Ashley rummages through a dresser drawer. “It seems like he really likes you.”
“It happens when you least expect it.” She watches Ashley for a reaction and gets a doozy.
“Do you think you’ll ever get married?”
“You’d be the first to know, but honestly Ashley, we haven’t discussed it.” She doesn’t tell her about Michael’s personal demon, doesn’t open that door to Ashley’s life with those words. “We’re good company for each other right now.”
“Oh.” Ashley sits heavy on the bed. Rachel gets the feeling she is seeing Carl somewhere in her mind, wondering what he would think, wondering if he would want her mother happy and safe. Wondering if this anniversary is a time to let go. “Well, it would probably be okay if you ever did marry him,” her daughter says.
“Thanks. I’ll keep that in mind. How about you?”
“What about me?”
“Any cute guys you’re interested in?”
She winks at Rachel and stands with a little jump, ready to leave for class. “A couple hot TA’s who make tutoring worthwhile. That’s why I can miss my second class.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
This is hers. Becomes her. With a spiral notebook tucked beneath her arm, she lifts a painting from the wall and finds its corresponding notes in the pad, logging the title, artist, date of painting, and condition. Her hand lingers on the heavy wood frame when she rehangs it. Possessiveness is funny like that, making you keep your hand on objects, mine, mine, mine, you say, trying only to believe it.
After seeing the historic house earlier, Tom seemed unsure of making a move. So she’s possessive of that, too, of the possibility of moving to an antique home. It’s up to her to keep that hope alive.
Earlier she pulled out her cell phone. It felt necessary to know which hope was really on her mind. Another Google search brought up the small museum north of Paris, listing Claude as curator. She took a deep breath and placed the international call, alone, from the carriage house. Her voice, it sounded foreign, too. Like it wasn’t really her, the way she scared herself going back two decades asking for Claude, identifying herself first to his office.
In the silent seconds when she was put on hold, she wondered if this was her new beginning. If it was too late to find out if she’d chosen wrong. And then, his voice.
“Sara?”
He sounded faraway, unsure.
“Sara Beth? Is that you?”
Her eyes closed, her heart beat fast. How do I do this? she wondered. What am I looking for? Her hand pressed the phone close and she heard him say something, in French, to someone in the room. The carefree, footloose old boyfriend with whom she’d traipsed through Europe on a wing and a prayer, speaking fluent French. And the picture came to her then. His dignified stature, his knowledge and prestige. His dream demanded it and he gave.
“Sara Beth? Êtes-vous là?” Then in a moment, “Are you there?”
Slowly, she pulled the phone away from her face. Years ago, his artsy ways and open thinking took her on one long magic carpet ride through France and Italy, through ancient cities and untamed countryside.
But for her whole life, to have that kind of wanderlust? Maybe it was more a freeing journey delivering her here. More a wanderlust to remember, to brush the dust off of sometimes, to know she’d once had it. In a piece of art, the stress of light or dark is the accent. Her time with Claude was her accent, necessary, but nothing more.
She disconnected the call.
Claude would wonder now, too. If it was really her or a misunderstanding in the translation. But placing herself in France with only a phone call, she stopped wondering. So there was that now.
She slips an index card into the metal box, her hands shaking at how close she’d come to putting a new layer of paint on her canvas. Far better to change the nuance of the existing layer. Maybe over tonight’s champagne and candlelight, with the written appraisal of their home and her approved loan in front of them, Tom will reconsider that colonial. So there’s that possibility, too. Sometimes it all comes at once like that. The whole When it rains thing.
She pulls the chain on her desk lamp. Even that is antique with a brass base and original label on the shade showing a 1916 patent. With the lights off, she locks up the carriage house doors, glancing up at the stars emerging in the twilight sky. How many people have stood along the riverbanks, ship captains and farmers and children and lovers, looking at the same starry sky? Wondering about their choices. There’ll always be wonder. She is comforted by that, by the familiarity, by sharing the same questions with so many others.
