The Nearness of You

by Dorothy Garlock

  Her father surely didn’t realize it, but he had perfectly described the guilt that gnawed at her. Every choice Lily faced, no matter how badly she may have wanted to make it, had to be balanced against her fears of hurting him, worrying that she would be abandoning him.

  That burden had never felt heavier than now.

  “I hate to imagine what your mother would say if she were here,” he continued. “Seriously, Lily? Running away in the middle of the night? Going off to live in a dangerous place like New York City? Sarah would’ve expected you to have more sense than that. She would have thought it the most foolish, irresponsible thing she’d ever heard of in her life. Why, I dare think she—”

  “You’re wrong,” Lily blurted, cutting off her father midsentence.

  In the silence that followed, she wondered which of them was more surprised that she’d spoken. Something inside Lily had changed. Before, she had always worried about her father’s feelings, afraid that she might hurt him, that by following her dreams she would leave him alone. But now she could no longer ignore the desire to live for herself, to find her own happiness.

  She couldn’t stay silent. Not anymore.

  “What…what did you say to me…?” Morris asked.

  “That you’re wrong,” Lily answered. “She would’ve wanted me to be careful, like any mother would, but in my heart I believe that the most important thing to her was that I make my own decisions. That I live my own life.”

  “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” her father answered dismissively. “Your mother wasn’t the sort of woman who—”

  “All my life I’ve been told that I didn’t know her, that I couldn’t because I was so young when she died,” Lily interjected, again daring to interrupt, realizing that she’d come too far to stop now. “But I do remember her,” she insisted. “I may not have more than a moment here and there, like the time she backed the car down the drive and knocked over the mailbox, or that she always smelled like lilacs,” Lily explained, each recollection raising a wellspring of both happiness and loss inside her, just like always. Her father also seemed moved, though Lily didn’t know if it was because he remembered those moments, too, or if he was surprised his daughter remembered them at all. “Mom was kind and understanding,” she finished. “In in the end, she would’ve wanted me to be happy.”

  “Are…are you saying you aren’t happy here?” Morris asked.

  Lily took a deep breath. “You know, Dad, I’m a lot more like Jane than you think,” she began. “I may not be as impulsive, and I’ll never be the prettiest girl in any room she’s in, but just like Jane, I have dreams of my own. I wanted to leave town just as badly as she did. And while I may not have gone through with it this time, that doesn’t mean I never will.”

  Maybe even sooner than you think…

  All day, even as she struggled with Garrett’s revelation, through her confrontation with Ethel, to her confession to Jane’s father and her own, Boone had never been far from Lily’s thoughts. Things between them were moving fast, but she didn’t mind, not one bit. She cherished every moment they were together. Every one they weren’t, she found herself counting down the minutes until their separation would end. Boone had told her that he was concerned about what would happen to them when his time in Hooper’s Crossing came to an end. Ever since, the possibility of going with him to the city had become more and more attractive. What would her father think if he knew what she was considering?

  “As much as I want to continue this conversation,” her father said as he glanced at the clock and then reached for his coat, “I’m needed elsewhere. I’m supposed to judge the Biggest Pumpkin Contest and have plenty of hands to shake. But we’re going to talk about this later. When I get home—”

  “I have plans tonight,” Lily interrupted, feeling a touch of anger him for trying to dismiss her, for wanting to retreat to his work rather than confront the problems that now stood between them.

  Morris paused, an arm halfway in a coat sleeve. “What plans?”

  “I’m going to the festival dance,” she told him.

  “With whom?”

  “Boone Tatum,” Lily said.

  Her father’s eyes narrowed suspiciously. “That photographer again? No. Absolutely not. You’ve been spending too much time with him. I won’t allow it.”

  Lily couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Jane had often complained about her own father, about how he was always meddling in her business, but Dave Dunaway wasn’t going to interfere as his daughter tried to make her way in the world. In comparison, Lily’s dad wanted to control who took her to a dance.

