Tessa gave a short laugh. “I know the feeling,” she said, and her voice was raw. She cleared her throat. “The thing is, I think I know how to help her, Vince. I have an idea.”
“What kind of idea?”
“I want to walk the pilgrimage route with her. Do it right, barefoot, and carry an offering. Atone, and make peace.”
He frowned. “Why would that help?”
“The priest told me that’s why people do a pilgrimage, and that’s why it’s always some test, really long or barefoot or whatever—so you make reparation.”
“I don’t know,” he said.
Anger made her sharp. “Stop being a coward.”
“Look who’s talking.”
Touché. She nodded, held her camera, looked off to the horizon. “You know, Vince, a person doesn’t have to be a permanent fixture to be valuable, to be important.” Her heart was aching on some deep, deep level. Something about the set of his mouth, the burly way he stood in protection of his girls, pierced her. “Life is a mosaic.”
“I’ll think about it.”
She nodded. “Okay.”
As she headed back to the car, Sasha came from behind the house, moving much more fluidly than she had been. “Hey, Sasha!” Tessa said, and bent to greet the ancient dog. “You should meet my dad’s dog Peaches. The two of you could tell some old-lady stories.”
Sasha barked, and then spied the other two dogs and ran to join them. Tessa stood, smiling.
Behind her, Vince said, “When you met Pedro, did he get hit by a car or something?”
She turned. “Why do you ask?”
“Just asking.”
Tessa nodded. “Yes. That’s why I stopped. But he was okay.” She felt awkward, as if her hands were too big, as if she was wearing a stained blouse. The person she had always been would have shrugged and whistled for her dog, climbed back into her car, and driven away.
Well, no, because she wouldn’t have had a dog, either.
Whatever. She put two fingers to the bridge of her nose,
thought of Annie and Vita and her father and everything that had happened in the past couple of weeks, and said, “Vince, I would really like a chance to make this right with Natalie.” She stood her ground, hands on hips. “Please. I know a little bit about betrayal, too, you know.”
He came down the steps, and all the invisible, blistered places on her skin, every single place that he’d kissed, started to burn. Around them, the sky was going orange and purple, those crazy fingers of light dancing across the fields, and she felt utterly disoriented.
“You can’t just play with people,” he said.
She made a noise of exasperation and briefly closed her eyes. “I am not playing. I have been absolutely honest with you from day one.”
He stood five feet away, as if he didn’t dare come any closer. The light flashed over his hair, touched his mouth, as if he were a saint. She raised the camera and shot a photo. It made her belly hurt. She had stored up so many things to tell him, and now she would never be able to.
She waited for him to say something, but he just stood there, his feet bare, his eyes dark and unreadable.
“I guess I’ll go.”
He nodded.
Back at her house, Tessa fell into a deep sleep, as if her mind needed time to sort everything to its proper place. She woke up, made a cup of tea, and thought of the crazy light this afternoon. With excitement, she fired up the laptop, plugged in the camera, and uploaded the shots.
She gave a little squeal, and Felix came over to lick her ankle. “These are amazing, baby! A-
maz-
ing.” It was the perfect combination
of circumstances—the right geography, the right location for the best shots, the right camera, everything—to capture that exquisite, incredible light show. She sent the shots to her Flickr account and saw there was mail in her in-box. First she tagged and labeled the shots, and then she opened the mail.
Dear Tessa
,
I’m the administrator of a national photography fellowship, and I would like to invite you to submit your portfolio for consideration. The winning photographer will be asked to shoot a natural environment for a feature in
National Geographic
next year. I have loved your series in Los Ladrones and highly encourage you to submit your portfolio as soon as possible. The information is below. Please contact me with any questions
.
Sincerely,
Matthew Barker
Out of sheer force of habit, Tessa picked up her phone and dialed her father. It was ringing on the other end before she realized she was still mad at him. When he answered, she was about to hang up, and then it seemed so stupid to hold a grudge that she said, “Hi, Dad.”
“Hey, kiddo.”
“I’ve been thinking … want to come to my house for dinner?”
“Absolutely.”
