“Did I just hear a teenager call you cool?” Earl Greene stood by the spot on the picnic bench that Sophia had vacated, right across from Julie. “Are you too cool to let an old friend sit with you?”
“Sit down.” She smiled to see his friendly face. They chatted and ate while conversations swirled around them.
Gradually, she noticed a couple of “shh” sounds and turned to glance in the direction of them. There was a circle of women, all leaning in toward Primrose Miller, the church organist and the biggest gossip in the community. Primrose was talking excitedly.
No big deal. Julie had ignored Primrose’s tales ever since she’d come to the island and started attending church.
“I have to play for the ceremony,” Primrose was saying, “but I don’t have to approve of it.”
Earl had stopped eating, and his forehead wrinkled. “We should go get some of that dessert while it’s there. I hear that Amanda Jones made lemon meringue pie, and Mary brought a terrific fruit salad. What do you think—should we go up?”
Another line drifted over from Primrose’s table. “I mean, he has to marry her. Honestly, at his age!”
“At least come up with me,” Officer Greene said. He stood and held out a hand to her, waited courteously for her to head toward the line in front of him. He really was a sweetheart.
She surveyed the desserts and truly intended to concentrate on Mary’s fruit salad, but she couldn’t resist a sliver of lemon meringue. And then she saw the cupcakes—piled high with fudge frosting, Goody’s specialty—and snagged one. Since she’d already blown her fast for the day, she might as well enjoy it. “I’ll start my diet tomorrow,” she said to Officer Greene.
“You’re just right the way you are,” he said.
What a loyal friend.
As they walked back to the table, she noticed the women at Primrose’s table looking at her. When she caught the eye of Primrose herself, though, the woman looked away. She said something to the other women and they all leaned closer and lowered their voices.
“You know,” Officer Greene said, “why don’t we sit over on the other side? I think there’s more of a breeze.”
There was that fake sound in his voice, the same sound she’d heard in Sophia’s. She looked at him. Then she looked at Primrose and her crowd.
She replayed their conversation in her mind. Primrose didn’t want to play at someone’s wedding.
They’d all been looking at her.
And Earl was acting weird. “Wait a minute,” she said. “Whose wedding was Primrose talking about?”
“Oh, who knows with that woman.” He took her elbow and urged her toward a seat at the opposite end of the picnic table from where they’d been. “Could be anyone.”
She felt as if someone had slammed a sledgehammer into her chest. She sank onto the picnic table bench. “Is Melvin getting married?”
Earl got very focused on arranging his silverware and wiping off the table.
She reached out and put a hand over his, stilling them. “Earl. Tell me the truth.”
He blew out a breath. “Yes, he is,” he said as he sank onto the seat opposite her. “I don’t approve of what he’s doing. Not at all.”
Pain radiated out from her heart. She’d been thinking this girlfriend was a temporary thing, an aberration. But if he was... Could it be...? Was he really marrying her?
In the church he’d been so reluctant to attend? Julie’s church?
The words he’d kept repeating during their counseling sessions, during their predivorce discussion, echoed in her mind.
It’s nothing about you. I just don’t feel like being married.
Even through her anger and distress, that had been a balm to her. Melvin was like so many other middle-aged men. He was railing against the constraints, all constraints, of his life. He wanted the freedom he hadn’t been able to experience as a younger man with a family to support.
But if he was marrying that girl...the poor child...
That meant it wasn’t marriage he’d disliked, as he’d said; it was her.
Earl looked at his hands. He straightened and flexed his fingers. “I mean,” he said, “a marriage under those circumstances is hardly going to last.”
She looked at him. “Under what circumstances?”
His skin flushed darker. Now he was picking at a splinter of wood on the table. “Oh, you know. Just recently divorced, that sort of thing.”
“No. Uh-uh. You meant something else.”
“Now, Julie, don’t read anything into what I said.”
Again, there was that maddening tone: coddling her, babying her. She thought back to what she’d overheard from Primrose. “Wait a minute. Why does he have to marry her?”
“I’m not sure...” He looked up and met her eyes. Under her glare, he trailed off. Looked away.
“Tell me,” she said as an ugly suspicion washed over her. No one really said it anymore, but when she was growing up, there had only been one reason people had to get married.
She looked into Earl’s dark, concerned eyes. “Is she...?”
He blew out a sigh. “Yeah. She’s pregnant.”
Julie’s eyes closed and her nails dug into her palms.
Melvin had gotten someone pregnant. Someone younger and prettier than Julie.
He was going to be a father again, the father of a baby.
That was something Julie, at her age, couldn’t give him.
She thought of the young woman who’d come into the bookstore, the one who looked every bit of a temporary fling for an old guy.
But getting married to someone who was having your child wasn’t temporary. It was awfully, horribly permanent.
Or, at least, permanent until he got tired of you.
“Julie,” Officer Greene said. “I’m sorry. Like I said, I don’t approve. He’s lost his mind. I didn’t want you to know.”
“Don’t you think I’d eventually hear about a baby?”
“Eventually, but not while you’re so...” He trailed off.
She shoved her plate away and stood. “So what? So fragile? Listen, Earl, I’m not made of glass, despite what you and my daughter think.”
