Meeting Miss Mystic (10 page)

“I bought the tickets. For Columbus Day. But…”

“But what?”

“Didn’t go over too well. Holly got upset. Just about hung up on me.”

Maggie’s eyes went wide. “Hung up?”

“She wasn’t comfortable,” he sighed.

“But you’ve been talkin’ and textin’ for weeks.” Her brows furrowed in confusion.

“I know. I—I tell you, Mags, I’m a little confused. I thought she’d be okay with it. Or at least
open
to it.”

“Tell me what she said.”

“She told me to stop talking. That things were going too fast and she wasn’t ready to meet yet. She asked for a few days to get her head around my visiting. Hung up.”

“Well, maybe that’s all it is? She needs a wee bit of time? To feel comfortable? You met online. Truly, Paul, you could be…anybody.”

“What does that mean?”

Maggie picked up a dishtowel from behind the bar and swiped it across the counter. She pulled out a coffee cup and poured a cup for Paul without being asked and slid it over to him.

“I mean, you could say you’re Paul Johansson, high school principal, upstandin’ member of a small town in Montana. But, in reality you could be anyone.”

“How? We’ve talked on the phone. I’ve sent a picture. She
knows
who I am.”

“She knows what you want her to know. What you’ve said. What you’ve told her. Maybe she just needs a little more time…to be sure she believes you are who you say you are.”

“That doesn’t make any sense. Why wouldn’t I be honest? Why would I lie to her? What would be the point?”

“Not everyone’s as good a person as you are, Paul.” She smiled at him gently. “Many men aren’t as up front, aren’t as kind and honest. Give her a day or two as she asks. Let her adjust. She’ll think about who you are, who she’s come to know, and she’ll come around to trustin’. Don’t you have enough on your plate anyway with school startin’ on Tuesday? For heaven’s sake, it’s a good time to take a wee break from Holly and give her a little space to figure things out.”

She patted his hands and tucked the dishtowel behind the counter, nodding to a table across the room who needed service. She checked her watch. “Summer’s here in thirty minutes to take over. We’ll talk more then?”

He nodded, smiling at her weakly, and picked up his coffee cup as she went to take an order.

Could that be it? Maybe Holly just didn’t trust him yet? He hated the idea, but he had to admit it had merit. Paul wasn’t a suspicious person – almost to a fault – and he probably missed a good bit of nuance around him because he was such a straight shooter. If someone said that they were born in such and such a year, in such and such a place, he’d believe them. He’d believe them until they gave him cause not to. It was sort of like “Guilty until proven innocent.” Only with him it was “Believed until proven untrustworthy.”

He’d stay the course. As up front as they’d been with one another, she had no reason not to trust him. She’d come to trust him as completely as he already trusted her. Anyway, they still had five weeks before Columbus Day weekend. He took a bracing sip of coffee, feeling much better. Maggie was right. He’d let her adjust. Trust would come. He was sure of it.

Chapter 6

Thank God the next day was Labor Day, otherwise Zoë would have called in sick, because she felt awful. She barely slept more than ten minutes all night long, tossing and turning, trying to figure out what to do about Paul and his impending visit, alternately worried then depressed and always desperate.

For the first time since meeting Paul, she didn’t start her morning by sending him a “Good Morning” message. She simply didn’t know what to say.

She rolled back over, the sun making it impossible to go back to sleep, listening to the sounds of morning in suburbia: a sprinkler starting, cars pulling out of driveways, neighbors greeting one another. It all sounded so normal, when the space in Zoë’s head felt anything but normal. It felt chaotic. It felt despairing. She wished it was raining and gray to match her mood.

Her plan had been to be “Holly” again by Christmas, and then tell him all about the crazy way she’d been Zoë for a while…the accident, the way she grieved it by drinking too much and getting her two tattoos—one with the date of the accident and the other for Brandon—how she’d changed her appearance and quit her job…only to have him pull her out of the darkness and into his arms, into the light again. She would credit him with helping her find her way back to the part of her that was Holly, he would kiss her passionately, and they’d never be apart again.

That had been her plan, but it wouldn’t work now. He had bought an airline ticket to come and see her. And seeing her was the problem—a big problem.

She stared at the bright sun bouncing off the ceiling and frowned as she reviewed her options.

She could tell him she wasn’t ready for a visit and put a hitch in the lovely momentum they’d managed to build despite the distance between them.