She glances at her new diamond ring. In the constellations, stars connect time.
Early Thursday morning, Sara Beth’s world shifts. She parks across the street from the old colonial right as the morning sun reaches the front windows. But it’s different from all the other times she’s stopped because the pretty paned windows could be hers by day’s end. Tom, with some convincing, had rethought the possibilities of this house and agreed to submit an offer on it today. It’s out of her control, really, the way she drove here. It’s her everything, her own North Star.
But the house isn’t all that has her smiling. Rachel called before her morning walk.
“July’s half gone and we haven’t talked in weeks,” she said. “How about we get a coffee this morning and try again?”
The longer they didn’t talk things out, the worse it got. All she wanted to do was tell Rachel about the colonial, but she couldn’t, not with that New York weekend still unresolved. Their relationship was like a van Gogh painting: a yellow rose of friendship and pansies of tender thoughts and red tulips of admiration and wisteria of welcome and goldenrod of encouragement and even Queen Anne’s lace of protection. But the vase broke one weekend, the flowers littered between them. They could try to patch their friendship up, but over a cup of coffee?
“I don’t know, Rach. We’ve been there, done that.”
“Well so what? Who hasn’t? You game, girl?”
“Buckle up,” Rachel says, waiting to put the car in gear.
Even though this feels like old times going antiquing or to the farmers’ market, stopping for cappuccino first, Sara Beth knows not to be fooled by the easy sensation. That’s how tenuous their friendship has become. It’s a butterfly flitting above those van Gogh flowers, just as easily flying away.
“I’m glad you called,” Sara Beth says as she shifts in the seat.
“Me too. The kids look good.”
“They’ve missed you.” She settles comfortably, turning toward Rachel. “They were so happy you came in and visited for a bit.”
“I’ve missed them, too. And hey, great piano.”
“I’m actually going to take lessons. I can’t wait.”
“You are? Good for you. I think you’ll love it, making music.”
They pass the turn-off for Whole Latte Life. “Rachel? The coffee shop’s back that way.”
“Oh, I have to make another stop first.” She pulls her oversized sunglasses from atop her head and slips them on. “You don’t mind, do you?”
“No. Go ahead.” Her hairdresser appointment isn’t for another two hours. But when Rachel gets on the highway, she starts to worry. “Where exactly do you have to stop? The mall?”
“No, it’s only a few exits down. Okay?”
Sara Beth doesn’t want anything to ruin the chance they have this morning. But when Rachel leans forward and turns on the radio, she’s surprised. “Hey. Didn’t you want to talk a little?” she asks over Tom Petty. “With that music playing, I can’t even hear my thoughts.”
“It’s just a little background music. Keeping things easy, you know?”
“I guess.” Trees and signs pass by at sixty-five miles an hour. Three exits later, Sara Beth lowers the music volume. “I don’t know if we’ll have time for our coffee now. How much farther do you have to go?”
“Oh,” Rachel says as she changes lanes, “I’d say a couple hour
s.”
“What? Where are we going?”
She glances in her side view mirror. “New York.”
“We’re going to Manhattan?”
“Even better. Long Island.”
“Come on, are you for real?”
Rachel guns the engine, pushing the speedometer past seventy. And she suddenly looks pretty darn pleased with herself. “Sara Beth? You’ve just been kidnapped.”
“You’re kidding, right?”
“Absolutely not.”
Sara Beth struggles with her seatbelt. “Shit, Rachel, turn this hybrid car around.”
“No way.” They’re cruising in the fast lane. “This car’s got a one-way ticket to the beach.” Rachel rolls her window all the way down, the wind whipping her hair. “Whooee! It’s not turning around and you’re not getting out!”
“Come on!” Sara Beth tries to hold her hair back in the wind. “I have a hairdresser appointment this morning.”
Rachel reaches into her handbag, pulls out her cell phone and tosses it in Sara’s lap. “Cancel.” Her eyes stay on the road.
