East Hope (20 page)

Will reached the top of the hill and slowed his pace. Caroline's house blazed white before his eyes. His morning runs usually brought him this way at first light. He hadn't seen Caroline since their meeting on the beach before the July Fourth weekend, and today he'd started his run later than usual, hoping to see her again. He was rewarded when he reached her drive. She was hanging sheets on the clothesline below the barn. Her hair was loose and fell to her shoulders.

He headed down the drive. “Need any help?” he called.

She turned and shaded her face with her hands. She was so tanned. It was as if all the freckles had blended together into one golden mass. “Hi,” she called back.

Will's feet crunched on the gravel as he made his way to the clothesline. “How've you been?” he asked.

“Don't you love this weather?” She lifted her chin toward the sky.

“Really great.”

She pulled her hair back in a self-conscious gesture and held it with one hand. Her fingers, while finely shaped, looked strong and capable. The sheets flapped behind her in the breeze. “Can you stop a minute?” She gestured toward the house.

“Thanks, but the store opens at ten. I'm late as it is.”

Her face appeared softer, rounder than he remembered, like a ripe peach. She reached for a pillowcase that lay in a crinkled heap in her basket. He thought he saw a glimmer of disappointment shadow her face, and this gave him courage. “I wondered,” he said, “have you ever been to Acadia?”

“The national park?”

“Yeah. On Monday I'm going to a town near there. Mr. Earl, an old friend of Mr. Taunton's, has died. The family is selling his house. Mr. Taunton's daughter, Penny, said I could go and take any of the books I want for the store. This guy had a huge library. I wondered if you'd like to come.” He shifted his weight from foot to foot, the runner in him ready to move.

She paused and considered. “This coming Monday?”

Will should have known better than to ask her. He looked away. “I know you're busy, but I thought you could look and see if there were any cookbooks worth your while. I mean, you could have them.” Will felt as if he were back in high school asking Missy Johnson out on their first date. It had taken him his entire junior year to get up the nerve.

“It's nice of you to think of me. It's just that—”

“I understand,” he said abruptly. He felt her gaze on him. What was he thinking? Why would she want to go off with him for an entire day? Besides, Mary Beth was coming in August. Yet she was hardly pining for him. Days would go by before she returned his calls. Her few e-mails were brief.

“I could use a day away.” She smiled, though her expression seemed tentative, as if she too were uncertain. “Monday will be good.”

“How about I pick you up around nine?”

“Perfect,” Caroline said. “Let me make a picnic lunch.”

“That would be great. Thanks.” He tilted his head and smiled. “Maybe you could make some of those cookies. Remember? The ones called Rocks.”

“Rocks for dessert.” At that she laughed lightly and snapped another pillowcase before pinning it to the line.

When Will started up the driveway he was sorry to have to leave. At the top of the drive he turned back. Caroline waved, then bent to pick up her basket.

W
ill stepped out of the shower when the phone rang. He pulled a towel around his waist and left wet footprints on the floor as he hurried to pick up. His first thought was that it might be Caroline calling to change her mind.

“I'm at LaGuardia,” Mary Beth said.

“Hi,” he said, feeling suddenly guilty that he had never considered that it might be her. “You're up early.”

“I'm going back to LA. I'm sorry I haven't made it up to Maine yet.”

“That's okay, really. You'll be here in August,” he said. “Only a few more weeks.”

“That's why I'm calling.”

Will gripped the towel around his middle. His skin had dried and the cool air raised goose bumps on his arms.

“We're starting the final negotiations. I'll need to be in California for at least a month.”

Another month. At least he wasn't waiting for her in the hot city. “I see,” he said.

“Why don't you come out to see me?”

“California?”

“I can't take the time to travel back. You could come for a long weekend. Drew said the company would pay for your ticket.”

“I'm afraid I can't.”

“Why not?” She sounded surprised.

“Weekends are my busy time. I can't close the store.”

“It's a free trip. We haven't been together in ages.”

“I can't leave here,” he said.

“Can't or won't?”

“I have another shipment of books arriving,” he said. “They have to be unpacked and put out. It's the height of the season here.”

“Get someone to cover for you. You don't even own that bookstore.”

“You don't understand,” he said, feeling the old anger once again. She didn't care that he had lost his teaching job, and she clearly thought his work at the bookstore was a waste as well.

“You're the one who doesn't understand. I'm asking you to come. I'm giving you the ticket, for God's sake,” she said.

Will could hear the echoing boom of airport announcements in the background. She expected him to drop everything and become part of her world. He looked down at his bare feet.

“I get it,” she said. “What you're saying is you don't care enough to make the effort to come.”

“Mary Beth, wait. Please let me explain.”

“Call me if you change your mind.” She hung up. Will looked at the clock. It was eight thirty. He was due at Caroline's in half an hour. He went to the closet and pulled out a clean shirt, one that he'd actually ironed, a rare feat.

