A Touch Bittersweet

by Carter Ashby

  She met his eyes. Her smile vanished. She blinked and looked away. Clearly she understood what he was hinting at. That the two of them working together, alone together, could only lead to trouble. She said, “I think it’ll be okay.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah. We’re adults. It’ll…it’ll be fine.”

  He was glad she understood him without him having to explain it. She wasn’t playing dumb. Wasn’t playing games.

  She nodded and squinted up at him. “We’re family. You’re related by blood to my kids.”

  He laughed at that. “Shit.”

  “Does that make you feel better?”

  “Yes and no.”

  “If you’re not comfortable, I can do it myself.”

  He sobered and stared at her. Yeah, she could do it herself. She would, too; he could see that plain as day. “I shoulda come to your wedding. Been around here more. Gotten to know you and the kids while Joshy was alive.”

  He thought about his little brother. In his mind, he was always a kid. They wrote, emailed, texted. But not often. Most of the time they’d spent together had happened before Joshy was even a teenager. Long before he met and married Maggie Lucas.

  “We can talk about him, if you like,” she said. “I think people assume I don’t want to. I’m happy to.”

  “I’d like that.”

  “Ask me something.”

  “Were you happy with him?”

  “Yes. So much.”

  “Was he happy with you?”

  “I believe so. It’s hard, in the military, you know. We had some rough patches, but we always got through them stronger. He was a great father. I believe he would have had some difficulty with Nate, being as they were so different. But he would have done his best.”

  She was even more beautiful now, talking about her husband, her eyes glistening with emotion just a little.

  “How’d you two meet?” He already knew the answer to it, but he wanted to hear her side.

  She leaned against the wall of the house. “Field trip for Earth Science in the eighth grade. We went to a quarry. I got my ankle caught between a couple of rocks. He helped me out. We sat by each other on the bus ride back.”

  “Love at first sight?”

  “Yeah. I didn’t think so at the time, but looking back…yeah.”

  “What about David?”

  The faraway look in her eyes vanished, and suddenly she was right back there with him. “David was Josh’s friend. He was the first one to ask me out. I said yes but regretted it. Josh already had my heart.”

  Logan nodded. Swallowed down some feelings he didn’t want showing up on his face. “Bet he’s happy for the second chance.”

  “I don’t know.”

  The longer they stood there like that, the more he wanted to reach out and play his fingertips along hers. Just test the waters. See what it felt like to touch her.

  “Logan?”

  “Hmm?”

  “Do you want to have dinner sometime?”

  He froze and stared into her eyes.

  She laughed. “You look like I just confessed to being a demon or something.”

  He tried to relax his expression. “I don’t understand.”

  “I mean, we could have dinner, couldn’t we? Would it really be so bad?”

  The air left his lungs. He turned and paced away from her. “I don’t…” He shook his head and turned back to her. “I ain’t here forever. I can’t. And you’re…” His heart raced. “The kids. I mean—you’ve gotta think about the long-term—”

  “Okay,” she said, holding her hands up in surrender. “I’ll take that as a no.”

  She didn’t look happy. “Maggie, it’s just not a good idea.”

  “Okay,” she said with a shrug. “I mean, I know you’re right. It’s just, I feel so drawn to you.”

  He wanted to tell her that he did, too. That he’d dreamed of her last night. That in less than two days, he’d already learned the smells and sights and sounds of her. That he was already ready to take her into his arms—into his bed.

  But he didn’t tell her that. “It’s just—”

  “Not a good idea. I heard you the first time. You’re right. Truly, it was stupid and impulsive of me to ask—”

  “No. I was on the verge of saying something stupid and impulsive myself. I probably would have if I could breathe.”

  She smiled at him. Such a beautiful smile. “I really like living in the moment.”

  “I couldn’t live with myself. I couldn’t, Maggie.”

  She shrugged and looked down at her feet. “That’s good. I’m glad you have more willpower than me. Can you drive me back into town?”

