Up at Butternut Lake: A Novel (9 page)

“What is that supposed to mean?”

She sighed, a little sadly, he thought, and sat back down on the chair. “It means I don’t exactly think you’re father material, Walker. At least not yet.”

He thought about it. “No, you’re right,” he admitted. My life is pretty . . .
commitment adverse,
I guess you’d say. I haven’t given any real thought to marriage before. Or fatherhood, for that matter.”
Liar,
he told himself.
You’ve given plenty of thought to both of them. And you’ve decided you didn’t want any part of either one of them.

“And that’s fine,” Caitlin said. “I’m not asking you to change overnight. Or change at all. You don’t have to be a part of this. Not if you don’t want to be. I mean, beyond providing financial support, that is.”

Walker didn’t say anything. He was thinking about his own childhood. And about his own relationship with his father.

His parents had gotten divorced when he was seven. For a while, his father had seen Walker and his older brother, Reid, every weekend. Then, gradually, the visits had tapered off. It hadn’t helped that his parents fought as much when they were divorced as they had when they were married. It also hadn’t helped that Walker’s father got remarried to a woman who resented the time he spent with his sons. When she and Walker’s father had a daughter of their own, she resented it even more.

By the time Walker entered adolescence, his father had more or less dropped out of his life. He sent the occasional birthday card or Christmas present. He sent alimony and child support payments, too, but eventually those became less frequent as well. When Walker’s mother took him to court to enforce those payments, the deal was pretty well sealed. Their father started sending the checks again, but he didn’t send anything else.

Walker had seen him one more time, though. It was at a Minnesota Twins baseball game several years ago. Walker had recognized him, and when he’d approached him, his father had been friendly enough. They’d had a brief, awkward conversation, but they’d had almost nothing to say to each other.

“No,” Walker said, suddenly. His voice sounded loud in the quiet room.

“No, what?” Caitlin asked, surprised.

“No, I don’t want to be that kind of father.”

“What kind of father?” She frowned.

“I don’t want to be a stranger to my own child. To
our
own child,” he corrected himself. “That’s the kind of dad my dad was. I was the kid on the Little League team checking the bleachers every sixty seconds to see if he was there yet.” He paused. “He was never there yet. He was never there at all. If I’m going to do this, I want to be there, Caitlin. I want to be in the bleachers for that Little League game.”

“It might be a girl, you know,” Caitlin said. “In which case, it might not be a Little League game. It might be a soccer game, or a volleyball game.” But the hint of a smile played around her lips.

“It doesn’t matter,” Walker said. “I want to be there.”

“You
can
be there,” Caitlin assured him. “We don’t have to work out all the details today, but if you want visitation rights, you can have them.”

“Visitation rights?” Walker repeated. The phrase left a bad taste in his mouth.

Caitlin shrugged. “I think that’s the correct legal term.”

“Well, that’s not what I want.”

She sighed and he noticed, for the first time, how tired she looked. “Well, what
do
you want?” she asked, with a trace of exasperation.

What he said next couldn’t have shocked Caitlin as much as it shocked him.

“I want us to be a real family.”

“A real family?” she echoed, skeptically.

“Yes,” he said, with conviction. “A real family. Marriage, a house, a baby. Everything.”

Now it was Caitlin’s turn to be speechless. “Walker, are you proposing to me?” she asked, finally, after a long silence.

“I guess I am,” he said.

She shook her head in wonderment. “Where is this coming from? We’ve never discussed marriage before.”

“Well, maybe it’s time we did.”

“I, I don’t know what to say,” Caitlin admitted. “Of all the outcomes I considered for today, this wasn’t one of them.”

“I’m a little surprised myself,” Walker said. And then, because he felt something more was called for, he said, “Come here.”

She stood up and came over to him. He took her hand and pulled her, a little awkwardly, onto his lap.

“I’m sorry that wasn’t a very romantic proposal,” he said, putting his arms around her waist.

“That’s okay,” she said, almost shyly.

