Blue Sky Days

by Marie Landry

  I picked out a couple of them anyway and studied the pictures, recognizing shots of the old movie theatre and the diner Vince and Maggie worked at on Main Street, as well as Farmer Milligan’s big red barn with his fields stretching out endlessly behind it.

  “Beautiful, aren’t they?” Mrs. O’Hanlon asked, setting an envelope of pictures down and leaning her elbows on the counter. She was one of those older women whose age was almost impossible to guess—she could have been anywhere from sixty to eighty. She had a sweet, lightly wrinkled face, and long snow-white hair that was piled on top of her head in an elegant twist. From her bright green eyes and red-lipped smile, I had a feeling that as a young woman she had been stunningly beautiful.

  “My husband took those shots. He was a professional photographer before we opened the store here—did all the weddings, christenings, and other special events in town. Became known as the town photographer.”

  She smiled wistfully, picking my photos back up and beginning to ring them through. Daisy had told me shortly after I moved to town that Mr. O’Hanlon died several years before from a massive heart attack. Despite her age, his wife couldn’t bear to give up the store because she said it was her last tie to her husband, and because it kept her busy.

  I set down a handful of postcards on the counter. “I’ll take these too, Mrs. O’Hanlon. They really are beautiful. Your husband was very talented.”

  She smiled, looking pleased. “I have a confession to make, dear. I accidentally dropped your photographs after they were developed and got a glimpse at them when I was collecting them off the floor. You’ve a talent that reminds me of my James. My eldest son, Jimmy, lives in the city and owns a company that prints postcards, stationary, photo books, and the like—that’s how James got into postcards once he officially retired from his photography business. You ought to consider sending some of your photos off to Jimmy.”

  My eyebrows shot up. My pictures couldn’t really be that good, could they? “Oh, I don’t know, that was the first time I’d ever really taken pictures and I was just playing…”

  “Natural talent,” Mrs. O’Hanlon said firmly, a hint of a smile playing at the corners of her mouth. “Same way with my James. He just had a knack for it. You think about it, anyhow. The address of the company is on the back of those cards, and if you decide it’s something you’re interested in, I’ll give Jimmy a call and tell him about you.”

  “Thank you, Mrs. O’Hanlon, I appreciate that.” I paid for my purchases and wished her a good day before leaving.

  The minute I stepped out into the sunshine, I pulled the pictures from their envelope and sat down on a stone bench near the sidewalk. The first picture was the one I had taken with Daisy right after she gave me the camera. I smiled as I looked at it, and noticed for the first time that Daisy and I resembled each other. Our eyes were different colours—hers a bright sapphire blue, mine an ever-changing shade of brown—but the shape, size, and set were the same. Our mouths were nearly identical—full lips with a more prominent lower lip—and our hair, although hers fell in a thick waterfall of waves and mine was a riot of curls, was very similar in colour and texture.

  I was absurdly pleased to discover that I looked like my aunt. I always thought Daisy was one of the most beautiful women I had ever known, and not just physically. She was such a beautiful person on the inside—so caring and loving and generous—that it shone through and she almost radiated with it. I wondered if anyone saw me as radiant. Nicholas told me all the time that I was beautiful, but I found it hard to believe because it was such a foreign concept.

  The sound of a car horn honking startled me, jolting me back to reality. I looked up to see the driver of a nearby car leaning out the window to call a greeting to someone across the street. Shaking my head, I flipped through the rest of the pictures, my smile returning and widening with each new shot. They really were good. I’d had fun playing with light and shadow, not knowing how that would translate into the pictures, but the result was lovely. I had never considered myself artistic, but these photographs were exactly that.

  Daisy would be proud of these pictures, and of the fact that I was happy with my unexpected artistic ability. I knew she would encourage me to send some of them to Mrs. O’Hanlon’s son, and in that moment I thought, why not? What did I have to lose, after all? Photography had never been something I previously considered when looking at college courses, but it could be fun. I could make a living bringing people pleasure by helping to capture their special moments.