“Good,” she said, and couldn’t help laughing. “I have the most amazing thing to show you.”
“Can’t wait.”
Then she called Vince. He picked up and she said, “Stop being
so rigid, will you? We don’t have to be lovers anymore if you don’t want to be, but I’d really like to walk with Natalie.”
“I was going to call you,” he said, and even the sound of his voice rushed through her like a song, like magic, like morning. She closed her eyes, pressing the earpiece closer to her head. “I talked to her counselor, and she seemed to think it might be a really good idea.”
“Good.”
“She has something to say to you.”
Tessa wasn’t sure if he meant the counselor until Natalie came on the line. “Hello?”
“Hi, Nat. You’re going to walk with me?”
“Yes,” she said firmly. “But I also want to tell you something.” Her diction was clear and precise.
“I’m listening.”
“You were mean this morning.”
“I know, Natalie. I am so sorry. There’s no excuse. I was thoughtless and I’m very sorry.”
“Okay. I forgive you.”
Tears sprang to Tessa’s eyes, and she blinked. “I’m so glad, sweetie. Your opinion matters to me.”
“Does it?”
“Yes,” she said firmly.
“My grandma said you just found out you have a twin sister. Is that true?”
“It is true. Weird, right?”
“And your sister is Annie at the café?”
“Yes.”
“That’s good,” Natalie said. “You both seem kind of lonely to me.”
Tessa bit her lip. “Thanks, kiddo. Bye.”
“Bye.”
Tessa waited in case Vince came back on, but he didn’t. She frowned, then decided to let it go. For now.
When Sam approached the little house Tessa had directed him to, he felt more than a little exhausted. It had been a day of too many revelations, and he wanted to be somewhere he could let his hair down.
Tessa and Brenna-Felix came to let him in. He was carrying Peaches. The other two dogs sat politely in the courtyard, waiting for instructions. “You want them in or out?”
“Not a lot of room in here. They can stay in the courtyard. It’s safe.” She gestured to Felix. “Go ahead, honey. You can visit. They’ll be nice, I promise.”
Loki bowed at the sight of a new friend and gave a happy bark. Felix edged out warily, but within a few minutes they were romping together. Sam put Peaches down, and she toddled over to the area rug and sat down with a sigh. “She’s doing better now she’s got her Tessa back,” he said.
She nodded. Smiled. “Give me a hug, Dad.
You ‘came a long way just to explain,’
” she said, speaking in music lyrics. He nearly broke down.
He hugged her, hard, and all the Tessas she had been came rushing through him—the little girl, the tomboy, the princess who autocratically ruled the Renaissance festival kids, the teenager dressed in pop fashion who listened to Top 40 radio and loved musicals, the wandering student who found a calling in tourism.
And now, a fully grown woman, who seemed whole here in a way she never had before. “What do you have to show me?” he asked.
She laughed and led him into the room. “This is freaking
awesome,” she said, and showed him the note and the photos of the light.
“I’m proud of you, Tessa,” he said.
“Thanks.” She took a breath and folded her hands loosely, leaning forward. “I need you to listen to me for a minute, okay? No interrupting or protesting or anything else.”
Sam nodded.
“I get it that life is not all black and white. I think you did believe you were doing the right thing to take me, and maybe you were, I don’t know. But I also think you’ve got to make amends somehow for the messes you’ve made.”
“Make amends how?”
“I don’t know. That’s up to you. I’m guessing that it will have something to do with Green Gate Farms or maybe with Vita. Whatever it is, it’s yours.”
He didn’t say anything for a long while, then finally he nodded. “I reckon there’s a lot of good sense in that. And if you’re staying here, I guess I am, too.”
“I don’t know if I am.”
Sam smiled to himself. He knew.
It was early morning, and cool, a week later, when Tessa and Natalie took off their shoes at the bottom of the hill. Tessa’s foot still showed the dark scar from her spider bite, but it no longer hurt. She had no illusions about the pilgrimage route—it probably
would
hurt by the end of the day, but it was worth it.
She and Natalie each had a bottle of water and a small pack over their shoulders. “Do you have everything?” Tessa asked.
Natalie nodded soberly.
