Choices

by Lyn Gardner

  Robin had spent her afternoon slicing up the shag carpet into squares small enough to fit neatly into one of the blue bags, and then she attacked the shutters covering the bay window in the living room with the same fervor. More than one expletive slipped from Robin’s lips, and a few were even shouted, but by the time the sun went down, she could see moonlight through the glass.

  Blowing a strand of hair from her face, Robin got to her feet and headed to the kitchen, rewarding herself with an ice-cold beer before grabbing the notepad to add a few more things to her shopping list.

  “Where the hell is my pen?” she mumbled, and as shuffled through the papers on the counter, she noticed Fred lazily making his way through the kitchen. Robin’s eyes turned to slits. “You know better than to get on the counters, now give me back my pen.”

  Without so much as a side-eyed glance in her direction, Fred swished his tail and moseyed on his way.

  “I have more pens than you have lives, you little bastard,” Robin said with a laugh, and fishing around in her laptop bag, she pulled out another rollerball and began jotting down notes. A minute later, the cataclysmic doorbell in the hallway of her apartment rang out, its shrieking volume echoing off the empty walls and sending Robin a foot in the air in one direction while her pen flew like a missile in the other.

  “Oh, you are so going to die,” she mumbled, and snagging the hammer off the counter, Robin marched up the hallway with demolition on her mind. Like a point guard going for a slam dunk, she leapt through the air, and a moment later pieces of plastic and chime were raining down on her. Delighted she had killed her siren nemesis, Robin was about to go in search of the broom when she heard the front chime sounding again. “Crap,” she said, and with hammer in hand, Robin jogged to the foyer.

  After ringing the doorbell twice, Judy Dunnigan debated on ringing it again. Maxine had forgotten to get Robin Novak’s number, and the landline to Safe Harbor had yet to be reconnected, so when Judy left the gallery that night, she thought she’d just stop by and introduce herself. It seemed the right thing to do at the time, but standing in the shadows of the porch light, Judy suddenly felt like an intruder. Technically, she hadn’t received an invitation to visit, but then again, did she need one? What if this woman went to bed early or worse yet, she was enjoying a late dinner and didn’t want to be disturbed? Judy nibbled on her bottom lip for a moment, but just as she was about to leave, she saw through the stained glass a silhouette approaching the front door. Taking a deep breath of the crisp, night air, Judy displayed her best smile as the door opened…and then a moment later it was all she could do to force it to remain.

  Seeing a short figure through the rippled glass, Robin assumed her visitor was Maxine, but when she swung open the door, Robin drew in the longest breath of her life. For a split-second, the world stood still as she gazed upon the woman who had haunted her dreams for over two decades. Robin’s heart began to race, and her palms grew damp, and it felt as if someone had placed an anvil on her chest. Her mind swirled with muddled thoughts, the past and present fusing into something both joyous and terrifying, and as Robin exhaled, she carried on her breath only two words. “Miss Lawton?”

  Chapter Eight

  It can happen at any age, that intense, most often short-lived admiration for someone known as a crush. Whether it is over the exchange of cardboard hearts in kindergarten or an innocent glance in high school or perhaps even just the scent of perfume or cologne wafting over cubicle walls, the minds of those affected fill with daydreams. Scenarios based solely on romantic obsession, time is lost to imaginations wild and free, and hearts beat faster at the possibilities the mind has created.

  By the time Robin was eighteen, she had experienced only two crushes in her life. Freddy McDonald was her first. A little buck-toothed boy she met in first grade, she found his lisp as adorable as his smile. In second grade, her interest was piqued by his sister, Louisa. Freckle-faced and chubby, her giggles were music to young Robin’s ears, but her interest in Louisa dwindled when books became Robin’s obsession.

  In the beginning, the written word sated her young imagination, filling it with images of little girls on prairies and a friendship between a spider and a pig, but as she grew older, books began offering Robin comfort in a different way. With her nose pressed deep into the pages, she could avoid what she was not yet willing to face.

