Forever Beach

by Shelley Noble

  “I think she’s been under a lot of stress lately between Michael’s injury and her job.”

  “I don’t know, it was more than that.” She looked up at him. “How did you know I’d come back?”

  “I was going to lunch and saw you drive by.” He flicked her chin. “Which still sounds like a good idea. Come on, we’ll splurge and go to TailSpin.”

  “I need to get back to work, then I have to pick up Leila at the bus.”

  “And you need to eat before you can do any of those things. Humor me.”

  Hadn’t she just been thinking that she wanted someone to take care of her? “Thanks, I’d like that.”

  They walked back to the street, past the clock shop, and toward the center of town. Since it was Monday, some of the stores and restaurants were closed. But most would be open seven days a week until the season was over. The clock shop was a block closer to the ocean than most of the stores, which meant it didn’t get as many browsers as the other stores did. That was fine with Sarah. She wasn’t dependent on foot traffic. She didn’t sell souvenirs or beach paraphernalia. Just clocks and watches. Most of her merchandise was pricey and not something you’d pick up on your way to the beach.

  They strolled down the sidewalk. And Sarah thought how comforting it was to live in a small town where everyone at least recognized one another, even if they didn’t know you outright. Despite the influx of summer tourists, the locals still waved at each other, always had time to stop and chat.

  “This is my family.”

  “Who is?”

  Sarah looked up at Wyatt, who was frowning curiously at her. “Who is what?”

  “You said this is my family.”

  “I did?” Sarah’s stomach twisted. “I meant all of this. The people here. Since Sam died my friends, my . . .”

  Wyatt smiled the way he did when he didn’t quite believe something but was giving her the benefit of the doubt.

  Please don’t ask if I mean you, she thought and mentally crossed her fingers. She’d already blurted that stupid thing to Reesa about being her friend. She’d sounded like she was in third grade or something. Anything she might say to Wyatt would be laughable. And she wasn’t even sure what she would say. I love you? I think I love you? I want to love you?

  Sam had loved her. And she had loved him. She’d scored big-time with him, but she wasn’t sure she could be that lucky twice in this life. And she was afraid to let go of Sam and take a chance on nothing.

  The TailSpin was a nouvelle fish restaurant that catered to tourists looking for a dining experience after a day of sand and sun and residents who were looking for a place to dine away from the rackety noise of the beach.

  It was a streamlined space, with curved booths along both walls and two rows of tables in the center of the long room. It was light and airy with aqua-wash walls and a minimalist industrial-shore ambiance.

  The hostess, a young girl who only had eyes for Wyatt, showed them to a booth. Sarah slid in. Instead of going to the other side, Wyatt slid in beside her. The hostess handed them menus and went back to her post.

  “Let’s order, then you can tell me about the nonevent this morning.”

  Sarah nodded. She’d slipped into a momentary comfort zone, but Wyatt’s reminder brought it all back. Her appetite flew south, but he was right, she needed to eat. And, besides, he’d badger her until she did.

  As soon as the waiter had taken their order, Wyatt turned to her, “Okay, spill.”

  Sarah started at the beginning, filling him in about meeting Reesa, about the sterile office and Ilona Cartwright.

  “When Reesa introduced me to her, she turned to me with such a weird expression. I tried to look her in the eye, you know, like equals, confident, but it was like looking into a black hole. I swear. Just blank, grabbing me and pushing me away at the same time. I don’t know. We shook hands, I think. She told us to sit down, that she hadn’t had time to look at the information Reesa had sent her. She opened the folder. Then suddenly she closed it and said, ‘I’m sorry, I can’t take the case.’ Reesa got really upset. And practically shoved me out of the office. And that was it. It doesn’t make sense.”

  “She didn’t explain why?” Wyatt asked and handed her a breadstick.

  Unthinking, Sarah broke it in half and took a bite. Swallowed. “No, just that she couldn’t help us.”

  “What did Reesa say?”

