by Nicole Baart
It didn’t help that after their confrontation in the vineyard Tyler had made a point of joining Abigail as often as he could for their daily walk home. He acted like they had never tussled, and on the days that Abigail was feeling strong and capable of being coy and playful, he made no attempt to disguise his growing attraction to her. One evening, he even tried to touch her, to press his fingers against the curve of her waist as he sidled close enough to show her the difference between two varieties of grapes.
Abigail felt the warmth of his hand at her side and jumped as if he had stung her. The look on her face, the shock and revulsion, must have been agonizingly evident because Tyler dropped his hand, spun on his heel, and made some excuse before leaving Abigail alone in the vineyard.
For days he barely looked at her. She didn’t know how to mend the rift, and she wasn’t sure that she even wanted to. But she did know that being confined in a motorboat with Tyler, bare-chested and browned by the sun, did not sound like a safe idea. She didn’t trust him, and she didn’t trust herself.
†
Canada Day dawned so blisteringly hot that the ground actually breathed a slow exhalation of misty vapor. From her perch slightly above the fields on Eli’s small hill, Abigail could watch the early morning fog rise from the sleeping vineyards as if God himself had just taken the lid off the simmering pot of Revell.
Abigail hated to admit it, but in the hushed stillness of the steamy morning, she wished she had taken Paige up on her invitation. Mild fear of boating or no, Abigail couldn’t help but long for a little company. The past several weeks had taught her that unoccupied hours were rather predictably filled with dark and troubled thoughts. Sometimes she wished she could just forget everything—Johnson, McNally & Bennett, her life in Florida, her gradually fading father, even Hailey—and just start over fresh in this new reality. This existence without a past to weigh it down and complicate it.
As much as Abigail didn’t want to be alone, she wasn’t brave enough to call Paige and tell her that she’d changed her mind. Instead, she went on a short jog, took a long, cold shower, and then went to knock on Eli’s door right before 9 a.m.
He answered in a wrinkled pair of old jeans and a T-shirt so thin and faded it looked as if he might have worn it when he was Abigail’s age. While Eli unlocked the screen door and propped it open, Nan ambled up beside him, yawning wide and looking for all the world as if he were dressed in furry, rumpled pajamas and mildly resented the intrusion.
“What do you want, girl? You have the day off today.” Although there was a stern line creasing his already-furrowed forehead, Abigail could instantly tell that he was in a good mood.
“I know.” Abigail found herself smiling at his tetchiness in spite of herself. “I was hoping I could borrow your car for a while today.”
Under different circumstances, it might have been a bit of a bold request. But living in the trailer had taught Abigail that Eli rarely left the estate. Once or twice a week he took Nan out for a lope down the beach, and on Sundays he went to the diner behind the Husky and to church. Abigail wasn’t sure when he did his grocery shopping, but she had to admit that she had rarely seen him eat at all. Eli seemed to subsist entirely on the three-quarters of a cigarette he smoked every day and a daily glass of his own wine.
“You want my car?” Eli asked. “You got groceries yesterday.”
“I forgot something.”
“You make lists.”
“I’m meeting a friend.”
“Everyone is going boating.”
“I have a hot date.”
Eli squinted at her. “Nope, you don’t. Try again.”
Abigail threw her hands up in exasperation. “I want to get out of here for a while. You made me get rid of my car, remember?”
Reaching behind the door, Eli grabbed a set of keys and handed them to her. “You can take the car on one condition.”
“Excuse me?”
Eli shook the keys tantalizingly. “It’s no big deal. I just want you to pick up some stuff for tonight.”
Abigail took the keys. “What are you talking about?”
“It’s obvious you don’t have plans for today, so I’m going to make you my famous balsamic marinated salmon. We’ll slice a few potatoes real thin and throw them on the grill with some asparagus. Do you like apricots? I’m thinking we’ll start with grilled apricots in a mustard glaze and chardonnay. Then the salmon with pinot noir. For dessert, plain, old vanilla ice cream and fresh cherries. What do you think? Shall we try the ice wine?”