  “It’s not up to you to decide,” she said defiantly. In a heartbeat, she was out of her seat and headed for the door.

  “Lily, wait!”

  “I’m going to the dance with Boone and that’s final!”

  Even as her father continued to call her name, Lily quickly made her way down the hallway. She never once looked back.

  “Is that what you’re planning to wear to the dance?”

  Boone was just winding up, ready to throw a rubber ball, Daisy excited and expectant at his feet, when he stopped and looked at Marjorie. The two of them stood in her yard, enjoying the beautiful afternoon while Clive did a little writing. The older woman had taken such a shine to the Labrador retriever that she’d gone down to the department store and bought a ball for the dog to chase. Though Marjorie had claimed she was too old to have a dog, Boone would’ve bet his life savings that she would have reconsidered within weeks of their leaving town.

  “I was thinking about my other shirt,” he said, looking down at his outfit, “but basically, yeah.”

  Marjorie nodded but not in a way that said she agreed with him.

  “Why?” he asked. “Do you think it’s a bad idea?”

  Boone then launched the ball, sending it bouncing across the yard, speeding toward the bushes on the opposite end of the property. Daisy was off like a shot, a panting, whirling dervish of legs, tail, and hair. She was so fast that she easily caught the ball well before the boundary, securing it between her snapping teeth, then cutting a sharp turn to run back to where she started.

  “All I’m sayin’ is that this dance is probably a bit fancier than you’re expectin’,” Marjorie explained. “Don’t get me wrong, it won’t be one of those fancy gown-and-tuxedo deals you see in the movies or the rich people hold on Park Avenue. But it won’t be a bunch of yokels in overalls slappin’ their knees while they mosey around hay bales, either. You need to be prepared.”

  Daisy dropped the ball at the older woman’s feet; Boone smiled, thinking that the dog wanted to make sure they were all taking part in the fun. Marjorie picked up the slippery, drool-covered thing without the least bit of disgust and tossed it. While it didn’t have the same speed or distance as Boone’s throw, Daisy pursued it with the same wild abandon.

  “You don’t want to disappoint Lily, do you?” she asked.

  That was the last thing Boone wanted. That morning, he’d gone to see Lily at the library, but she hadn’t been behind the counter or among the stacks of books. Walking back, feeling a bit discouraged, Boone realized that she had snared his heart, but he would do nothing to pull it free. He was right where he wanted to be.

  “No, I don’t,” he answered.

  “Then let me give you a bit of advice,” Marjorie began. “A lot of years have passed since the last time a suitor came to court me, but there’s something to be said for a man who presents himself well, who shaves his whiskers and dresses nice. Seeing that he’d made the effort always spoke louder to me than any words he might say.” The older woman nudged him with her elbow, then winked. “Women notice these sorts of things.”

  Boone chuckled but he took Marjorie’s words to heart. He wanted to make a good impression on Lily, to show her how seriously he took what was growing between them. A plan began to form in his mind. If he was going to pull it off, he had to hurry.

  There was no time to waste
.

  Lily stepped back from the mirror, turned one way and then the other, her eyes never leaving her reflection. She wore a red dress that started just below her knee, rose to a cinched waist, then climbed until it ended in straps across her shoulders, revealing a just-appropriate amount of skin. She liked the dress because it was stylish not old-fashioned, fancy yet not showy. Almost a dozen outfits lay in a heap across her bed, rejected for any number of reasons: wrong color, wrong cut, wrong season, wrong whatever. She’d chosen not to wear stockings, thinking that between her excitement and all the dancing she would manage to stay warm, but had added a white cardigan just in case.

  She hoped that Boone would like it as much as she did.

  That afternoon, he’d called her at the library to tell her he was running late and would have to meet her by the park, giving her the time and place. She had spent the rest of the day on pins and needles, obsessing about the festival dance. Fortunately, Ethel appeared to have gotten the message from their confrontation and had largely stayed out of sight, allowing Lily plenty of time to think.