  “Yeah. Sure.”

  He waited as she walked past him to the truck. They drove back in silence. He dropped her off at the recorder’s office. It was within sight of where she’d parked her car, so he felt okay with leaving her there.

  Well, he didn’t exactly feel okay with it. But it needed doing. He watched her walk in the door of the office. She didn’t look back at him. Her head was high, shoulders straight.

  Logan took a deep breath—or tried to anyway—and drove back home.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  LUNCH WAS WAY too fancy.

  Maggie would have been fine with a cheeseburger, but David insisted on going someplace with ambience, so he’d chosen the town’s only all-local cafe. All the food was sourced locally, sodas made in-house, gluten-free and vegan options.

  No cheeseburgers.

  It was also a pay-what-you-can place in an effort to make good food available to everyone, no matter their financial status. The suggested prices were high. David paid double as a donation.

  As they made their way to a booth in back, people stopped David just to say “Hi, how ya doing?” He glad-handed like a politician, introducing her as his friend.

  When at last they made it to their booth, Maggie sat and laughed. “You were always popular, but I didn’t realize you were the Messiah.”

  He grinned and shook his head. “I’m just out a lot.”

  “And you own half the town. I checked up on you last night. Ellie says you buy up these really bad, low-rent places, fix them up shiny and clean, then keep the rent low. You’re a do-gooder.”

  “I’m a businessman with a conscience, that’s all.”

  “That’s a pretty good thing to be, don’t you think?”

  He shrugged. “What about you? What have you been doing with yourself?”

  “Not much outside of taking care of my kids. I let my teaching license lapse, so I can’t do that unless I renew it. I mentioned how Josh and I used to flip houses. And since I was the one who did most of the work, I always considered that my financial contribution. Other than that, four kids is a full-time job.”

  “I imagine. How are they?”

  “All healthy and happy, for the most part.”

  “How’d they take losing Josh? I mean, them being so young and all.”

  “Right. Well, Levi was just a baby, of course. Izzie was speaking. So she’d just ask for Daddy, and I’d say he was in heaven. She seemed okay with that answer. Cried a few times. Gracie was kind of the same. Nate was old enough to understand the loss. And it seems like every few months, he goes through another round of processing it. Lately, he’s been very withdrawn.” She shrugged as she thought about her sweet babies and this particular burden they would always bear.

  “Must be so hard, Maggie.”

  She smiled and shrugged. “It is. We signed up for it, though.”

  He studied her for a long moment.

  She managed to hold his gaze, penetrating though it was.

  “Nobody really signs up for that, though, do they?”

  His words chipped away at the dam she’d built around her grief. She felt pain for a moment. “You know, I grieved. I let everything out in those first days. I went through the depression following. And the acceptance. I think it’s healthy to understand that this was the life we chose.
To be proud of him for his sacrifice. And ours, really. But no, there’s really no preparing for that loss. People shouldn’t have to die far away in a strange land all alone. We should get to die near our loved ones.”

  David reached across the table and squeezed her hand. His touch was warm and secure. She enjoyed it. And then she felt guilty for enjoying it. And then the server brought their lunch.

  They talked about everything over the next hour. David shared about his family—parents who were celebrating their fiftieth wedding anniversary next year, a younger sister who’d just given birth to her second child. Maggie talked about Ellie and her diagnosis and the way the whole family was showing up to surround her with love in what could be her last years or months or maybe even weeks; about how sometimes she looked so healthy it was hard to believe she was dying.

  After lunch, she started to stand and get ready to go.

  David leaned forward and took her hand. “Wait.” He withdrew his touch and blushed. “I’m sorry. I was just wondering if you’d like to go for a walk, or something. I’m enjoying the conversation so much.”

  “I am, too, but I need to get back to the house. I left the kids with Ellie and Frank. And Logan. I just feel guilty if I stay away for too long.”

  He stood with her. “Sure, I understand. How about dinner tomorrow night?”

