In a Midnight Wood

by Ellen Hart

  As the conversation turned to Cordelia’s wealth of entertaining exploits in the theater biz, Emma took a few minutes to silently survey the room. She was curious to see if any of her classmates had arrived early for the reunion. Seeing Kurt, she ordered a dirty martini and then excused herself.

  He was seated at a table next to the window overlooking the lake. She wanted to check in, make sure he was okay after the state he’d been in last night. As she approached, she recognized the man he was sitting with.

  “Ted?” she said. “Wow. If it isn’t our infamous class president.”

  He rose to give her a hug. “Great to see you, Emma.”

  Ted Hammond had always been on the short side, but husky. In the years since she’d last seen him, he’d put on weight, all of it muscle. His red hair remained thick and wavy, and he looked tanned and healthy. The only difference in his appearance was a nicely trimmed beard. She’d had a crush on him in junior high, but that was ancient history. “I didn’t think you’d be here until tomorrow.”

  “I drove up Saturday night. I don’t know if you’ve heard, but my dad died last year, so I usually try to come up one weekend a month to spend time with my mom. This gave me a reason to spend a few extra nights. It’s been a hard time for her.”

  “I didn’t know,” said Emma. “I’m so sorry.”

  “Thanks. My sister still lives here—she’s married with a couple of kids, so that helps.”

  “Do you want to sit down?” asked Kurt.

  “No, I can’t. I’m with friends. But I wanted to come over, mainly to tell you that—”

  He interrupted her. “I’m sorry about last night. Really. I was in pretty bad shape.”

  “No worries,” she said, touching his arm. “Honestly, I’m just glad Danny was able to take me home.”

  “Sounds like there’s a story there,” said Ted, grinning at her.

  “Not much of one,” said Kurt.

  “You heard about the party I’m throwing on Friday night for the entire class, right? After the homecoming game. If the weather holds, I thought we’d do a bonfire on the beach, maybe get a keg.”

  “I’ll be there,” said Ted.

  “Is your wife with you?” She was fishing, but didn’t think he noticed.

  “I’m not married. Came close a couple of times, but no cigar.”

  She laughed. “Well, I should let you two get back to your dinner. You’re both coming to the final reunion meeting on Thursday night, right? We need to get the VFW hall set up on Saturday morning. So much to do. You know, Ted, maybe you should come to the meeting for the committee chairs tomorrow night.”

  “I’m available for anything you need.”

  Emma was genuinely starting to get excited about the reunion. “We’re meeting in the basement of the hall at seven.”

  “I’ll be there.”

  She’d no sooner made it back to the table, where Cordelia continued to hold court, than she noticed someone else she knew—the last person she expected to run into tonight.

  Scott stood at the entrance to the bar, beckoning her over. He’d been calling and texting her all day. She’d never found him annoying before, but she did now.

  Carrying her martini, she crossed the room to where he stood. “Did you follow me here?”

  “God, it’s good to see you.” His eyes were bloodshot. “You look amazing.”

  “You look hung over. Answer my question.”

  The muscles along his jaw tightened. “I’m not proud of it. Yeah, I followed you.”

  “That’s stalking, Scott.”

  “You wouldn’t respond to any of my texts. I had to see you, had to apologize.”

  “Men and their apologies.”

  “What’s that mean?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Look, Emma, I was desperate to see you last night, but I didn’t think you’d come by, so I started drinking—too much, as it turns out. My brother’s death had really hit me hard.”

  It hadn’t seemed that way last night, but then in the shape he was in, there was probably no way to tell. Standing here now, he seemed so sad that it gave her heart a hard twist. In spite of herself, she felt sorry for him. “I wanted to talk about Sam last night.”

  “Did you? I don’t remember much about our conversation.”

  “You scared me.”

  “Oh, Emma, I never intended to. Please, let me cook you dinner tomorrow night. I know you’re leaving soon. Can’t we have one last normal night together?”

  She wasn’t sure what he meant by normal.

  “Please? I’ll do something nice. I know you like my beef stroganoff. How about that?”

