After rinsing her lunch dishes, she grabbed a sun hat and headed downtown. Haunting the shop seemed easier and more fruitful than staring at her studio walls. Isa smiled when the bells tinkled overhead.
“Hey, lady. Gorgeous day out, isn’t it?”
Tadie glanced back out the glass windows. “Ah, yes, it is.” Bright sun and lots of tourists in town for the weekend. Odd that she’d walked all the way here and noticed only where she needed to plant her feet so she wouldn’t stumble on a crack or miss a curb.
“Perfect sailing weather,” Isa said. “I’m surprised you’re not out on Luna.”
Luna sat neglected at the end of her dock, as if the days were breezeless. “I’m not.”
Isa stared at her oddly.
Concentrate, Tadie. She drew on a smile and tried to make her voice sound cheerful. “I’ve come to give you another few hours off.”
“Again? You don’t have to.”
“It’ll be fun. Go.”
Isa didn’t need to be cajoled. She grabbed her purse, said she’d be back soon, and hurried out the door, leaving Tadie to wonder why she’d been so eager and what she’d rushed off to do.
A call came in shortly after Isa left, saying that a quilt was ready for pick-up. The quilter was an incredibly talented paraplegic from Newport. “I’ve finished the design I told Isa about,” the woman said. “You think she’ll be able to get it sometime soon?”
“If not, I will.”
Tadie mentioned the call to Isa when she came in, flushed and smiling from wherever she’d spent her lunch hours.
“I wish I could get it today,” Isa said. “I know she needs the money.”
“You can’t?”
“Not tonight. I’ve got an appointment.”
When the other woman didn’t explain, Tadie’s curiosity soared, but it wouldn’t do to ask. “I’ll go,” she said instead. “I’m not busy.”
Isa bent to scribble the address on a pad. “It’s easy to find. She’s out there off Highway 24 in one of those new condominiums.”
Taking the note, Tadie collected her hat and bag.
This would be another trip over the causeway. She had to go at least twice a week, either to pick up a consignment or to fetch something in Morehead. And Sundays, of course, when she went to church in Newport.
She got in her car, backed out, and headed west. She hated crossing that bridge, because as soon as she did, the boatyard acted like magnetic north to her compass needle. She had to hold her head rigid and cling to the steering wheel to keep from exiting, just to take a peek. Just to see if the Nancy Grace still waited to go in the water.
This time, the compulsion to turn in was almost overpowering. If the boat were gone, she could forget about them. Imagining Will climbing up and down the ladder, working practically within shouting distance, was killing her.
She held her course, although she felt like an alcoholic weaving past an available bottle without stopping to drink. Gone or not, Jilly wasn’t going to be forgotten so easily.
Once she entered Morehead, she turned onto Bridges Street and eased on past the city to the outskirts. She hadn’t called ahead and wasn’t surprised when a stranger opened the door. “I just came for the quilt,” Tadie said.
And that was that. She had the quilt in the car, the car headed east, and the causeway to face again.
* * * * *
With Matt’s cold lingering, Hannah spent more time closer to home, escaping only occasionally to catch breakfast or lunch with Tadie, which didn’t do much for Tadie’s loneliness, especially now that Rita had found a job working at the local women’s shelter and their sails were rare.
She was almost glad when Alex called the next Saturday, because arguing with someone suddenly seemed better than silence … at least until he said, “Can I come by in a little while?”
“Sorry. I’m swamped.”
“I was hoping we could take Luna out. There’s a good breeze, and I haven’t seen her off your dock recently.”
“No, thank you.”
“You don’t want to sail?” His voice sounded incredulous.
Hadn’t they had this discussion? “No, thank you.” Which wasn’t strictly the truth. She’d like to sail. She would. Only not with him.
She spread apart the living room curtains. Sun and a perfect breeze. The idea took hold.
After lunch, she gathered her sailing things and was heading down the stairs when a voice called from the kitchen. “Hey, it’s me!”
Hannah. How long had it been since Hannah had popped in like this?
