October Snow

by Jenna Brooks

  “Only about ten more miles.” Jo was at the same time excited and apprehensive. “You’re going to love it up here. Especially the house. It’s beautiful.”

  Max reached to turn up the radio, joining in with the chorus of a soft-rock song. “I…can’t do that to you…no no no…”

  “You can’t sing, either.”

  “Then I won’t try out for ‘Lungs’, or whatever the hell that show is.”

  The rain was clearing away, and the sun came out just as they crossed the town line. Max frowned. “Where are we? I haven’t been up this way in ages.”

  “Center-city Strafford.”

  Max looked around. There was a convenience store, a diner, two gas stations–one of which had a sign in the window, Welcome Home Mark! Semper Fi!– and a small grocery store, which apparently doubled as the local Post Office.

  “Oh, yeah,” Max grinned wryly. “And the house is in the suburbs, I suppose.”

  Jo made a hairpin turn onto a narrow dirt road, just beyond a small cluster of tidy ranch houses. On the right, the bank rose up beside them as they descended, until the main road disappeared. There were several small cottages on the left, camps that were used only from Memorial Day through Labor Day, owned mostly by Bostonians who came up on the weekends.

  There was a small patch of saplings just ahead, in the center of where the road became a circle for cars to double back. Beyond the trees, at the top of the circle, a large, white New Englander appeared.

  “Wow, Jo…Wow, that’s the house?”

  She nodded, smiling. “Look behind it.”

  The lake, Max thought, was an impossible shade of blue. There was a small patch of land about fifty yards out, like a tiny island, just visible from where Jo parked the truck.

  “Are those flowers on that island?”

  “Yeah. Local legend has it that some guy, decades ago, planted them there after his wife drowned just a few feet from the shore.” Jo pointed. “See the dwarf pine in the middle?”

  Max nodded as she opened her door.

  “They say no one at all planted that tree. It was just there, exactly a year after she died.”

  “Are we trying to rent a haunted house?”

  Jo laughed. “No. Well…All of the spirits here are friendly.”

  “Terrific. I get to spend the summer with friendly ghosts.”

  They walked around the house. A massive deck wrapped from the west side of the building all the way across the back. A small dock extended about fifteen feet into the lake, a canoe attached to the post.

  “Jo, this is gonna cost a ton.”

  “Yup.”

  “Really…”

  “My call, Bim. I need this. You do, too.”

  Max was silent for a moment, studying Jo as she reached into her backpack and pulled out a small bag of corn chips.

  Jo grinned at her. “Watch this.” She threw a few of the chips underhand, as high as she could, then looked around expectantly as they landed on the sandy area just before the dock. Within seconds, several seagulls descended from somewhere–Max had no idea from where–and scooped up the chips.

  They laughed in unison, delighted by the raucous beauty of the gulls. Max thought she had never seen Jo like that, almost childlike in her excitement. For some reason that she couldn’t grasp, as she watched her she felt a sudden wave of something like regret–a sadness that she wanted very much to comprehend; then, an odd thought occurred to her: it wasn’t time yet.

  “You’re right, Bim,” she said. “We need this.” She shook off the sudden pensiveness of the moment before. “Give me some chips, and then we’ll go find Grady Simpkins.”

  Sam wandered into her mother’s kitchen, eyes lidded, stretching hard. As she bent for a few toe-touches, she noticed her mother sitting at the table in the breakfast nook with her coffee and a legal pad, making her daily to-do list.

  “Morning, Mom.”

  She didn’t answer, seemingly engrossed in her planning.

  “Coffee fresh, Mom?”

  Liz looked up, peering over her pink-rimmed reading glasses. “Goodness, Samantha. Noon?”

  “You didn’t wake me up.”

  Liz gave her a dismissive glance, then returned to her list.

  Sam was checking her phone. “Huh. I thought the girls would have called by now.”

  Liz didn’t look up. “I’m sure they’ll be in touch later. Jack called, though.”

  Sam opened her phone, frowning, checking for his number. “When?”

  “He called me around nine. He’d like to take you to dinner tonight.”