Although it felt like she might shatter into a million pieces.
Or have a tantrum, or just fall down into a sobbing heap. And she didn’t want to do that here.
“I’m leaving,” she said as a dizzy, roaring feeling spun in her head.
“What are you going to do?” he asked as if from a great distance.
“I don’t know yet,” she said. “But it’s going to be good. Or at least it’s going to feel good.”
* * *
THIS HAD TO WORK.
Monday morning, Erica took a huge gulp of bitter gas-station coffee and looked around at the grumpy kids who were picking up trash and pulling weeds on Sunset Street, the neighborhood of mostly older folks that adjoined the school.
If this service project went well, and if news of it got back to Principal O’Neil, it might make up for Friday night’s bad scene.
Friday’s bad scene with Trey, who was in the next yard over rebuilding a retaining wall and who seemed determined to ignore her.
Well, fine. She could ignore him, too. It was probably for the best so they didn’t appear to be in a relationship.
“It’s so hot,” Venus complained, sitting back from the rocky garden she was weeding. “And it’s only nine o’clock. How long are we doing this for?”
“And why are we doing it?” Shane used the hem of his T-shirt to wipe sweat from his face.
“Studies show that activities integrating troubled teens and disadvantaged elderly are beneficial to both,” Rory said in his most pedantic voice. “I did some research before we walked over here.”
“Who are you calling troubled?” one of the kids snarled, and a
couple of others bristled. Rory, socially awkward, tended to say the wrong thing. Or, sometimes, the truth, but in a too-blunt way.
Erica sucked in a breath, bracing for a fight.
“Who are you calling elderly?” came a lazy, cultured voice from the porch next door. Bookstore owner Mary Rhoades stood on her front steps, graceful as always in skinny jeans and a button-down shirt, her little dog in her arms, her white-gray hair back in a loose ponytail. “Let alone disadvantaged,” she added. “But I have to say that it would be very beneficial to me to have you young people tidy up my front gardens, whether you’re troubled or not.”
“No one would call you elderly,” came a gravelly voice from the porch next door to Mary’s. “They might call you gorgeous.”
Mary ignored this remark except for a slight eye roll that made a couple of the kids chuckle.
The man’s voice seemed familiar, and when a big, fit-looking older man with a bald head and piercing eyes leaned over his porch railing, Erica stared at him. “Kirk James?” she asked.
He tilted his head to one side. “And who might you be, pretty lady?”
“I’m Erica Rowe,” she said slowly, “and I think you used to date my aunt Jane.”
“He used to date three-quarters of the women in this town,” Mary said dryly.
Kirk was frowning like he didn’t remember Aunt Jane, which was pretty bad since Aunt Jane had been crazy about him. “Jane Newell?” Erica said to prompt his memory.
His face broke out into a wide smile. “Lovely, lovely woman,” he said, and then the corners of his mouth turned down. “Such a shame. She left us too young.”
Erica swallowed an unexpected lump in her throat, thinking of the woman who’d been a second mother to her and Amber, inviting them for extended visits every summer right here in Pleasant Shores. “You’re right—she did.”
Once again, Mary seemed to know intuitively how to relieve an awkward moment. “Now that he’s reached the elderly stage,” she said, nodding at Kirk, “he’s slowed down. His dating pool is only half what it used to be.”
The two had both come down the steps and they met on the driveway between their houses. “I’d give them all up for you, Mary,” Kirk said.
“No, please don’t. But thank you for the offer.” Mary continued out into the yard to walk her dog around. Kirk sat down on the rock ledge beside the driveway, staring moodily after her.
“That’s kinda gross, old people dating,” Shane muttered, but the rest of the kids seemed amused by the show.
Erica grabbed the opportunity to snap a few pictures of the kids, and then glanced over at Trey and caught his slight grin. Her mouth went dry as she tried and failed to look away from him. Patches of dark perspiration showed on his T-shirt, and he wiped his brow on his sleeve, and Erica tried to focus on that—he was so sweaty!—instead of his broad shoulders, strong biceps and slim hips.
He seemed to be studying her, too, and then he turned sharply away. “You kids need to get back to work,” he ordered.
“But it’s hot, and my back hurts,” Shane complained. He picked up one small branch and carried it toward the trash bin.
“Yeah, it’s hot, and it doesn’t affect you near as much as it affects the folks who live in these houses. And your back might hurt, but I’ll bet a nickel it’s not as much as—” He broke off and slapped Shane’s arm, gently. “Just get to work, kid. You’re plenty strong enough to carry a bigger load.”
Shane straightened and did as he was told.
A deep, happy sigh escaped Erica. Trey was so much better than he thought he was with these kids. And he worked hard despite his injury, which she could now see was bothering him—he was limping slightly and he winced as he bent over to pick up another pair of heavy rocks.
He’d mentioned working extra hard in a PT session when they’d seen each other in passing, over the weekend, each of them walking their dogs in carefully different directions. She’d been preoccupied with Amber, nursing her through a cold—at least, that had been her excuse for not stopping to talk.
