Lake Dreams

by Lee Ann Sontheimer Murphy

  By mid-morning, Cole had trimmed most of the weeds around the cabins, the pool, the playground and the office. Drenched with sweat, he used his arm to wipe his face. Every muscle he hadn’t used in a long time complained and he figured he’d be sore by morning. A warm satisfaction warmed Cole deep within, however, and he realized he enjoyed the physical work. In his career, he had no way to determine what difference he made but cutting weeds he could see the results of his hard work. He started down near the gate and moved back toward his cabin so when he quit Cole took a break sitting on the porch steps. A breeze wafted in from the lake and cooled him and he allowed his mind to drift, almost thoughtless.

  A giggle and the slam of car doors alerted him or he wouldn’t have noticed Maggie and her kids leaving. Maggie and her daughter’s auburn hair caught the sunlight and glistened, brilliant red and gold. Cole admired it. He’d never known anyone else with the same natural hair color.

  Since he’d spent several hours working, Cole now wanted to be lazy so he basked in the sun. He became part of the surroundings, soaking up sunshine like the greenery around him, still as one of the trees offering shade and yet Cole remained alert. The vista of sky and water yielded calm, a restful quiet easy on his soul. Being instead of acting soothed Cole and he remained outside for more than an hour. Hunger drove him inside and after slapping together a quick sandwich he showered, put on clean clothes and wondered what to do with the remainder of the day.

  Cole considered some possibilities – he could go fishing but he didn’t have any gear, read but he hadn’t brought any books, drive around Branson sightseeing, or take a nap. He almost succumbed to sleeping but instead Cole decided he’d go downtown. Maybe one of the flea markets he’d noticed the day before offered either used books or some old fishing poles and tackle. After the holiday weekend Cole thought he might brave the Strip but he’d heard enough horror stories and remembered the traffic too well to try it now.

  Cole almost regretted his decision as he waited in traffic to reach Main Street and circled the block six times before he whipped into a just vacated parking space. One of the flea markets he remembered had been an old fashioned mom and pop grocery store but the place now featured a little bit of a lot of things. He browsed each aisle, marveling over how high some prices seemed and surprised how inexpensive some things seemed to be. He didn’t hurry and looked at just about everything, a range between old granite ware coffee pots to Beanie Babies and Hot Wheels.

  Among the trash and treasures he found an old fishing rod with a Zebco 202 reel. Although the vintage fiberglass rod showed wear and a few minor cracks, the reel was in good shape so he grabbed it. Cole sorted through shelves of old paperback novels, picking out some old favorites, a Dean Koontz novel, two by Tom Clancy, and a couple others he hadn’t read before. On impulse, he added a box of old fishing lures much like those he recalled in his grandpa’s tackle box. He found baseball style cap he could wear while working around Maggie’s. At the cash register Cole picked up a bottle of water then carried his purchases out to the car.

  He stowed them in the trunk and decided to head up the block and visit Dick’s Five and Dime. Cole remembered the traditional variety store from his childhood and after he entered, he couldn’t see many changes. The crowded aisles yielded everything from tourist knick-knacks and hillbilly humor items to cotton dishtowels, the kind his grandma used to embroider, to iron skillets and brands he’d thought long out of business. Cole picked up a little more fishing tackle and a plastic tackle box although the price seemed a little high. If he waited he might find it cheaper at a Wal-Mart but Cole wanted it now so he indulged himself.

  After Cole paid, he joined the crowds thronging the sidewalks and found his way back to his vehicle. Fifteen minutes later, despite the heavy traffic, Cole turned into the resort. Maggie’s car wasn’t back but he grinned to see two little girls, their long hair in tandem braids, swinging on the weed-free swing set. Another family splashed in the pool and an elderly man sitting out on the porch of one cabin lifted his hand in greeting so Cole waved back. Cole unloaded his new fishing gear, strung the rod with nylon line and decided he’d try casting.