  “He called you? Why?”

  “He was being thoughtful. He didn’t want to wake you.” She pushed the pad aside, taking off her glasses and chewing on the stem as she studied Sam. “He’ll pick you up at seven.”

  “Uh, I didn’t say I’d go, Mom.”

  “You have to. He’s your husband.”

  Sam rolled her eyes.

  Liz sighed. “Samantha…”

  “I don’t want to discuss this right now, Mom.”

  “Well, we’re going to.” She pointed to the chair across from her.

  Sam put her phone back on the counter, but didn’t move toward the table where Liz sat. She wondered if–no, why–it had always been this way, because she knew she would eventually sit; but then again, just a few moments of seeming defiance might reestablish something she hadn’t often felt. Something like a sense of independence, perhaps.

  Still, though, she didn’t move. She could feel her brain giving her legs the signal to walk, but she felt strangely dissociated, as though there was a short-circuit someplace inside her. This guy had hurt her, and her mother was demanding that she see him for dinner.

  “Samantha, sit down.”

  Her mother suddenly looked like a stranger to her. She thought of the rage, the twisted ugliness of Jack’s face, and for a moment Sam believed that she hated the both of them. They had never been conjoined in her mind in that way, not until that moment. None of the men with whom her mother had teamed up had seemed quite so melded, so unified with her in whatever purpose it served to hold Sam back. To hold her down.

  In a flash of sudden, exasperated understanding, it occurred to her that she had let them hold her down.

  Almost imperceptibly, she shook her head. “No. No, I don’t want to.” She was surprised at how easy it was to say those words. “Mom, I just can’t do this anymore.” Her hand closed over her phone as she turned to leave; she reached for her keys, hanging on the hook by the doorway.

  Liz stood. “Where are you going?”

  She paused, but didn’t look at her mother. “I don’t know.” Her voice was thin. She could feel tears welling up, but she didn’t understand why she would be on the verge of crying. “I just need to go.” She broke into a run as she got to the staircase, and took the steps two at a time to her room.

  Liz was standing at the foot of the steps when Sam came out, staring impassively at her daughter. “We need to talk.”

  She was between Sam and the front door, and Sam felt a grip of apprehension. Her mother had never raised a hand to her; however, it seemed that the threat–the eventuality–was always there.

  “Step aside, Mom.”

  “Not until I speak.”

  Liz grunted, surprised, as Sam pushed by her, then set her overnight bag beside the front door. She turned back to her mother. “Okay, go ahead.” She thought that she saw her mother’s hands tremble slightly as she ran them through her hair, frustrated.

  “Do you want to end up alone, Samantha? With a child to raise? Waitress for the rest of your life?”

  “No.”

  “Then believe me, when I tell you…”

  “Okay. I do.” She felt flat, almost dead inside. It had always been this way; then, she realized that for twenty years, all she had ever needed to do was to get up and walk away. Her mother’s ability to keep her feeling like a child was the reason that fact had never before occurred to her.

  The
n she understood that she, herself, had allowed that as well. She had wanted it. Staying small gave her a false sense of safety.

  “It was safety, not security,” she said softly. “There’s a difference.”

  Liz stared at her, not understanding.

  “Goodbye, Mom.” She shut the door carefully, leaving her mother’s shocked silence behind her.

  “We’re looking for someone,” Jo said to the elderly woman behind the desk, at the Post Office part of Lettie’s Foodstop. “You’re Lettie?”

  “I think this place was in a horror novel,” Max mumbled, and Jo kicked her foot.

  “You betcha, miss. ‘Lucille’ actually, but they call me ‘Lettie’. Who’re you looking for?”

  “Grady Simpkins.”

  “Grady! Sure, he’ll be in to get his mail sometime today. Don’t know when, though. How do you know him?”

  “I rented his beach house from him a few times. Been a lot of years since the last time, though. I’m hoping to do it again this summer.”

