“And then there’s the flip side,” Theo said. “Someone like Ellie who wants to be married so bad that she ignores even the flashing neon warning signs. Maybe she invested so much in the relationship that she couldn’t imagine breaking up with him. Even though it meant starting out marriage on a rocky path.”
“Maybe a couple just has to be madly in love.”
“But that ‘in love’ feeling doesn’t necessarily last. The relationship has to be backed up by other stuff. Like maturity.”
As they neared Theo’s house, Rebecca could hear Spock barking. “He must know you’re coming.”
“He knows my footsteps,” Theo said. “And I’m sure he smells his fajitas. Come on in. Give me a second to find his leash and we’ll walk you back to Finch’s.”
Rebecca’s heart leaped at the thought of going inside, of seeing where he lived, where he sat, ate, slept. Took showers. She walked in behind him and smiled. Not a black leather piece to be found. Spock had a plush bed near the stone fireplace. The house was so nice that Rebecca wondered if he’d lived here with a woman.
She sat down on the sofa, a wood base covered with cushions in a subtle leaf design. It looked like nature. The entire downstairs did, with its sisal rug and bark curtain rods that held muslin drapes. “Your house is beautiful,” she said as he attached Spock’s leash. “Did you build most of the furniture yourself?”
“Actually, yes. That’s where I make most of my money.” He stood by the door with Spock at the ready, but she wanted to stay. She was starting to really like this guy. Which was why she got up.
And within five minutes, they were at Finch’s.
“I built that swing for Marianne two years ago,” he said, gesturing at the beautiful swing for two on the side porch.
So of course she sat down on it and he sat next to her and kicked off the porch to sway it. Above them were twinkling white stars in the black sky, a crescent moon. She stared up at them, forcing herself not to make a wish. Forcing herself not to fall for this gorgeous, insightful, intelligent, wonderful guy.
They sat so close she would barely have to move an inch to kiss him.
“You still wish on stars?” he asked.
“I see that mind reading is among your many talents. Though actually, if I were honest, I’d tell you I was making myself not wish on a star.”
“Complicated?”
“Very,” she said, one perfect twinkling star beckoning her. “Last night I came out here and wished that this would all make sense, my being here. That I’m supposed to be here, that I’m doing the right thing.”
“Worried you’re not?”
“Joy doesn’t want me here,” she said. “And then there’s this.”
“This?”
She hesitated, then just blurted out, “I’m sitting on a porch swing with a man I want to kiss, when I have a live-in boyfriend who’s waiting for me to come home.”
He smiled. “Do you want to go home?”
She glanced at the moon, at the perfect sliver of it. “I don’t know. This doesn’t feel like home. I’m not in my own life. I’m trying to foist myself in someone else’s life. I’ve done that kind of thing before. You know when you’re hanging on too long to a relationship, and the person has made it clear you’re not wanted, but you can’t leave. That’s kind of how I feel—how I think Joy feels.”
He nodded. “And what about this guy you want to kiss. Is he adding more weirdness to the equation?”
“He’s more helping me figure things out, without his even knowing it.”
“Interesting how people do that. I’ll bet he’d let you test out that kiss, if you need to. Just saying.”
All she had to do was tilt up her face and in seconds she could test it out. The gentlest of breezes beckoned her closer, but she hesitated. If she was going to kiss this guy, this beautiful man, shouldn’t she be free to do so?
You’re not married, she reminded herself. That’s different.
But it shouldn’t be so different. She and Michael were committed, they were living together. Though not exactly at the moment.
Why do I feel so comfortable with you? she wanted to ask. Why does this feel so comfortable? I’m in the middle of nowhere, somewhere else, wanting to kiss a guy I barely know. But a guy who makes me feel like I belong exactly where I am.
I am here and here is where?
“This is probably where you should offer to see me to my door,” she said. “To keep me safe from coyotes and wild rabbits.”
“And me?”
“And you.”
With that, he got up and so did she, and he walked her to the front door. She used her key to go inside and he plucked a little purple flower from the ones that lined the bushes.
He tucked the flower behind her ear. “I’ll come get Charlie tomorrow around five. Sound good?”