  He hadn’t fished in years or even handled a fishing pole. His few clumsy efforts frustrated him but Cole caught his stride and began casting with ease. Several times his line caught in the branches of a tree but he untangled it and after about forty five minutes, Cole could cast without difficulty, landing about wherever he wanted. The whirr of the Zebco 202 reel echoed like music in his ears and until then he’d never realized how much he missed fishing or his grandfather.

  “Slow down, son,” grandpa said from the porch. The fragrant aroma of the Raleigh cigarettes he smoked wafted on the wind to where Cole stood, fishing rod in hand. “You’re going at it like a wildman. Just be calm and make the line go where you want it to.”

  “I can’t,” Cole whined, a tired twelve year old who wanted to go swimming.

  “Oh yes you can,” grandpa told him. “There’s no such word as ‘can’t’ because you can do anything you put your mind to doing.”

  Pop had been right, Cole thought, as the memory washed over him. His sage advice and insistence Cole could do anything remained sound. All these months he’d believed he couldn’t get over losing his family and carried the burden on his back, heavy in his soul but in the remembered echo of his grandfather’s voice, Cole realized he could. He wouldn’t have if Pop’s old saying hadn’t flashed back into his mind, evoked by the fishing pole in his hands. Since the cold November night when the officer rang the doorbell and delivered the news about his family Cole lived cozy with ‘can’t’. He stepped into the trap and let it spring shut, pinning him in place until this moment when his grandfather’s words released him.

  I won’t heal instantly, Cole thought, but I can and I will.

  With the clarity of hindsight, he understood why his station manager forced him into a three month leave of absence. His life had been on a fast downward spiral and the best he could’ve hoped for would have been to keep his usual routines, going through the motions like a puppet for the rest of his life. Whether or not Cole returned to his weather anchor job or St. Louis didn’t matter. He’d emerge stronger and whole again. He might be scarred but he’d live. That was the important thing.

  Like a child with a revelation he longed to rush down and tell Maggie she hadn’t returned yet. His gut told him any of his friends, close or otherwise back home would just say ‘I told you so’ and so, although he’d sworn he wouldn’t turn the phone on at all for three months, he put away his new fishing gear and got his Blackberry off the charger. There was one person who would want to know and he called her.

  “Mom?” he said when his mother answered the phone at home in the old Bevo Mills neighborhood. He could envision her in the two story rambling old house on the corner of Bates Street across from Concordia Cemetery.

  “Cole, thank God,” she replied with a sigh. “I’ve been worried sick about you. I didn’t even know if you made it to Branson or not. How are you, honey?”

  “I’m good,” he said and meant it for the first time in months. “Don’t worry about me, Mom. Lake Dreams is exactly where I needed to be. Lots of memories are here and it’s helping. I bought some fishing stuff and I was practicing casting when I remembered Pop’s old thing about no such word as ‘can’t’.”

  His words tumbled out with an enthusiastic free flow he’d lacked in recent months. Most of his conversations with anyone had been stilted and forced because he didn’t want to talk, had nothing to say. Cole chattered into his mother’s ear and when he paused for breath, he heard a muffled noise.

  “Mom?” he said, concerned because it sounded like she might be crying.

  “I’m here,” his mother replied, her voice husky with emotion. “You made my day, Cole. For the first time since you lost your wife and the kids, I think you’re going to make it.”

  He’d been a heel and never realized it. “Sure, I am. Jeez, Mom, don’t
cry. It makes me feel bad.”

  She sniffed and snuffed back tears. “I won’t then, because you sound good, son. I’m so glad you called me. Whatever’s there helping, you hang onto it.”

  Cole thought of Maggie but he didn’t mention her. “I will, Mom. I’ll let you go. Tell Dad ‘hi’ and I guess everything’s okay?”

  “It’s the same old, same old,” she answered with a lighter note in her voice. “Call me once in awhile, would you Cole?”

  “Sure, I will.”