“So are you going to accept it?” he asked.

She smiled, a little shakily. “Why not?” she said.

“Exactly,” Walker said. “I mean, how difficult can this whole marriage thing be?”

Plenty difficult,
it turned out. But they hadn’t known that then. They hadn’t known
anything
then, as far as Walker could tell. Now, three years later, sitting in his office at the boatyard, he could only feel regret. Regret and guilt.

But something else tugged at his consciousness now: Allie, the woman he’d met at the coffee shop last weekend, and her little boy, Wyatt. Strangely enough, he’d been thinking about them lately, too. He had no idea why. Probably because Caroline had told him about Allie’s late husband. It had made sense to him, somehow. Somewhere beneath her prickly defensiveness, he’d guessed there was a deep sadness. And a soft vulnerability.

He should have gone to Minneapolis today, he thought. Because here he was worrying about two people he didn’t even know. Didn’t even
want
to know, really. He forced them out of his mind and drained the last of the coffee from his cup. It was like drinking mud. If he did nothing else tomorrow, he decided, he’d buy a new coffeepot at the hardware store. Then he’d have something, however small, to show for staying here this weekend.

CHAPTER 9

A
llie and Wyatt were already sitting on the front steps of the cabin when they heard the crunch of Jax’s tires coming up the gravel driveway.

“Wyatt, there’s something you need to know before you go blueberry picking this morning,” Allie said, putting his Minnesota Twins baseball cap on him and adjusting the visor to a jaunty angle.

“What?” he asked.

“Eating blueberries from the pail is a time-honored tradition,” she said, playfully. “So is eating them directly off the blueberry bush. So don’t worry about filling up your pail. I don’t care how many blueberries you bring home. I just want you to have fun. Okay?” She waited for a response. There was none. “Okay?” she said again, lifting up his visor and looking into his chocolate brown eyes.

Wyatt didn’t say anything. He didn’t need to say anything. His trembling lower lip said it for him. He didn’t want to go blueberry picking without Allie.
Oh God, please don’t cry,
she thought desperately.
Because if you cry, my resolve will crumble. And I’ll come with you. Or I’ll let you stay home. And you’re already with me twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. It can’t be healthy, and it can’t be fun, being with someone who’s always pretending that everything’s all right, when it’s so obviously not all right.

But Allie didn’t know how to say any of this to him. So instead she handed him a slightly battered tin pail, and said, “You have to trust me on this one, okay? You’re going to have a good time blueberry picking with Jax and her daughters. And I’m going to get a lot of work done here by myself cleaning out this old cabin.”

“Oh, look, here they are,” she added, brightly, as Jax’s pickup rolled into view. “Let’s go, buddy,” she added, standing up and brushing off the seat of her blue jean cutoffs. Wyatt sighed, and stood up, slowly. Wearily.
Just like a little old man,
Allie thought sadly.

But in the next moment, Jax and her daughters came tumbling out of the truck, creating a welcome distraction. And Allie was amused to see that Jax’s three daughters were all scaled-down, but otherwise identical, versions of Jax. They each had jet black hair, vivid blue eyes, and creamy white complexions sprinkled liberally with freckles. Soon, the three of them had surrounded her and Wyatt and were all talking at the same time.

When the introductions had been made, Jax said, cheerfully, “All right, everybody into the truck. Let’s pick blueberries before it gets too hot, and then we can have our picnic in the shade.”

Allie watched as Jade, Jax’s youngest daughter, took Wyatt firmly by the hand and led him over to the truck. Wyatt looked surprised, but he didn’t object.

Jax glanced over at them and then back at Allie. “Could this be the beginning of a beautiful friendship?” she asked.

“God, I hope so,” Allie said, visibly relieved. “I was afraid there’d be a scene,” she confessed. “You know, one that ended with you peeling a hysterical Wyatt away from me.”