  Maybe my joke to Daisy several weeks before about the two of us going into business together wasn’t as far-fetched as it had seemed. I knew it was something I would have to think about.

  *****

  During those weeks right after Nicholas went back to work, I called home several times and talked to my dad. One of the good things about my mother was that she was predictable—she had been going to meetings of the local women’s society every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon for as long as I could remember. My dad often stayed home and did paperwork in his study, so I called at those times, knowing I could avoid another sour conversation with my mother.

  After the first couple of times talking to my dad, I realized there seemed to be a change in him, almost like a mellowing. He was more open and receptive, actually talking about real things like we used to, and not vague topics like the weather, business, or the news. Part of me wondered if my leaving had woken something up inside him and made him realize that he was unhappy with his life and the way my mother treated him.

  We had been living like that for so long, in the same way, all of us stuck in a rut without realizing it. I wondered if he’d been jarred into reality by the fact that I finally acknowledged the rut and had done something about it. Part of me hoped that was the case, anyway.

  Nicholas agreed with my theory about my dad. He said maybe my freedom and the act of finally creating a life for myself that I was happy with was making my dad realize how unhappy and monotonous his own life had become.

  Nicholas and I spent at least an hour together every weeknight, but he was usually tired from his long and physically strenuous days. He was always up at dawn, heading to the construction site soon after, and would often work ten-to-twelve-hour days. We spent a lot of time sitting on his front porch or mine, talking quietly or just sitting silently with our arms wrapped around each other.

  We frequently spent time with Daisy and Sam on the weekends. The four of us would go to the movies or take long drives through the scenic back roads of Riverview and other nearby towns. We began a ritual of Sunday night dinners, alternating between our house and the Shaw’s.

  It was much like that first night Sam returned to Riverview and we had him and Nicholas over for dinner; we would talk and laugh, enjoying the comfortable familiarity growing among the four of us.

  I felt like my family had extended from just Daisy and me to include Nicholas and Sam; it was an amazing feeling that left my heart feeling blissfully light.

  Maggie and Vince also became part of that extended family. Sometimes while Nicholas was at work I would stop in and visit them at the diner, and on a few occasions, Maggie came over to hang out with Daisy and me.

  Maggie was the first real girl friend my own age I’d had since childhood, and I was surprised to find how natural our friendship felt. She was sweet and kind, and so full of energy I began to wonder if there was something in the Riverview water that made people that way. Maggie had the same lust for life that Daisy and Nicholas had, and I was quickly learning it was infectious.

  One night, Maggie invited Nicholas and me to the apartment she shared with Vince. The two of them had been living there since they graduated from high school a few years before.

  “What do Maggie’s and Vince’s parents think of them being so young and living together?” I asked Nicholas on the drive over.

  “They’re okay with it, actually,” Nicholas said, glancing over at me. The reflection from the streetlights made his hair ap
pear silvery in the otherwise dark truck. “Vince and Maggie were best friends growing up, and they became a couple early in high school. We all had a feeling it would last, so their parents gave them their blessing to live together. I think they’d rather have them live away from home since they were always together anyway.”

  He smiled over at me and I wondered what it would be like to live with Nicholas. The times we spent together alone at Daisy’s or at his place had felt almost like playing house. I always knew it was temporary, and that he would go home or I would go home, but I never wanted those few precious hours alone with him to end.

  I knew Maggie and Vince lived in an apartment above the bakery Maggie’s parents owned, but it seemed strange to pull into the bakery parking lot after hours. When we were out of the truck, Nicholas took my hand and we ascended the long set of stairs along the back of the building.

  “I’m so glad you guys could come!” Maggie exclaimed as she flung open the door, beaming at us from the threshold. She pulled me into a quick hug, then hugged Nicholas, and ushered us inside. The second I stepped through the doorway, my nose was met with the most incredible scent of baked bread, cinnamon, honey, and all kinds of fruity smells.

