“Does he live here?” I ask politely, and Evita turns to me and smiles.
“He’s my grandson. My daughter Maria’s boy.”
I think of the two girls I saw walking together earlier. I wonder which one is Maria, and why on earth she would choose to name her son Crew.
I follow Evita down the path and the steps to the Main Lodge. She disappears into the kitchen with the bowl, her voice rising and falling through the door that’s swinging open and shut after her. Frank and the two Muscles are standing over a table covered in papers. As I approach, he lifts a hand to say hello, but then quickly looks back down. I take a seat in an armchair next to a big window and look at a map of the village that’s sitting on a coffee table in front of me. On the other side of the room, the three men huddle together, their voices dropping so low that I can barely hear them. I’m looking at the lines representing paths on the map, tracing them with my finger so that I can try to make my way to the beach when I feel a hand on the back of my head.
“Hey there.”
I look up and see a Crew that I’ve never seen before. He’s dirty, covered in mud and leaves and sweat has soaked through his t-shirt. There’s a gash on one hand that probably needs to be cleaned and a streak of dirt down one side of his face.
“Hey, yourself. That looks nasty.”
He looks down at the cut and shrugs. “It’s just a scratch. Did you eat something?”
I nod and stand up next to him.
“Yes. Was the basket from you? I didn’t hear you come back in.”
He looks a little awkward for a second and then smiles.
“Sorry. I can’t take credit for all of that. I gave the bagel to Maria and then asked her make you up a tray.”
“Oh,” I stammer, “well, thank her for me.”
“I will.”
I want to ask him about the little boy I met but before I can say anything, Frank calls Crew over. They stand shoulder to shoulder around the table nodding and pointing at things and then one of the Muscles starts speaking into an earpiece. I watch them, trying to pick up any clues about what might be going on but they give nothing away other than it’s obviously something serious, and they don’t want me to know about it.
“Do you want to go for a swim?” Crew says when he’s back at my side. “I’ve finished for the day. I want to show you around.”
I look up at him for a moment and then back over to where Frank and the Muscles are laughing and passing around cigarettes.
“Don’t worry about any of that,” he says softly as he bends down and kisses me lightly on my cheek. He smells like earth and salt and sunshine. As if he’s part of the forest itself.
“Is it something bad?” I say, and he takes my hand, leading me out through a doorway and down a path that leads to the beach.
“Not really. It’s an ongoing thing. I don’t want you to worry about any of it.”
“Crew,” say, stopping so that he has to stop too. “Don’t treat me like a child. If there’s something wrong, tell me about it. You don’t need to protect me.”
He looks back at me for a second and then sighs.
“Come with me.”
Chapter Thirty Three
Crew
I open the door to my office and stand back so that Hartley can walk through. She takes a moment to look around and then turns to me with a smile.
“This is messy.”
“It is not!”
“Crew,” she laughs triumphantly, “this is messy! I knew it! Everybody has a drawer or a cupboard or a room - ”
“Or a whole house - ”
“Somewhere that they keep in a mess. It’s scientifically proven.”
“Proven how? State your source.”
She laughs, ignoring me, and looks at the pile of papers on my desk.
“I feel so much better now knowing that you have this room,” she sighs happily. “All of that minimalism and order was starting to freak me out.”
“Don’t get too excited, kid. I share this office with the foreman and most of this is his mess.”
She narrows her eyes at me and sits down on one of the chairs opposite the desk.
“What did you want to show me?”
I walk around behind the desk and open the top drawer with a key.
“These.”
She watches as I spread the plans for my newest project out across the table.
“What is it?”
“This is Still Waters. It’s something I’ve been working on for three years. It’s a new direction for me. I’m not saving the land from development this time; the land is already protected. This project is more about education and conservation. I want to build a place where scientists, policymakers, and environmentalists can meet and talk and hopefully build relationships that will bring about some innovations in the future.”
I move back so she can look at the plans properly. She traces over the lines on the page, and it reminds me of the first time she drew on my body with her fingertip.
“This looks amazing,” she breathes, “is that a lab? It’s so huge. What’s that?”
“That’s a Great Hall. It’s for lectures and conferences.”
“How did you come up with the name? I love it.”
“It’s the traditional name of the land. There’s a lake there that used to be known as Still Waters.”
She’s quiet for a while, looking over each detail in the plan. Her lips move as she quietly relays the details of the drawings to herself – the measurements, the layout, the proposed building materials, and I realize with a jolt that she’s memorizing them.
“It’s going to be wonderful,” she says at last, looking up. “This is exactly what my sector needs. We all want to do things better, but we’re so disjointed; there’s no dialogue between scientists locked up in the lab and the politicians working at a state or federal level. It’s a brilliant idea.”
She looks at me, her face bright and her eyes sparkling. I feel my heart swell in my chest, and it makes me want to look away. She’s staring at me like she’s prouder of me than she’s ever been of anyone. Like I’m her hero.