“Perfect. How do I look?” she asked, turning to model her flower-adorned ear.
“Beautiful. Like always. Night,” he said, then walked off into the inky darkness under the stars.
• • •
The first thing Rebecca saw when she opened her eyes the next morning was the little purple flower. She’d put it in a teacup filled with water.
“You’re going to be in good hands this weekend,” she told Charlie.
And when Theo came to pick up the dog as promised, right on time at 5:00 p.m., with just a squeeze of the hand, no mention of their almost kiss, nothing except “I’ll be home after three on Sunday, so come pick him up anytime,” Rebecca knew that she was in good hands with him, too.
eleven
As Rebecca pulled up to Joy’s house, a stylish fifty-something woman came out and walked over to a car parked in the driveway. She rooted around in the backseat, then the trunk. The breath caught in Rebecca’s throat.
Pia Jayhawk. Rebecca was sure of it.
Her blond hair was cut in an A-line chin-length bob with heavy Louise Brooks bangs. She was dressed all in black, like a New Yorker, and had something resembling a belly dancer’s scarf with beads around her hips. Long metallic earrings dangled from her ears. Each arm sported several bracelets and bangles. She carried what looked like an easel into the house.
Everyone said Rebecca looked like her father, that aside from the chestnut brown wavy hair and the light brown eyes and the slightly long nose and the slightly wide mouth, there was something in her expression that reminded everyone of Daniel Strand. She wondered if Pia would recognize her. If she’d look at her and know.
Doubtful.
It took Rebecca a few minutes to leave the comfort zone of her car. But finally she collected her travel bag and her purse and rang the bell.
Joy opened the door a crack. “Remember our deal.”
Rebecca nodded, and Joy opened the door wider and gestured her through. She stepped into a small mudroom with tiny shoes and rubber rain boots and preschool paintings hung adorably on a clothesline across the narrow room. As Joy led the way into the living room, Rebecca immediately noticed that she and Joy did have similar taste in home décor. Folksy meets modern meets thrift store. The plush, comfortable cream-colored sofa with its interesting texture and colorful throw pillows, the big muted rug and interesting lamps with elephants as bases. Rebecca had a few lucky elephants among her possessions at Michael’s.
Michael’s. Interesting that Rebecca didn’t think of her home in New York as her apartment. It was and had always been Michael’s apartment.
“You know Ellie, of course,” Joy said.
Ellie was biting her lip and glancing out the window for Tim. She popped a cheese cube into her mouth. “Not here yet.” Rebecca watched Ellie’s expression alternate between hope and despair in the same second. She hoped Tim showed up this time.
“And this is Aimee and Charles Cutlass,” Joy said, leading her over to a thirtysomething couple who sat very close together on the love seat. “Aimee is a librarian and Charles is the manager of the Honda dealership in Brunswick.” They were both tall, thin redheads,
but Aimee’s frizzy curls were almost orange, and Charles’s hair was more auburn. They both wore white turtlenecks, khaki pants, and had matching navy blue windbreakers. Joy smiled at the couple. “Rebecca is the mediation specialist I mentioned would be joining us.” After a few minutes of small talk, Ellie pulled Rebecca away to the little table of refreshments by the window.
“I wonder what their story is,” Ellie whispered. “They seem to be very happily married. Right down to the matchy-matchy clothes.”
“Seems is always the key word,” Rebecca pointed out.
The doorbell rang, and Rebecca could feel Ellie stiffen. Please be him, she said silently for Ellie’s sake.
And it was. Rebecca breathed a sigh of relief at the sight of Tim Rasmussen. At least six feet three and with a football player’s neck, he filled the doorway and smiled awkwardly at Joy, then glanced around. His gaze rested on the now beaming Ellie and he gave a little wave. She ran over to him and whispered something in his ear. Rebecca heard him say, “I’ll try.”
Good enough for now.
