The Lemonade Year

by Amy Willoughby-Burle

  Then he leaves me an address, asking if I’ll meet him there the next day.

  I watch him cross the street toward my building, and I think he’s going to go in, but he turns back down the street and I know he’s heading home. He’s got the little book clutched in his hand.

  20

  I recognize the street from Oliver’s voice mail as being downtown. It’s not too far from my old office, but I can’t image why he wants to meet at that end of town.

  I park at work, my old pass still letting me into the garage for now, and walk along the busy street. I go all the way to the end of the road and arrive at my destination. The Catholic Basilica. I recheck the paper where I have written the address, feeling like a character in a movie who has been given a false clue to lead her off the trail.

  I pull open the door and enter the cool darkness of the old building. The noises of traffic and chatter grow dimmer as the door closes behind me, shutting out the bright midday sun. Inside the church, the air is soft and candlelight glows from the votive array—prayers made and vigils begun.

  I don’t see Oliver. My first thought is to text him, but if he’s in here, I don’t want the buzz of a phone to disturb the few people sitting in the pews. I move toward the center aisle and look up at the high, domed ceiling. All around me are stained-glass windows with scenes of Jesus and His disciples. It’s been awhile since I went to church, but I recognize the story.

  I walk down the aisle toward the front, stealing glances at the statues of saints that line the walls and fill the alcoves at the corners of the church. I breathe in warm-smelling incense and imagine I can feel the prayers that have left the lips of the lonely, hurting, and hopeful.

  I need to give you something. Oliver’s words resound in my mind, and I wonder for just a second if he’s going to propose.

  At the front of the church, someone steps out of a pew and turns to face me. He’s wearing a long black garment that tapers in at the waist. He walks toward me with a familiar gait. It’s Oliver. I’m utterly confused. He stops in front of me and offers a small and somewhat apologetic smile.

  “Are we going to a costume party?” I ask, trying but failing to make a joke.

  He shakes his head and bites on his beautiful bottom lip. I suck in an incense-laden breath of air.

  “You’re a priest?” I say, more loudly than I mean to, and the sound of the words bangs against the stone walls and comes back to me in an echo.

  “Not yet,” he says. “But soon. I decided to go back to school.”

  My mouth falls open, and I look instinctively at the enormous crucifix behind Oliver. All I can think about is Oliver’s lips on mine, his hands around my waist, my hands on his chest, me kissing his neck—and then . . . him pulling away. Him. Always.

  “Oh, no,” I say and quickly put my hand to my mouth as if I can shove the words back in. “I’m so embarrassed.”

  “Why are you embarrassed?”

  “We kissed, and we—” I feel myself blush. I’m stammering, and he’s smiling at me. “Well, we kissed.”

  “I’ve already talked to the Big Guy about that, believe me.” Oliver waves his hand to dismiss my fear. “You don’t need to worry over me.”

  “You?” I ask. “What about me? I’m sure this is frowned upon up there.”

  “You didn’t know,” he says apologetically. “So, this is what I’ve been hiding from you.” He gestures to his clothes. “When I said I had dropped out of school, I meant the seminary. When I kept telling you I needed to tell you something—this was it.”

  “So when you said you were getting your master’s degree, you meant Master’s in . . .”

  “Divinity,” he says.

  I clap my hands over my mouth again. “I’m going straight to hell,” I say, the words mumbled through my fingers.

  He suppresses a grin. “Come outside with me.” He nods his head for me to follow him.

  We exit through the far door of the church and into the sunlight again. Oliver leads me around a shrine of some sort to a small rose garden behind the building, and we sit on a bench at the feet of a large, stone angel.

  “I hope you’re not angry with me,” he says, his voice calm and low. “It’s all right if you are.”

  “This isn’t fair, you know,” I say, moving my hand up and down to indicate his attire. “They should only let ugly people be priests. You’re not nearly ugly enough.” The joke is my way of letting him know that I’m not angry. I’m something, but not angry.

  “So, I’m sort of ugly,” he says, smiling that incredible smile of his at me. “Just not ugly enough.”

  “No,” I say. “You’re gorgeous. And that getup does nothing to hide it.”

  He gestures to the black cassock he’s wearing as if to say this old thing?

  We sit for a moment and just look at each other.

  “So you’re not mad?” he asks, his brow furrowed.

  “I’m confused,” I say, but then realize that’s not right. “That’s not true. This clears up a few things, actually.”

  “Like why I always pulled back from a relationship?” he says, twisting his mouth in an apology.

  I nod, but it’s more than that. “You always seemed so sad,” I say. “Underneath it all. Was this making you sad? That you had to become a priest?”

  Oliver smiles the most gracious and blissful smile I’ve seen. He chuckles and shakes his head. “Trying to choose the world over God was making me sad. Finding myself in love with you made me sad.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “That came out wrong,” he says and takes my hand in his. “I walked away from the seminary before I knew you. I was scared, and I thought that my doubt and everything I’d ever done wrong made me unworthy. So, I left school.”

  “And came here?”

  He nods.

