by Skye, Harper
“I didn’t know who she was!” Ailsa’s voice was louder than she had expected. Suddenly there were hot tears flooding the corners of her eyes. “I was completely caught off guard. I felt like an idiot. Standing there looking like this with my hair a mess and my face and my torn jeans. And she’s standing there looking like a fucking goddess telling me she’s your fiancé!”
“Ex-…”
“Whatever!” Ailsa pushed two stray tears out of her eyes. Why did she always have to fucking cry?
“And what’s wrong with your face?” His voice was rising again along with hers. “Your face is fucking beautiful.”
“Yeah with the bags under my eyes and my…” Ailsa choked on her words.
“Yeah with the bags under your eyes and your everything else!”
Ailsa glared at him and he glared back.
“Ailsa, you are ten thousand times more beautiful than that woman. In every way. What did she say to you that’s made you this upset?” From the way his voice was strained, she could tell Zach was trying to get a grip on his emotions.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were engaged to her!”
The sound of the chair scraping across the floor echoed harshly through the room as Zach abruptly pushed himself further away from the table and stood up. Everything about Zach’s body was tense. His hands knotted through his light brown hair, and his shoulders and biceps bulged with tension as he paced in a small circle between the table and the kitchen.
“Ailsa, please don’t freak out!”
Ailsa saw him look over at her with pain in his eyes. She clutched her hands tightly together, trying to keep herself calm so she could hear him out.
“Fuck!” He cursed again. “I should have told you. Of course I should have told you. I didn’t…I don’t know why. I just hate thinking about that whole relationship. I wasn’t myself. I was trying to make this thing work that so clearly wasn’t working.”
“She said I should be careful of you,” Ailsa whispered. “That you’ll make me believe you love me, and then you’ll drop me and move on to someone else like you did with her.”
“God damn her!” He slammed his fist against the kitchen counter.
“Zach calm down!” Ailsa could feel the heat in her cheeks. Her heart was beating faster, but she stayed glued to her seat.
“I don’t want to fucking calm down.” She saw Zach squeeze his eyes shut as if wincing, and he turned his back away as if to hide the rage in his face. Taking the edge of the counter in both hands, he leaned into it pumping air into his lungs. Finally he let his head fall between his arms, and she could hear him take a few deeper breaths before he raised his head again. The next moment, he turned back towards her, and his eyes were open as he knelt down before her.
“Ailsa, everything I told you at the beach in Nome is true. I was really lonely. I met Maddison through a mutual friend and we dated for about six months. When she started talking about getting married, there was part of me that figured maybe this was as good as it gets. I hate thinking about it because it’s the one time I feel like I was really untrue to myself. I went along with things. I’m not proud of it. And I know I hurt her, and I’m not fucking proud of that either. But it was messy between us. It was messy on both sides, and she knows it, so I’m not taking all the blame either.”
“What made you break things off?” Ailsa wanted to reach out and touch him. He was kneeling inches away from her, and yet she felt frozen in armor she had brought up to protect herself.
“I was having drinks one night with Seb and he asked me a question about…the wedding, the honeymoon, I don’t know. I honestly can’t even remember. I gave him some mediocre respond and I remember the look he gave me then. He didn’t even have to say anything, but he looked so shocked at my response, and seeing his reaction was like someone holding a mirror up to my face. And I realised this wasn’t how it was supposed to feel. Suddenly I felt the profound thing I was going to do with Maddison. Marriage — that’s supposed to be forever! And the weight fell on me like a load of bricks. So I got completely shit-faced and the next day I talked to her and broke things off.”
He paused, but Ailsa didn’t know what to say.
“That’s the truth, Ailsa. I broke things off with Maddison before I ever even met you last summer. We haven’t been together for over two years…”
“I believe you,” Ailsa said quietly. “It’s just…ughhhh!” She shook her head, and her light hair fell down in front of her face as she bent into her hands.
When she looked up, she could see Zach’s warm brown eyes pleading with her. He wanted her trust. And Ailsa wanted to give it. But she couldn’t deny how much this had shaken her.
“Ailsa…” She felt his wide hands encircling her wrists, asking her to move her hands, asking her to uncover her face and look at him. “Ailsa…”
“What?”
She looked up, and the expression in his eyes almost broke her heart.
“I love you.” He fingered a strand of her long hair. It looked like he was going to say something else. His mouth opened, but it was as if he couldn’t find the words and so he shut it again, looking deep into her eyes and trying to tell her things he couldn’t find the words to say.
“Why did she have to look so fucking beautiful? Couldn’t she have been ugly? One little flaw…”
“Ailsa, that woman is anything but beautiful. She doesn’t hold a candle to you.” Zach said, reaching to cradle the side of Ailsa’s face. “I wish you could see what I see when I look at you. Then you’d never have any doubts.” He gave her a gentle smile.
“But I will make a fucking point to tell Maddison where she can go next time I see her. She knows damn well what happened between us. It wasn’t a fucking bed of roses. And I was always sorry I hurt her, but its been two years…”
“Did she live here with you?” Ailsa heard her voice like a whisper. It sounded small.