  “Well, it shouldn’t be too hard to track him down.” Lettie’s expression became dramatically mournful then, and with the measured regret of the practiced gossip–and lowering her booming voice to a milder yell–she leaned on the counter, ready to share a confidence. “He lost Marie last winter, you know. His wife. Just awful, so sudden.”

  “Oh, dear. What happened? Heart attack?”

  Lettie snorted. “No, no–she run off with some guy from the Rochester Gun and Game Club.”

  Max’s head jerked up from where she had been studying the gum rack.

  “Oh…” Jo felt herself getting sucked in to the wiles of a townie yarn-spinner, into the favorite hobby of small-town New Hampshiremen. “That’s terrible.”

  “Eh, not so bad.”

  “Really?”

  “She run off ‘cause Grady was keeping company with that Louise Wilson.”

  Max burst out laughing. Jo felt as though she had wandered into one of those sudden thickets that were always cropping up by the lake.

  “I see.” She stifled her own laughter. Small-town New Hampshiremen didn’t take well to that kind of response.

  Max was still chuckling; Jo kicked her again.

  “I’ll be in the truck, Jo. Nice to meet you, Lettie.”

  “Pleasure’s mine, dear.”

  Jo gestured to the cluttered desk behind Lettie. “Can I have a piece of paper, and I’ll leave Grady a message here?”

  “Sure. He’s living at Louise Wilson’s house now, over on Acorn Road. If you find him before I do, tell him he has a couple of packages here that I need to get to him. I keep forgetting.”

  Jo wrote her name and number, and a brief note about the beach house, relatively sure that Grady would remember her. “Here you go,” she slid it across the counter. “Wish me luck.”

  “I know he didn’t rent it out last year. He and Louise was living there for a while. And he hasn’t mentioned it at all for this year, so maybe he’s looking to make a little money off of it by now.”

  “Let’s hope. See you soon, Lettie.” It occurred to Jo that it would make for a nice gesture to buy something, and she grabbed a two colas and some pretzels from the display by the door. “By the way, how much for these?”

  “I’ll just charge you for the chips, dear. Two ninety-five.”

  “How nice. Thanks.”

  “We’ll just hold a good thought, and call it a welcome present.”

  On her way to the truck, Jo thought about how things might have been different for her, had she stayed in a small town. She had always despised the city, but that’s where Keith had to be to build his career.

  Max was on her phone, her face pinched. She mouthed, Sammy. “Where are you now?…Well…Well, I don’t know.” She motioned to Jo. “What time is it?”

  “One-thirty. Little before.”

  “We’re looking for someone right now. Maybe around five or six?” She looked at Jo questioningly.

  “What does she need?”

  Max sighed. “Hold on–I’ll give her the phone.” She handed it to Jo. “She’s in bad shape.”

  “Sammy? What’s up?” Jo could hear the ragged breathing on the other end, deep breaths as Sam tried to control her voice through her crying.

  “I think I just left home for the last time.”

  Jo looked up at Max, confused. Max shrugged, shaking her head. “Home? You mean you left Jack for good?”

  “No, I left Mom. For good.”

  Jo’s mouth dropped open, and she muted her phone. “Sammy just ran away from home…?” She was trying not to laugh.

  Max slapped her on the arm. “Stop that!” she hissed.

  “Jo?” Sam’s voice was plaintive, anxious. “You there?”

  Jo pinched herself on the arm to regain her composure as she turned off the phone’s mute. “Right here, Sammy. Where are you?”

  “At your apartment building, but you guys aren’t here.”

  “I know, honey. Tell you what–let me run a fast errand here, and we can be back by four. You’ll be okay ‘til then?”

  “I don’t know…Yeah, I guess so. Is your apartment open?”

  “No, it’s not…let’s see…” She looked to Max. “Please tell me your apartment is unlocked?”

  “Don’t remember. Tell her to go check.” Max was opening the pretzels, tossing a few out the window to see if the seagulls would return. She was glad that Sam had left Liz’s house.

  “Yeah, go check…No, I’ll just wait on the line with you.” She turned to Max. “She really wants to hide out.”

  “I don’t blame her.”

