Bitterroot Lake

by Alicia Beckman

  She didn’t bother knocking. Inside, she set her bag and the pie on the kitchen counter, next to a used coffee cup. Her mother had never been one of those artists who lost track of time or forgot to eat, likely because she’d snuck painting between work and family for so long. It hadn’t become her focus until she retired from teaching. After JP’s death, she’d stopped painting for a while, brushing off her kids’ concern. Now, Sarah understood. If her mother had found the spark again, good, even if that kept her from paying attention to other things.

  One foot on the bottom step, Sarah glanced into the living room with its high ceilings and tall windows, the decor a quirky mix of new and old, her father’s bronze urn on the fireplace mantel. What was that line from the poem, about arriving home and recognizing the place for the first time? This hadn’t been her home, the place where she lived, for a long time, and neither had the lodge, long her second home, but her heart would always recognize them both.

  She started up the staircase. The wall had been covered with family portraits when she was growing up, but now held only one painting, a large oil Peggy had done of Bitterroot Lake. At the landing, where the staircase turned, she called out. “Hey, Mom, it’s me.” The smell of paint mingled with the raw odor of brush cleaner.

  “Sarah!” came her mother’s voice from the studio. A rustling sound. A door closed and footsteps followed. Then Peggy stood at the top of the stairs, eyes bright, cheeks flushed.

  “I didn’t hear you come in.” She smiled broadly, almost breathless.

  “Caught up in your painting. Show me.” Sarah took another step.

  “Oh, no.” Peggy wrapped her hand around the newel post. “No. It’s—they’re not in any shape for eyes other than mine.”

  “Oh. Okay. When you’re ready.” That was new; her mother had never hesitated to show work in progress, even soliciting opinions. She started back down, Peggy behind her. “I stopped at the Spruce. Brought you pie.”

  “Huckleberry-peach? Perfect—I’ll have it for dinner.”

  One of the many secrets of adult living was that you actually could eat pie for dinner, or breakfast, contrary to what your parents had told you when you were growing up. Contrary to what you’d told your own children.

  In the kitchen, Sarah opened the fridge to tuck the pie box inside. Cream, a jar of strawberry jam, and a jar of pickles. Two bottles of mustard, a bag of sliced salami, and half a loaf of cinnamon-raisin bread.

  “Come out to the lodge for dinner. No cleaning, I promise. I’ll run you back into town later. You can help Holly and me make a plan.” She filled the pot with water and poured it into the coffee maker. Not that she needed any more caffeine. She needed the ritual. “There’s so much to do in the lodge, and the carriage house is worse. Where do you keep your coffee?”

  “Hmm? Umm. Freezer.” Peggy was sitting on a stool at the kitchen counter, chin resting on the back of her hand.

  “Earth to Mom,” Sarah said as she opened the freezer and took out a bag of ground beans. “You’re a million miles away.”

  “Nooo. I’m right here.” Peggy blinked. “What were you saying?”

  “I was saying, we need to make a plan. I’m not sure how long either of us can stay, so we need to identify the most important projects and get as much done as we can.” Sarah scooped coffee into the filter basket, slid it into place, and pushed the button.

  “Oh, honey. Tonight? I wish I could but—the painting. I’m—I’m at a delicate spot, and I need to get it right.” She gestured with both hands, fingers close together, not quite touching.

  “Okay. Sure. Tomorrow, then. I’m not going to stand in the way of art.”

  What wasn’t her mother telling her? Was it about her health? The lodge, or Holly? She opened her mouth to ask, then closed it. Took two mugs from the cabinet—at least they were where she expected them to be. Nothing else was as she expected.

  Deep calming breaths, she could hear her therapist say. Was it nuts to hear the voice of a woman five hundred miles away in her head? Only if she listened, she told herself.

  In, out. In, out. In, ouuut. You don’t know if there’s a problem. You don’t know if she’s sick. And you’ve dealt with worse.

  Ohhh god, oh god oh god. In, out.

  She got the cream and found a spoon. Poured the coffee and carried the cups around to the other side of the counter. “Finish the painting, or at least, this delicate spot. Then come out tomorrow and spend the day with us.”