“No.” He leaned towards her, his face inches away from hers. “Ailsa…I’m so fucking sorry I didn’t tell you the whole story. But I really need you to believe me. To trust me. You are everything to me.”
She nodded. “Okay.”
He pressed his mouth against hers, warm and scratchy and so familiar now it made something in Ailsa’s chest ache. “I’m yours,” he murmured against her mouth. And she nodded as she kissed him back because she wanted to believe him.
Chapter 37
“Ailsa…”
She hadn’t recognized the number, but Ailsa recognized the voice. It was Rob. Why would he possibly be calling her after all these months? Ailsa looked over the back of the couch at Zach’s broad back. He was sitting at the kitchen counter searching the internet for something.
“Ailsa, wait don’t hang up…” Rob’s voice was such a sudden and familiar sound of home, Ailsa suddenly felt her eyes water.
“Hi…” she tried to make her voice sound normal as she eased off the couch.
“Hi…” Rob paused as if he had suddenly gotten nervous and forgotten what to say. Ailsa walked towards the sunroom and stepped through the French doors shutting them behind her.
“Rob…?”
“Sorry, ‘em…” Rob cleared his throat. “So firstly I wanted to say that…’em….”
Ailsa waited. She should say sorry. This was Rob, one of her oldest friends. Yes they had sort of fucked things up between them by sleeping together. But it was both their faults really. And she had been the one who had been too awkward to talk to him about it.
“Look, I’m fucking sorry, Ail. I fucked things up between us. But…I mean I know Rosslyn said you didn’t leave because of me… I mean, of course you didn’t. You’re always travelling…but…fuck!” She could imagine the look of his face buried in his free hand, his longish black hair spilling forward.
“Rob…?”
“Yeah?”
“It wasn’t your fault. You didn’t fuck things up. We both did.” She paused biting her lip. “I’m sorry I ran away without speaking to you.”
“Yeah?” He breathed a sigh.
“Yeah. Is that why you called?” She could feel a small smile rising to her lips. She felt so much better finally clearing the air with Rob. He was a good friend. And a music friend, which made him one of her soul friends. And she had hated feeling like they weren’t speaking, even if it had been her fault.
“No there’s something else…” He was finding his way through the conversation, and Ailsa could hear how much he shared in her relief that they were finally talking things through.
“I wanted to call you because my parents have a friend back home in Inverness who is trying to sell his music shop. Well, not sell exactly but hand it over to someone to run so he can retire. And the bloke he had lined up has just done a runner on him and moved to Brazil with his girlfriend.” She could hear Rob chuckling in the background. Obviously the idea of running off with your Brazilian girlfriend was very entertaining.
“What does that have to do with me?” Ailsa prompted.
“Ach, well…” He hesitated again. “I thought you might like the job when you got back. Mr. McInnis wants a musician. You’ve got to know music to run Bear Wood Fiddles.”
Suddenly Ailsa felt her heart run cold. “What did you say?” She heard herself whisper.
“I know it’s a ways from Glasgow,” Rob’s voice tried to reassure her. “But, I just thought, it might be a new start, Ail. Maybe you just need a new start. It’s not for me,” he added quickly, assuming the reason for her suddenly silence. “I’ve got a girlfriend now. It’s…not about that…”
“I know…” Ailsa replied. “Ros told me you’re dating someone. I’m really glad.” She could feel a lump caught in her throat, and she tried to swallow it down, hoping she had simply misheard him. “What was the name of the shop?”
“Bear Wood Fiddles.”
“Bear?”
“Yeah, Bear. Why? What does it matter about the name?”
Ailsa swallowed again. This was too crazy to be a coincidence.
“What do you think? You interested? Mr. McInnis really needs someone soon, but he doesn’t want to put his life’s work in the hands of someone he doesn’t know. So when I mentioned you he was really keen. You can basically have the job if you want it.”
Ailsa bit down hard on the inside of her cheek. Her breath had caught in her chest, and it felt as if her whole body had gone very very still.
“Ailsa? You still there?”
“Yeah I’m still here.”
“You interested?”
She swallowed again, and glanced over her shoulder to where Zach sat in the kitchen. From out here in the sunroom, it felt as if she were standing outside the house peering in the window at the life with Zach that could be hers. Fuck!
“Ailsa?”
“Yeah, I’m interested.” She heard herself whisper.
“Brilliant!” Rob’s voice echoed with enthusiasm. “It will have to be soon though. He wants to start training someone for the position by the end of the month. When are you coming home?”
“I don’t know. I’ll text you.”
“But you want the job?”
“‘Em…” Ailsa could taste the blood in her mouth from where she had bit her cheek. Fuck! “I…sorry Rob, this is just a bit sudden. I wasn’t planning on coming home so soon…”
“Can’t you change your ticket?”
“Yeah, I could…”
“Okay, well let me know within the next day or so because I’ll need to let Mr. McInnis know. Ailsa…?”
“Yeah?”
