The Late Bloomers' Club

by Louise Miller

  “Nora,” Elliot said breathlessly, and for a moment I thought he might be feeling the same way. “It’s Freckles. He’s shown up on the game camera we set up by the sugarhouse. He’s in the cage.”

  “You caught him?” My mind scrambled, trying to switch gears. “He’s in the trap?”

  “Yes.” He sounded elated. “Yes, I think we did. He’s there, and the trapdoor is closed. He’s pacing back and forth. He looks soaked to the bone, the poor guy. I called Erika. She’s gone to pick up temporary fencing to put up around the trap so he doesn’t bolt as soon as we open the door. Can you come?”

  “My sister has my car,” I said. “I’m at the diner.”

  “I’ll be there in ten minutes,” he said.

  I grabbed my raincoat and keys, flicked off the lights in the kitchen, and locked the door behind me, ready to see what would happen next.

  * * *

  “The image was shadowy—the camera is set up pretty far from the trap. And the rain has fogged the lens up. But it’s Freckles, that much I know for sure.”

  It was cozy in Elliot’s little two-seater. He had the seat warmers on, and it felt as if I were sitting on someone’s lap. The car raced up the dirt road toward the Sugar Maple, kicking up the water that had gathered in the ruts. It looked as if we were driving through a tunnel. The road was pitch dark, the rain beating down through the canopy of tree branches above us. Elliot reached over and squeezed my hand.

  “I just can’t wait to get ahold of him,” he said, sounding like a little kid. “He’s been out there for so long.”

  “Erika said it might take some time before he’s comfortable with people again,” I said carefully, not wanting him to be disappointed. I was bracing myself at the same time. I had read that it could take months, even years, for a dog to switch back from survival mode. Some never recovered. There were stories of dogs coming back to their old selves right away. But I worried that without Peggy, Freckles’s chances were low.

  “I had a dog that went feral after a hunting accident. I was around nine or ten. We never caught him. Every so often I thought I would catch a glimpse of him in the woods, but I was probably just seeing what I wanted to see. It would still happen years after he would have died of old age.” He glanced over at me. “Even if Freckles doesn’t come around, I’ll just be happy to see him safe. How about you?”

  “I want to do right by Peggy,” I said, thinking about her and Elsie. “She left us everything. It was so generous of her. Making sure Freckles is safe is what she would have wanted. ”

  “I’m sure she would be grateful to you.”

  “It’s funny. I thought I knew what her life was like, but I barely knew her at all. I had made all of these assumptions—but her life was much bigger than I imagined. She had a great love. And she was an artist—at least I think she might have been. At the very least she inspired one. It may have been her partner who made the sculptures, or they made them together, I’m not sure. But now I look at her flower gardens and taste her cakes and I can see what a creative person she was.”

  “It sounds like a good life,” Elliot said softly. “And a meaningful one. Better than most.”

  “Do you think so?”

  The Sugar Maple appeared before us. Elliot pulled around the building and into the back parking lot, the one nearest the crab apple trees. Erika’s town truck was nowhere to be seen.

  “I do,” Elliot said. “There is a lot to be said for being a part of a community, and for taking care of the people in it any way that you can. And if you can do that, and make time to make something of your own . . .”

  It was something my mom would have said. She would have loved Elliot. Capable, she would have said to me when we were in the kitchen doing dishes. That was one of her highest compliments. Along with thoughtful and kind. She would have said these things, too. She’d have teased him about his ears and put him to work replacing lightbulbs in the diner or weeding in the garden as soon as he arrived. At supper she would have peppered him with questions about birds and fruit trees and his childhood in Maine, and she would always have served his favorite dessert, no matter who else came to the table.

  The windshield was blurry with rain. Elliot turned the headlights off. In front of us was complete darkness.

  “Peggy’s love, Elsie, is in a nursing home. I think it’s why she was going to sell her land to HG. To pay for Elsie’s care.”

  “Who is taking care of her now?”

  I watched the rain rush down in thick rivulets.

  “Wait. Have you been—?”

  I nodded. “I’ve been paying the nursing home bills, and visiting Elsie—”

  “And that’s why you’re selling the property. I always wondered why you weren’t going to keep it for yourself.”

  “If it were just me, I might have tried. But half of it is my sister’s. I can’t afford to buy her out. There are liens against it, which you know. And back taxes. And Kit needed the money. All of that was already the case when we found out about Elsie.”

  Elliot blew out a long breath. “You take care of everyone, don’t you?”

  “Not everyone.” Not myself, anyway.

  “What are you going to do?”

  I kept my gaze trained on the darkness in front of us. “Honestly, I don’t know. I haven’t received any other offers on the land. I’m almost out of money. The nursing home will be patient, up to a point, but I took out a loan . . . I’m sorry. I don’t mean to burden you. This isn’t your concern.”

  Elliot reached over and took my hand in his and ran his thumb over my knuckles.

  “If I were a different man, I’d ask you if you were reconsidering my offer.”

  “I’m glad you aren’t a different man.” I stole a glance at him. When our eyes met, he squeezed my hand. I felt my pulse quicken, but I held his gaze. “And the answer would still be no, I don’t think HG is good for the town.”