Father Timothy had pinned a pilgrim’s badge to each of them, blessing them with a prayer before they began. They walked alone, without dogs, and the rule was to walk in absolute silence. Because it was a hard, long climb, they’d worked out a signal that Natalie could use if she needed to stop or if it was becoming too difficult.
“I’m ready if you are,” Tessa said.
“I’m ready.”
Tessa gestured for Natalie to go ahead of her, and they began to walk. At first it was not terribly unpleasant to be barefoot. The path was smooth dirt, and cold, but not unduly so. Tessa turned her mind to Lisa, to remembering and honoring her. She carried a photo of the young woman in her pocket. Natalie carried a photo of her mother and something else she wanted to leave as an offering at the shrine at the top. She didn’t tell Tessa what it was.
In silence, they walked up and up. The sun came over the mountain and touched their heads, and still they walked. The silence and the steady movement put Tessa into a meditative state where things became clear. Or at least clearer. It was what she loved most about walking.
Because of her injury, she had not had many chances over the past few months. It had knocked her off balance, especially when she had so many things to think about, so many things that had shifted in her life. Things lost, things found, things given away and rearranged.
As they climbed, the trail grew rockier and more uncomfortable. They had to slow down and pick their way over sharp stones sticking out of the ground and beware of roots. Tessa stubbed her toe and it started to bleed, but it wasn’t bad enough that she felt she had to stop, and they kept going. A little
while later, Natalie cut her heel on something, and they looked at it silently, but it was not bad, either. Their eyes met and they kept walking.
Walking higher and higher, Tessa gave thought to what she wanted. If she was honest with herself, she had been drifting since Tasmania, shaken by the loss of a dream she really had wanted and believed in. She had believed she would settle with Glenn, leave the wandering life behind, and have a baby or two, maybe move her father into a cottage nearby.
For the past two years, she’d been leading tours only because she had no idea what else to do, how to arrange her life, what she wanted it all to look like.
As she walked a pilgrim’s trail, she allowed the possibility that she had been blocking her happiness by never naming anything she wanted.
So what
did
she want? If she made no judgments and resisted all fear, what did she want, big and small?
A different job. This one had become too exhausting for her nearly forty-year-old self.
A place to belong.
Her sister close by, and her father.
She swallowed, watching brave Natalie climb the mountain on strong, sturdy legs, her hair crazy around her head.
Natalie. Tessa wanted Natalie. To be around her and watch her come into herself. She wanted to foster that fierce passion for food, find ways to encourage her and help her grow. For a moment, she imagined Natalie at twenty, wearing the green coat of the Green Gate Cooking School, looking saucy and cheerful like Julia Child, and the vision brought tears to her eyes.
Did that mean she wanted Vince, too?
Vince was a separate issue. Vince, who was so tender and powerful, with his giant heart and giant hands and delectable lips and good mind.
Yes. She wanted Vince, too.
Under her breath, she started to hum the tune:
“Well, the rivers ran uphill
And the fish began to fly
And the day before
I died, I became a blushing bride.”
Natalie hummed with her, giving Tessa a wicked and complicit glance over her shoulder. They hummed the old song until they ran out of breath, until the trail became genuinely difficult, very steep and littered with sharp, nasty rocks and scree that made them walk very carefully. Both of them had bleeding small cuts and bruises, but Tessa gave Natalie the respect of not fussing. It was meant to be hard.
Toward the top of the mountain, the path looped along a steep, dramatic cliff that showed views of the entire valley and both the San Juan and Sangre de Cristo mountains. It was slightly dizzying, but the path was a good solid fifteen feet away from the edge, and Tessa felt safe.
For some reason, however, it brought Lisa to her mind vividly—the young woman’s joy in discovering that she had what it took to hike to a beautiful high mountain and conquer her fears, to be an active woman. Tessa halted for a moment, tears crowding into her throat, and suddenly she realized that a part of what she’d been feeling was
grief
.
She let the tears flow unchecked, finally. Natalie came back and put her hand into Tessa’s but didn’t say a word, and she
was simply, honorably just there. Tessa squeezed her hand in thanks, and they continued the climb.