  “Thank you, dear,” Peggy said, though whether for the coffee or the reprieve, Sarah couldn’t tell.

  “By the way, George Hoyt stopped by this morning.”

  Peggy raised her eyes quickly. “What did he want?”

  “Nothing. Just making sure we were okay after the storm. I’d already walked part of the property, but we drove up and down most of the logging roads. Holly called Connor and he’ll send someone out to clear them and throw some tarps up.” She filled in the sketchy picture that was all Holly had had time to give their mother.

  “Your father always called major windstorms a lumberman’s dream and nightmare, rolled into one.”

  “Speaking of Dad, he’d be shocked to see all the junk in the carriage house. There’s barely enough room for two cars.”

  Peggy lowered her cup. “Connor decided they needed your father’s shop space as part of the expansion, so he moved the tools and equipment out there.”

  “What expansion?”

  “Your brother works too hard,” her mother went on, ignoring Sarah’s question. “That company’s a big responsibility. Too much for one man to shoulder.”

  “Connor’s a big man. Broad shoulders.”

  “I am speaking metaphorically.” Peggy gave her a sidelong glower, then picked up her cup.

  “Ohhh-kay.” She’d ask Connor about the expansion when she saw him. “It would be a lot easier to inventory the lodge if they hadn’t started packing it up. That was a lot of work for nothing.”

  “Well, it seemed like a good idea at the time,” Peggy said. “But he’s too busy now, and I can’t decide whether to put everything back, call an auction house, or what.”

  “Sounds like we all need to sit down together and talk things over.” Everyone said you shouldn’t make a major decision like selling your house for the first year after your spouse died, but that didn’t apply to family property, did it? It couldn’t. She couldn’t ask everyone else to put this off until she was ready. With three siblings, someone’s life would always be in flux. And Peggy was getting older, and what if she was sick? Sarah added that to her mental list for this hypothetical conversation. “While Holly and I are in town. And we should probably include Leo. I know you and Dad bought his parents out years ago, but we’ve always let him use the place. Although he’s got a full plate, too.”

  “Why is Holly here?” Peggy asked.

  Sarah’s breath stopped.

  “To support Janine?” Peggy continued. “They’ve stayed fairly close, I know. Unlike you. And—well, she came right out.”

  There it was again, the hint of something about her sister that no one was telling her.

  “Nic called her. You remember the letter Lucas Erickson sent Janine?”

  “Of course I remember. Sarah, what is this about?”

  “Your guess is as good as mine, Mom. He sent Holly one, too.”

  * * *

  The car behind her honked. Deer Park only had one stoplight and it had turned green while she was daydreaming.

  The horn beeped a second time and she resisted the urge to flip off the other driver as she accelerated through the intersection. So much for the quiet, small-town life.

  Not fair, she told herself as she steered the SUV into the shopping center lot. The rules of the road were a mutual agreement. You went when it was your turn, you stopped when it wasn’t. You drove close to the speed limit, you stayed in your lane, and you turned down your brights when traffic was approaching.

  If only the rest of life were that fa
ir, and that simple. It wasn’t. It never had been. Her husband was nineteen days dead. And she hated when people reminded her, as Janine had at lunch, that she didn’t have to worry about money.

  Did they think she didn’t know that? Did they think she wasn’t grateful that at least money wasn’t part of her worries?

  Did they think she wouldn’t trade all the millions for more time with a happy, healthy husband?

  At least Janine hadn’t invoked the other phrases she detested. “He’s in a better place,” or “God has his reasons.”

  No way out but through. A saying from her therapist or another one of Abby’s posters?

  She sighed, then grabbed her purse and stepped out of the car. Straightened her back and pretended she felt better. Fake it till you feel it.

  Shit. She was full of cheap wisdom today.

  Weird to go from bright daylight to brighter fluorescents. Weirder still to walk in the grocery store and hear her name. She turned to see a slender woman with short, highlighted hair, wind-whipped like her skin.