  For the most part, her years in primary and secondary school went by without fanfare. The slew of studies, field trips, finals, and whatever bestseller she could get her hands on filled her days and her nights, leaving no room for anything or anyone else, much to her mother’s dismay. More than once the subject had come up over dinner, the questions raised by a parent who didn’t understand their offspring’s detachment from youthful companionship, but once again, Robin’s brilliance quieted Constance’s worries. She told her mother that books didn’t argue or compete, they held no grudges and possessed no ulterior motives, and when Robin opened her latest fixation in the morning, it hadn’t changed overnight, morphing into something she could no longer recognize. Just like Robin’s career choice, Constance never questioned her again. Robin wasn’t exactly telling the truth, but she wouldn’t face that until college.

  On her first day as a senior at Heritage High, Robin had ambled into her homeroom and slipping into a chair, she began reading the schedule she’d been given. She looked up occasionally, acknowledging those she recognized as they straggled in, their clothes newly purchased, but their expressions lacking the same crispness. She glanced down at her schedule again, confirming the location of her first class, and as the bell rang, Robin lifted her eyes…and then she walked in.

  Petite, with a pixie haircut, vivid blue eyes, and a smile that created dimples in her cheeks, Judith Lawton was positively the prettiest woman Robin had ever seen. As she made her way to her desk, grinning at the roomful of students, Robin tried not to stare. For a moment, she acted nonchalantly and looked around the room, but unable to stop herself, her eyes found their way back to the teacher. And once everyone was settled, and Judith Lawton spoke for the first time, Robin couldn’t help but shift in her seat.

  Miss Lawton went on to introduce herself, informing all she was a newly-hired member of the Phys Ed department. Her classes would revolve around health and fitness, but her extra-curricular activities would include coaching the girls’ soccer and softball teams, and Robin silently damned herself for never taking an interest in sports.

  A minute later, Miss Lawton moved from behind her desk, and as she started calling off names from the attendance sheet, Robin found herself entranced. Dressed in a pleated dark blue short skirt and red polo top, the woman’s vocation was clearly seen in her muscled calves and defined biceps, and Robin noticed every toned line. Lost in her admiration, it wasn’t until Robin heard the class tittering when she realized Miss Lawton was calling her name, and as scarlet stung at her cheeks, Robin raised her hand...and so it began.

  From that day forward, Robin began arriving at school earlier. She told her mother it was to get a jump on the day, but she didn’t spend those extra minutes in the library cramming for a test or huddled in a corner, reading the newest novel. She spent them sitting in her homeroom, craving every second she could spend in Miss Lawton’s presence. The words they exchanged in the mornings were purely obligatory greetings at first, but as the weeks went by, their conversations grew. Sometimes it was only about the goings-on at school, the score of the latest football game, or attendance at a pep rally, but on more than one occasion, one or the other would bring up the latest headlines in the newspaper, and they would comfortably chat until other students began to show up.

  Those were the mornings Robin liked the best for they made her feel more like a friend and less like a student, but what made her blossom, what made her cheeks cherry and her eyes gleam were the few times when Miss Lawton complimented Robin on how she looked. When that happened, Robin would float through the rest of her day at school, her feet barely touc
hing the floor as her head rose high above the clouds. But in clouds there are storms, and one was brewing that Robin knew nothing about until she returned from Christmas break to find Judith Lawton had resigned from Heritage High to get married.

  Robin was devastated, and feigning illness, she didn’t return to school for a week. Under her covers in her room she hid, waiting until her mother left for work before allowing her tears to fall, but eventually, those tears dried up. They left a residue of sadness that took months to overcome, but when Robin entered college that fall, she held her head high and looked toward the future. Judith Lawton still plagued her dreams, but Robin believed sooner or later, they would disappear, too. She was wrong.

  ***

  Judy took a step back, and then she took another, her brain working overtime trying to keep up with her thoughts. The woman standing in the doorway was disheveled; her blonde hair more out of the clip than in, and errant strands were going in every direction. Her jeans were torn, and her T-shirt was ragged and stained, and in her hand, she clutched a hammer. The combination resembled that of someone deranged, yet the scale of surprise hadn’t been tipped by the woman’s appearance, but rather by something else.