  Lunch with an old friend was lunch with an old friend. This sounded like a date.

  He must have seen it on her face. “Or lunch,” he said, backpedaling. “Or stop by my office and hang out? Coffee? I’d just like to visit some more.”

  It would be easiest to just accept. But it might not be fair. “I’m still settling in,” she said. “And my focus right now is on Ellie and my kids. So I just…”

  “I’m not asking you on a date,” he said with a nervous laugh. “Not at all.”

  “Oh,” she said, letting out a laugh of relief herself. “Okay. I’m sorry. I just wanted you to know, if you were looking for something more, I’m just not in the right place now.”

  “Of course! I wouldn’t even think of it. So…lunch again, then?”

  She took a deep breath. Her instinct was to say no. But he said it wasn’t a date. “Sure. But maybe someplace with cheeseburgers.”

  He grinned and walked her out, briefly guiding her with a hand to her lower back as they stepped out of the restaurant. He opened her car door for her. Stood, and waved as she drove back home.

  Not a date. Just lunch with an old friend.

  She tried to shake away the unsettled feeling in her stomach.

  Logan played catch with Nate again, this time with a baseball and gloves.

  He’d gone to church with the whole family. Charlie and Spencer—brought food for a potluck lunch. They’d eaten. And since it was a nice day—warm with uncharacteristically low humidity for August—they’d all gone outside.

  Somehow Logan found himself playing catch with Nate as though they’d always been doing it. As though they’d begun a game long ago and it never ended—just paused for life breaks.

  The kid could throw. He could catch. He could understand and learn. He was quiet.

  Until he wasn’t. “Aunt Charlie says you’re stranged.”

  Logan blinked and almost fumbled the ball. “Stranged?”

  “Yeah. She says you’re my stranged uncle. What’s so weird about you?”

  Logan laughed. “It’s estranged. Means not really part of the family anymore. Distant. Does that make sense?”

  “Oh.” He went through a couple more catch sequences. “That makes more sense. I been trying to figure out what was so strange about you.”

  Logan let it go at that.

  But then Nate asked, “Why are you estranged?”

  Logan had to think about this one. “I don’t know. I didn’t really think of myself as estranged.”

  “It’s because you live in Montana, I bet.”

  “Probably.”

  “But you live here now. So that means you ain’t estranged no more. Right?”

  “Well, I’m just living here a little while. So…”

  “You’re not staying?”

  “I’m staying for a while.”

  “Oh.”

  Nate didn’t talk anymore after that.

  Logan wasn’t sure if he should say anything else on the subject, so he just kept playing catch.

  It was nice to keep his mind off the fact that Maggie still wasn’t home. Two hours after church let out, she was still gone. Must have been a nice lunch with David.

  Logan knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that David would try to get more from her. At least a commitment for a second date. The thought of it made him sick to his stomach. But she was still young. Lonely. Free to love as she saw fit.

  Logan heard the sound of the screen door to the back porch slamming shut. He looked up to see Maggie making her way onto the porch. In the moment that he looked up, Nate threw the ball and hit him square in the chest.

  Logan let fly a string of curse words as he clutched his bruised sternum and went down on one knee. The first one to his side was Nate, followed by Maggie, Ellie, and Charlie.

  “Oh, my God, are you okay?” A flurry of female voices took turns, asking him unnecessary questions.

  Logan knew if he didn’t get back on his feet, they were never going to stop. He stood, rubbing his throbbing chest. The pain went all the way through him. He looked down at Nate, who was staring rather unsympathetically at him. “I’m sorry, Uncle Logan, but you never take your eye off the ball. That’s just one-oh-one.”

  “Come rest, Logan,” Ellie said. “I can’t imagine how much that must have hurt.”

  “Should we go to the hospital?” Maggie asked.

  Nate rolled his eyes. “He just got hit with a baseball. What’s the big deal?”

  “Nate, you apologize to your uncle right now,” Maggie said.