She could break things off clean, beating him to the punch. It would break his heart, but at least he wouldn’t have to suffer through her deception.

She could tell him the truth as she should have long ago. Of course, she’d never hear from him again, which would break
her
heart, but at least she’d have done the right thing.

The thought of stalling, of putting him off, felt awful. It would kill the excitement between them. And why would he want to invest himself in her anymore if she refused to see him? It would change everything between them and it was too new and too unique to survive.

But breaking things off clean with him was so upsetting it made her want to throw up
. I won’t do it. I won’t lose him. I won’t push him away and turn my back on him when I lo—

She sucked in a breath, truncating the direction of her thoughts, blinking her eyes furiously.
You do
not
love him, Zoë. You’ve never even seen him in person. More importantly, he’s never seen you. Don’t bring love into this.

Knocking out her first two ideas only left the last as viable: telling the truth. She groaned, turning over on her side, tears falling sideways down her face to soak into the pillow, making a splotch beneath her cheek.

She missed her mother. So much. And as much as Sandy had tried to be mother and sister and aunt to Zoë, she missed Thea too. If she could go back and change one thing in her life, it would be that day. That terrible, terrible day.

She tried to keep the memories away, but they rushed at her, taking advantage of her sad mood, and suddenly she was back at that day. Two years ago.

The strap on Brandon’s car seat was broken. She’d noticed it right away. She should have called Thea to leave work, go home for the backup car seat and come meet her. If only she’d made that decision. If only she could go back in time and make that call. But she hadn’t. She’d used the regular seatbelt instead.

Why? Because Zoë was in a hurry and she resented Thea for using her as a taxi service and free babysitting; it wasn’t fair that Thea had had a child, but Zoë, with a more flexible schedule, was responsible for him after school every day. She had wanted to stay after school and join some of the other young teachers for margaritas down by the harbor. If she could drop her nephew off at the pizzeria with Sandy, she might be able to still meet the girls for the second half of happy hour.

She had taken the highway to try to save time, and she was distracted, wanting to get to her friends. She didn’t realize the driver to her left was in her blind spot. By the time his pickup truck had blared the horn, it was too late and her much smaller car had already bounced off of his. She lost control, spinning across two lanes, into two other cars, before smashing into the guard rail to the far right of the highway. She didn’t actually remember hitting the rail. The last thing she remembered was the crash and screech of twisted of metal. The last thing she heard was Brandon’s voice way too close to hear ear, screaming her name.

Zoë took a deep, sobbing breath and hugged her arms around her body, pushing the memories away with all her might. She pulled her knees up to her chest and ran her fingers down the two-foot scar, felt the twisted, mangled skin that would never look normal again. For a moment she imagined it throbbed with the memory of hot, jagged steel cutting into her skin.

She had lost her mother.

She had lost her sister and her nephew.

She wasn’t losing Paul too, damn it.
No. It’s not fair!

“Zo? Zoë? You here? Me and Rob are going to a barbecue at the Tapleys later and I was wondering…”

She wiped her tears away, sitting up in her bed just as Sandy walked into her bedroom. Sandy’s brows furrowed in concern taking in her niece’s red eyes and damp cheeks.

“…if you wanted to come with.”

Sandy moved to the side of Zoë’s bed, reaching out to hold her niece’s chin in a firm grip. “What’s going on?”

“Don’t feel well.”

“That’s obvious. You look like hell. You sick? Your stomach?”

Zoë wrenched her chin away and looked down, shaking her head back and forth slowly, feeling miserable.

“Zoë, you’re scaring me. Don’t scare me in my condition.”

Zoë raised her head and then totally lost it when she saw the kindness and compassion and love in Sandy’s eyes. She hurtled her body toward her aunt, sobbing against her shoulder like the world was about to end.

“What? Oh, Zoë, honey, what is it?”

“I m-met a g-guy!” she wailed.

“You met—”

She felt Sandy’s strong hands on her shoulders and she was suddenly jerked away from the comforting warmth of her aunt’s body.

“
This
is about a guy?” Sandy’s eyes were wide and her lips were pursed. “You’re scaring me to death over
a guy
?”

Zoë nodded.

“A really great guy,” she protested through sniffles.