Abigail sputtered.
“A simple yes or no will do.” Eli dug in his back pocket and produced a couple of twenties from his wallet. “The best salmon is at the IGA on the south side of town. Look for nice, dark pink flesh. And make sure the package says ‘fresh’ or ‘Pacific’ or something like that. Sockeye if you can find it. I can’t stand farmed salmon.”
“Okay,” Abigail muttered, finding her voice. Eli could be so compelling, virtually magnetic at times, and it was impossible to fight the pull of his gravity. Not that she wanted to in this case. Salmon? Grilled apricots? Her mouth watered at the thought.
“Do you need me to write the list down? Or did you get all that?” Eli demanded. He added, “Don’t worry about the cherries. I’ll pick them up. The Warkentin farm is just over the ridge. It might be a bit early for cherries, but I’ll find some ripe ones.”
“Apricots?” Abigail asked.
“You’ll have to buy those. They won’t be done until the end of July.”
“Okay,” Abigail said again.
“Let’s do an early dinner. Say four o’clock? I’ll start the grill and we can take our time.”
A grin flashed across Abigail’s face before she could contain it. “Okay.”
“You need a thesaurus,” Eli remarked, then pulled Nan back by the collar and shut the door without another word.
Abigail laughed.
†
The IGA was packed with people throwing packages of hot dogs, chips, and buns in green baskets slung over their arms. Abigail was happy to go against the frenzied flow. For the first time in months, she got a cart and meandered through the aisles, leaning against the long handle and inspecting the goods the grocery store had to offer. She bought a fat loaf of still-warm-from-the-oven sourdough bread and a little plastic container of candied walnuts for the ice cream and cherries. In the produce section she picked out a bunch of crisp, slender asparagus and carefully selected five small, heavy apricots with peachy-pomegranate colored skin.
Picking out salmon proved to be a bit more difficult since Abigail had grown up in the Midwest and had never fully developed an appreciation for fish. The thick slabs of sirloins and rib eyes tempted her, but Abigail passed over them and spent no less than ten minutes trying to select the perfect salmon fillets instead. She couldn’t decide between two different packages with hunks of salmon like open butterfly wings, so she bought them all. Eli could put the extras in his freezer, she rationalized.
Driving back to Thompson Hills with her backseat full of such gourmet delicacies was distinctly exhilarating for Abigail. She was looking forward to her afternoon and evening with Eli more than she could have ever anticipated. It felt normal. It felt casual, fun, maybe even comfortable.
Abigail talked Eli into letting her borrow one of the Wine Spectator magazines that she saw cluttering up his counter when she dropped off the groceries. He flipped through the stack and pulled out one that broadcast the headline “Ultimate Wine Buying Guide” and told her to study it as if reading the magazine had been his idea.
After a quick lunch of sliced apple and generous hunks of cheddar, Abigail took her magazine and the woven blanket that was folded up on the bench in the trailer and found a grassy spot to relax beneath a gnarled tree. She fell asleep with the magazine opened as far as the table of contents on her chest.
It was the sharp, almost-metallic tang of burning charcoal and the sound of voices that finally roused Abigail from h
er afternoon nap. She breathed deeply, remembering what she had to look forward to in a sudden wash of anticipation. Stretching lazily, she considered the soft suffusion of robin’s egg blue peeking from between the celadon leaves of the aspen above her and savored the moment. The scent, the feel, the sounds . . . It hit her all at once that she heard voices. Voices?
Sitting straight up, Abigail twisted around and saw Eli and Tyler standing together over Eli’s old-fashioned, bowl-shaped charcoal grill. Their heads were bent together and they seemed to be, at least for the moment, somewhat friendly.
As if he could sense her waking, Eli looked up and called across the lawn, “Good morning, Sleeping Beauty.”
Abigail waved weakly. Why was Tyler here? His truck hadn’t moved for days, but she hadn’t seen him around the house in at least as long. She figured he had decided to crash on the couch at a friend’s house or something. She certainly hadn’t expected him to be around tonight.