  “What about Cricket and working at the nursing home?” I ask, trying to sort out the rest of the story. “What about me?”

  “Everything I told you was the truth,” he says. “The lie is in what I left out. I was using life like a pair of earplugs so I wouldn’t hear Him calling me.”

  “God?”

  Oliver nods again, and there is such a peace about him now that I couldn’t stay mad even if I was. I knew he was struggling with something. I just never would have guessed it was this.

  “I really hate to be all, so none of that was real,” I say, looking back at Oliver’s beautiful face lit up from the inside, reflecting the sun back at me, “but was none of that real? Was I some sort of test? Because, if so, you should have given yourself a better shot at it. Why not one of the girls from work or that girl from the restaurant yesterday?”

  Oliver tilts his head at me, but he doesn’t say anything.

  “Did you just pick me out of the blue?” I ask.

  “Nina,” Oliver says, putting both hands around mine now. “Why do you think I rushed out to help you put Nate’s things in your car back at the nursing home?”

  “You’re nice?” I offer.

  “I’m a helpful guy,” he says, “but no. I wasn’t ready to see you go. I thought you were the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen. You were so funny and smart. You were passionate about your dad’s care. I already felt like I knew you and I already liked you. You were completely oblivious to me, though.”

  “Not completely.”

  “It was all real. I didn’t seek you out to distract me. If I’d wanted a distraction, I would have gone for some pretty, young thing who just wanted to hook up and hang out at the bar.”

  “I’ll try not to let that comment make me feel as old as I am.”

  “What I mean is, I was never going to miss the silly games and shallow relationships. Choosing this calling meant sacrificing a real relationship with a woman I respected and loved. I thought I didn’t want to make that sacrifice. But it turns out, sayin
g no to what I’ve always known I wanted was the sacrifice.”

  I point at the church, and he nods.

  “When I fell for you, I thought it meant I was right, that I’d been wrong about this gig.” He gestures at his clothes and back at the church. “I just didn’t want to listen when God was calling. I thought it would be easier that way—that answering Him would be hard. I didn’t want a hard life. I thought that the black robe looked scary, but now, I can’t wait to put it on every day. I wanted to open the door, but I knew there would be no going back once I did. Now that it’s open, I can’t stop myself from wanting to run through it.”

  I squeeze his hand. “This actually makes me feel better about you turning me down all the time.”

  “Do you have any idea how hard that was?” he says and smiles a devilish smile. “Letting go of you was a hard decision. Following Him wasn’t. I just had to get out of my own way.”

  “So, once you do this”—I nod at the church behind us—“that’s that?”

  “You mean dating and women and all that?” He chuckles. “Yep, that’s that.”

  “Ever consider becoming Protestant?” I wink at him.

  He laughs out loud, lighting up his beautiful face even more. He is completely at ease, and the difference in his demeanor and mannerisms is noticeable.

  “It’s going to be totally unfair, you know,” I say, glancing around the colorful rose garden, seeing the beauty all around me. “These poor women having to confess to you about being attracted to their priest. Cut a girl some slack.”

  “You’re just flattering me,” he says, waving it off, but blushing nonetheless.

  “Maybe you can grow a huge beard or let your eyebrows get all wonky,” I say.

  He laughs again and this time has a hard time getting himself back together. I laugh too.

  “I’ll miss this part of us the most,” he says.

  I realize that his hands are still pressed around mine.

  “I’ll miss you, too,” I say and hold tighter to his hand. “So, what now? I guess you’re leaving for school?”

  “The semester starts in August,” he says, “but I’ve missed registration already. So I’ll stay in town until January and go then. I need to get some things settled here anyway and make sure that Mr. Cole is taken care of. His daughter is finally able to move here, so she’ll take over the house and be here to look after him. Then I’ll head back to Charlotte, finish seminary, and see what God has in store for me. What about you?”

  I don’t really have any idea. The lemonade book is done. The divorce is final. Cassie is still gone.

  “What do you want, Nina?” Oliver asks, his eyes searching mine. “What would make your heart happy?”

  “My heart?” I look away. “Aren’t you supposed to worry about my soul?”

  “Classic Nina deflection,” he says and chuckles. “Yes, I’m concerned for your soul, and I’m here for you when you want to talk about that, too.”

  I wrinkle my brow but stay silent.

  Oliver touches my check. “What’s broken that needs to be fixed? What were you hiding from while you were at my house taking pictures of lemons? What didn’t you want to deal with?”

  My marriage, my part in its demise, my teenage daughter growing up, up, and away.

  “The easy way out is just a way out,” Oliver says. “Then the door shuts behind you, and everything you had is gone. You don’t have to let the door close on what you really want.”

  “This right here is what I’m talking about,” I say, and Oliver wrinkles his brow. “How do you expect women to listen to your words of wisdom with that gorgeous face looking at them?”

  “It’s just the way God made me,” he says and winks at me.

  “Well done, God,” I say and make an exaggerated thumbs-up to the sky. “Well done, indeed.”

  Oliver blushes and lets go of my hand. I think he’s going to stand up and leave, but instead he reaches out and touches my face. He runs a strand of my hair through his fingers and then puts his hands in his lap. This is his good-bye, I can feel it.