  “You want to know something?”

  “What is it?”

  “I don’t think so, either.”

  “You aren’t a very good deal maker, are you?” I laughed. “I thought a corporate developer was supposed to swoop in on the vulnerable seller and offer less than market value right about now.”

  He smiled. “Well. A person could argue that a good deal isn’t just about money. It’s about making a decision that benefits everyone.”

  “Is that HG’s philosophy or just yours?”

  “Let’s just say they give me a certain amount of latitude to do the job, as long as I meet their quarterly goals.”

  Elliot looked in his rearview mirror. The rain was falling harder, fat drops pounding against the windshield and roof. “I wonder what’s holding Erika up. Could she have come in a different way?”

  The only other way into the sugar bush was the carriage path that connected the Sugar Maple to the McCracken farm, but you couldn’t take a car down that way.

  “No, this is it. Shall we go up and see Freckles? I hate to think of him nervous in that trap. And what if it’s in a low area?” Freckles had been through enough without having to fear drowning.

  Elliot leaned over and popped open the glove compartment, retrieving two flashlights. “Let’s go make sure he’s okay.”

  We walked slowly through the crab apple trees, the path impossibly slick with wet grass and mud. Elliot held out a hand and I took it. His hand was warm, his grip reassuring. We kept our flashlights trained to the ground. The wind picked up, blowing the rain into our faces, making it difficult to raise my head. Elliot walked confidently into the darkness. “I’ve taken this walk every day since I arrived,” he called over his shoulder, guiding me around a tree stump hidden under a patch of tall grass.

  There were no cheery lights on in the sugarhouse.

  “The trap is just a short way up the carriage path.” Elliot held out his arm. I slipped my arm i
nto his. “This way.”

  Elliot called to Freckles when we were still a few yards away. “Hey, boy. We’re here. It’s okay.” He aimed the beam of light at the corner of the woods. There it was, a sturdy wood frame covered in a thin chicken wire. At the base, the wire had been pulled out of the frame, exposing a ragged edge. We reached the trap. There was black fur caught in the raw ends of the wires.

  “You’re kidding me.” Elliot squatted down, his fingers on the wire. “It looks like he gnawed his way out.”

  “Poor guy,” I said, thinking of the time one of my goats chewed some wire fencing a blackberry bush had grown around—her mouth had needed eight stitches, and I had to give her antibiotics for weeks.

  Elliot sat down on the wet ground, defeated. I sat down next to him.

  “It would be nice if something were simple, wouldn’t it?” I said.

  Elliot pressed his palms into his eyes. “Yes, it really would.”

  I reached into my raincoat pocket and took out a clean wad of paper napkins from the diner. I handed half the stack to Elliot. He wiped at his face.

  “Maybe he hasn’t gone too far in the rain. Let’s go farther up the path.”

  “I’m afraid even if we found him, we wouldn’t be able to grab him. It would just be like all the other times. We need him contained.”

  Elliot’s cell phone lit up in his jacket pocket, illuminating his face.

  “Sorry about that. The main office is in California. I get calls at all hours.” He plucked it out to turn it off, glancing at the screen first. “Oh.” Elliot stood up. “We have to go.”

  “What is it? Was that Erika? Did she find him?” Maybe someone had been able to catch Freckles because he was injured? It was a long shot, but I was ready to grasp at straws.

  “Does Erika volunteer with the fire department?”

  “All of the members of the force do. What’s going on?” I scrambled to my feet and leaned over to read the text on his cell phone.

  “It’s the diner,” he said, his voice barely reaching me over the sound of the rain. I was already running.

  CHAPTER TEN

  As you can see, the fire started here in the kitchen,” the fire inspector said, pointing to the greasy black stripe that went up the wall behind the range. “Whatever started it seems to have fallen to the floor, and the fire spread from there.” The wooden floors were original. I remember my father sanding and waxing the floor by hand. Knowing my dad, he had probably been more interested in using the most authentic floor stain, and not the one that was flame retardant. “Thankfully your gas setup was up-to-date and it shut itself off. Otherwise you could have been looking at a total loss.”

  The county fire inspector couldn’t get over to the diner until Friday afternoon, after the nor’easter had passed. The kitchen was a blackened, sopping mess. The sprinkler system had done its best to control the fire, but had steeped the floor with water. After the system had been turned off, water from the storm had poured in through the roof and the broken windows. The firefighters had had to break the glass door and several windows in front to get in, and there were bits of broken glass covering the tables and benches out front. The electricity had gone out. A month’s worth of hamburger patties and Boston cream pies were melting in the freezer.

  I’d run the whole way to the parking lot after seeing Erika’s text, falling twice in the wet mud, not realizing that I didn’t have my car until I reached Elliot’s. He’d been close behind me, and had driven me to the diner. By the time we’d arrived, the flames had been put out, but the head of the volunteer fire department wouldn’t let me in until the next morning, when the fire inspector had made sure it was safe. I’d stood outside in the rain until Erika, who was concerned I was in shock, had gently pulled me away. She’d insisted on coming home with me to make sure I followed her instructions. Elliot had made me a cup of tea while Erika had helped me change into warm, dry clothes. They’d both sat with me until Fern came over, her kids in tow, to spend the night.