“Hey, stranger,” Tadie said. “What got you out of the house?”
“Alex just took off for who knows where—with a suitcase. While that’s interesting and very good news in the short term, I don’t know what it means for Morgan’s. Matt’s in denial and has gone off to play golf. Mind you, that nasty cold ought to have kept him off the course in this heat, but will he listen?”
Tadie lifted the pitcher out of the refrigerator and filled two glasses. “The porch or in here?”
“Here,” Hannah said, taking a glass and plopping down on the kitchen couch. “I need a little best-friend time with no other distractions.” She kicked off her sandals and extended her bare feet onto the table, wiggling unpainted toes.
“You give up the pedicures?” Tadie asked, stretching out her own feet and settling back into the cushions.
“Chipped polish. I’m between colors.”
“Well, that’s good. You had me worried.” She lifted her glass in salute. “I’m so glad you’re here. It’s been ages.”
“Too many.” Hannah gulped half her tea. “Lands, Tadie, I’m so tired of worrying about that man. He’s a grown-up. He ought to care about his own health.”
He should, but this wasn’t the first time Matt had neglected himself to the point of getting really ill. Hannah hadn’t been able to fix him then, and she wasn’t likely to stop him now.
Tadie tried to sound soothing. “He’s got to make the decision for himself.”
“You’re preaching to the choir, except I’m no good at paying attention, am I?” With a huff, Hannah set her glass on the lamp table and laid her head back. “I’m tired of thinking about it and more than tired of moaning.” Shifting to the side to look at Tadie, she said, “I haven’t been a very good friend.”
“That’s not true—” Tadie began, but Hannah’s hand stilled her.
“It is. Something’s been going on with you ever since that hurricane. Does it have to do with those two, Will and Jilly? Isa said—”
“Isa said what?” Tadie sat up straighter. If they’d been talking about her …
“Calm down. Isa only said Will wouldn’t let Jilly come in the store to work, and that he’d sent her off to her aunt’s. I thought he liked having her there, hanging around us.”
“Yeah, well, I guess he changed his mind.”
Hannah’s brows hiked.
What? Was Tadie supposed to spill her guts and give Hannah another reason to feel sorry for her?
“He has issues,” she finally said. “Something about being afraid Jilly would bond too much and be unhappy when they sailed away.”
“The fool. He’ll be sorry someday when that child’s old enough to make her own decisions. Wrapping her in wool, keeping her from making close friends. That’s not smart.”
“Isa suggested he might be jealous.”
A snort greeted this. “Of his daughter’s friends? Good riddance is all I can say.”
Absolutely. Good riddance. But Tadie couldn’t say those words aloud.
* * * * *
Tadie kicked at a pebble along the sidewalk as she walked home from the shop the next day. Wasn’t heartache supposed to render an artist more creative instead of less? Her sketch pad remained pristine, and its naked pages taunted her. Working on pieces she’d already designed was one thing. Her hands could perform in spite of her mood. Tackling anything that required a higher brain function made her gut hurt. It helped
that Isa had found a way to fill in the emptying jewelry case with little objets d’art from the back shelves.
She paused for a bite to eat at the Beaufort Grocery and brought home leftovers. She always had leftovers these days. After tucking them in the refrigerator, she spied the box of Godiva Stefan Ward had given her—with one each for Hannah and Isa. Her mouth watered. A bite of Godiva was exactly what she needed after that partially eaten dinner. Just one.
Reaching in, a stab of regret assaulted her. She’d left the box sitting on the counter where the sun could get it, and her beautiful truffles had morphed in the heat.
Oh well, they were still edible. She studied the oddly shaped candies and chose one with an orange center, closed the box, and stuck it in the freezer. She chewed slowly, but the pleasure didn’t last long enough to be satisfying, so she opened the freezer door and drew out a messy glob of dark raspberryish delight. When she’d finished it, she licked the residue from her fingers and poured herself a small glass of wine, deciding she needed something nutty to go with it.