  “Sarah,” the woman repeated, her voice rich with emotion, and set her shopping basket on the floor, then extended her arms. “How good to see you.”

  “Mrs. Holtz. Hello.”

  “It’s Pam,” the woman said. “I stopped being Mrs. Holtz when I retired. Forty-two years in the classroom—can you imagine? I don’t know how I did it.”

  Sarah took in the woman’s close-fitting neon yellow jacket, the tight black pants that ended just below the knee, the cleated shoes. The bike helmet in the shopping basket.

  “You biked to the grocery store?”

  “Stopped in on my way home. Ted and I do a training ride a few afternoons a week. And I walk with your mother.” The longtime high school English teacher, one of Sarah’s favorites, turned somber. “Sarah, we were devastated by the news about Jeremy. I’m sorry we couldn’t make it out for the funeral.”

  “Thank you.” Were the simple words enough? She hoped so. “I’m staying at the lodge.”

  “Ahh,” Pam Holtz said. She picked up her basket. “I wondered. We just rode out to Granite Chapel and back and when we passed the lodge, I had the sense of it coming to life.”

  “Pam, do you know”—it felt like betrayal to ask, but she had to. “Is my mother sick? Ill? I can understand her not telling me so soon after, but …”

  “No, she’s not. And yes, she would tell me, and yes, I would tell you. My guess is she’s got a painting stuck in her head. You can count on it.”

  She was counting on it. Desperately.

  A movement caught the older woman’s attention and she gave a small smile, one hand raised. Renee Harper returned the greeting and turned her cart down the closest aisle.

  “Another former student,” she said. “Renee Taunton. Harper, I think, now. Smart as a whip. But then there was that business over the scholarship.” She shook her head, remembering.

  “I met her this afternoon,” Sarah said, not mentioning the encounter in the woods. “At Lucas Erickson’s office. I didn’t realize she was a local girl.” What scholarship business? There had been no diploma in the frames she packed up this afternoon.

  “Came home a couple of years ago to take care of her mother. Judith Taunton would try the patience of a saint under any circumstances, and now …” Pam shook her head. “I’ve gotta run. Ted had a few more miles in him, so he rode out to the cemetery. He’ll be waiting for me on our deck with a cheese plate and a glass of chardonnay. As soon as I get there, with the cheese and wine.” She laughed, then touched her fingertips to Sarah’s arm. “Let’s make time for a real catch-up while you’re here. You and your mother and I can take a nice, long walk.”

  “It’s a date,” Sarah said, and leaned in to kiss the air next to her old teacher’s cheek.

  Though the entire conversation had lasted three minutes, five tops, Sarah realized as she watched Pam Holtz click-clack her way to the express lane that it was the first time in the two days she’d been back in Deer Park that she’d actually felt welcome here.

  * * *

  They were good for wine, thanks to the case Holly had bought, but Pam Holtz had inspired a cheese binge. Not quite the selection Sarah was used to, but she’d made some tasty finds. Cheese, light bulbs, and cat treats safely stashed in the back seat, she punched in her brother’s cell number.

  “Sis!” the deep voice said a moment later. “You’re back in God’s Country.”

  “And hoping to see you. I’m in town—can I swing by the mill?”

  He made a grunting sound. “I’m still in the woods. I’m gonna miss soccer practice, for sure. Just hope I get home in time for pizza night with the kids.”

  Cleaning up storm damage. She should have known. “Oh. Right. Sure. Mom said you wanted to talk to me.”

  A heavy silence. “Another time. In person.”

  “Okay, sure,” she repeated. What that was about, she couldn’t imagine. “Maybe when you come out to the lodge. Give Brooke and the kids my love.” Call over, she headed out of town, thinking not of Connor but of Pam Holtz. The ride to Granite Chapel and back had to be twenty-two miles. She couldn’t do that at forty-seven, let alone seventy-whatever.

  Dang. She should have asked Pam about the roadside memorial. The woman knew everyone and everything going on in Deer Park.

  Was Pam right and Peggy was just preoccupied with her art?

  Would she ever find something she cared about that much?