  Judy kept her eyes fixed on Robin while she got her thoughts in order. “I’m sorry, but...but do we know each other?”

  Up until that moment, Robin had been lost in a vortex of memories that spun through her mind like a tornado. Flashes of a to-die-for smile, eyes of brilliant blue, short pleated skirts, and the melody of a voice Robin would never forget sucked her into a whirlpool it took all her strength to escape from. Robin cleared her throat, and taking a deep breath, she let it out ever so slowly. Unfortunately, she needed a hell of a lot more time than that to return her to adulthood.

  “Um...yes. Um...I...I went to Heritage High when...when you were there.”

  “Oh,” Judy said, continuing to stare at Robin. “I’m sorry. Your name…your name doesn’t ring a bell.”

  Robin didn’t allow the pain of that particular revelation to show on her face. “Well, it was Robin Cook back then, and I wasn’t really a student. I mean...I mean I was a student, but not one of yours. Well, actually, I guess technically I was one of yours. You were...uh...you were my homeroom teacher.”

  Before another word could be said, a gust of wind came out of nowhere, its force strong enough to make Judy widen her stance to steady herself while Robin raced to stop the door from slamming into the wall.

  “Geez, get in here before we’re both blown down the street,” Robin said, quickly waving Judy inside.

  Judy darted into the house, her shoulders hunched against winds suddenly too strong for her fleece-lined jacket. “Thanks,” she said, and waiting until Robin closed the door, she held out her hand. “And speaking of names, it’s Dunnigan now. Judy Dunnigan.”

  When Robin had looked into the bathroom mirror while brushing her teeth that morning, she had seen the person she had become. In her teens, she was often mistaken for someone older, her intelligence and maturity overshadowing that of her peers. Blessed with good skin and a healthy body, she had been carded in bars until her mid-thirties, and when her forties arrived, while a few aches and pains had begun to show up when she pushed herself too hard, they hadn’t slowed her down for long. Yes, Robin was lucky not to look or feel her age, but when she stared at Judy Dunnigan’s extended hand, Robin’s luck ran out. Suddenly, she was eighteen again with all the awkwardness, uncertainty, and lack of social skills that came with it.

  Robin knew a handshake was merely a gesture used in greetings, a ritual in which two people grasp hands and say hello, and she had done it literally hundreds of times before, but this wasn’t just any handshake. This would be the first time she had ever touched Judith Lawton, and as she reached out to take the woman’s hand, a murder of crows flapped their wings in Robin’s stomach.

  Robin dared not make eye contact, knowing if she did her cheeks would flush scarlet and words would fail her like they’d never failed before. She slipped her hand in Judy’s, and although the time it took was immeasurable, the effect was not. The texture, warmth, and strength would be something Robin never would forget. Judy’s skin was soft and cool, and her grip was firm yet feminine, and unable to stop herself any longer, Robin raised her eyes. She had to make sure this wasn’t a dream, and when she saw her twelfth-grade homeroom teacher smiling back at her, for more than a few seconds, Robin forgot how to breathe.

  Like all good things, their handshake came to an end. Judy waited for what she thought was an appropriate time, but when Robin seemed content in just staring at her, her arms dangling at her sides, Judy pointed to the hammer in the woman’s hand. “Doing a little renovation?”

  Robin looked down and paled. Not only was she still gripping the hammer, but the jeans she was wearing were also the most ripped up pair she owned, and her white T-shirt had lost every bit of its whiteness hours before. “Oh, God. I’m so sorry,” she said, raising her eyes. “I must look like a wreck.”

  “Don’t be silly. It’s me who’s sorry,” Judy said, taking a step toward the door. “Maxine O’Connor mentioned you may be looking for a manager for Safe Harbor, but she didn’t have your number. I was on my way home, so I thought I’d just stop by, but it’s obvious you’re busy. I’ll just come back at another—”

  “No,” Robin blurted a mere decibel lower than the chime she had just destroyed. “I mean, please don’t. I just need a couple of minutes to get cleaned up.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Absolutely,” Robin said before pointing in the direction of the innkeeper’s suite. “Would you like to come back? I only have a couple of chairs at the moment, but you’re welcome to one of them, or if you’d rather just make yourself comfortable in the parlor, that’s fine, too. It’s totally up to you. Oh, and would you like something to drink? I have water, of course, and coffee or tea, and...and beer if that sounds better. And I also have wine. Would you like some wine?”