“We're in no rush,” Will said. He closed his Jeep's passenger door and went around to the driver's side. The vehicle, dark green and well cared for, was the boxy old-fashioned style, not the new sleeker models with all the luxury options. He started the engine and Caroline fumbled for her seat belt, jerking it unevenly as she drew it around her middle.

She hadn't meant to be late. Vivien had called that morning while Caroline was eating breakfast. They hadn't spoken since Vivien's departure after the July Fourth weekend. Vivien had written a polite thank-you note for her visit, but had made no mention of the baby or the terrible argument on the morning she left. On the phone Caroline had answered Vivien's few questions about formatting the text for the vegetable cookbook. Vivien was all business, cool and efficient.

“Look, Vivien, I'm so sorry.”

“Forget it. You've made up your mind.”

“I think I'll have the manuscript ready sooner than September,” Caroline said, hoping to please her, wishing she could break the ice.

“I've got to go. I have a call coming in.” Vivien hung up.

Caroline sat by the phone feeling defeated and sorry for herself and then suddenly remembered Will's imminent arrival. She hurried to the shower. Her hair was still wet when Will's car pulled into the driveway.

Now, sitting next to him as he drove along the curving road toward Route 1, she felt distracted and regretted that she had agreed to spend the entire day with him. He had looked so lost that morning last week in her driveway. She had felt sorry for him and had hastily accepted his invitation. Today his thick hair was neatly combed into place. He seemed subdued, having yet to smile. Perhaps he was annoyed at having to wait for her, or maybe he had second thoughts about spending the day with her as well. She couldn't deny how attractive he looked wearing khaki trousers and a blue cotton shirt, the sleeves rolled to just below the elbows. His tanned forearms were covered with pale hair, making her think he must have been blond as a child. Caroline looked away, wishing she'd taken a little more care with her own appearance. She'd put on a soft flowered skirt that she had found when cleaning out Lila's closet, and she wore a tailored white shirt over this, having based her choices more on comfort than fashion. Her own clothes had begun to feel snug at the waist. But this was Maine, after all, and not a garden club luncheon. How long ago her other life now seemed.

The car eased onto the causeway, bringing them closer to Route 1.

“Amazing, isn't it?” he said.

“The water, you mean?” She looked off to the right.

“It's everywhere.”

“What beautiful weather,” she said unnecessarily. After the last patch of fog it had been perfect day after day. While hot in the daytime, it was never humid, and it always cooled off at night. So unlike Washington. In Caroline and Harry's first house there had been no air-conditioning. During the long summer nights she'd tried to lie still, sweating in the darkness.

“Yeah, it's a great day,” he said. “I bet these roads are something else in the winter. You know, there are more unpaved roads in Maine than paved.”

“You know a lot about Maine.”

He glanced in her direction. “I just like odd bits of information. How about you? Have you come here forever?”

“Not at all.” Caroline explained how she had inherited the house. “My husband came here when he was a boy. I've been only once before, years ago. My son was only three.”

“You have a son?” He seemed surprised.

“Yes. He's nineteen.”

Will was silent for a few minutes. They were behind a large fuel truck, and he needed to apply the brakes and slow the car as the road began to climb. The truck gave off great wafts of diesel fumes. Caroline closed her window and held her hand to her face, breathing in the lavender-scented cream she had put on just before running out the door. She wished she had brought a few crackers to munch on. Just when she thought she couldn't stand the smell another moment, the truck turned left down a gravel road.

“And your husband?” Will kept his eyes on the road.

“He died last November.”

“Gosh—I'm sorry.” Will waited at the intersection with Route 1 and watched the heavy oncoming traffic intently, trying to turn onto the roadway heading north. He gripped the wheel, craning his head from right to left. Finally, at an opening, he eased into the flow of cars. “How did it happen? Your husband?” His brows were drawn together in concern.

Caroline told Will about Harry's heart attack, but did not explain her financial worries and how she needed the money from the sale of Lila's house. Having to tell him about Harry's death stirred up all the memories, and she wished she were alone in Lila's airy living room, where, in solitude and quiet, it had become easier to forget those painful days. The table there was piled high with the old cookbooks. She'd been thinking more and more about what she could do with some of the recipes. The histories of nameless, forgotten women seemed to lurk within the yellowed pages. But she had agreed to spend the day with Will, and she had known this question might come up.

“My son is in Colorado this summer,” she added. “It doesn't make sense for us to keep the house in Maine.”

“You must have had your son at twelve.” He smiled slightly and turned as if to gauge her reaction.

“Hardly,” she said, secretly pleased that he thought her younger than she was. “I got pregnant on my honeymoon. I'm forty-four.”

“Married at twenty-four? That was young.”

“I suppose. I met Harry my senior year in college. He was working in New York then. We got married just before he took a new job in Washington.” She folded her hands together in her lap, wishing again she'd said no to this day. Caroline bit her lip. Will was a nice man, quite attractive, she admitted to herself, though probably younger than she was. He was probably lonely too. She needed to banish any romantic notions right from the start. Her life was way too complicated. How could she enter into a relationship when she was pregnant from an adulterous one-night stand?