  She glanced in her rearview mirror. The same white car had been behind her since she’d left town. Was it following her?

  “Oh, give up the paranoia, Sarah. The world does not revolve around you.”

  The car was close now—close enough to glimpse the driver’s face. The Black woman she’d seen in the Blue Spruce.

  She passed a few roads and driveways—the houses were closer together this close to town. The names on the mailboxes were unfamiliar.

  As she neared the memorial, she slowed, debating whether to stop. Was it selfish to drive on, promising to stop another day? Her therapist would say no, that she had to take care of herself first. Only then could she take care of anyone else.

  She wanted to be home. In Seattle, in the sanctuary she’d created for her family. But the place had felt so big, so empty, after Jeremy’s death. After the visitors left and the kids went back to school. Tragedy affected a house. That made sense. If you could change the mood in a room by swapping a vibrant but faded plum on the walls for a calming sage, by switching out the flooring or the artwork, why wouldn’t death change the place, too? Wasn’t a house meant to hold the full range of a life, to contain and support the people it held? You lived inside the space, you changed it, it changed you.

  She wasn’t ready for all this change.

  When she slowed to turn onto McCaskill Lane, the white car was no longer behind her. The woman must live out here, but where? Next chance, she’d introduce herself. If she stuck around.

  15

  “Oh, shit. You scared me half to death.” Holly stopped short on the threshold of Grandpa Tom’s office. “What are you doing, just standing there?”

  “Just—standing here,” Sarah echoed. She’d been listening to the lodge, to the hum of it, the low underlying noises you didn’t notice until they stopped. When she and Janine walked in the other night, the place had been spooky-still, only the old refrigerator muttering to itself. Now, though they’d barely dented the dust that caked every surface, Pam Holtz was right. The lodge was coming back to life.

  “Whatever Janine’s making, it smells great.” She held up the grocery bag. “I may not be the cook she is, but I excel at buying cheese to go with your wine.”

  “I like how you think, big sister. We will not go thirsty or hungry in this joint.” Then Holly dropped the good cheer. “I was missing Grandpa, so I decided to clean his office.”

  This morning, she’d been focused on checking for damage. Now, Sarah gazed at the shelves, grateful that Connor and Brooke hadn’t touched th
is room. The photos and objects told the history of the logging business in the valley. Scaling tools and calipers. A sepia-toned photo of two men in high-waisted pants and suspenders, feet in heavy work boots planted wide as they worked a crosscut saw. A yellowed newspaper shot of the last three-log load pulling into the mill.

  Outside, the lake rippled. “Whenever anyone asked how Grandpa got any work done with a view like this, he got all mock-gruff and said ‘discipline.’”

  Holly joined her. “But Grandma always said the only work he got done here was the Sunday crossword.”

  They shared a smile. It felt good. The way it was supposed to.

  Sarah took a step toward her sister. But before she could say a word, her foot touched something, no doubt a stray stone or a bit of cat food.

  But no. In a straight line on the rug lay three bright copper pennies.

  What game are you playing, Jeremy? Sarah asked her dead husband. It’s starting to scare me.

  She raised her head and met her sister’s gaze. “What were you saying about wine?”

  * * *

  “Did he leave them for you or Holly?” Nic asked. They sat on the deck, in the same chairs they’d taken at lunch. A tray of cheese, crackers, and grapes sat in the middle of the table, beside a bottle of something white.

  “Sarah, for sure,” Holly said. “I’d just vacuumed.”

  “We all know you had a thing for him,” Nic said. “That’s why—”

  “Right. It’s all my fault,” Holly snapped. “Blame me for everything bad that’s happened in the last twenty-five years.”

  “Hol.” Sarah stretched a hand across the table, though she couldn’t quite reach her sister. “No one’s blaming you.”

  “There was never anything between us. You know that, right?” Holly’s voice took on a pleading tone. “It was a silly crush. I admit, when it was obvious, about two minutes after they got here, that Jeremy only had eyes for you, that he only came up here because of you, I was ticked. But I got over it. Especially after the crash. And he was a great brother-in-law.”