“He looks fine,” Jax said, glancing over at Wyatt and Jade. Jade was speaking animatedly to him, and Allie thought she heard her say something to him about a rock collection. Then, a moment later, she watched as Jade took a rock out of her pocket and handed it to Wyatt. He examined it politely.

“I hope Wyatt likes rocks,” Jax said, wryly.

Allie smiled and turned back to her. Then she
really
smiled. “Jax, I swear,” she said, studying her. “You look so adorable.” And it was true. Jax’s hair was braided in twin braids, and she was wearing a checked maternity blouse under a pair of faded denim overalls. A battered straw hat, strung on a ribbon, hung down her back.

“I don’t
feel
adorable.” Jax sighed. “Just big.”

“Oh, I almost forgot,” Allie said, climbing back up the front porch steps and retrieving a Tupperware container she’d left there. “This is my contribution to the picnic.”

“Chocolate chip cookies?” Jax asked, hopefully.

Allie nodded.

“The same recipe we used that summer?”

“The very same.” Allie smiled.

They started walking toward Jax’s truck and Jax asked, “How’s everything going? It’s been, what, two weeks now? Are you two settling in?”

“More or less,” Allie said. “Sometimes more, sometimes less. But I wanted to thank you, Jax, for giving me Johnny Miller’s phone number. He’s been a lifesaver. He’s already replaced the rotted-out parts of the porch and the steps.” She gestured at the new pine planks that were now interspersed with the older, darker ones. “And now he’s moved onto the boathouse and the dock.”

“I’m so glad it’s worked out,” Jax said. “I can’t say enough about his work.”

They reached the truck, and Allie watched while Jax boosted Jade and Wyatt into the backseat and fastened their seat belts. She fidgeted, resisting the urge to give Wyatt another hug and kiss before Jax slammed the truck’s back door.

Then she followed Jax around to the driver’s side and watched in astonishment as she lightly hoisted herself up behind the wheel. How anyone that small could drive a pickup truck that big was a mystery to her. She lingered for a moment, feeling the first stirrings of anxiety. Wyatt wasn’t the only one who was nervous about their separation today, she realized.

“Are you sure this isn’t too much trouble?” she asked Jax.

“No trouble at all. Trust me. Any day I spend away from the house and the hardware store is like a vacation for me. Besides, you must have a lot you need to get done around here.”

Allie nodded and stepped back to let Jax close the truck’s door. Then she smiled and waved as they drove away. But she felt a little bereft as she went back into the cabin.

She went to the kitchen, where she’d planned to spend the morning cleaning out the cupboards, but she didn’t start work right away. Instead, she walked over to the window and looked out at the lake. It was a breathtaking shade of deep blue today, and its smooth surface, sparkling in the morning sun, was only occasionally broken by the ripples of a soft breeze. One of those warm breezes stirred the kitchen curtains now, and it brought with it the dry, piney smell of the trees, and the clean, almost tangy smell of the lake. And then she remembered something she’d seen in the storage shed that morning when she’d been searching for a blueberry pail for Wyatt.

That’s it,
she thought.
I’m not spending another second inside.
The kitchen cupboards will have to wait.
She left the cabin, walked around behind it to the storage shed, and, swinging the door open on its rusty hinges, maneuvered carefully around the junk inside until she came to a canoe in the corner. It dated from her grandparents’ time at the lake and was, she knew, at least fifty years old. She turned it over now, gingerly, and looked inside of it. It was lined with leaves, dirt, and spider webs, but she wasn’t ready to give up on it yet.

So she took one end of it and dragged it out of the shed and over to the garden hose at the back of the cabin. She turned the hose on full throttle and rinsed the debris out. Then she had another look at it. It just might be lakeworthy, she decided. She could see that the wood was rotting, slightly, in the bottom of the canoe. But there were no actual holes in it. She went back to the shed for some other items she’d seen there: a canoe paddle, a battered life vest, and a sawed-off plastic milk jug used for bailing out boats. She hosed those off, too. Then she threw them all in the canoe and pulled it down to the lake.