  It wasn’t until she saw the humor in Judy’s eyes when Robin realized she had just rambled off a few dozen words in less than a breath. Pressing her lips together, she prayed her cheeks weren’t as dark as they felt.

  Amused that the nervousness she had felt a few minutes earlier while standing on the front porch seemed to be catching, Judy took off her jacket. “What kind of wine?”

  “What?” Robin said, snapping back her head. “Oh…um…Cabernet.”

  “That’ll work,” Judy said as she walked over and hung her jacket on the coat tree.

  “Yeah?”

  “Yes, Robin, that’ll work just fine.”

  It was only two syllables. A name given to her at birth, but when Robin heard it spoken by Judith Lawton, it lit a fuse that sizzled all the way through her body, igniting Robin’s core while extinguishing her ability to speak...again.

  A few moments passed before Judy pointed toward the back of the house. “Um...shall we?”

  “Oh, yeah, of course,” Robin said, confident she would never need to buy anything to highlight her cheekbones again. “Follow me.”

  The walk through the house was uneventful. One woman was content in just admiring her surroundings while the other was absorbed in mentally scolding herself for acting like such an idiot. It wasn’t until they stepped into the apartment when Robin was torn from her thoughts by the sound of Judy’s voice.

  “I was wondering what the hammer was for.”

  Halfway down the hall, Robin turned around to see Judy looking back and forth between the shattered pieces of plastic on the floor and what was left of the chime above the door. “Oh, yeah, it...it was—”

  “Obnoxious?”

  “How’d you know?” Robin said, flinching back her head.

  “When Adele was recovering from her fall, I stayed here. On the island, the front doors of the B&Bs are rarely locked. Most of the guests know just to walk in, but the newbies would always ring the bell. I swear that thing scared me so many times if I had been a cat, I would have
used up all my lives in about a week.”

  “Well, you don’t have to worry about that anymore.”

  “Um...you do know those things have electricity running through them, don’t you?” Judy said, pointing to the chime. “Beating them to death with a hammer could be hazardous to your health.”

  Robin grinned. “That’s why I aimed for the chime and not the transformer.”

  “You know electricity,” Judy said, catching up. “I’m impressed.”

  “Don’t be,” Robin said with a laugh. “I know just enough not to permanently curl my hair.”

  Robin rounded the corner and waited for Judy to catch up. “So...the wine is right there, and the glasses on that towel are clean,” she said, pointing to the far corner of the countertop. “Feel free to help yourself, and I’ll be back in a couple of minutes. Okay?”

  “Take your time, Robin,” Judy said with a smile. “I’ll be here.”

  Robin’s heart did a flip, and after giving Judy a quick smile of her own, Robin made a beeline for her bedroom.

  After snagging a clean sweatshirt and jeans out of one of the open suitcases on the floor, Robin rushed into the bathroom, closed the door and ran to the sink. While she waited for the water to get warm, she stripped out of her T-shirt and then stared into the mirror. “Oh my God,” she whispered as reality hit home. “Oh—my—God!”

  Time had dulled Robin’s memory just a tad, so she had forgotten some of the subtler points of having a crush, but not any longer. Her heart was pounding, and her palms were sweaty, and it was, as it always had been, because of the woman who was now standing in her kitchen. A woman Robin thought she’d never see again, a woman who had appeared in Robin’s dreams more times than she could remember...and a woman who had hardly changed at all.

  True, Judy’s chestnut brown hair had strands of gray now running through it and the lines once only appearing when the woman laughed, now seemed permanent, but as far as Robin was concerned, they enhanced Miss Lawton’s beauty. Her eyes were still as blue as the sky and her form, still as slender, and Robin swallowed hard. Acting nonchalant was going to take some practice.