  I hadn’t realized my eyes were closed until I heard Maggie laugh softly, and my eyes popped open. “Amazing, isn’t it?” she said, slinging an arm around my shoulders.

  “How can you live with that delicious smell all the time? I’d go crazy,” I said, hoping I wouldn’t start drooling at any second.

  “Believe it or not, you get used to it after a while,” Vince said, appearing from a short hallway on the other side of the apartment. He did some strange boy handshake/fist bump thing with Nicholas that had Maggie and me rolling our eyes at each other, before coming to place a loud kiss on my cheek. “Great thing is, any rejects or whatever doesn’t sell within a couple of days gets sent up to us.”

  “Which is why I told you guys not to have dessert tonight, because I thought we could have dessert and coffee together,” Maggie said, pointing toward the counter that separated the living room and kitchen. It was covered in plates of cookies, squares, and small slices of cake. “Dessert buffet,” she said, grinning.

  “I think I’m in heaven,” I said, leaning into Maggie, who laughed and tightened her arm around my shoulders.

  A few minutes later we were all seated around the coffee table, Nicholas and I on the love seat, our shoulders and legs touching, with Maggie and Vince across from us on the couch. Their apartment was filled with a mish-mash of furniture, nothing matching anything else, but somehow it worked. The place was comfortable and homey, filled with personal touches like framed photos and shelves filled with books. I also spotted at least two of Daisy’s paintings adorning the pale green walls.

  “I love this place,” I said.

  Maggie had been looking at me almost expectantly. Her shoulders relaxed slightly when I spoke, and a wide smile spread over her face, lighting it up. “Thanks. So do we.” She glanced at Vince, who leaned into her and kissed her temple.

  “We’d like to buy a house someday, but this place is perfect for us now,” Vince said. “We figure we have lots of time for that, so we might as well do all the traveling we want first. There’ll be plenty of time to worry about the real life stuff—the grown-up stuff.” He flashed a boyish grin, and I laughed.

  “Plenty of time for that,” I agreed. It was a concept I was trying to embrace myself. “How’s the saving going for New York City? And why New York City?”

  “We actually have almost enough saved,” Maggie said excitedly. “We’ve tentatively decided on October if everything goes as planned. And the why part, well…” She looked at Vince, her lips curving in a gentle smile.

  “The why part,” Vince said, “is because New York City is where we fell in love. We were there on a school trip a few years ago, and everything just sort of clicked into place. We were headed there anyway—the love part, I mean—but, I don’t know, maybe it took being in a different setting, doing different things to really make us both see.” He reached down for Maggie’s hand and twined his fingers through hers. Maggie leaned her head on Vince’s shoulder, her vibrant red hair spilling down his arm.

  “So now we want to go back,” Maggie said. “As adults, not chaperoned kids, you know? We want to explore, take it all in, see everything. We even have this silly little dream of playing on a street corner or in Central Park.”

  “Playing?” I asked.

  “Guitar,” Maggie said, pointing to the far side of the room where two guitar cases sat. “We played in the school band. That’s how we ended up going to New York—it was a band trip.” She shifted to lean over the back of the couch and pull something from one of the bookcases behind her. As she flipped through the pages, I realized it was a yearbook.

  “Here,” she said, handing it to me, open halfway through the book. There was a two-page collage of pictures from New York, with Vince and Maggie making appearances in more than half the photos.

  Some of the pictures were of students around the city, posing in front of landmarks or sitting in parks in large groups; others were taken in what I assumed was the hotel. The rest were of the band on stage in a large auditorium, Maggie playing acoustic guitar and Vince playing electric guitar.

  “We want to do a lot of traveling, but we figure New York should be first,” Maggie said. “Sort of like coming full circle, you know?”

  I made a little noise of assent in my throat and nodded, my eyes still on the pictures. I started to flip through the yearbook, seeing the occasional familiar face of people I had met around town, and noticing there were a lot of pictures of Nicholas, Vince, and Maggie. The three of them at dances, pep rallies, school functions, posing for the camera, or laughing and talking, completely unaware their picture was being taken. They looked so happy, so carefree.