Eli greeted her with a raised blackened pair of tongs that he had been using to poke at the coals. Tyler waved, too, his mouth a tight line of resignation that told Abigail he had been roped into sticking around against his will; he wasn’t going anywhere. She groaned inwardly. Why had Eli invited him to stay for their little celebration? The uncle-nephew duo didn’t even get along most of the time.
But there was nothing she could do about it now. Abigail reluctantly got to her feet and, with deliberate precision, folded the
blanket she had been lying on. She tucked it under her arm, grabbed the magazine, and forced herself to join the men at the grill.
“We’ve got twenty minutes or so on the coals yet,” Eli remarked, closing the lid. “Get her a glass of chard,” he told Tyler.
“No thank you,” Abigail demurred. “All I need right now is a big, tall glass of ice water.”
Eli flicked his wrist at Tyler authoritatively. The younger man turned toward the house, presumably to get Abigail the glass of water she had just mentioned.
“Oh no, Tyler,” Abigail called after him, “you don’t have to get me water. I can get it myself. . . .”
But he was already gone.
“Let him do it,” Eli directed her. “It’s good for him to do something for someone other than himself once in a while.”
Abigail sank onto the bench of Eli’s picnic table with a sigh.
“What is it with you two?” Eli asked without warning. He sat down across from her and put his elbows on the peeling-paint tabletop, leaning in conspiratorially.
“Excuse me?” Abigail murmured, startled.
“What is it with you and Tyler?” Eli repeated. “I can’t decide if you’re in love with him or if you hate his guts.”
“I am not in love with him,” Abigail snapped.
“Then it’s the other.”
“No,” Abigail rushed to explain. “No. It’s not that at all.”
Eli stabbed her with a meaningful look. “Honey, when it comes to Tyler, you are either one or the other. There’s no in-between.”
“What about you?” Abigail shot back. “He’s your nephew, but you sure act like you hate him.”
Throwing back his head, Eli laughed long and hard. “I love that boy more than my own life. But he ticks me off something fierce. I’m hard on him because I expect more than he’s often willing to give. That kid is a mistake waiting to happen, and I’m fighting it with all I’ve got.”
Abigail looked pointedly over Eli’s shoulder, warning him that Tyler was coming. Eli just smiled at her and took a small sip of his wine.
Although Abigail had expected the clash and disharmony of three incompatibly strong wills to dominate the evening, the rest of the night unfolded quietly, like a languid song played by an unhurried hand. Eli talked, filling in the stifling pauses that threatened to spread and conquer and disrupt the gentle night with conflict. And it worked. Maybe it was the inviting breeze above the sun-warmed earth. Maybe it was because they had been softened by wine. Whatever the reason, they—all three of them—were so impassive they didn’t have the energy to worry about the friction between them.
Tyler tried to be civil and unobtrusive, and Abigail did her best to be as indifferent to him as she was to the pepper mill at the center of the table. It didn’t quite work—Abigail sat almost piously rigid on the picnic table bench—but by the time she forked a bite of Eli’s exquisite salmon and let it melt on her tongue, she was at least relaxed enough to truly enjoy the food.
“Amazing,” Abigail breathed, sampling Eli’s grill fare. “Buttery and soft . . . tangy . . . a hint of sweet . . . I love it.”
“Try it with the pinot,” Eli instructed.
Abigail lifted the glass and let the wine slide over her tongue. “Perfect.”
“If there’s one thing my uncle does right, it’s salmon.” Tyler lifted his glass in a toast to Eli.
Eli cleared his throat and indicated the wineglass he was holding by striking it gently with the tines of his fork. The ensuing hum was so clear and resonant, Abigail knew she was drinking out of the finest crystal.
“Excuse me,” Tyler amended. “If there are two things my uncle does right, they are salmon and wine.”
“Hear, hear!” Eli cheered. He lifted his glass with a triumphant flair and held it high over the table. “A toast,” he said
grandly. “To fine wine, good company, and—” he paused notably—”new beginnings.”
