The Summer of No Regrets (15 page)

The door to Luke’s house was dark green. I couldn’t believe I was standing here. It was sily to avoid knocking on his door.

What did I expect would happen? That a bodyguard would come out and say, “Go away”?

All the windows had blinds over them, so it was impossible to see inside. A few potted plants were set around the porch.

Luke’s Jeep was not in the driveway. Probably there was nobody home. I should go back. Luke was not here. I was sure of it. He’d have come if he was here. He’d have come to the cougar’s den or the tree house by now. I’d have found his footprints on the bridge. No, he was definitely gone. On vacation or wherever it was he went for days at a time. Television interviews. Yeah, right.

I was halfway to the fountain when the door opened. I was afraid to turn around.

“Brigitta?”

I did turn then. He was standing barefoot in a slice of doorway wearing cargo pants and a beige shirt. His hair was messy. He smiled.

For some reason I was tongue-tied, rooted to the walkway.

“Hey,” he said. “Aren’t you even going to pass me a magazine and share a gospel message?”

“I didn’t knock,” I blurted.

“Yeah, I know. I saw you coming.” He opened the door wider. “Come on,” he said.

“Into your house?”

He laughed. “It seems only fair, seeing as how we’ve spent He laughed. “It seems only fair, seeing as how we’ve spent the night together twice.”

My cheeks flushed, but I stepped back onto the porch.

“Luke, they took the kittens!”

“What?”

“The Fish and Wildlife guy. Officer Mark. Malory’s boyfriend turned us in.”

“Malory’s boyfriend?”

“The Psychic Children’s Brigade found the kittens and the kittens are sick and we stayed up with them all night and this morning Officer Mark showed up with a cage and drove them away in his truck and where were you?!” The last three words came out strangled. My throat had that verge-of-tears soreness, and I swalowed hard. I wanted to hit him, not cry in front of him, but I managed not to do either.

Luke puled me into his arms. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I shouldn’t have made you come with me.”

“You didn’t make me come anywhere.” I took a deep breath.

“I went with you because I wanted to. I stayed because I wanted to. For me. I should have thought of someone besides myself.”

“Brigitta.” He held me out from him. My face was probably all red blotches. “You did think of someone besides yourself. It’s just that the someone doesn’t deserve you. Come on.” He led me inside.

The house was airier than I expected, with French doors opening into an enclosed garden off the living room. The living room was white: white couch and love seat, two small white armchairs, a soft white rug. A few books scattered the coffee table and couch: decorating, Renaissance art, and manga. The corner of the room was taken up with a white baby grand.

I puled myself together while Luke gathered the manga off the couch.

I glanced at the piano. “Do you play?” It gave me something to say.

“Mum does. Rachmaninoff’s her favorite. She was a child prodigy.”

“She performed in public?”

“Yeah. In France mostly. Her teacher was French. She performed at the Paris Opera House when she was ten.”

“Wow. I’ve done state competitions, but nothing like that.

And I was scared spitless. Wasn’t it hard on her? Wasn’t it a lot of pressure for a kid?”

Luke stopped stacking books. “Yeah,” he said briefly. He sat down on the couch and patted the cushion beside him. “Where did they take them?”

It felt strange to be in his house. “Someplace caled Cedar Haven Wildlife Center. Malory’s true love has some ex-student who works there.”

“Where is it? Can we go see them?”

“Yes.” An idea began to form in my mind. We could take them back! We’d go to the wildlife center, and we’d hide, the way we had in the lighthouse. We’d bring duffel bags lined with something soft and then we’d wait until nightfal. Felix and Kalimar would come. They knew us.

Luke touched my cheek. “What are you thinking about, Brigitta?”

I grabbed his hand impulsively. “We could sneak them out of that place. We could bring them back where they belong!”

“You mean catnap them?” He grinned at his pun.

“It wouldn’t be like that! They’re ours. We’re their parents!”

“Brigitta.” He was shaking his head, suddenly serious.

“Don’t you feel like living dangerously?”

Luke sat back and folded his arms. “I already do.” With a pang, I thought about his mom. What was he living through that I didn’t know about?

“Brigitta”—Luke took my hand and traced circles on the back of it—“it’s a wildlife center. That’s what they do. They’ll take of it—“it’s a wildlife center. That’s what they do. They’ll take much better care of them than we could. Don’t you want what’s best for them?”

Suddenly I felt about ten years old. Ever since I’d reminded Dad about Onawa, I’d been nurturing a tiny spark of hope. Luke had just pinched it out at the wick.