  “I’m not sure it’s a good idea.”

  “Come on. It might be our last chance.”

  He seemed so dejected. “If I agree, there won’t be any drinking, right?”

  He held up his hand. “Scout’s honor.”

  She could feel her resolve crumbling. She didn’t love him, not the way he wanted, but she had grown to care about him. “Okay. Seven o’clock.”

  “Thank you.” He hesitated. “Can I kiss you?”

  “Of course not,” she said, appalled. Had he never listened to her? “I can’t be open about our relationship. You know that.”

  “Just this once?”

  “No,” she said, taking a sustaining sip of her martini. “Now I have to get back to my party.”

  “Okay, sure. Tomorrow night, then. I’ll be waiting, Emma.”

  15

  Jane stood in front of Leslie Harrow’s front door and rang the bell. An hour before, she’d been standing in front of a mirror back at the lake house, wondering if wearing a pair of gold hoop earrings was too much. She didn’t usually dither over things like that and was more than a little embarrassed by the way she was fussing over what to wear. Much of her clothing was wrinkled from being in a suitcase. With no time to iron, and no desire to iron to begin with, she’d decided on a pair of tan cargo pants and a black turtleneck. Before leaving, she’d gone back to add a bit of lipstick to her look.

  When Leslie answered the door, she seemed more relaxed than she had earlier in the day, a kitchen towel tossed over her shoulder. She had on ripped jeans and a navy-blue sweatshirt with the word HOYAS written on the front of it in big block letters. “Did you have any problems with my directions?”

  “Nope,” said Jane. “I just did what you said. I turned onto the road marked Dead End.”

  “As long as you don’t have problems with metaphors, this is a great place to live.”

  The main room was a combination of living room/dining room, with high, vaulted ceilings and modern furniture.

  “Do you ever feel color challenged?” asked Leslie as she stood next to a leather sectional. “That’s how I felt when I bought the house three years ago. I couldn’t decide on anything, so I just painted everything white. It’s kind of stark.”

  “No, I like it,” said Jane, handing Leslie the bottle of wine she’d brought and then removing her jacket. “It’s like a gallery space. You have some fascinating art.” She deposited the jacket on a chair as she stopped to examine a swirling metal sculpture.

  “It’s supposed to look like wind,” said Leslie, perching on the arm of the couch. “Bought it in Budapest.”

  “That’s right, you’re the world traveler.”

  “Sort of. Do you like Campari and soda?”

  “Sure.”

  They moved through the kitchen and out onto a deck. A table had already been prepared with the Campari, soda, and several platters and small bowls containing Leslie’s promised antipasto.

  “This looks lovely,” said Jane.

  “It’s one of my favorite quick dinners. We can graze our way through it, and then I have something special for dessert.”

  “Is that soppressata?”

  “And mortadella, Genoa salami, and cotechino—which you have to try with mustard.”

  “Where do you buy all that in town?”

  “Actually, Kurt S
teiner stocks a good assortment of deli meats. The rest I buy here and there online.”

  Jane saw Peppadew peppers, kalamata and Manzanilla olives, sliced heirloom tomatoes, marinated mushrooms, and artichoke hearts. “What are the cheeses?”

  “The first one’s a Comté from Fort St. Antoine, my current favorite. The next is a Marieke Gouda from Wisconsin. I think it’s better than the Netherlands Goudas. The final one is a piece of Gorgonzola Dolce, another Wisconsin cheese, this one from Green Bay. And that”—she pointed to a small bowl—“is a date-and-fig chutney. I make it myself. The bread’s an old-world farm loaf that I buy from a local bakery.”

  “Looks amazing.”

  “A spread like this makes people think I went to a lot of trouble when all I did was buy and assemble. I’m not fooling you, though, am I?”

  Jane glanced around to see if there might be a dog or cat lurking somewhere, scouting out the food on offer. “No pets?”

  “No, never really been a fan.”

  “I have a couple of dogs. A brown lab and a little black poodle.”

  “And you adore them.”