  “I just did.”

  “A real apology. You’re supposed to feel bad for what you did.”

  “I didn’t do anything. He should feel bad for not catching the ball.”

  Logan laughed, which finally silenced the arguing. “He’s fine, Maggie. I shouldn’t have looked away.”

  She turned her “mom” face on him, and he felt a brief moment of fear.

  “It’s fine. Really.”

  Her eyes were wide, her jaw set. She turned back to Nate. “Be careful. And show a little empathy.”

  “I did show empathy,” Nate said. “I feel bad for him because he looked away and got hit by the ball. I did that once, only I got hit in the head, and what you said to me was, ‘You gotta keep your eye on the ball, Son.’”

  Maggie’s face turned red. “Don’t talk back to me, young man. Now what do you say?”

  “Yes, ma’am. I’m sorry.”

  “Good.” She turned and made her way back to the porch.

  As Nate walked back, Logan heard him mutter, “You’re wrong, though.”

  Logan resumed the game. “Did you really get hit in the head with a baseball?”

  “Yep. I wasn’t paying attention because I was a dumb little kid. What’s your excuse?”

  Distracted by a pretty lady. “Hate to tell you this, but you just get dumb in different ways as you get older. So don’t feel like you’re so much better than me, kid.”

  They played until Ellie called everyone in for ice cream. Logan didn’t much want any, so he made his way to the barn to check on the horses. Maybe go for a ride. Frank and Eleanor used to have a whole stable of horses. There were only two left—Pixie and Dirty Harry.

  Pixie was a beautiful young Paint horse. Dirty Harry was an ex-racehorse. Logan didn’t hold it against Dirty Harry that he was Frank’s horse; he just preferred to ride Pixie. She was more intuitive, and a little bit faster.

  “Logan?”

  He didn’t turn at the sound of Maggie’s voice. He’d been about to open Pixie’s stall, but instead he just kept petting her nose.

  “You going for a ride?” Maggie asked. He coul
d feel her moving closer.

  “Yeah, I think so.”

  “Is your chest okay.”

  He laughed and turned to face her. “Yeah. It’s fine.”

  “I’m sorry Nate was so rude.”

  “I didn’t think he was rude.”

  “He was being really disrespectful.”

  Logan thought about it. Shook his head. “I didn’t see it that way.”

  “It was nice of you to keep playing with him.”

  She kept inching closer. She had on her church dress. A pretty, yellow sundress with a pale pink cardigan. Her hair pulled back in a low ponytail. “What do you want, Maggie?”

  She grinned, her cheeks dimpling. “Come have ice cream with us.”

  “I need quiet for a while.”

  “I could ride with you. And be quiet.”

  “I’d have to give you Pixie.”

  “Why?”

  “Because you can’t ride Dirty Harry. He spooks easy.”

  “I can handle him.”

  “I’d be worried the whole time. Wouldn’t be any fun.”

  “So let me ride Pixie.”

  “Don’t want to. She’s my favorite.”

  At this point Maggie was standing way too close. He could feel her heat, she was so close, her head tilted back to look at him. “I just want to spend time with you. How about a walk instead?”

  “Why are you doing this?”

  “Because I have no self-control.”

  “How was your date with David?”

  “It wasn’t a date. And he’s not you.”

  “You don’t even know me, Maggie. Ain’t anything good that could come of this. Please. Go back up to the house.”

  “You’d have to let go of my hand.”

  He looked down, not even realizing he’d done it. He’d reached over and taken her small hand in his. He stared at it. Felt her flesh on his. His heart raced, and he felt warm all over. Too warm.

  “It’s such a good feeling,” she said softly, moving her thumb alongside the edge of his hand. “An alive feeling. An awake feeling. I assumed my light was all burned out, you know. But it’s not. All I have to do is stand near you and everything in me lights up.”

  “Jesus.”

  “You’re right, though. I don’t know you. I want to. Do you want to know me?”