Rebecca looked around, hoping for another glimpse of Pia Jayhawk. She heard a child’s voice, then the cutest giggle-laughter, and followed the sound, pretending to be in deep study of the small paintings along the living-room wall where it narrowed into a hallway. Through the French doors of what appeared to be a playroom, she saw Pia sitting on a big round rug, building a fort of blocks with Rex. Joy walked in, scooped up Rex, and hugged him tight, twirling around with him. Rebecca heard murmurings of “See you in two little days” and “You’re going to have so much fun with Grandma.” There was another hug, and then Joy slipped back through the doors again. Rex settled himself in Pia’s lap on the rug and played with the long chain of her glasses.
Rebecca stared at Rex, her nephew, her father’s grandchild. She wanted to run into the playroom and get down on the floor and build a tower of blocks and make a Play-Doh cat. But now certainly wasn’t the time. Perhaps when they returned from the tour, Joy would agree to letting her join her and Rex at the playground or at the library for Story Time.
She watched as Harry Jones came in and did much the same as Joy had. Harry was very good-looking in an easygoing way, like a model in an L.L.Bean catalog, with his brown windswept hair and hazel eyes. Harry and Joy looked like a couple, looked like they belonged together. They had on the same low-slung jeans and J.Crew-ish sweaters and Merrells. They both had the same friendly kindness in their attractive faces. You could imagine going up to Joy in the produce section of a supermarket and asking her if she knew how to tell if the mangoes were fresh. And car-greenhorn Rebecca could easily see herself calling over to Harry at the gas station pump to ask if there was any point in using the premium gasoline.
Pia, on the other hand, had that intimidating quality that most New Yorkers had.
Of course, since Rebecca was staring, Pia Jayhawk glanced up and smiled. In that moment, Rebecca saw Pia in her Madonna tatters and bangles, seaweed twisted around her ankles as she searched for the perfect rock to paint.
Rebecca dashed away. Yet as she headed down the short hallway to the living room, another painting stopped her cold.
Her father.
She was sure it was him. It was a small painting, on an unframed eight-by-ten canvas. A young Daniel Strand sat on a stretch of beach, his arms wrapped around his legs, looking neither happy nor at peace. He seemed to be searching for answers in the blue water ahead of him. There was something in his hand, and when Rebecca leaned closer she could see it was a rock, likely the one Pia had given him to throw when they’d met. Rebecca stared at her father’s face. There was the slightest hint of heartbreak in his expression, as though he were trying to hide it. Pia had captured the essence of her father in the painting; it was so visceral Rebecca almost wanted to reach out and touch the paint.
Pia had loved Daniel Strand, of this Rebecca was sure.
And though Rebecca recalled from one of her father’s letters that this house had been Pia’s, it was now Joy’s home, and the painting was still there, on the wall. Did Joy know that the man on the beach holding the rock was her father? Perhaps she did and liked having the painting in her house, albeit along a short stretch of hallway that didn’t beckon one to linger and look at the art. Perhaps it was enough for Joy to know it was there. Every now and then, she likely stood where Rebecca was now and studied it, looking, wondering.
“Who’s that?”
A child’s voice.
Rebecca jumped, until she realized that Rex Jayhawk-Jones was talking about her. He stood a few feet down the hall in front of the French doors and stared at her with those huge hazel eyes, glancing from her to Pia.
“I’m sure that’s a friend of Mommy’s,” Pia said. She glanced at the painting that Rebecca stood in front of, then looked at Rebecca, her gaze so sharp that Rebecca bit her lip.
She knew. She knew. She knew.
“That’s right!” Rebecca said to Rex in that overly cheery voice people used with kids, then hurried back into the living room. She stood at the table of cheese and crackers and focused on the painting above the upright piano, this one of Pia and a man jumping off a cliff.
“We weren’t too sure,” a voice said from behind her. “Boy, we were wrong.” Rebecca turned around. Pia stood there, her gaze on the painting. “My husband and I married seventeen years ago. We’re renewing our vows in November.”
She could hardly believe she was standing here talking to Pia Jayhawk. In front of this painting, no less. “Is seventeen significant for you?”
“Not particularly. But Jack had a cancer scare last year, and so it’s something we’ve been wanting to do.”
“My father just died of cancer,” Rebecca said, then shut her mouth fast.
There was no reason Pia Jayhawk would know of Daniel Strand’s death. Or necessarily care. Though Rebecca imagined you’d always care.
