swim with a teasing smile that he was ready to repay her for paddling beside him. But she kept telling him not yet, she wasn’t ready. In truth, he didn’t know what she was actually writing about, just that it somehow involved birds. She knew it would have to be finished before she’d feel comfortable letting him see it. Otherwise he might misconstrue everything.
* * *
THERE ARE MANY WAYS TO BE INTIMATE WITH A MAN who is paralyzed from the waist down, Lucy learned. They began slowly, hesitantly and she was much more nervous than he was. That night, they sat on the dock watching the night sky unfold as the chorus of tree frogs, crickets and other night creatures began, a ritual she’d come to love. A glimpse of the beach on St. Augustine flashed across her mind and she knew in that moment she loved this as much. The wild, natural beauty of the northern woods, the hidden creatures of the night, even the coming winter, in which she envisioned the lake frozen over until it shone like glass, the ice-jeweled tree branches shimmering in the sun.
Earlier Colin had spent an hour loading firewood onto his deck, a task he had begun while she was away, in preparation for the coming cold weather. She watched from her cabin while he pushed himself up and down his deck, bringing logs and stacking them carefully on a wooden platform he must have had built so that no wood sat on the deck floor itself. Once again she was awed by his quiet strength, his will not to be daunted by the lowliest tasks.
Sitting beside him on a lawn chair now, she again thought he was like no one she’d ever met. Would she feel that way if she’d known him before? She wondered. Or was this strong yet tender man the result of his own loss, as she was the result of her own.
“Do you still miss the army?” she asked.
He took a long moment before answering. “Yes and no. I love living here, on the lake. But I miss my men. In the beginning I missed the structure, and the simplicity of the life. You never have much more than you can carry on your back.”
She thought about all she’d gone without in the past months, and not missed at all.
“I don’t miss the fear, for myself or one of them, that this day or hour might be your last. I don’t miss having to aim a rifle at someone, or the Godawful sand down your neck, in your eyes. I surely don’t miss the smell of garbage.”
He paused and looked up for a long moment. They were watching the nearly full moon, hoping to see birds making their way across the sky in the dark. Earlier Colin had explained that once migration began, which for some birds was already starting, they would fly day and night. And if you watched the moon carefully enough, you could see their silhouettes across its bright expanse as they winged past. Lucy was enthralled, having already spotted half a dozen.
“I never intended to make the army a career,” Colin continued after a while. “Not in the beginning. I just figured I’d straighten myself out and grow up. I was kind of lost when I graduated high school and to be truthful, I didn’t want to be like my old man. I loved him and there were a lot of good things about him, but Warwick is a small town. I heard the stories as I got older. I knew he cheated on my mother, and I knew there was a bit of that wild streak in me. I can’t imagine how that hurt her and…that’s why I wanted to wait for your divorce, you know?” He turned to her and smiled, as a ripple of unease swept through her.
A wisp of cloud drifted across the moon, and they watched the stars come out, one by one, as he talked softly, the trees and houses mere shadows in the distance. She could tell him the truth now, that David thought she was being foolish. That with a little more time she’d come to her senses. But she knew in her heart it was he who would come to his senses and realize it wasn’t love, but once again responsibility, and obligation, that was fueling his determination. Her attorney assured her that he could only delay things a while longer.
“I started as an Army Ranger,” Colin said, hushing her thoughts, “with a three-year tour, but after serving in Desert Storm, I reenlisted twice more. I knew it was hard on my mother, but after a while I felt like I was right where I always belonged. I got to see the world. And I felt good, proud to serve my country. Then 9/11 happened, and I just couldn’t leave after that. I was a soldier, it was the thing that defined me.”
“You don’t feel any bitterness about what happened?”