“I will not. And Katherine’s having a cavity filled at three-fifteen.”
“Whatever.”
“Whatever? This is some kind of a joke, right? You can’t kidnap me.”
“Oh yes I can. You ran away on me. And that’s what got us into this whole mess in the first place. You!”
Sara Beth sits back and closes her eyes. This can’t be happening, not with the To-Do list she has to check off today, including a one o’clock appointment with the real estate agent.
“Come on, Rachel. If you won’t go back, let me out at the next exit. Up ahead there.” The car flies right by it. “You don’t understand!” She whips around in the seat and watches the exit fade. “We’re making an offer on a house today. For my shop. My life, okay? Tom finally agreed. God damn it, would you stop this car!”
“Tom’s got everything under control. He’s putting in the offer as planned.”
“He knows about this?”
“I called him last night. Who do you think put your overnight bag in my trunk when we were with the kids?”
“Overnight bag? Overnight? This was planned? What the hell are you doing?”
Rachel grips the wheel with two hands. The wind blows through the car while Petty sings about free falling. “Listen,” she says over it all. “Our friendship means way too much to lose over one really screwed up weekend. And you’ve told me more than once that what we need is time on some boat, with no distractions, to get to the bottom of this. Well, I don’t have a boat and neither do you, so I don’t know where you got that from. But there is a little cottage out on Long Island that will do just as good. You’re not going back home until we’re finished with this thing once and for all. Got it?”
“Long Island. I don’t suppose this has anything to do with that cop I guess you’ve hooked up with?”
“He’s a Mounted Police Officer with the NYPD and he has far more to do with this than you realize.” So now there’s that, too, this whole guy thing Sara Beth knows nothing about. “And he’s really the best thing to happen to me since, well, he’s the damn best. So leave him out of this before you say something you’ll really regret.”
Sara Beth shifts in her seat, crosses her arms and looks out the window. They are miles from Addison now. “This is perfect. Really great. What a brainstorm you had. Owen’s got BedTime StoryTime at the library tonight.”
“Do you hear yourself? Hair appointment, house appointment, dentist appointment, storytime. You need this kidnapping more than you think!”
“I can’t believe Tom agreed to this. We had a huge day planned. There’s no way he’d go along with such a ridiculous idea.”
“Call him.”
“I think I will. And I’ll have him call the police while I’m at it.” She dials her home phone. The announcement on the answering machine has been changed to Tom’s voice. Sara, if it’s you, don’t worry. Everything’s under control. I’ll take care of the house and get Katherine to the dentist. Relax already, and I’ll see you whenever you get back. She stares at the phone, then disconnects silently.
Rachel keeps her eyes on the road. Then, as if to say forget-about-it, there-is-no-ransom, she passes a car and picks up speed.
“You won’t turn around no matter what I say, will you?” When she laughs, Sara Beth punches in the salon number and cancels her appointment, then redials her home. After the beep, she leaves a message. “Tom!” She turns away from Rachel. “Jesus Tom,” her voice angry. “What’s gotten into you? I can’t believe this. Kidnapped? I’ve been kidnapped? I thought we, well, why didn’t you…Well, Owen’s got story time tonight. Be sure he wears his pajamas there. All the kids do. And let me know about, oh, never mind.” She disconnects and throws the phone back in Rachel’s purse.
Rachel settles back, turns the music up when a Stones song comes on, and drives the route to the Connecticut docking of the Cross Sound Ferry. Sara Beth alternately watches her and the road without talking because sometimes you can’t talk, everything that needs to be said has been, and the moment has to wind itself down.
“I made advance reservations online,” Rachel finally tells her when they pull into the line waiting to board the ferry. She inches the car forward, looking a little like a rebel.
“Why? So I wouldn’t have a chance to escape if you bought the ticket here?”