“So,” I say, clearing my throat, “the reason the project has stalled is because we’ve had some threats from another company that wants me to sell them the land. It’s not a big deal, and there’s no immediate danger, so I don’t want you to worry. Frank is just overprotective, and I make him tell me everything because I like to be kept well informed.”
I gather up the plans and lock them back in the drawer. The office is stifling.
“Let’s go for a swim.”
We walk to the door, and she takes one last look at the office before smiling to herself and following me out into the sun.
“I’ve got an idea,” she says, as she swims over to me and wraps her arms around my neck.
“I’ve got an idea, too. Do you think it’s the same one?”
“I doubt it,” she laughs, “but I like your idea, too. Mine first.”
I grin at her and lick a droplet of salt water from the tip of her nose.
“I think we should re-establish the question rule. Honest answers, no stalling.”
“Hartley,” I groan into her neck, “I like my idea better.”
“Three questions,” she says, pulling away. “And I promise I’ll give you proper answers.”
“Babe, if you want to ask me something, just ask. You can have three hundred questions if you want. I’ve told you all of the hard stuff. I’m pretty sure I can handle ‘favorite colors’ and ‘who my favorite band was in high school’ now.”
She looks at me for a moment and bites her lip.
“Say it.”
“Ok. Today I met a little boy who told his name was Crew. There was something about him….and I was just wondering, if, maybe, oh God. Crew, is he your son?”
I stop paddling for a moment and put my feet down on the ocean floor. She’s actually serious.
“You think I have a child that I haven’t told you about?
”
“No. Well, maybe. You made it clear that you had some crazy years after the accident, and he looked about five. The timeline fits.”
“First of all,” I say, pulling her to me and kissing her hard on the mouth. “I may have been crazy, but I always, always, used protection. And second of all, there are five boys named Crew in the local village, and one girl. The kids are named after me because I gave their parents a job that pays American wages and allows them to move home from the city. I ask them not to do it, but they do it anyway.”
“Oh,” she says into my shoulder. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s ok. Keep going.”
“How often do you have nightmares like the one you had last night?”
“Almost every night. Unless I’m drunk. Next?”
“Have you seen a therapist about them?”
“No.”
“Would you?”
“No.”
“Did you mean it when you said you loved me?”
I push her away from me a little, so I can look down into her face. Her hair is tied back, and her eyes are golden and glinting in the sunlight. I think she’s gained a few more freckles in the time we’ve been out in the water.
“I thought that love was this singular, wonderful, overwhelming thing. I was lucky enough to have it with Jessie, and after she died, I was convinced that anything else would just be a cheap imitation. I didn’t realize that love could be different, feel different, with someone else. It’s a relief that what we have isn’t the same as what I had with Jess. The things I’m feeling for you, Hartley, I can honestly say that I’ve never felt them before. This isn’t teenage love. I know who I am, and I know what I want. So yes, I meant it. I’ll never stop meaning it.”
“Crew,” she says, swimming forward and wrapping her legs around my waist. “I mean it, too.”
“You do?”
She puts her hands in my hair and pulls my face down to hers. “I really do.”
I kiss her slowly as the water laps around our bodies and the waves push her against my chest.
“I think it’s time for my idea now,” I say against her mouth as I reach around and undo the tie on her bikini top.
She pulls back and looks over my shoulder at the beach.
“There’s no one around, babe,” I say, undoing the tie at her neck. “Have you ever done it in the water before?”
She shakes her head. Of course she hasn’t.
“Well,” I smile as I tug on the bows on either side of her hips, “I tried a bubble bath for you…”
“Yes, you did,” she gasps when I pull her bikini bottoms away, and she feels the water rush around her. “And you loved it.”
“I have this feeling,” I murmur against her mouth as she cradles my face in her hands. “That you’re going to love this even more.”
Chapter Thirty Four
Hartley
We’re side by side in the cabana listening to the splash of the waves on the jetty, still choppy after last night’s storm. For the first time in a long time, I have absolutely no idea what the time is. And I don’t care. I flip over onto my stomach and rest my face on my arm. The skin under my cheek feels tight and peppered with salt.
“What are you reading?”
Crew lowers a tattered looking book from in front of his face and smiles.
“Old man and the Sea. I read it every time I come down here.”
“Really? Why?”
“I like to have one book for each place I spend time in. It’s kind of a ritual. Whenever I’m here, I come down to the cabana and read it. I even keep a copy of it in there.” He points at a wooden chest at the end of the platform we’re lying on.
“Do you have one for Twin Heads?”
He nods without looking up from his page.
“What is it?”
“The newspaper, in Spanish. I can’t concentrate on anything else when I’m there. Maybe you should try it.”
“Read the same book every time I visit somewhere?”
“Yes,” he says, looking over at me. “It means something different each time.”
“What about the holidays?” I mumble, closing my eyes and listening to the sound of the water below. “Do you have a book for those?”
“I read Frankenstein every Halloween if that’s what you mean.”
“Let me guess,” I yawn, “you read A Christmas Carol every December.”