Pia held her gaze for a moment. “I’m so sorry. Are you here for Joy’s tour?”
Rebecca was speechless for a moment. You had an affair with my father. You slept with him on a beach. You had his child.
Did you love him? Do you think about him? Did you keep tabs? Do you know that he’s gone?
Pia was staring at her, so Rebecca finally nodded.
“Good luck, then.”
“I—” But it’s not as if she could explain she wasn’t a participant on the Rocky Relationships Tour. And besides, she did need luck.
She glanced down the hall. There was Harry, with Rex on his shoulders. And Joy was going over something on a piece of paper with a man she presumed to be Jack, her stepfather. Rex’s schedule perhaps.
Joy’s gaze locked with Rebecca’s. There was the slightest narrowing of her eyes. “Mom, could you come take Rex. We’re going to be leaving in five minutes.”
Pia smiled and headed back down the hall. Pia and Joy hugged, then Joy took Rex from Harry and hugged him tight and covered him with kisses before handing him over to Pia. Joy didn’t introduce Rebecca to Harry, presumably because she couldn’t very well say in front of her mother, “Oh, and, Harry, this is the half sister I was telling you about, the one whose father had an affair with my mother and then pretended it and the resulting pregnancy never happened.”
Rebecca’s heart squeezed. She was in Joy’s house, among Joy’s family. She was the odd one out here, the one who didn’t belong. When Rebecca’s father told her about the baby he’d turned his back on, Joy was the one not connected to the Strands. But here, Joy had her whole world, her whole life, family, friends, a husband, and a child. Rebecca was the outsider.
• • •
During the thirty-minute drive from Wiscasset to South Freeport, Rebecca learned from Aimee Cutlass that she and Charles had been trying to have a baby since their honeymoon five years ago. Aimee was ready to adopt. Charles was ready to adopt a dog. Maybe even two. Aimee believed she couldn’t get pregnant because Charles really didn’t want a child; she’d heard on Oprah about a book called The Secret,
and apparently the secret was that you had to think positively. Apparently, Charles was thinking that babies cost money, that babies were life-changing, wailing, helpless, dependent, demanding little creatures, and therefore sperm was not making its way to egg.
Aimee told Rebecca, Ellie, and Joy this from her seat next to Ellie in the first row. If Charles was listening, it wasn’t obvious. He sat in the middle row, but was facing sideways, talking to Harry and Tim in the back row. Joy had suggested this seating arrangement so that the trip started out easier for Tim, with him talking guy talk instead of sitting next to his complaining wife and listening to a list of his infractions as a husband.
“Rebecca, maybe you could lead a discussion about what we all want in a marriage,” Ellie whispered.
“Actually, I think we should let things be,” Rebecca whispered back. “Look, Tim’s having a great time back there, talking about the Red Sox and whether they’re gonna make the playoffs. That good mood will carry over to dinner.”
“I agree,” Joy said as the orange minibus turned onto a dirt road with a sign for Harborview Lodge.
A half mile down, the beautiful old stone house came into view. It looked more like a small castle than the ski lodge Rebecca was expecting—not that Freeport was skiing country. The house was surrounded by evergreens and paths meandering up through the woods in every direction. Inside, Rebecca was surprised to see the lodge was actually charming and cozy but rustic. In the huge living room were overstuffed sofas and floor pillows, soft, faded rugs, and a massive stone fireplace that Harry lit in less than a minute. Well-cared-for plants were everywhere, and each doorway was lit by twinkling white Christmas lights. There was a large kitchen, two full bathrooms, and a screened room that led out to a back deck with its view of the ocean. Upstairs were five large bedrooms and three bathrooms.
Rebecca’s room had a tiny balcony facing the woods. She unpacked, then stood out there, taking in the red and orange leaves of the trees, until she saw Aimee and Charles come out onto their little balcony. They still wore their matching white turtlenecks and khaki pants. They embraced, and from the way they looked at each other, the way they hugged, Rebecca knew immediately that they loved each other in a way that would transcend their problems. They were here to talk something through, but their marriage was safe.
The Secret of Joy Page 15