Abigail faltered with her hand in the air, drawn down by a glass of pinot noir so deep and rich and lovely that her eyes were relentlessly pulled to the glistening shimmer. It held such weight she could barely keep it from toppling out of her hand.
New beginnings? What was Eli talking about? How could he possibly guess at what she deep down wanted? The chance to start over was a hope she had buried long ago and endeavored to ignore. And that latent wish now lay in shambles—an impossible dream. How did Eli know? Suddenly the night took on a menacing quality; it filled so quickly with a sense of foreboding that Abigail felt regret begin to nip at her consciousness.
But before Abigail could let worry overtake her, Tyler tipped his glass against Eli’s and then hers. She watched in confusion as he gratefully took a generous mouthful and then squeezed his eyes closed for the briefest of seconds before swallowing. It looked like he had to struggle to get the wine down; like Eli’s toast was more than a toast—it was a hard reality to digest.
Uncertain, Abigail glanced between Eli and Tyler and back again. Tyler was looking into his wineglass as if the answers resided there, but Eli was staring at his nephew. The palpable ache of longing that fled across Eli’s face when the younger man took another sip of deliberate consummation was so fierce and raw that Abigail’s breath caught in her chest. In that moment she knew without a doubt that the toast hadn’t been about her. It had been about Tyler.
†
Melody’s death had nothing to do with Abigail leaving for Florida, but her elder daughter couldn’t help but shoulder at least part of the blame. I should have known. I should have guessed. I should have stayed. . . . Abigail abused herself as she retraced her steps back to Newcastle, Minnesota. Back to the place that seemed so intent to hold her fast. And the whole way, she couldn’t stop wondering: If I would have stayed, would she have lived? Would I have somehow known? Could I have stopped it? maybe even prevented it?
It took Abigail nearly eight hours to secure a flight home, and in that time she was able to piece together what had happened. Mrs. Manning, the Bennetts’ neighbor for over thirteen years, had lost her husband a number of months before, and when she learned about Melody’s untimely passing, she moved into the Bennett home as if she were family. Abigail called Mrs. Manning collect from the Fort Myers airport no less than a dozen times, numbly giving her flight information and then changing it, and in the moments between business the elderly woman told Abigail everything she knew.
Melody died of a massive brain aneurysm. The initial autopsy results identified that much, but later information reveale
d that she had suffered a subarachnoid hemorrhage, a cerebral rupture that released blood into her brain and ultimately caused a stroke of such lethal proportions that it would have been fatal with or without the provocation of an aneurysm. Even if she hadn’t gone to bed with a splitting headache and bled out quietly, alone in her room, even if Lou had been with her and had raced for the phone and called an ambulance, Melody would have probably still died. Or at least been confined to a nursing home. She would have been a vegetable.
No one was to blame—except maybe nature, Melody’s DNA, or as Abigail couldn’t help noting, God—but everyone seemed to want to hold somebody responsible. Hailey blamed Melody’s doctor for not connecting the dots of Melody’s chronic hypertension, her mild heart problems, and her family history—Melody’s grandmother had died young of an aneurysm, too. Lou blamed Abigail for leaving and consequently sending Melody’s blood pressure through the roof. Even Abigail needed someone to fault. She wavered between blaming herself and blaming Hailey. Wouldn’t all those years of mothering Hailey be enough to destabilize anyone’s health? There was more than enough guilt to go around.
The vigil for Melody Bennett was poorly attended, but though they would have never admitted it, the family actually wanted it that way. Their restrained mourning, the tears they shed over the now plastic-looking face of their petite wife and mother were solitary offerings meant to polish the smooth lines of her casket, not to impress the neighbors with the scope of their sorrow.
Mrs. Manning and Dr. Madsen came as well as several family friends and twenty or so members of St. Mary’s who had known Melody through her occasional attendance at a Ladies Aid baby shower or the biannual quilting circle. All in all, fewer than fifty people walked heavy-footed through the doors of St. Mary’s and peered over the edge of her candlelit casket. Most hardly remembered the young woman Lou had married or the energetic new mother who had ecstatically raised her first daughter for five years before everything was irreversibly altered.