“This could be really great. If you saw Bear Wood Fiddles, you’d love it. Trust me.” For Rob to say that really meant something, and Ailsa knew that was the problem. She had played music with Rob for so many years now, she did trust him. Especially about something like this.
“Okay. Thanks Rob. It was good to speak to you.”
“Yeah, same. I’ll look for your text.”
“Yeah okay. Bye then.”
“Bye.”
She saw the call disconnect, but she kept the phone against her ear for a long time as she stared out across the wild land of Alaska. Across the vast forests towards the distant mountains. The view she had thought might be hers to keep. Ailsa took a deep breath and felt it shudder in her chest when she let it go.
She was so tired. So fucking tired. She hadn’t slept more than a few hours a night for over a week, and she could feel the strain pulling at her mind.
Nothing seemed to make sense. The dreams of the accident were relentless, and she couldn’t make them stop. Every night when she lay down in bed Ailsa could feel her body tense, scared of the dream that would take hold of her as soon as she closed her eyes.
And now this.
A sign.
She had been following signs and omens her whole life. And never had they let her down. Since the accident, Ailsa had missed this connection she felt to the wider universe. It was as if this part of her had truly died in the accident with her friends. And on so many occasions she had found herself looking up into the night sky or across the sea from the shoreline in Oban and asking for this connection to be returned to her.
Send me a sign, she had pleaded. Send me a sign so I know what I should do. Send me a sign so I know why the universe chose to keep me alive when everyone else died in that car. Tell me, tell me, what am I supposed to do with this life I’ve been given? Tell me what I can do with my life to honor the lives of my friends who will never get to live out their dreams.
Almost every day for four years since the accident she had found this prayer on her lips. And finally the universe was answering her. Sending her dreams of the bear. She had read that the bear was known as a source of healing. Maybe she should trust the signs. If they were telling her to go home, maybe that was the only way to stop these dreams and finally heal the broken bits of herself.
Bear Wood Fiddles. How could she ignore this sign? It was the bear calling her back home.
Ailsa remembered the moment she had looked out of the airplane window and cursed the universe and its signs. She remembered how her fists had clenched with determination that she was not going to listen. That she was going to stay here with Zach and be happy.
Ailsa wished she felt that confidence now. She wished she had never picked up the phone and heard Rob’s voice. She wished she had missed this sign calling her away from the beautiful cabin and this beautiful man.
But she hadn’t. She had heard it. And Ailsa knew there was a reason for that too. And the pain in her mind from the relentless nightmares was starting to convince her that no matter what she thought she wanted, she really wasn’t going to heal here in Alaska.
Chapter 38
That night she lay next to Zach listening to him breathe. His broad chest rose and fell in the shadows of the night, his face was smooth, his cheeks and jaw shaded with a short beard. Ailsa wanted to reach out and run her fingers across the dark roughness of it. Instead she lay frozen in her body while her mind ran scattered and chaotic.
There were times during the day when she knew in her heart that she wanted to stay. And then night would come where she was afraid to sleep, and she would lie awake remembering all the times she had been wrong about the future, and she would begin to doubt herself all over again.
There was so much she didn’t understand. And the lack of sleep was making it harder and harder to see things clearly. One minute she was sure she could trust Zach. He would wrap his arm around her or smile at her from across the room, and she would feel something inside of her settle and relax.
But then the next minute, another voice would come into her head reminding her how little time they had really known each other. Running into Zach’s ex- fiancé was just one example of how much they still didn’t know about each other. He’ll make you feel like you’re the only one. He’ll draw you in and just when you’ve let your guard down, he’ll get bored of you. The woman’s words throbbed like a splinter in Ailsa’s mind, her voice echoing Ailsa’s own midnig
ht fears.
And then there was this new element. This sign of the bear that had appeared out of nowhere and when Ailsa least wanted to receive it. Rob’s phone call had shaken her, especially since she knew that at any other time in her life, this would have been a dream opportunity. A job running an established music store in Inverness! How could she say no?
Ailsa lay in the shadows of the bedroom listening to Zach’s slow breathing, and she could feel the fear beginning to consume her. What if she stayed and things between her and Zach didn’t work out? What if the same thing that happened with Maddison happened to her? She would be left all alone thousands of miles from her family. What if she gave up this chance to make a new life for herself in Inverness? Would she ever get this kind of opportunity again? Could she really be so bold as to turn her back on this once-in-a-lifetime job?
And what would happen if she blatantly ignored the signs the universe had sent her? How could she ever be free of the past? How could she ever reconnect with that deep part of herself that knew its place in the vast world? Would that part of her be lost forever? Would she never heal from the wounds of her past?
After all, Ailsa thought, what did her heart know? How could she take such an insane leap of faith and move across the world to Alaska when all the signs seemed to be pointing the way back home?
When Zach found her in the morning, she was already dressed, wrapped in a blanket and sitting on the couch in the sunroom.
“Have you been up all night?” Zach asked when he wandered through to find her. The sun had been high in the sky for hours. It hardly dipped below the horizon even in the middle of the night.
When she looked up at him, he noticed something in her face. Ailsa could see it. The way his eyes flickered with a pain he didn’t yet understand.