She carried her glass as she wandered through the downstairs. Her shoes echoed on the wood floors, but muffled when she entered her daddy’s library. His desk needed dusting. So did the bookcases. Maybe she’d clean tomorrow, get out the vacuum, the dust rag and polish, and make this place look presentable again.
Setting the glass on the desk, she traced her fingers along the leather bindings, looking for something that might distract her, but the empty chair staring back at her made her chest hurt. She longed to smell Samuel Longworth’s distinct perfume again, a smattering of aftershave and a lot of soap. She used to sniff his neck when she was little. He’d laugh and give her a hug.
Oh, Daddy.
Eb padded in her wake as she climbed the stairs. He jumped immediately to the bed, ignoring her as she adjusted the water flow into the tub. Bathing remained her one escape other than sailing. If she couldn’t sail—or didn’t want to—her big tub eased too-tight muscles.
Her skin pebbled in goose bumps as she stripped. She slipped one toe in and swirled it around, trying to cool the water enough to allow an entire foot to enter. Slowly, she lowered herself into the bubbles and settled against her bath pillow.
Music filtered in from her bedroom, soothing melodies that ought to comfort. She let her arms float at her sides, then pulled bubbles up to her neck until they surrounded her aging and unwanted flesh. Here, at least, she could usually pretend joy in being a woman, even if she were becoming an old-maidish, five-years-from-forty specimen whose sensual pleasures seemed scanty.
Tonight, the seductive illusion of soft water caressing her skin no longer existed, because nothing caressed. Nothing actually seemed to touch her, as if her skin repelled water in the same way that she herself—her psyche and her flesh—repelled others.
The melody changed, recalling her dreams, which seemed to have as much substance as the notes flowing past. Her eyes closed on a groan, and she slid under the water until her lungs screamed for air. She wiped her eyes with a towel and stared at the empty room, at the doorway leading to more empty rooms.
White foam hid her skin, and she knew this was as good as it was ever going to get—her body touched by water. Never by a husband or a baby of her own.
Why not? Was she so horrible? So completely unlovable?
She gripped the side of the tub so she wouldn’t scream. Her throat constricted as the furies unraveled. The ache crimped her insides, and tears that had begun as a trickle turned into heaving sobs.
She finally cried out, “No!”
The water sloshed as she bounded upright. She opened the drain and pulled the towel around her, rubbing herself dry. After yanking on a pair of jeans and the nearest T-shirt, she drew a brush through her hair. “I’m going out,” she told Eb. He just closed his eyes. Why should he care? Why should anyone?
It was only seven-thirty. She grabbed her keys.
She had to do something. Go somewhere. Be anywhere but here, staring at the walls of this empty house, yearning for Bucky’s laughter, for her daddy’s smile, for her mama’s arms. Yearning for what would never be.
Backing out of the driveway, she pointed the car west, holding steady, not looking left as she crossed the bridge. The beach would do her good. Maybe the pounding surf would drown out her desperate thoughts. If she sat on the sand and waited for dark, maybe inspiration would come blowing in from the ocean. Perhaps she’d hear a whisper from the heavens.
The only thing she knew right then was that she, Sara Longworth, had better do something to change things because life felt nightmarish too much of the time. She didn’t like much of anything these days. She certainly didn’t like the consumed, self-absorbed person who’d just lost it in the bathtub.
The more she ached for had to be out there someplace. It obviously wasn’t lurking in her studio while she played at being an artist.
As she cut into the left lane to cross the beach causeway, it hit her like blinders dropping. She braked, signaled, and did a U-turn at the first crossover before the Atlantic Beach light.
She wasn’t going to find revelation walking the beach. Hadn’t she and Rita sailed to the Cape not very long ago so they could watch the breaking waves? Last Friday, hadn’t she anchored Luna on a sandbar near Core Banks so she could float and watch the sky, hoping something—someone—up there would speak to her? How much more communing with nature did she need before she understood this wasn’t the place where she would find change? It was all too close to home, too familiar. Too static.
