Memory Tree

by Pittman, Joseph

  “You look great,” Sara said moments later when Brian made his way down the stairs.

  He’d gone with the jeans-and-blazer look.

  “Janey’s suggestion.”

  “He almost wore a tie,” Janey stated, disapproval evident in her voice.

  “If it’s any consolation, Brian, Trina called me three times.”

  “Grown-ups are weird,” Janey decided. “Come on, Sara, let’s see what’s for dinner.”

  The two of them ventured off to the kitchen, allowing Brian to escape their clutches—and further judgments—and he headed out into the dark night to his truck. He stared at it, realizing it was the most ridiculous vehicle to show up for a date with; it was old and the engine rattled, and truth be known, it had been Annie’s and he really didn’t feel right about taking it out for a spin on the dating wheel. His old Grand Am lay idle in the barn, but it was at least more appropriate for such an excursion. Going back inside the house for the keys, he couldn’t help but overhear an exchange between Janey and Sara.

  “It’s going to be a house full of Duncans,” she said.

  “That will be wonderful, Janey. Family is important, especially around the holidays.”

  “But they’re Brian’s family, not mine,” she said. “I mean, I don’t even know what to call them.”

  “But I’m sure you’ll get more gifts.”

  Brian slipped back outside, carefully avoiding detection and wishing he’d just driven the truck. If he had, he wouldn’t have heard what Janey said, comments that tore deep at his heart. True, Didi and Kevin Duncan were his parents and not her grandparents. And she had referred to him just now as Brian, not Dad, as they had established two years ago after an episode that had threatened their trust. Maybe his parents’ imminent arrival was more impactful on Janey than he had thought—or than she was letting on. He made a mental note to sit down and talk to her again without distraction. But that would have to wait.

  For now, he had a date.

  A word that sounded even stranger to him than Dad.

  RiverFront Restaurant and Resort was located at the western edge of the city of Hudson, just a twenty-minute drive from Linden Corners, a combination four-star hotel and spa, as well as an upscale restaurant that overlooked the banks of the city’s eponymous river. It was where Mark Ravens’ primary job was, his main source of income as a waiter and occasional host, which afforded him the chance to provide for his wife and soon-to-arrive child. His job at the tavern was supplemental, the commute unbeatable. His job here also provided him with connections, so the staff had been alerted to the fact that Brian Duncan and Trina Winter were to be treated like family.

  “Good evening, Mr. Duncan. Ms. Winter,” said a tuxedo-clad gentleman with silver hair and a smile, standing tall behind the check-in desk. “Your table is ready if you are—and it comes with a lovely view of the river.”

  “How nice,” Trina said.

  The maître d’, with his slicked-back hair and bow tie making Brian feel underdressed, led them across the floor and to a table for four that provided them with room to spread out. Dim lighting cast a hush over the dining area, which meant that even though a few tables were occupied with diners near them, they were encased in their own private corner, and true to the man’s word, the mighty Hudson was seemingly within reach.

  “Again, how nice,” Trina said, gazing through the reflective glass at the river.

  Night was in full bloom, with moonlight streaming across the currents like waves of light.

  “Mark’s doing, no doubt,” he said.

  “Mark speaks very highly of you, Brian,” Trina said, pushing her hair back from her face. She wore more makeup tonight than Brian had seen her with before, and a lone gold necklace dangled from her neck. “He told me that without you he wouldn’t have had the guts to get his life together. It was the relief bartender job that allowed him to get to know Sara so well—and we know how well that turned out.” She paused, seemingly using the river view as an excuse to collect her thoughts. “If you want to know the truth, it wasn’t your friends Nora and Cynthia who convinced me to come on this date; it was Mark.”

  “Nice to have an independent’s endorsement,” he said.

  “I don’t know Mark well. I mean, how could I, since I barely know my own father? I’m not exactly comfortable with the Ravens side of the family.”

  “What do you say we get a drink before we, uh, delve into our lives?”

  “Sounds perfect.”