Sandy took a deep breath and shook her head. “I’m going to go make a pot of coffee and you’re going to get cleaned up. Then you’re going to come sit on my back porch in the sunshine and tell me all about it. You hear?”

Zoë managed a small smile and nodded, taking a deep sobbing breath. “Okay.”

***

An hour later, Sandy sat across from Zoë alternately staring at her and shaking her head back and forth. She took a long sip of coffee then set her mug back down on the picnic table, crossing her arms over her chest and facing Zoë again.

“So, basically, I’ve totally deceived him, Sand. You remember how I looked at your wedding. Wearing that white sundress? Blonde hair. Blue eyes. Twenty-five pounds thinner. No facial and body scars. Schoolteacher. Happy. I was a totally different person. That’s who he’s expecting to see when he gets here. Not…” she looked down at her body then back up at her aunt. “…this.”

“If he only fell in love with a picture, he deserves a letdown. People aren’t pictures.”

Zoë loved her aunt for defending her, but she knew Paul wouldn’t forgive her for deceiving him. If she tried to tell him, he’d hang up on her and no matter how many times she tried calling and texting him, he’d move on. She shuddered to think of his reaction if he actually travelled all the way to Connecticut only to learn the truth. He wouldn’t forgive her. She knew it.

“He won’t see it that way,” Zoë said softly. “He’ll see that I lied to him.”

“But, if you explained…setting up the account so long ago…meeting his friend Maggie…how you kept meaning to tell him, but kept falling for him? He might understand?”

Zoë snorted lightly. “Maybe. If I had him tied to a chair and he couldn’t leave and was forced to listen to me. But, even then—”

“What did you say?” Sandy uncrossed her arms, sitting forward, at attention.

“Even then, he wouldn’t—”

“No. The other part. About him not being able to leave.”

“If I had him tied to a chair and he couldn’t leave and was forced to listen to me?”

Sandy nodded. “Yeah. That part. That’s your answer.”

“Sandy…what are you talking about?”

“You have to go to him.”

“Go to him? Let him see me like
this
? Um…is the sun too bright for you? Do you have heatstroke?”

“Listen to me, Miss Smartmouth, you have to be face to face with him on
his turf
when you tell him the truth. He’ll have to listen if you’re face to face. But if you’re face to face
here
, he can just leave and go home. You need to be face to face
there
. He’ll have nowhere to go. You keep saying that if you tell him the truth he’ll shut you down, hang up, never write back, right? That’s harder to do when someone’s standing in front of you.”

Zoë couldn’t believe Sandy was being so dense. Her voice sounded crazily high pitched when she started speaking again, even to her. “Have you missed
everything
I’ve said? I don’t
look
like Holly. I don’t have Holly’s job. Holly doesn’t have tattoos. Holly doesn’t have black hair and dark brown eyes. Holly doesn’t have a foot-long scar on her face and a two foot-long scar on her leg. Holly’s a
human toddler
thinner.”

“First of all, you
are
Holly. You are Zoë
Holly
Flannigan and you’re freaking me out talking like you’re two separate people.” Sandy shrugged. “Second of all, that stuff doesn’t matter.”

“Doesn’t matt—Look, Sand. You love me and I appreciate it when you say that you can’t see my scars anymore, but it’s because you look at me with love. You compare now to two years ago, and yes, it’s better. But, I still get looks. I still get questions. I still get assholes like that guy last month at O’Byrne’s who make comments under their breath.”

“But Paul’s not that guy,” said Sandy, quietly but firmly, taking another sip of coffee. “You gotta go to Montana, Zo. It’s the advice Carly would’ve given you. I know it.”

Zoë smiled sadly and her shoulders drooped in defeat when Sandy said “Cah-ly” because it sounded so much like her mom, it was like she was there with them.

Sandy folded her hands on the table, training her eyes on her niece. “Carly told me to go for Rob. Did you know that? I didn’t like him. I thought he was too straight. Too buttoned up. He’d come to the pizzeria every other week and do the books for Grammy and Pop. An accountant. Woo-hoo! What’s more boring than that? Carly said it was the way he looked at me. Always asked me out and always said ‘I’ll try again next time, Sandy’ when I said ‘No way.’ Carly said, ‘Rob loves you. Rob’s always gonna love you, even when you’re gray and your boobs sag to your knees and you got three kids giving you wrinkles. Rob’s still gonna come home on time and say thanks when you put meatloaf in front of him.’