  He reaches into his pocket and pulls out something. He opens his hand, and I see my wedding rings.

  “I think we’ve both known all along what we really want,” he says and nods for me to take the rings. “This is really what you want, isn’t it? Your marriage.”

  I take the rings from his hand and slip them back on my finger.

  “You know where to find me,” he says and stands up. “I need to get back inside. I have no idea how to say good-bye to you, so I won’t. I’m here if you need me.”

  He bends down and kisses me on the top of the head and walks away.

  I slouch back on the bench and look up at the angel above me.

  21

  “Oliver broke up with me because he’s secretly a priest,” I say when Lola answers my call.

  “I’ll be right there,” she says, not asking for more details.

  She finds me sitting in my car in my usual parking spot. She knocks on the window and holds up a pint of mint chocolate chip ice cream. I get out and she hugs me.

  “Cliché, I know,” she says. “But who doesn’t love ice cream? What are you doing down here? I went up to your place but you weren’t there. I almost went back home. You’re lucky I remembered you have a parking deck.”

  “Mrs. Edlerman took Jack’s old space,” I say. “I guess that makes it official.”

  “Let’s go inside,” Lola says. She takes my hand and leads me to the elevator, then down the hall, and inside my condo.

  Inside, the condo is dark and lonely. The television is still on. I’ve never been much of a TV watcher, but the silence in this place is hard to handle and I’ve taken to turning it on for the sound of voices in the room. I think about turning it off, but don’t.

  Lola goes to the kitchen to get bowls and spoons.

  Outside on my patio at dusk, we sit and look out over the city. Lola heaps us each a bowl of minty escape, and we sit and soak up the night around us. Summer will be over in a few weeks, and Cassie will be back in school. I haven’t pressed the custody issue yet, but I’ll have to soon. I didn’t want to beg for my time with her, but it looks like she’s not going to come back on her own.

  “You want to tell me what’s going on?” Lola asks, raising both eyebrows so high I think they’re going to lift right off her head. “Because I would really like to know. It’s August. I haven’t heard from you since July.”

  “That was just a couple of weeks ago,” I say. “Don’t be so melodramatic.”

  “I can’t remember two days passing without talking to you,” Lola says. “You haven’t called or answered for two weeks. I even checked with Jack to make sure you were ok.”

  I pick a flower head from the pot of daisies on the table and throw it at her, but it’s too light and gets caught in the wind. It lifts up over the railing and sails off into the coming darkness.

  “Oliver kept trying to tell me something and I didn’t want to hear it,” I say.

  “Like a confession?” She smiles. “Sorry, that was too easy. Seriously though—what in the world?”

  I tell her the whole story, and she tries not to interrupt too often with exclamations of disbelief and surprise.

  “I cannot believe Orange Juice Hottie is going to be someone’s priest!” She flings herself back against the chair for added drama. “I thought priests had to be old and significantly less attractive.”

  “That’s what I said.”

  “Sounds like he must have known what he really wanted all along,” she says, leaning toward me. “I think you do, too. You’re just afraid.”

  “Afraid of what?”

  “All of it. To try and fail. To try and succeed.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Yes, you do,” she says. “You
gave up because things got difficult.”

  I shrug.

  “So, call him,” she says.

  “I think he’s made his choice.” I scrape the edges of the empty bowl with my spoon. “And I don’t think I can compete with God.”

  “I didn’t mean Oliver,” she says.

  I look at her and shake my head. She points at the rings that are back on my finger.

  “Jack?” I finally ask.

  “Yes.” She shakes her head at me in exasperation. “Despite it all.”

  “I thought you hated Jack.”

  “I hate that you’re hurting, but I know you still care about him,” she says. “Am I right?”

  “Of course I care about him. But I don’t know if that’s enough of a reason to try again.”

  “What other reason could there be?” she asks.

  She suddenly holds up one finger and I know she’s about to change the subject before I can comment further.

  “I want to show you something,” Lola says in a hushed and hurried voice. “It’s a secret. I’ve been wanting to tell you, but I wasn’t sure how you’d react. Chris isn’t happy about it, but I just feel like I have to do it.”

  “I don’t think I can handle any more secrets,” I say, my head starting to swim. “You’re not secretly a nun, are you? Chris and I are going to have to start a support group or something.”

  “Don’t be silly. That’s ridiculous.”

  She reaches for her bag and starts digging around in it. She pushes a flyer across the table at me.

  “I’ve signed up to go to Peru with this missionary group,” Lola talks quickly and passionately. “They’re rebuilding churches in areas of poverty, and they want me to paint for them. There would be me, this guy who works with wrought iron, and this couple who makes this amazing furniture.”

  “Peru?” I ask, trying to measure in my head how far away that is, seeing it only as a color splotch on a map in some classroom in my mind. “I thought you said not to be ridiculous.”

  “Yes, Peru,” Lola says, lost in her own excitement. “I picked up this flyer downtown about artists on a mission and they’re going to Peru. I signed up.”