  A waiter arrived and took their order, a seltzer with lime for him, Trina asking if they had Johnny Blue, her face lighting up when the waiter confirmed they stocked it. He handed them menus and left them to peruse their choices. Silence settled over the new couple, leaving Brian wondering if the lack of conversation was acceptable. Was it a good sign they were comfortable not filling every single moment with conversation, or a bad one, the fact that they were out of topics before the first drink?

  “So, Brian, you really don’t drink?”

  “Haven’t touched a drop in three years. Well, except once.”

  “Fall off the wagon?” she asked.

  “Voluntarily. In tribute.”

  “Care to share?”

  This one was easy, Linden Corners 101. He told her about kindly George Connors and how he had taken a wet-behind-the-ears Brian under his wing at his bar, then called Connors’ Corner, and by doing so helped initiate Brian into village life. While the story’s ending was sad, it was inspiring too, with Brian adding, “I don’t think I would have remained in town if not for George. When he passed away quietly just moments after pouring that one last beer, I did as he’d intended and I drank it down. I might have taken over his bar, but never again did I take a drop from the taps. Those are for my customers.”

  “That’s a sad story, but a lovely one.”

  “Welcome to Linden Corners,” he said. “We rise from the ashes.”

  Their drinks arrived and they cheered the phoenix, drank, and then studied their menus.

  “So,” he said, realizing it was the ideal transition word. “How’s your father doing?”

  “Ah, Richie,” she said.

  “You call him Richie?”

  “It’s complicated,” she said, again pushing her styled hair back over her ear, keeping the strands from covering her face. “I didn’t grow up with him. We’ve only been in touch . . . recently, the last few years or so. I had a stepfather who was always there for me.”

  “Had? Sounds like past tense.”

  “My mother is on her third husband.”

  “Always in search of the next ex-Mr.?”

  “She’s a fickle woman.”

  Brian laughed. “So I’m learning—about fickle women.”

  “Who would that be?”

  “Janey. Confession time? I almost wore a tie tonight. I was advised against one.”

  “Janey is your daughter.”

  “My . . . yeah, my daughter.”

  “Sounds like another story.”

  “Parental relationships can be complicated,” he said. “Which, by the way, you didn’t tell me how Richie’s doing.”

  “Richie is ornery.”

  “Well, we all know that.”

  “When he fell from the roof of the Solemn Nights, he broke his leg in three places. As you’ve no doubt heard, he’s in a cast and of course can’t get around much. Once it comes off, it will be weeks, maybe months, of physical therapy until he’s back to normal. It also leaves me as the manager of a roadside motel outside a rinky-dink town that seemingly can’t wait to celebrate Christmas.”

  “Have you put up lights around the motel yet?”

  “Richie doesn’t partake.”

  Brian nodded. “So I remember. It’s always a pretty dark stretch of road there no matter the season. You know, you could change that this year, and I can help put them up if you want. Keep Richie off of ladders, right?”

  “Um, we’ll see. I don’t want to come here and change things.”


  “I think you already have,” Brian said, suddenly feeling a rush of blood to his neck, making him blush. Where was that tie when you needed it? “Uh, anyway, you know, I stayed at the Solemn Nights when I first came to Linden Corners.”

  “Let me guess, you first had lunch or dinner at the Five-O and Martha sent you over.”

  Brian raised his glass in acknowledgment. “How long have you been in town?”

  “Long enough, apparently.”

  He noticed she hadn’t taken him up on the Christmas lights offer. “You make it sound like your being here is temporary.”

  “It is,” she said, far too quickly. “I do have a life elsewhere.”

  Brian quieted down at that point, the string of questions in his mind suddenly tangled. He could make no sense of her, and even if he asked her more, was he confident in Trina’s answers? He wondered just what he was doing on this date. A date with a woman who had no intention of sticking around town beyond the terms of her obligation. But as he reminded himself, this was an appeasement date. Dine, relax, go home—separately—and then the next day tell your friends she’s/he’s nice, but nothing to pursue. No spark.