  Long after he ended the call, thoughts of the old neighborhood haunted him, the good, some bad, all familiar. Cole thought of the home where he’d grown up, the youngest child by almost a decade. His brothers and sisters were in high school before he began kindergarten and out of the house before he reached his teens. So the three left standing, Cole and his parents, rattled around the big house like lost souls and he spent most of his time down the block at his grandparents. Jarek Celinksi, known around the neighborhood as ‘Polish Jack’ bought his narrow frame two-story house around the time he returned from World War II. Babka Sophie, his grandma, kept house, raised her brood of nine children, and spoiled Cole rotten. American born to immigrant parents, they spoke with no more than an occasional touch of accent and didn’t keep most of the Old World superstitions. Neither minded living across from Concordia Cemetery or down the street from St. Michael’s cemetery.

  Most of the frame houses were built in the early 1900’s and the neighborhood around the actual Bevo Mill grew up to house blue collar working class families just like Cole’s. If Pop, his grandpa, hadn’t gone fishing with friends at Branson in the early 1950’s, Cole might never have known about the place, let alone spent summers there. And he’d never known Maggie if he hadn’t.

  With a warm fondness for his grandparents, especially his Pop, Cole settled out on the porch with a book and whiled away the rest of the afternoon. He heard Maggie when she came back but he didn’t move. Tomorrow he’d talk to her, tell her about his epiphany but for now, he was content with his memories.

  After watching a colorful sunset drench the western sky with vivid color Cole fried up a hamburger in the small kitchen. When he pressed the patty together, he noticed the meat looked darker than it should but he shrugged it off. Just as he sat down to eat, someone tapped at his door and when he opened it, Maggie stood there, face blotchy as if she’d been crying. Tension thrummed in the air around her, almost audible, nearly strong enough to touch.

  “Cole, are you busy?” she asked and then walked into the cabin as if she owned it, which he guessed she did.

  “I was about to eat a hamburger but it can wait,” he said. “Is something wrong?”

  Maggie sighed with a rush of air and a murmured moan. “No, I’m just tired and lonely.”

  “Where’re the kids?”

  She sat down on the sofa and sprawled back on the pillows. “Oh, I guess I didn’t tell you – I drove them over to Joplin to spend a couple of weeks with Dwight’s parents. They go every summer sometime during Memorial Day weekend. Kaitlin and Kiefer hate it over there because they see the Browns just twice a year, now and around the holidays. There’s nothing to do and they don’t know anyone.”

  From her melancholy tone, he didn’t think she cared much for the visits either. He leaned against the waist high divider separating living room from kitchen. “So why send them if they don’t want to go?”

  Maggie’s clear grey gaze met his as she said, “Guilt, I suppose. I didn’t love Dwight and his parents know it. They lost their son and so I felt like I couldn’t deny them the chance to see their only grandkids. It seemed right and then it became carved in stone. When they get back, I’ll have them a few weeks and then they’ll fly out to California to spend July with my parents. It’s what I call the annual tug of war between the grandparents and I’m the rope they jerk around. By the time they get back, I’ll have two weeks or so until school starts. I trust my folks to watch them but I’m never sure about the Browns. They let them do things I won’t. Kiefer can’t swim, not a lick, and they’ve taken the kids swimming in creeks before. And they drop them off at the mall for hours alone. I worry, Cole, besides missing them.”

  Cole’d assumed her kids would be around all summer, helping at the resort but no, they were sent hither and yon during Maggie’s busy season. Now he understood why she didn’t pick a day for him to take them all to Silver Dollar City. The kids wouldn’t be around until later and then in short spurts. “I’m sorry,” he said although it didn’t seem adequate. “I wish I could make it better for you.”

  She smiled and said, “You do, just being here. It won’t be as lonely since you’re around. I think the last summer I wasn’t blue and lonesome was the last time you were here.”

  Cole chuckled. “I remember you had a lot of giggly girlfriends. What happened to them?”

  “Most of them moved away,” Maggie said. “Tori and Donna still live here but I don’t see them much. They’ve got careers, kids, and husbands. Wives don’t like widows hanging around, especially when the widow’s husband od’ed out on the lake during a bad ass party. They’re respectable, I’m not.”

  Anger bubbled up on her behalf. “That’s silly. Of course you are.”

  Maggie shot him a high caliber look straight down her nose and snorted. “Would your late wife have thought so, Cole?”