He nudges me with his foot and bends to kiss me on the forehead.
“Too obvious. Christmas is Sherlock Holmes.”
“Huh.”
I look up at him, all tanned and sandy with his hair starting to curl at the ends. The book is lying open on his stomach. He sees my grin and lifts his eyebrows.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“Nothing, you said? Oh good. I can get back to my book then.”
He makes a big show of finding where he was up to and is careful not to look in my direction. We lie like that for a few minutes, Crew humming under his breath every now and then. He knows this is killing me.
“Fine. I’ll tell you,” I say, pulling the book away from him and ignoring the look of outrage on his face. “I just think it’s interesting that you sell yourself as someone who doesn’t like to plan, Mr. Free Spirit go-with-the-flow when actually I think you live a very controlled life.”
“Take some psych classes with the big kids in college, did ya?”
I toss the book to the end of the bed and move closer to him, propping my head up with my hand.
“I kind of like it. The idea of having a book for certain moments in your life. I like the routine of it. And you build these amazing places, even when there are problems, and you’re making people mad. You do like structure. You’re dedicated. When you decide to go for something, you really go for it.”
He looks at me intently and smiles softly.
“I guess that’s fair.”
“I’m thinking that you must have some faults, though, other than being a controlling neat-freak.” I reach down, tracing over his lips, and he catches the tip of my finger between his teeth.
“I have many. Do you want a list?”
“Yes, please.”
“Well,” he says, scratching his cheek and looking up at the ceiling. “Apart from the obvious ones I would say I’m overprotective, drinking makes me grumpy instead of happy, and I have zero tolerance for slow drivers. Plus,” he grins, “I don’t like tea.”
“You don’t?” I cry, hitting him with a cushion. He pulls me down to him for a kiss.
“Your turn. Let me have it.”
I sigh and spend a long time thinking about it just to annoy him.
“Some people would describe me as messy.”
“Oh would they?” he laughs, “I can’t imagine why.”
“I’m also very forgetful for someone with such a good memory.”
“Hmmmmm, go on…”
“Sometimes I wake up in the morning, and I have this really strong feeling telling me to ‘just go’.”
“Go where?”
“Anywhere. It doesn’t matter if it’s two hours away or the other side of the world. I’ve only acted on it once. I surprised David with a trip to India - ” I fall back on the cushions, laughing to myself as I remember the look on David’s face when I removed the blindfold, and he saw the word ‘Delhi’ on the departures board.
“I like ‘just go,'” Crew says, rolling onto his side and pulling me against his chest. “What else have you got?”
“Ummm, I’m not very good with money.”
“Uh oh.”
“I’m not a shopaholic, despite what you saw in those boxes back at the house. I just forget to pay my bills.”
“I can live with that.”
“So, kid,” he says sitting up and squeezing sun lotion into his hand. “I reckon I only need to be here for a few more days.”
He nudges me so that I roll onto my stomach and begins rubbing the lotion onto my back.
�
�We can leave soon,” he says, when I stay quiet.
“No. Let’s stay forever.”
“Hartley,” he says, lying down next to me. “Where do you want to go next? What’s your plan?”
I’ve been waiting for this. But I still don’t have a good answer.
“I don’t know. Where do you need to be?”
“I can base myself anywhere, but I still have to travel a lot. We can go to Ondas next if you want. But that doesn’t answer my question. What’s your plan?”
“Argh, I don’t know Crew,” I say, burying my head in the cushion. “Can’t I just follow you around the world and do this?”
He pushes the hair away from my face and kisses my forehead.
“No, babe, you can’t. Wait - ” he says when he sees the look on my face, “it does sound amazing. But you’d go crazy in a month, and you know it.”
“I wouldn’t..”
“Yes, you would. I don’t want to be the guy who makes you feel bored and resentful.”
“Crew,” I smile, “I can’t imagine that ever happening.”
“You can’t imagine it now. You have a great, big brain in there, kid. You need to use it.”
He’s right, and I know he’s right. The problem is; I can’t see a way to blend our worlds so that everyone wins. He travels all the time, and I know I could never be happy with a long distance relationship. My job requires me to be tied to one place, and that isn’t going to work for Crew.
“Hey,” he smiles softly when he sees my frown. “We’ll work it out.”
“Will we? I can’t think of how.”
“Don’t give up yet,” he murmurs as he kisses me gently. “We’re just getting started.”
“So, Ondas next,” I say quietly, “and then what?”
“I’m going to need to be in Twin Heads.”
“Twin Heads?”
“Yeah. I want to spend some more time with Jake and his parents, and it’s a convenient place for me to base myself while I’m working on Still Waters.”
“Still Waters? Is that close to the coast?”
“Not really, it’s up the coast and inland a bit, in the mountains. But it’s only a three hour drive. You’re going to love it up there,” he says, kissing my neck, my shoulder, behind my ear. “It’s misty and cold, and everything is green. The house I bought has a huge fireplace.”
Still Waters Page 17