  Except he wasn’t sure that last part was entirely correct.

  Thankfully the waiter returned and took their dinner order, handily distracting them from their staccato-sounding back-and-forth dialogue. She would have the salmon, he the skirt steak, and she also put in an order for a second drink, and then the waiter was off, far too quickly for Brian’s comfort. He imagined that he was fast losing Trina’s attention, as there were lots of topics touched upon but he’d found no common ground between them. Maybe he’d spent too much time consumed with Janey’s problems and insecurities, to the point where he no longer knew how to carry on a conversation with an adult, not counting Cynthia and Bradley—they were his friends—and Nora, whom he’d gotten to know only last year and had flirted with only to decide they worked best as friends. Other than that, his dating opportunities were relegated to his memory banks. Memories filled with early promise and ultimate demise.

  “I have an idea, Brian,” Trina suddenly said.

  “Uh, okay?”

  “I know what we agreed upon, but it’s pretty clear this is a real date.”

  “Yeah, guess it feels like one.”

  “And a first one, at that.”

  “So what do you propose?”

  “Just two people having dinner. Takes the pressure off.”

  “An interesting proposal,” he said.

  “I mean, this can’t lead anywhere. I’m not staying and you’re not leaving.”

  “Good point.”

  “You’re a nice guy, but I’m not looking for any kind of guy.”

  “Fair enough.”

  “Plus, you have a kid and I don’t want a kid.”

  Okay, that revelation shook him, and he wasn’t sure how to respond. “That’s . . . honest.”

  “Sorry, I didn’t mean that to sound so . . . harsh. Look at my life, Brian,” she said. “My parents had me and then divorced when I was three years old. My mother remarried, an older guy named Charles Winter, and not that I had any choice in the matter, but he adopted me, hence my legal last name. Bye-bye to Richie Ravens and any link to my actual family. Charles, whom I always called Dad, also had two children—both sons—from a previous marriage, which meant we were like a modern-day Brady Bunch, truncated for sure, and without the quick thirty-minute resolution to our problems.” She paused before drinking her scotch. “Trina Winter in a nutshell. Your turn.”

  Seltzer water seemed wholly inappropriate at the moment, so he ignored his beverage and leaped into the deep end of the pool she’d taken them to. “After my fiancée’s betrayal, I moved away from New York City and ended up in a small town called Linden Corners, where I met a woman, fell in love, and after she passed away in a freak accident, I was granted guardianship of her at-the-time seven-year-old daughter. She’s ten now, and while I don’t know where the time has gone, she’s the absolute center of my life and I couldn’t imagine waking without knowing she was there for me, and I for her. My best friends and Janey’s support system just announced they are moving away, and to top it all off, my frosty parents, who haven’t exactly approved of my life change, phoned me on Thanksgiving to say they were coming for an extended holiday visit—their first ever to Linden Corners.”

  She dangled her drink before him, and he wondered if it was a tease or an offer. “Okay, Windmill Man, you win that round. I just have to deal with Richie’s eccentricities, and even he gives me a night off like tonight to knock back a few,” she said with a surprising laugh, one that allowed a natural smile to cross her lips. He thought at that moment, with her mix of humor and sympathy, that she was as attractive as he’d seen her. Candlelight highlighting her eyes, she was a far cry from the desperate woman he’d met that night at the tavern.

  Dinner arrived then, and they dug in heartily, happy for the distraction. They switched to the safety of small talk, his life down at the tavern, her experiences at the motel, the two of them finding common ground in the fact that both businesses tended to attract the transient. Brian admitted that when he’d left New York, setting out on the road for where he didn’t know, he’d envisioned ending up much farther from New York City than the Hudson River Valley.

  “I ended up less than three hours away from the city.”

  “Where do you think you’d have gone?”

  “At that point in my life, I think Alaska wouldn’t have been far enough.”

  “She hurt you a lot. This old girlfriend.”