  He opened his mouth to say ‘sure’ and paused. Victoria’d been none too fond of his humble origins in Bevo and if he spoke truth, he’d have to say she probably wouldn’t think running an aged resort to be any better, probably worse.

  “That’s what I thought,” Maggie said, with a sigh as she crossed her arms across her chest. “Maybe it’s what you think, too. Maybe every damn body is right. I don’t know.”

  He’d almost forgotten her temper matched her red hair but Cole could almost see the tension between them, wavering like heat lighting on a summer night. Her rigid body stood at attention and her eyes, calm earlier, flashed fire now. He understood such turbulent emotion, a simmering stew of feelings on the verge of explosion. He’d drowned his for the past six months but Maggie’s current emotions ticked like a timer on a bomb. Two choices loomed – defuse her or take the brunt of her fury.

  Cole chose the first and crossed the small room with two strides. Until he reached her, he had no plan, no clue what he’d do. She glared at him, arms still crossed, chin jutting out in a way he remembered all too well and a dark expression. Beneath her anger, though, he sensed hurt and a need for comfort.

  Acting on instinct he offered her his hand and she uncurled her arms to accept it, eyes wary. Cole pulled her to her feet and her grey eyes turned almost black.

  “Are you asking me to leave?” she asked, her voice harsher than he ever remembered hearing it.

  “No,” Cole said, “I’m doing the only thing I know to help.”

  He bent to kiss her, his lips covering her mouth with a quiet tenderness at first, a touch so light it was nothing more than a flutter but when they connected, Maggie put her arms on his shoulders, then around his neck and he kissed her for real, his mouth seeking hers with the earnest intent of someone witching for water in a drought.

  Chapter Seven

  Somewhere over the past couple of years, Cole and Victoria drifted apart and he couldn’t keep her close any more than he might catch a floating leaf drifting away in a swift running stream. In full make-up mode, face schooled to perfection, she didn’t want her lips marred and so he’d got into the habit of giving her air kisses or social ones. What few kisses they shared were in bed, a prelude to intimacy. Cole’d almost forgotten how pleasant kissing a woman could be until he kissed Maggie.

  Her lips yielded to his unexpected kiss, warm and silky beneath his mouth. Something sparked between them, old and familiar but new too. The kiss kindled desire. Want surged strong and rich through Cole’s body and he felt renewed. Fiery electricity danced through his nervous system, tingling and reviving him. When Maggie touched him and pla
ced her hands on his body she stirred the embers almost gone cold in the ashes of his soul. His living force within soared and caught fire with a whoosh rocketing from his feet to his head and Cole reacted.

  Cole didn’t think, just experienced. He inhaled the essence of her shampoo, caught a whiff of her perfume, and tasted lingering coffee on her lips. Her slender body shifted until she stood so close a thin sheet of paper couldn’t pass between them and heat filled the slender space. His years away, the months of tragic induced agony, the maturity of his third decade, more than halfway to his fourth melted like candy in the rain as Cole embraced the wild, heady intoxication of youth. A carnal yearning rose in him like a wild animal’s need to mate and yet something else tempered his lust with a caring sense of connection. He wanted to ravish and yet nurture her, all at once. He ached to use her like a whore and own her but on a deeper level Cole longed to become one with her, to twine not just bodies but merge souls.

  He deepened the kiss until his tongue worked into her mouth and Maggie moved the rest of the way until her breasts rubbed his chest. Her soft mews of pleasure told Cole could have her, take her there on the living room couch, her body supported against the pillows she’d chosen at Wal-Mart or JC Penney’s. He didn’t doubt it and because he knew he could, he didn’t. Cole let the kiss wind down, slow and easy. He allowed one of his hands to crawl from her back to fondle her full breasts with a gentle caress. He almost lost control when she arched her back like a satisfied cat but Cole eased back to normal, his breath a little too quick and grinned at her. Maggie smiled back with an unfocused gaze. She looked the way he felt when he came out of a movie he’d really gotten involved with, dreamy until he walked out into the sunlight and experienced a jolt of reality.

  “Oh, Cole,” she breathed, her tone filled with appreciation and what might be affection.