  “Beyond measure. When I’m out of town, they stay with a neighbor. She loves them almost as much as I do.”

  As Leslie mixed the drinks, Jane surveyed the scenery. The deck overlooked the Bullhead River and, beyond that, a wooded area. She already knew that this was the tonier section of town.

  Sunset in mid-September was around seven-thirty, so Leslie switched on several strings of orange and red mini-lanterns before she sat down. The little lanterns didn’t offer much in the way of illumination, but they were pretty, and as the sun dipped lower over the trees, made the deck seem cozy.

  “So what brings a world traveler to Castle Lake?” asked Jane.

  Leslie looked over the cheese and finally selected one, carving off a chunk. “My grandparents on my mother’s side owned a farm just west of town. It’s where my mom grew up. When I was a kid, I’d beg to spend the summers here. I came every year from the time I was eight until the summer before my senior year. I’d follow my grandfather around the property, initially just to spend time with him. Later on, I began to help with chores. My grandmother taught me how to cook and knit, and she was the fisherman in the family, so we’d go fishing together. I made friends, too, and honestly, there were times when I didn’t want to go home.”

  “Where was home?”

  “Buffalo, New York. My father owned a bar there, and my mother worked for the Buffalo Bills, the NFL team. She’s a physician, specialized in sports medicine.”

  “You didn’t like Buffalo?”

  “It wasn’t that. My family was kind of, how do I put this … chaotic. Anyway, Mom wanted me to pursue a medical career, like my older brother. I wasn’t interested. I ended up going to Georgetown and graduated with a degree in American history with a minor in public policy. My parents paid for my schooling and assumed I’d continue on for a masters, but, again, I had other ideas.”

  “Such as?” asked Jane, spreading some of the Gorgonzola on a piece of bread.

  “To travel. I had a friend who’d been hired by TWA. She somehow wrangled an interview for me and, amazingly, I was offered a job as a flight attendant. I moved on to Qantas six years later, and then to British Airways. I never made any money, but I did get to see the world.”

  “Why did you stop?”

  She took a sip of her drink, gazing toward the river. “For many years, I was with someone who meant a great deal to me. Another flight attendant, Chris Boncamper. We’d just about decided to split when there was a plane crash in France and … Chris was badly injured.”

  “I’m so sorry.” Jane had no idea if Chris was a woman or a man.

  “Yeah, it was pretty awful. I took a leave of absence to help with the rehab. It didn’t feel right to just pick up and leave. As it turned out, I never went back to work. I couldn’t. Even the idea of getting on a plane to fly back home gave me panic attacks. Several months later, with the help of booze and Xanax, I landed in Buffalo, where I spent the next few weeks with my parents. My grandparents had both died while I was living in Sydney. They left me money and the farm. Initially, I was concerned about the one-sided bequests, but my father assured me that my older brother had no interest in the money or the farm, and my younger brother—he’d been in prison for eight years before he was released—was nowhere to be found. Dad suggested we continue to rent the property and offered to invest the money. Prior to owning the bar, he’d worked in finance, so I was happy to just leave it in his hands. When I got back, I had a nice little nest egg.”

  “Good for you,” said Jane. “Do you still own the farm?”

  “I came back to take a look at it and make some decisions. I eventually sold it. Couldn’t believe how much it was worth. By then, I’d pretty much decided to stay for a while. I had nowhere else to go, and I felt at home in Castle Lake. After I’d been here for a year or so, I decided to get involved in town government. Initially I did a two-year stint on the town council. During my second term, I bought this place. And then I ran for mayor.”

  “You like being mayor?”

  “I like government, especially local government, because it’s where you can really make things happen. I’m a registered Democrat, but having lived with two deeply conservative parents for eighteen years, I realize that they often made some good points. They were huge Reagan supporters.”

  “Were you?”

  “Kind of. But while I was in college, my thinking changed. Ronald Reagan was the one who popularized the idea that government wasn’t the solution, it was the problem. It still makes me furious when I hear someone repeat that meretricious garbage.”

  “Is Castle Lake pretty conservative?”