“We could still go see them,” he went on. “You could see how they’re being cared for, talk to the people who work there.

You’d feel better.”

“Darling?” Luke’s mother caled down the halway. She had a musical voice with a soft note to it.

“Coming, Mum!” he caled back. He started readjusting the couch cushions. “I’m going to have to go,” he said. “She’s not in shape for company.”

He peered down the halway and then put his arm around me, led me outside, and closed the green door firmly behind him.

“We’ll go see them then?” I pressed him, knowing that I was nagging.

“Tomorrow,” he said. “You need to sleep first.” He lifted up my chin. “I’ll meet you by the tree house at noon tomorrow.”

“And you’ll realy be there? You won’t disappear again?”

“I’ll realy be there,” he said. “I promise.” He took hold of my shoulders and kissed me. I put my hands on his chest and felt like I was melting right onto the porch.

He stopped and wrapped his arms around me, resting his chin on my head the way he had right after Onawa walked back into the woods. “I don’t want to lose you,” he murmured.

I slept the entire day and most of the night. No one woke me to do any retreat stuff. When I did wake up it was nearly 5:00 a.m.

and I was still in my jeans. The sky was pink over the fir tops.

The kittens! How long since I’d fed them? I swung my legs out of the bed and had my shoes on before I remembered: Felix and Kalimar weren’t out there anymore.

Malory’s bed was empty. Even now she couldn’t stand a night without Webster.

As soon as I thought this, I felt bad. I’d seen her wiping away tears when Officer Mark drove off with the cougars. I’d even considered hugging her then.

I puled my knees up and leaned back against the tires in the wal. Luke hadn’t been as upset about the kittens as I’d wanted him to be. I’d wanted him to be outraged, to storm the gates of Cedar Haven Wildlife Center, to draw his sword—oh, God: I wanted him to be Prince Felix of Imlandria!

I couldn’t stay in bed any longer, and I didn’t want to get nabbed for Indigo duty, so I brushed my teeth, puled on my ripped-up Nonni coat, and went out to the tree house.

Malory was already there.

A single sleeping bag was stretched out on the floor, but Malory was standing in her jeans and an oversized shirt in front of my Onawa shrine, scrutinizing the clipping. She touched the unblinking eyes in the picture. “Sad,” she said.

“Yeah.” I couldn’t think of anything else to say. I sat on the window seat with my Nonni coat wrapped around me.

“How long did you take care of them?”

“A week.”

She nodded. “Was Devon helping you?”

“Not Devon.”

She didn’t ask. Last night I’d dreamed I was with Luke on his porch. He was holding my hands as water rose around our ankles and up to our knees. “Don’t let go, Brigitta,” he said. “I’m in over my head.”

I didn’t know what it meant.

Malory began roling up her sleeping bag. I was grateful that she didn’t pry about Westport. She sat back on her heels, frowning. Then she looked up at me. “I only left them for the afternoon, Gita, I swear to you. They were sleepy when I left, but they weren’t sick.”

“Don’t blame yourself.”

Neither of us spoke for a while. I watched a spider taking her web apart under one of the rafters. Malory stacked the pilows in the corner.

I picked at the frayed patchwork of my coat. “I miss Nonni.” I surprised myself by saying this, not knowing what it had to do with the kittens or Luke or Onawa.

Malory sat down beside me. “Me too, sometimes,” she said.

“You were closer to her. I was always jealous of that.”

“You were?”

“Yeah.” Malory looked at her lap. “She and you had this magic circle. I didn’t think I could ever get in.”

“We would have let you in.”

Malory brushed a strand of hair out of her eyes. “Sure you would,” she said.

“I wasn’t ready for her to die.” I had to blink when I said this.

“It was sad,” said Malory. She picked up the cardinal feather, which I’d placed on my altar to Onawa.

“On the week of the funeral I saw more cardinals than I’ve ever seen,” I said.

“Could be,” said Malory. “Or maybe it was that mostly you sat in Aunt Julia’s kitchen and looked out the window.” She stood suddenly and looked out the window herself. Her face changed.

A man’s thin voice was caling her name from below.

“Webster,” she whispered.

“Webster,” she whispered.

I looked down and could see the top of his Greek fisherman’s hat. He was gazing up at each tree in turn. Even with the hat, he looked like a banker lost in the jungle.

“Please don’t let him up here,” I said.

Malory rubbed her temples. “I’ll go down.”