  And her mother had been on her mind.

  If Sarah Denton were still alive, this moment would’ve been very different. The two of them would have gotten Lily ready together, talking about clothes, hairstyles, and all the other things that bound mothers to their daughters. Lily couldn’t help but wonder if Sarah had been as nervous and excited when she and Morris had started dating. Sadly, she had no way of knowing. Instead, she would just have to listen to her heart for guidance.

  Still, in one small way, Lily did feel as if her mother was there with her. For the dance, she had chosen to wear pearl earrings that had once belonged to Sarah. Though Lily had been given them shortly after her mother’s death, she’d never put them on, always telling herself that she was waiting for just the right time, that one special occasion to take them out of their box.

  This was that moment.

  Boone was worth it and more.

  Lily took one last look at herself in the mirror, tugged at the hem of her dress to make it fall just so, and nodded. She was ready.

  As ready as I’ll ever be…

  She grabbed her purse and left the bedroom, but no sooner had she set foot on the landing than she heard the door open downstairs.

  “Lily?” her father called out. “Are you here?”

  All afternoon, Lily had considered getting ready for the dance early enough to be sure she was out of the house before her father returned home. By doing so, she was sure to avoid further confrontation. But it would also make her a coward, a little girl running away from her problems. Their talk in Morris’s office had been the beginning of a conversation many years in the making.

  Now she had to bring it toward its end.

  “I’m here, Dad,” she answered.

  Morris came down the hallway from the kitchen, his ample girth making the wooden floor protest beneath his heavy foot. He ran his hand over the well-worn newel ball at the bottom of the banister, then stopped to watch her descend. But Lily halted halfway down, wanting a bit of distance between them.

  “You…you look beautiful, sweetie,” he said with genuine sincerity.

  “Are you still going to try to stop me from going to the dance?” she asked.

  Her father sighed deeply, then shook his head. “No, I’m not,” he answered. “Ever since you left my office, all through an afternoon spent working out the thousand details for tomorrow’s Halloween parade, judging that silly pumpkin contest, I kept coming back to how I behaved toward you, the things I said, how I acted…” He paused as if, amazingly, he wasn’t sure what to say next. “I wasn’t fair to you…”

  “You’re just being overprotective,” Lily replied, defending him even when she agreed with what he’d said.

  “Then that’s a problem. Maybe it’s always been the problem,” he said. “I don’t know if it’s because of all the years I spent raising you or it’s how young you were when your mother died, but I have a hard time seeing you as the woman you’ve become. I can’t help but see you as six, playing hide-and-seek in the laundry, laughing and laughing.”

  “I do the same thing, in my own way,” Lily admitted, coming down the rest of the stairs. “I’m so worried about upsetting you that I forget I should be making my own way. Every baby bird leaves the nest, after all.”

  “I’ve always considered myself more papa bear than bird.”

  “Male bears don’t raise their cubs,” Lily said. “That’s the mother’s job.”

  “Really?” her father asked. “Are you sure?”

  Lily shrugged. “I’m a librarian, remember?”

  Morris laughed hard enough to shake his considerable bulk. But then he fell silent. He looked at Lily intently, then tenderly touched her ear, his thumb running over the pearl ornament in its lobe. “These…these were your mother’s, weren’t they?”

  Lily nodded. No words were needed.

  “I gave them to her for our one-year wedding anniversary,” her father explained. “I saved and saved for them. I even skipped a meal or two,” Morris said with a chuckle. “I can still see the look on her face when she opened the box. Happy, of course, but she knew they were expensive and was mad at me for spending so much money, but I didn’t care. She was worth every penny.”

  A lone tear slid down Lily’s cheek, but she made no move to wipe it away; when it neared her chin, her father did it for her.

  “You like this guy, don’t you?” Morris asked.

  “I do,” she told him truthfully.