  “Yes … and no. People surprise you. Humans are a lot more complex than the common wisdom might allow.”

  “Is the town a safe place to live?”

  “Again, yes, generally, but we do have crime, the same sorts of crime you find in urban areas—drugs, aggravated assault, sexual assault, domestics, property crime, car thefts.”

  “And murder.”

  “More suicides by gun than murder, but yeah, it happens. Come on, now. That’s enough on my side of the ledger. I want to know something about you. For instance, Cordelia said you lost your partner last year. That must have been hard.”

  It was the last thing Jane wanted to talk about.

  “How long were you and—”

  “Julia.”

  “Yes, Julia.”

  “It’s kind of a long story.”

  She grinned. “Isn’t everything?”

  The doorbell rang. “Now what?” Leslie muttered, rising from the table.

  Feeling a little chilly, Jane decided to go inside to get her jacket. As she came into the living room, she saw that the man following Leslie around last night was standing just inside the doorway.

  “Oh,” he said, seeing Jane come in. “I didn’t realize—”

  “This isn’t a good time, Don. Perhaps we can talk about it tomorrow.”

  “Sure. Right.” He shifted his stance. “I was in the area and figured maybe I could get your thoughts before the meeting.” He nodded to Jane. “I don’t suppose you’ve heard anything more about that fire, specifically about Carli?”

  “Nothing,” she said, continuing to hold the door open.

  “Well, you’ll let me know if you do, yes?”

  “Of course I will.”

  Jane had the sense that he was casting around, trying to come up with a reason that would allow him to stay.

  Snapping his fingers, he said, “You know, that reminds me—”

  “Have a good evening,” said Leslie. “We’ll talk tomorrow.”

  “Oh, okay. Sure.” He nodded to Jane. “Good to see you again.”

  Once he was gone, Jane said, “Maybe I’m wrong, but I think he likes you.”

  “I think you’re right,” said Leslie, locking the door. “He’s a nice man, but he’s not my type.”<
br />
  “You have a type?”

  “Doesn’t everyone? For instance, if I said you were my type, what would you say?”

  “Me?”

  Hands on her hips, Leslie stepped closer. “I must be losing my touch.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I’ve seen you twice in twenty-four hours. Both times I flirted with abandon, but you didn’t seem to notice. Or maybe you’re not interested. If so—”

  Jane cleared her throat and looked down at her shoes. “Cordelia tells me I not only don’t know how to flirt, I don’t recognize it when someone flirts with me.”

  “You’re flirt challenged. That’s hilarious.” She eyed Jane a moment, then said, “Oh, screw it.” Moving close, she gave Jane a kiss. “I suppose I should have asked permission, but you know what they say: It’s easier to ask forgiveness.”

  Jane blinked a couple of times. “None required.”

  “Do you have any idea how many women I’ve met in the last few years who gave me any reason to flirt?”

  “How many?”

  “Two. One was married—to a guy—and the other was about to be deployed to Afghanistan. There are, maybe, a dozen out lesbians in Castle Lake. Most of them are friends. They’re all either paired up or I’m not interested. In any event, I have to be somewhat circumspect.”

  “People don’t know you’re gay?”

  “If they do, they don’t talk about it in front of me, and I haven’t made it an issue. I will, of course, somewhere down the line. I’d like to run for the statehouse next time around. But that’s off the topic.”

  “What’s the topic?”

  “You. We got the first kiss out of the way. Sometimes that can take forever, you know what I mean? I realize I sound kind of clinical. I’m really very romantic given the opportunity, but I don’t have a lot of time here. You’re leaving next weekend, and I’m not sure when I’ll see you again.”

  Jane opened her mouth, but couldn’t quite figure out what to say.

  “I like you. I think you like me. Nod if you agree.”

  She nodded.

  Taking Jane’s hand, Leslie said, “Then stay the night. Maybe we’ll just have some fun. I’m fine with fun. Or maybe we’ll be soulmates forever. That seems less likely, but you never know. Say something. I feel like I’m making a fool of myself here.”