“That’s exactly right.” She maneuvers the car onto the upper level auto deck, kills the ignition and steps out. “Come on,” she says, lifting her sunglasses on top of her head and taking a deep breath of the salt air. “We have to get out of the car for the crossing.”
Sara Beth opens her door, seeing the water spread out before them, seagulls flying in high loops above the dock. The boat sways slightly, like it’s trying to prove that, yes, she is about to cross Long Island Sound. Because, oh boy, she still doesn’t believe it.
“Hey!” Rachel says as she heads for the passenger cabins on a lower deck. “I guess we found that boat after all!” she calls over her shoulder. “What a co-in-kee-dink!”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Architecture as art. This is the thought that crosses her mind when Sara Beth sees the small gray cottage Little Gull. Architecture with its inherent design, structure and style, is one of many art forms from which she’d been trained to cull the universal forms of human expression. So much of her Art History education was a visual training. Learning to look.
It comes naturally now, silently walking the flagstone path to the bungalow. She’s sure Rachel thinks it’s her irritation at being kidnapped that keeps her quiet. It’s not. It is the innate way she employs her trained eye: Peeling paint from the flower boxes contrasting with the red geraniums and snow white petunias; lattice porch windows open to the sea; jars of seaglass sitting amidst an array of conch shells and painted seagulls mounted on driftwood; hurricane lanterns.
So what is the human expression in this beach architecture?
What function does the three-dimensional delineation serve? In a social context, this structure serves honesty. It is edifice stripped down to simplicity, leaving room for the heart to expand within its context. She feels it already.
Inside, chairs slipcovered in stripes and plaids along with whitewashed end tables all face a stone fireplace upon which sits a massive vase of heather and wild grasses. In the kitchen, dried flower bunches hang from ceiling beams. There’s a mingling of human touch with structure everywhere around her.
But nowhere more so than on the kitchen table: A vase of fresh flowers sits beside a bottle of wine and a can of coffee grounds, and, almost like an afterthought, someone leaned against the vase the mall photograph of Sara Beth and Rachel smiling together.
“He left ice cream in the freezer, too. I think there’s cookie dough.”
Sara Beth turns and studies her friend’s face. What she sees in its space, light and color are answers to questions she never voiced: How long did Ra
chel wait in the restaurant that day? A long, panicked time. And did she sleep those nights, worrying? She worried a hell of a lot more than slept. And did Rachel look for her in the city? She looked in every special place their friendship has ever taken them, hoping hoping hoping Sara would return to her in some way, even by revisiting a memory. All those answers are there, human expression in the architecture of her eyes.
After being out of college for two decades, twenty years of life between herself and classroom desks, what Sara Beth knows is this: When a relationship is mounted and framed against the simple setting of a beach cottage, she finds the same emotional dimension in the relationship’s symmetry, design, balance, content, layout as in the work of the great masters.
“We’ve been trying all summer to get back to that picture,” Rachel says.
Sara Beth takes the photograph and sets her visually trained eye on it. “Oh Rach. We never really left it in the first place.”
There are oil paintings and there are watercolor paintings. Both are layered. Here, at the beach, Sara Beth thinks they are watercolor. Light. Translucent. Blending. Watercolor paints are transparent, never fully covering the layer of paint beneath. So it is important, in a watercolor, to work from the lightest color to the darkest. And that is what Sara Beth does.
She drops in her feelings and motivations, tips the paper and blots them with stories of Tom, and how she’d nearly divorced him before Owen came along. From that canvas, she pulls out the bigger picture of her life, glazing over it with the color of growing up in a well worn old home and introducing more color in the hue of her mother and how she included her children in her day-to-day life, her restoration of that home, her lesson that you’re never alone in its history because of the stories in the walls, the furniture.
But in her painting, it felt lately like color was being lifted out when Owen came along, taking all her time, and then even more color drained with her mother’s death. Sara Beth doesn’t paint in every detail; they’d been friends long enough for Rachel to know them. So she suggests her recent feelings, her frame of mind, her desperation, with mere brushstrokes.
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