  As I continued to turn the pages, smiling now and then when I spotted Nicholas’s grinning face, I thought that after four years of high school, I didn’t own a single yearbook. I didn’t think I even had any photos from that time, other than family pictures. I had never gone to a dance or a pep rally or a sports event. Never sat in the cafeteria surrounded by friends, making plans for the weekend or the summer.

  I wished I had come to Riverview earlier and known Nicholas and Maggie and Vince all those years. I wanted to be in those pictures with them, or at the very least, have my own photos from my high school days. Suddenly I wondered if I had to do it all over again would I do things differently? Knowing what I knew right then—that no matter how hard I tried to please my mother, no matter how desperately I wanted her attention and affection but would never get it—would I have tried so hard? Would I have made different decisions?

  If I knew that, at nineteen, I’d be unsure what I wanted to do with my life, would I have worried so much about school? Or would I have actually tried to have a life—friends, a boyfriend, social activities, trips?

  The yearbook snapped shut in my lap, breaking me out of my trance-like state. Nicholas eased the book from my lap and handed it back to Maggie, whose brows were drawn slightly in worry. I looked up into Nicholas’s face, his gaze steady on mine. I was sure he knew where my mind had gone, and I was just as sure what he would tell me if I voiced my thoughts.

  I didn’t have the choice to do it over again, no matter how much I wished I could. All I had was here and now, and I was doing my best to make up for things by living my life the way I wanted to. And who’s to say that if I actually could do things over again, I wouldn’t end up doing exactly the same things, making exactly the same mistakes? Or that if I’d lived in Riverview as a teen, I would have been friends with Nicholas, Vince, and Maggie? There was absolutely no way to know, which meant there was no reason to dwell on it.

  “Full circle sounds good,” I said quietly, clearing my throat as I tried to clear my thoughts. I looked at Maggie and smiled weakly. “I’d love to hear you guys play sometime. I didn’t even realize you were musicians.”
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  Maggie’s smile returned slowly, and I got the impression by the way she had shifted on the couch that she wanted to reach out to me, touch me, reassure me in some way that things would be all right. We hadn’t spent nearly as much time together as we wanted, but we had become close in the time we did have, and she was almost as good at reading me as Nicholas was. “We could play right now, if you like,” she said.

  I nodded, and as she and Vince crossed the room to get their guitars, Nicholas pulled me back against his body, tucking me into his side. I loved when he did that; it made me feel safe and secure, and I thought of him once again as an anchor, keeping me grounded in the present.

  He smiled down at me, brushing his lips over my forehead and into my hair, lingering for a moment before pressing a soft kiss to my lips. In the back of my mind, I was vaguely aware of Maggie and Vince tuning their instruments, but all I could really think about was Nicholas and the almost overwhelming love I felt for him in that moment.

  “Okay lovebirds,” Vince said, bracing one leg on the arm of the couch and resting his guitar on his knee. “This is a new song Mags and I have been working on, so pay attention because you’re the first ones to hear it.”

  I smiled as Vince nodded at Maggie and began to play. Maggie joined in a minute later, and a few seconds after her fingers began to move on the strings, her sweet, clear voice joined the chords. Her singing was so lovely it made me think that if they went to New York they might get ‘discovered’ and never come back.

  I didn’t have long to continue that train of thought before Nicholas was pulling me to my feet and we were swaying to the music. As he wrapped his arms around me, and our two friends played just for us, I knew it didn’t matter that I couldn’t go back and change things. I was right where I was supposed to be at just the right time.

  CHAPTER 10

  I never wanted that summer to end. I’d had the best few months of my life since arriving in Riverview, and it all felt tied into the season somehow. The long, bright days; the sultry heat off-set by a cool breeze coming off the river; the youthful feeling I had as I learned to play and dance and enjoy life in a way I’d never known was possible before.