Truthfully, she was too troubled by questions about what their relationship was and what it might mean to be able to be around him one-on-one.
“Hey! That’s my flower bed!” The indignant, out-of-breath shout came from the house on the other side of Mary’s, where some of the kids had gone to haul a stack of boards to the pickup in which Trey or Erica would drive them away. One of the kids had gotten careless, dragging a board through a struggling swatch of flowers.
Oh, great. It was Primrose Miller, the church organist and a notorious gossip, though from what Erica had seen, she didn’t mean any harm.
“Be more careful,” Erica ordered the kids. “Sorry, Primrose,” she added. “We’ll fix your flowers, and I’ll keep a closer eye on them.”
“Thank you, honey.” Primrose worked her way across the porch—she wasn’t using her wheelchair today—and sat down on a wide bench, breathing heavily. “Wish I could do it myself, but I can’t, not anymore.”
“’Cause she’s too fat,” one of the kids said from Mary’s yard, low enough that Primrose couldn’t hear. But Erica could. She spun around to confront the offender.
Venus was a step ahead of her. “You shut up,” she scolded the kid who’d made the comment, her voice low and angry. “She’s a lot like my grandma who died, and I never let anybody pick on Old Mama.” The teenager continued lecturing, having more impact than Erica or any adult ever would, so Erica went over and sat down next to Primrose. Partly, she wanted to distract the older woman from the argument among the teens, but she also wanted to make sure she wasn’t too upset about her flowers. It was important that whatever word got out about this project was positive, not negative.
The door to Kirk’s house opened a few minutes later, and this time, a frail elderly man made his way out, using a three-pronged cane to steady himself as he came to the edge of the porch to survey the scene.
Trey, working right below him, looked up, then took a step back. “You’re a World War II veteran?”
The old man smiled. “Hat gives it away every time,” he said, indicating his ball cap. “Bob James.”
“Trey Harrison. Pleased to meet you,” Trey said, then added, “Thank you for your service.”
“You’re very welcome, young man.”
Rory had been listening, and now he approached Trey and Mr. James. “Were you there on D-Day? We read about that in class.”
Erica walked over, her teacher brain going into overdrive. If they could get Mr. James, who she guessed was Kirk’s father, to visit, the kids could videotape his stories, fitting right into her co-teacher’s unit on oral history.
More of the kids had drifted over while Trey, Rory and Mr. James continued talking. There was nothing but respect in their expressions and demeanor, and she was proud of them.
Behind her, voices rose, and she turned away reluctantly to troubleshoot. Kirk and Primrose were up on Primrose’s porch, talking and gesticulating, and Shane and one of the teenagers had started weeding the flower bed below and were listening.
And looking ready to blow. Erica hurried over.
“It’s the property value,” Kirk was saying to Primrose. “It could be through the roof, but not with that school right here. Do you know how much we could sell these houses for if it weren’t for those kids?”
“Oh, well, the school is part of the community,” Primrose said. “They’re not bad kids.”
“They didn’t used to be, but things are getting worse over there. Did you know one of them was arrested?”
“I did hear that,” Primrose said, her voice troubled.
Shane stood up from where he’d been blocked from view, startling the elders. “These old shacks ain’t worth anything anyway,” he said. Then he deliberately kicked over the metal trash can they’d been throwing the weeds into, causing a loud clanking as t
he can rolled, spilling weeds along the way.
Unfortunately, the can was rolling toward a vintage car parked along the street. “Stop that can!” Erica yelled, and one of the kids ran gamely after it, but it was too late. The can crashed into the vehicle, and when it bounced back off, a dent was visible.
Kirk came down the steps double-time. “That’s my father’s car! You kids did that on purpose.”
Shane looked shamefaced. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to dent the car.”
“Sorry doesn’t fix a vintage vehicle,” Kirk fumed.
“I’ll pay for it,” Shane said quickly. “I’m really sorry.”
He sounded sincere and almost ready to cry, and Erica put an arm around his shoulders. “You have money?”
He nodded miserably. “From work last summer. I’m saving up for a car.”
“Maybe when you own one, you’ll have more respect for other people’s property.” Kirk was kneeling in front of the old car, examining the small dent. “This won’t be cheap.”
“Shane, you need to go apologize to Mr. James. The older one, over there.” She pointed at the World War II veteran, sensing he’d be more forgiving than his son. Then she turned to Kirk. “We’ll make sure it’s paid for and fixed,” Erica promised.
Unfortunately, she wasn’t sure the damage this little incident had done to the program’s reputation could be repaired as easily as a dent to an old car.
CHAPTER TEN
MONDAY MORNING, TREY was at the school supervising a small group of kids in putting together a Cinco de Mayo presentation board—which for whatever reason involved sawing and hot-glue gunning and therefore had to be done outside—when he heard shouting behind him.
Specifically, he heard someone shouting his name.
He turned. Leaning on the chain-link fence, fingers laced into it above his head, was Cochran.
His heart sank even as the sight of King’s former new handler set off fireballs of anger in his head. Word of the episode with King had somehow gotten back to Earl Greene Friday night, but there had been no official report. Trey had hoped Cochran would make the right decision and let the whole matter go.
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