  “Fiancée,” he corrected, as though such a label added weight to the betrayal. “Let’s just say I never expected what was going on. Big-city ambitions make you appreciate a place like Linden Corners. As George said, there’s a simpler way of life here, where your neighbors are your friends, not strangers. When you ask for help, they ask how—not that you ever need to ask; the residents here just seem to know when someone is in need. Like tonight, Trina, I’m actually enjoying myself.”

  “Gee, a girl loves compliments like that.”

  “No, it’s not about you, and I’m sorry if it sounded that way,” he said. “It’s hard to be selfish in Linden Corners, and I think that for the past two-plus years I’ve been on autopilot. Caring for Janey on a daily basis, caring for George’s bar, back and forth between home and the tavern, I just do, act, respond. If Gerta needs something, I’m there. Same with Cynthia, Nora.”

  “Meaning you’ve put Brian Duncan on hold?”

  “How could I not? The situation I found myself in, I’m the last person who needs help.”

  “Your friends think otherwise,” she said.

  “You’re in the same boat, taking on the role of caregiver, which means you’ve put your life on ice too.”

  “Look at that, something in common.”

  Silence again fell between them, Brian noting it came tinged with an uneasiness he could remember from early dates with his old high school flame, Lucy, and even with the alluring, sexy Maddie, whom he was convinced he’d fallen in love with their first night together. He was feeling a connection suddenly with Trina, and whether it was the bright flicker of candlelight that danced in her eyes or the distant sound of waves upon the shore, it was a magic word that neither had consciously recognized. This newfound awkwardness meant a shift had occurred tonight. Two people, both vulnerable, feeling the pressure of responsibility, had been given the gift of a night off from their lives and a chance to explore something beyond their daily routine. For a moment Brian Duncan considered a breach of his tightly held self by ordering an after-dinner drink.

  But Trina spoke up before he could address the waiter, and the moment passed.

  “What do you say we get out of here? I for one could go for a walk along the river.”

  A romantic gesture, he thought, one that froze him in his tracks.

  Not because he wasn’t attracted to Trina, not because he feared intimacy.

&nbs
p; It was the location, along the banks of the Hudson River. It made him think of Annie.

  “You’ve grown quiet. Was this a bad idea?”

  Brian had indeed gone silent, afraid if he spoke his tone would give him away.

  They had left the restaurant and at Trina’s suggestion ventured beyond the chains of the parking lot and into the accompanying park. The park was closed for the night; the swings were silent and the wind grew as quiet as Brian. Bypassing the park benches and continuing up a grassy slope that Trina hoped would afford them a beautiful view of the river, Brian wondered just how to answer her question.

  “Are you afraid of heights, Brian?”

  “No, it’s not that . . . ,” he said.

  “Then what’s wrong? Why the hesitation?”

  “Nothing,” he insisted. “Here, take my hand; it’s a little slippery from the recent rain.”

  Brian reached out in the darkness, feeling Trina’s hand connect with his. It was the first act of physicality between them, and he wasn’t sure how he felt about that. Her touch was warm, and as he guided her up the last few feet of the hill, he caught her expression in the moonlight, she as relaxed as he’d seen her. Not that he knew her well at all, but he sensed that beneath her cool exterior was a gentle, generous soul. Someone who traveled all these miles and put her life on hold to care for an injured father she barely knew certainly had more to her than a brusque manner. If only she had chosen a place other than the hills above the river to end their first date.

  At last they emerged at the top of the hill, Trina scoping out a large rock with a smooth surface on which to stand and stare down at the languid waters of the Hudson. He too gazed out at the way the river merged with the distant horizon, backlit by the glimmering moon. To say the setting was romantic was an understatement, and he was about to suggest they make their way back to avoid this going any further when Trina heightened the romance. He felt her lips upon his, soft and tentative. Like she too wasn’t sure this was the right thing to be doing, her mind telling her one thing, her heart acting independently. She didn’t pull back, their kiss lingering, while above them came the squawk of a soaring seagull.