No, finding the elusive more would require that she get off her duff and do something different. Something that took her away from here and the status quo of small-town Beaufort.
Beaufort coddled its eccentrics, which was probably why she was comfortable here. She had friends and lots to do, but it was unvarying. If she wanted to be something else, do something else, and, yes, find someone else, maybe she needed to go somewhere else.
She remembered Rita’s question, “Haven’t you ever wanted to leave?” For a long time she hadn’t been able to. But was anything stopping her now?
She could take a cruise. She had the money. Or—and this came in a flash she decided was inspiration—she could be daring and rent an apartment in some big city—Paris, Rome, or even Manhattan. It might be exciting to spend the fall visiting museums, meeting new people, living a little. She could study the work of other jewelry makers and call it an educational trip. She could decide where she wanted her life to go from here.
When had she ever done anything unexpected?
Her little car crept back through Morehead’s slow zone, hit the high bridge, crossed the causeway—she did not look to the right this time—and then crossed the Beaufort bridge. It took her fifteen minutes to make it to her driveway, another fifteen or so to get the computer booted up and begin an Internet search.
Isa didn’t need her. Hannah didn’t need her. Elvie was recovering beautifully, and James had his garden. Rita’s new job at the shelter kept her busy, and Martin visited on weekends. It was time for her to do something proactive to change her life. Something healing. Something fun.
Manhattan was less of a stretch than Europe. She’d spent time in Paris in her youth, but she’d never spent more than two nights in New York City. She could go and still change her mind whenever she wanted without having to deal with transatlantic travel.
She found several short-term rentals available on the Upper West Side near Riverside Drive, but they were really expensive. She chewed on her thumbnail and weighed her options. Just for comparison, she checked out rentals in Italy and Spain, where she’d never been.
All she found were tiny rooms that cost as much as a New York efficiency. And she’d be too far away to scoot home if anything came up at the shop or with Elvie’s health.
Fine. Traveling anywhere cost money, unless she rented a room in the boonies, and then she might as well stay home. No, she needed something radically different. Someplace where she could
lose herself if she wanted—or get involved if she wanted. It had to be a city.
She clicked on an apartment a few blocks from the Metropolitan Museum, near the subway. She jotted down the listing and the broker’s phone number.
By noon the next day, she’d arranged to lease a one-bedroom apartment for three months, and she’d booked a flight out of New Bern.
“You’re what?” Rita asked when Tadie called.
“I’m going to see some of the world, even if it’s just New York City. Will you stay over here, take care of the place and Eb?”
“Of course, but are you sure you want to do this?”
“Absolutely.”
“Well, then, I think it’s thrilling. It will be good for you.”
“Would you ask your daddy if he could get me to the eleven o’clock flight tomorrow? I’ll need him to take care of Luna too.”
Tadie heard Rita talking in the background. “He says sure, if you want to, but I’m not at all certain he approves. He’ll try to convince you to stay home.”
Next, she dialed Hannah and told her the plan.
“Go, girl. I’m proud of you. About time you thought of doing something fun, but make sure that apartment has enough room for me to come and stay. Imagine the shopping we can do.”
Her excitement grew at Hannah’s words, as if her best friend’s approval had been all she lacked. She imagined the two of them strolling through Central Park or catching a Broadway show.
Isa’s tone matched Hannah’s. “Soon as Hannah gets back, she can babysit the shop and I’ll come play with you.”
By the time Tadie had made all the phone calls and everyone had encouraged her to leave, she began to hope James would beg her to stay, just so she’d know someone cared enough to miss her.
Chapter Twenty-five
Sandpaper raked across the rough epoxy. Will’s electric sander had gone on the blink at precisely eight thirty-five that evening. He knew because he’d checked his watch. It was now a little after nine, and he felt as if he were smoothing millimeters instead of inches. He pressed harder on the sandpaper block and let his shoulders bear the load.
Becalmed: When a Southern woman with a broken heart finds herself falling for a widower with a broken boat, it's anything but smooth sailing. Page 20