She did.

I watched them from above: Webster with his hands on Malory’s shoulders, grinning at her, Malory smiling back, seeming to get smaler and smaler under his gaze. I felt sorry for her for the first time. What could have made her fall in love with Professor Smugbottom?

He put his arm around her finaly and led her away like a tamed mustang.

•••

Nonni’s death had come at an “inconvenient” time for Aunt Julia.

She made us stay at her house, which was way bigger than Cherrywood. She wouldn’t unlock Cherrywood for us—“Too much of a mess in there”—and she had the only key. Dad didn’t bother to argue with her.

In Aunt Julia’s dining room she and Dad were signing papers.

Dad looked up when I came in. “I have an idea,” I said. “You don’t have to go to all this trouble. I can take care of Cherrywood.”

Aunt Julia smiled her thin smile. “That’s sweet, honey. I don’t think they let fifteen-year-olds live all by themselves.”

“So Malory could live there, too. She’s eighteen. She could go to colege here. It would give Mom and Dad extra room in the mobile.” It would work. I could go on homeschooling, only I’d get my assignments from Mom by email. Malory would go I’d get my assignments from Mom by email. Malory would go to school, and I would cook and take long walks in the woods.

Someday I’d get married and my kids would live at Cherrywood, too.

Aunt Julia’s smile didn’t waver. “That’s sweet, honey,” she said again. She shifted her eyes to Dad.

He put his pen down. “We have a buyer, Brigitta.”

“You can’t!” I put my hand over my mouth and ran from the room. I spent the next two days curled in the guest bedroom pretending to read. I didn’t even come out for meals. At night I rocked myself to sleep.

Our last day was the only time I saw Cherrywood. Dad had to make a “quick stop” there on our way to the airport. We still couldn’t go inside. “There’s no time,” Dad said. “We have to catch a plane.”

From the backseat my eyes traced the chimney and the line of roof I had loved. Dad stood in the front yard with the realtor who was attaching a “sold” placard to the lawn sign.

I stepped out of the car and walked along the driveway to the back. There was the brick walkway. There was the birdbath and Nonni’s mint in the garden. And there, in front of the garage, sat a Dumpster the size of a swimming pool. I backed up to the raspberry bushes and craned my neck. Heaped inside were garbage bags, moldy cartons, the clock from the kitchen wal, a broken chair from the screened-in porch, a vacuum cleaner. And at the very top, a cardboard box, piled high with Nonni’s sewing scraps.

I wanted to tie Aunt Julia to some railroad tracks.

A month after we came back to Kwahnesum, Dad had enough money to finish The Center.

•••

He wasn’t there.

I waited for ten minutes and then fifteen more before there was a rustling in the leaves. A rabbit darted out from under an elderberry bush. I waited another ten minutes. I checked the cougar den. My stomach felt heavy seeing it empty of cats. I walked back to Adam. No Luke. He had promised not to pull his disappearing act again. Had he forgotten? Or had he only made the promise to get me out of his house? Was that it? Had I become too clingy, begging him to steal the kittens back? Was that why he’d never given me his email or his cell phone number?

So he could escape when it became necessary?

But just yesterday, on the porch, he’d said he didn’t want to lose me. What did he mean by that?

It was 1:00 now. I hiked out to the property line. In Luke’s driveway, on the other side of the fountain, was a silver Lexus.

Cautiously, I moved toward the fountain. Droplets of water landed on my arms. The Lexus had a Cornish School of the Arts license plate holder. A wooden pendant on a green silk ribbon dangled from the rearview mirror—some kind of Celtic knot pattern was carved in it. On the seat was a copy of
Jane
Eyre
.

Jane
Eyre?
Not exactly guy reading.

Who was visiting Luke?

I was being sily. It was probably his mom’s car. Or someone visiting his mom. Slowly, I climbed the steps until I was standing in front of the green door. Not a sound came from inside the house. I raised my hand to knock.

house. I raised my hand to knock.

I turned back to the Lexus. Cornish School of the Arts?

Weren’t his mom and her friends a little old to be going there?

Did the car belong to an art student? Someone older and more sophisticated than me? Was she right now showing Luke her portfolio? Was he teling her every painting was exquisite and he couldn’t believe how talented she was? Was she shrugging carelessly while Luke insisted? Was she asking to paint him nude? Aak! Cancel that!

I walked back down the steps, past the fountain, out the driveway, and through the line of maples. I wouldn’t beg. If he wanted to see me, he could come find me himself.