In the darkness he shook his head. “We all took risks, every time we left the blast zone. You lived in constant fear of being the next guy hit. But it could have been worse for me. I told you about the guys who got their heads blown apart. I saw too many of those, and if they make it home, somebody has to give up their life to care for you because you’re little more than a vegetable. Anyway, I don’t have it so bad. I can take care of myself. I have a pretty good life. The army sends me money every month, so I don’t have to worry about how I’ll survive financially. Not a bad life, really.” He turned and ran a finger down her cheek. “But then you came along and…now it’s a whole lot better.”
She smiled.
“There’s a lot you don’t know about me, Lucy. A lot you should know.”
“I realize that and…I guess I could say the same about myself.”
“Why don’t we take it slow, okay?”
She nodded.
He brought her hand to his mouth and opened it, kissing her palm softly, his lips brushing a path to her fingers, which he kissed one by one as her eyes closed.
“When I dream, I’m always the way I was before, as if the accident never happened,” he whispered. “That’s how I feel with you.”
Then he tugged her hand, to make her stand, which she did, understanding his signals already. She followed him into his cabin, where he turned out the lights, one by one, and by the glow of just a few candles, they lay on his bed and he held her full length against him, as the blood rushed to her middle. A moment later, he let go and slowly unbuttoned her blouse, kissing her collar bone, the tender hollow at the base of her neck, while a finger traced the curve of breast above her bra.
He began to kiss her on the mouth, longer, deeper, with a fierce hunger that matched her own. Her hands ran up and down his back, under his shirt, not knowing what would come next, but knowing that it no longer mattered. He stopped and looked deep in her eyes, then gently turned her around, her back to his chest. As they lay there in the candlelight, he whispered her name over and over again while his hands loved her as his body couldn’t.
43
HALFWAY THROUGH HER DRIVE TO THE CONVENTION in Philadelphia, Lucy found herself missing Colin already. The past days had been magical, each pierced with the clarity and beauty of simply being alive. It was strange, but it felt as though after all the struggles in her life, she was where she was meant to be. David was right about one thing—you couldn’t go back in life, you had to go forward. Once she let go of the past and stopped trying to hold back, she knew with certainty that she was in love with Colin. She had probably begun to fall in love with him in that first moment she saw him rising out of the lake, naked, beautiful, imperfect.
Last night they’d gone further in their intimacy, to a place she wasn’t certain was even possible. He seemed uneasy about her leaving again, and she assured him that this time there would be no delays coming back. He cooked a beautiful candlelit dinner while she readied for the trip. Afterward, as she lay on his bed waiting for him, he came out of the bathroom with nothing but a towel across his lap. As he swung himself up and onto the bed and then turned to face her, for the first time since that morning he emerged out of the lake, she saw all of him. And she was surprised to see that he was erect as any normal man.
“The miracle of modern medicine,” he whispered with a smile.
He pulled her to him, her skin igniting as it touched his, their bodies as close as it was possible to get without melting into each other. Then he slowly pulled her on top of him, their eyes locked as he held her above him, a moment more erotic than anything she’d ever experienced. Watching him as he watched her, his light blue eyes filled with wanting.
“Can you feel this, any of this?” she whispered.
“There’s something, like a shiver that runs through you. But believe me, I’m enjoying this every bit as much as you are.”
Then he took her hands, clasping her fingers, and she held on tightly as she moved for them both, rising, soaring, then finally tumbling back to earth.
As they lay there afterward, he asked, “Can you see a future for us?”
She opened her mouth to speak, but he put a finger to her lips.
“Don’t answer that now.”
She’d sat up. “Why not?”
He didn’t speak, but she knew what was going on. Although she’d told him that she wanted to tell Ruth about them, because she was still uneasy about all she’d been holding back, he’d asked her not to yet. Despite her own certainty, she knew Colin still harbored doubts about her being able to commit. How could he not, after Gloryanne?
Lucy was hoping that by the time she returned from the convention, David would finally give in and she could be open about everything. Because she was also tortured by holding back about that.
Finally he said, “This time with you here, it’s been like…”
“A dream?”
He nodded.
“I know. It’s like this magical place apart from the rest of the world.”
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