  “Must be quite a lot if you’re going out wearing those earrings.”

  I think I’m falling in love with him.

  “Think he’d ever buy you a pair?” her father asked.

  Lily thought about it for a moment. “I don’t know,” she answered truthfully. “But from the moment I met Boone, when I bumped into him and he took my picture, he’s made me feel special, as beautiful as any of the Hollywood actresses he’s photographed, important as any king or president. Not even getting a handful of diamonds could be better than that.”

  At that, the sternness that often filled Morris’s eyes fell away, revealing someone who knew firsthand how powerful love could be.

  When Lily slipped into her father’s open arms, squeezing him tight, it felt as if, after years of trying, they’d finally managed to turn a page.

  Now they just needed to read the rest of the book.

  “A hundred miles for an outfit. This girl must really be something special.”

  Boone glanced at Clive as the two of them leaned against the back of a bench, taking in the festival. After leaving Daisy with Marjorie, he’d spent the early afternoon on the telephone searching for a store that sold decent clothes. Once he’d finally found somewhere promising, he had dragged Clive away from his writing and set off, the Chrysler flying down the rural highways. He’d burst into the small boutique in Creston, a larger town more than an hour to the northeast, like a man possessed, hoping that it hadn’t been a wasted trip. But Boone had been pleasantly surprised by what he found. He’d purchased a stylish blue shirt, a slightly darker shade of tie, black dress pants, and the fanciest pair of shoes he had ever owned. No overalls for him. His wardrobe problems solved, they’d raced back toward Hooper’s Crossing, only making a quick stop at a gas station so that he could call Lily at the library and tell her he was running late.

  “She’s worth all this and more,” Boone answered. “Trust me.”

  “Correct me if I’m wrong, but didn’t you complain the whole drive up here from the city?” Clive asked. “Didn’t you tell me not to unpack because we were going to go right back? That you had to get to Havana?” He laughed good-naturedly. “Seems to me that if we had, you would’ve missed out in the worst way.”

  “Yeah, yeah. Keep reminding me, why don’t you?”

  “Oh, I plan on it. Believe me.”

  As unexpected as meeting Lily had been, it wasn’t the only crazy thing to happen on this assignment. Slo
wly but surely, Boone had realized that he actually sort of liked Clive. Stunned as the people back at the Life office would have been to hear it, Clive could even be funny; Boone had laughed at a couple of jokes during the day’s drive.

  Somehow, some way, they were becoming friends.

  “This dance seems like a pretty big deal,” Clive commented.

  “That’s what Marjorie told me.”

  The crowd had swelled in the short time they’d been there. Couples walked arm in arm, dressed nicely, smiling and laughing, excited about what was to come. A band warmed up beside the open-air dance floor, the snare of a drum here, the rising and falling scales of a trumpet there. Though the sun still colored the sky with a last smear of purple, the strings of lights had been turned on, glowing among the trees and stretching over the park.

  “You owe me five bucks, you know,” the writer said. “Or at least I think you do. You kissed her, didn’t you?”

  “I sure did.” Boone glanced across the crowded park at the bakery; only a few nights before, after the movie, he’d taken Lily in his arms and touched his lips to hers. Strangely, it felt as if it had happened a month ago and yesterday, both at the same time.

  He pulled out his wallet but Clive waved him off.

  “No, no, no,” he said. “I was just kidding. It was a joke.”

  “Come on. A bet’s a bet.”

  “I don’t want your money, Boone. Honest. I’m just really happy, for the both of you, even if I’m a little disappointed for myself.”

  “How so?”

  “The whole way up here, I kind of hoped I might find someone to spend some time with,” he explained. “Nothing serious. It’s not like I expected I’d meet the girl of my dreams, but, well, you know what I’m talking about. The problem is, with a face like mine…” Clive began but didn’t finish. Boone thought he knew the rest; even without the bruises, he wasn’t much of a looker.