  “Me neither.” Then, a minute later, “Oh, good.” She nodded at Max. “Just go on in and relax–we’ll be back as quick as we can, get some dinner and talk, okay?”

  She closed the phone. “She said to tell you thanks.”

  Max was draining the last of her soda. “Can’t wait to hear this one.”

  An ancient red pickup truck was pulling up beside them in Lettie’s parking lot. A white-haired, slightly bent old man emerged from the cab, looking curiously in Jo’s direction. Then he broke into a smile, waved, and walked over to Jo’s window.

  “Hey, stranger!”

  Jo rolled the window down, tossing the phone back to Max. “Grady! Hey, I didn’t know if you’d remember me!” She got out of the truck, reaching to hug him.

  “You kiddin’? Like I ever forget a pretty woman. I’da known you by that hair, if nothing else.” He squeezed her hard. “Good to see you. Was gonna call you back on the weekend. So what you doing up here? Last I knew, you and the boys had moved to Manchester with the bum. How are those kids?”

  “Great.” She pulled away and smiled at him, genuinely glad to see him. She had forgotten what a kind man he was. “They’re all grown up now, of course, but they’re great.”

  “And you? Still with the bum?”

  “No, got divorced a few years back.”

  “Can’t say I’m sorry.”

  “Me neither.” They laughed.

  Max came around the truck to meet Grady. “Grady Simpkins, this is my friend, Maxine Allen.”

  He extended his hand. “Another pretty woman. Pleasure, Miss Allen.”

  She grasped his hand, smiling at the pleasant old man. “Max.”

  “Okay, Max.” He looked flattered. “Just call me ‘Grady’, okay?”

  “You bet.”

  “Actually, Grady,” Jo said, “I’d like to call you my landlord again.”

  He cocked his head. “Yeah? You want to rent the house again?”

  “Hoping to.”

  He grinned, jerking his head toward the store. “Well, I don’t know if you’ve been in to see Lettie yet…”

  “I have. She has a couple of packages for you.”

  “Then you know that Marie and I are no longer married.”

  “Well, Lettie did mention it…”

  Grady gave her a knowing look. “And so you know that Louise Wilson and I are an item the
se days.”

  Jo nodded. Max watched them, amused by the exchange.

  “Anyway,” Grady went on, “Louise and I are going to Nantucket to stay with her daughter for the summer. House’ll be empty. What can you afford?”

  Jo felt something, almost a thrill but not quite, run through her. “What are you asking?”

  “You’ll do the upkeep, as good as you did before?”

  “Absolutely.”

  He waved his hand. “Ah, I know you will. How many of you gonna live there?”

  “Probably three…?” She looked at Max, and she nodded.

  “Thousand a month.”

  Jo stared at him in disbelief. “Grady, you could get three times that much…”

  He touched her cheek. “I’ll have no worries for an entire summer. That’s worth an awful lot to me. How long you need the place?”

  “At least through Labor Day. Longer, maybe. Maybe through September.”

  “As long as you want. We live in Louise’s house now, so the beach place is just sitting there. Thousand a month. Deal?” He extended his hand.

  Jo took it with both of her hands. “Deal,” she said, her voice thick. She reached for her purse, clearing her throat. “I have my checkbook. You have the keys on you?”

  “Love a lady who knows how to conduct business.” He pulled his keychain from his pocket, removing two of the many keys. “Here you go–one for each of you, feel free to get a copy made for whoever the other one is.”

  Jo was scribbling her signature on the check. “What needs done over there?”

  “Shouldn’t be nothing to do. I’ll call the electric company today, and get ‘em to put the electric in your name. Cleaned it up for the season just last month–it’s still furnished and all, too.” He scratched at the slight gray beard under his chin. “No, actually you’re gonna need a table to eat on. Louise and I took the one that was there. And a tank of oil, too. But I got a kid from Rochester who comes in every ten days to do the mowing, so you won’t have to worry about that.”

  “Okay,” she handed him the check. “I prorated May, and the rest of it is payment through August.”

  He whistled softly as he looked at it. “You do mean business, my dear.”

  “I’ve been waiting for this.”