  The fire inspector continued. “The building inspector has to come in. You know Doug, don’t you? And your insurance guy. Have you called your insurance company?”

  I nodded.

  “Doug will have the final word about the structure, and of course it depends on your contractor, but I would say you are looking at three, maybe four months until you are back up and running.”

  “Three months?” In three months it would be the New Year. No leaf-peeping rush. No family breakfasts over the Thanksgiving weekend. No ice cream and pie for the kids after they went Christmas shopping with their moms. Three months of no work for Charlie and Fern and the rest of the staff. Three months of loan payments to make.

  “Maybe four. Doug will have a better idea. Things will go faster once he says the building is sound.” The inspector carefully walked over to the stove and kicked the charred remains of a saucepan. “Pretty sure this was the culprit. Went up fast. Do you know what it was?”

  I nodded but couldn’t make myself say the two words out loud.

  Burnt. Sugar.

  * * *

  Max and Kit were waiting for me in the apartment when I returned home from my meeting with the fire inspector. Fern must have called them. Kit wrapped herself around me while Max stood behind us, petting my shoulder.

  “Are you okay? How is the diner? Is it fixable?” Kit asked in a rush.

  I felt like I couldn’t catch my breath. I extracted myself from Kit’s embrace and sat down in the chair, needing some space.

  “It isn’t a total loss, but it’s going to be months. I’m waiting to hear from the insurance agent. I’m pretty sure we’re covered.” Were we covered? I had just kept renewing the insurance my dad had set up years ago. Surely a restaurant must have insurance against fire. My heart pounded an extra beat.

  “Do you know what happened?” Max asked. He and Kit had settled into the couch.

  “You were right—I should have done my mise en place. I was distracted while making the burnt sugar cake, then I got a call about Freckles.” I buried my face in my hands. “I thought I had turned the burner off. But now I can’t remember.”

  “Why don’t you come to New York with Max and me?”

  My already-queasy stomach roiled at the mention of Kit and Max’s New York trip, and acid crept up the back of my throat.

  “It will be perfect, right, Max?” Kit said, grabbing his hand. “We were just talking about how sad we felt leaving you. We’d love to have you come with us. When is the last time you’ve had a vacation? This is, like, the perfect opportunity for you to get away for a while.”

  “Kit, I—”

  “And you can take in all the museums while we edit during the day. The place we are staying at is pretty close to the Whitney. The library has passes. It won’t even be that expensive.”

  “Kit—”

  “You’d have to sleep on the couch, though. It’s only a one-bedroom, but you’ve always said you wished you had adventures like—”

  Max put an arm around Kit’s shoulder. “I think your sister is trying to tell you something. What is it, Nora?”

  “I didn’t have my car. And the equipment was heavy. I decided to just leave it—”

  Kit froze. She looked all around the living room, her head whipping back and forth. “It’s not—”

  “The laptop, the camera, the lights you left—they were all in my office. On the floor of my office. I don’t think—” The scorch mark on the floor had led into my office. I hadn’t looked in, not wanting to see the melted family photos.

  “Om namah Shivaya,” Max said quietly.

  “Are you sure?” Kit stood and paced around the room. “You never would have left everything at work. Maybe you put the laptop in your safe? Most of the movie is on there. Or maybe the camera? You wouldn’t have just left the camera—”

  “There were the sprinkle
rs, too, Kit. And the water from the hoses. And it was raining. There was water everywhere.”

  “Oh, my God. All of that work. The festival. We won’t make the deadline, there’s no way.” Kit’s words came out louder and faster as she talked. Watching her circle the couch made me feel even sicker. “We’ll never have another opportunity like this. This was it.”

  “Kit, come sit down,” Max said quietly, but I knew my sister. There was no calming her.

  “I might as well quit now. My career as a director is over.”

  “I’m so sorry, Kit, I really am.”

  Kit sat down heavily on the couch. “I’ve lost everything.”

  “You’ve lost everything?” the words came out of my mouth before I had even finished thinking them. Kit reared back, as if I had slapped her. “Kit, the diner was all I had.”

  “I wish you could hear yourself, Nora. Can you really not see it?”

  “What on earth are you talking about?” My mind flooded with all the times Kit had done what she wanted, all the things she wasn’t afraid to ask for, all the risks she took.

  “Honey, look around. You have everything. You always have. You have the diner. A place in the community. You’re surrounded by friends. You’ve had a husband, and his family. You had Mom’s love—”

  “Mom loved you. You must know that.”

  “I know Mom loved me, but did she need me? Same with Dad. God, he looked to you for everything. Do you have any idea what it was like for me? You guys were like a team. I was always on the outside. Anything I have in my life now I’ve had to create for myself.”

  Her words ripped off the scab of a wound I thought had healed long ago. “I don’t see what’s so great about being needed. I’ve sacrificed everything I can to give people what they needed, including you. You had me. Doesn’t that mean anything to you?”