  “I don’t even know. Something about being too close to the case because she was my friend, and I freaked and begged her not to stop being my friend.” She dropped the breadstick halves onto her plate. “Like, that was the stupidest thing I could have thought of, like it was even important when Leila’s future is at stake.”

  Wyatt laughed and gave her a quick hug. “Of course it’s important. You like to compartmentalize . . . and it may work with clock parts, but life is a lot messier and it doesn’t like being put nicely away. Get used to it, love. You’ll be a lot happier when you do.”

  “I am happy,” Sarah protested as the waiter placed a bowl of mussels in red sauce between them. “At least I will be when this is all completed.” She mentally crossed her fingers. “If it works out right.”

  “It will or it won’t. We’ll all do our best. Now let’s worry about right now and eat.” He’d reached for a mussel just like it was any ordinary day. Like he was oblivious or clueless. But he was none of those.

  Fix the now. And right now she was hungry.

  “Reesa said the lawyer’s pro bono work might be filled for the month,” Sarah said when they were halfway through the bowl of mussels. “But I think she was being sarcastic. I told Reesa I could pay. But she said I wouldn’t have enough for Ms. Cartwright’s fees.”

  “There are other lawyers. Are you sure you even need a different lawyer?”

  Sarah shrugged. “I didn’t think so. I thought it was just a matter of the paperwork working its way through the system. Surprise on me. I don’t want to be caught unprepared again.”

  She leaned back while the waiter replaced the mussels with two rectangular plates of broiled flounder and pilaf with a ratatouille condiment.

  “If I don’t have enough money on hand, I’ll have to borrow it.” She dropped the fork she’d just picked up. “I don’t mean borrow it from anyone or anything like that. I meant take a second mortgage on the house or sell it outright.”

  “And then where would you live?” He picked up her fork and wiggled it at her, before handing it back.

  “Or I could sell the store.”

  “And become one of the idle rich?”

  She speared a piece of flaky fish. “In my dreams.”

  Wyatt cut a piece of fish, piled pilaf on the back of the fork English style, slid it into his mouth, and chewed, savoring the taste. “Why don’t you just hold off on anything extreme until we know how serious Carmen really is.”

  That stopped her for a second. “Why wouldn’t she be serious?”

  “She might be. She might really have turned over a new leaf. But it’s just as possible that she has a new boyfriend who is pulling her strings. It wouldn’t be the first time.”

  “No, and I was lucky to even have gotten Leila back after both failed attempts. Usually they just send you to wherever there’s a bed.”

  “I know, hon. You’ll figure it out. And you’ve got a whole crew of people in your court. Your family, like you said. So try not to worry and make this the best time ever.”

  In case it’s soon gone forever, Sarah finished for him.

  After a brief skirmish over Wyatt’s buying lunch, which he won, they left the air-conditioned restaurant for the heatpulsing sidewalk. Two blocks later they parted at the corner, Wyatt to return to his store, Sarah to hers. They’d seen each other more in the last few days than they had in a while.

  In the back of her mind, Sarah was afraid it wasn’t a good idea. It didn’t seem fair for Leila to be sent back to Carmen just when she was getting along so well with Wyatt. There were bound to be repercussio
ns when she returned. Either afraid of him or mean to him. He’d make himself scarce for a while and the cycle would continue. Or she wouldn’t come back at all.

  But Sarah wouldn’t contemplate that yet. It would all work out. It had to.

  She walked around to the backyard, where she retrieved her briefcase and the box of documentation from the car. It wouldn’t hurt her to organize what she had and review some of the incidents she may have forgotten.

  After letting herself into the shop, Sarah deposited her briefcase and the box on the floor and walked through to the front room. She normally loved Mondays, when the shop was closed and she could come and go as she pleased. Work all day if she wanted. Or just sit in the quiet.

  She stepped out to the center of the room, breathed in the scent of wood and wax and oil. There were no lights on. A few dust motes were suspended in the air near the window where a ray of sunlight sliced to the floor. But that was all. Just her. Alone. And in the silence she could hear it. The ticking of the clocks, steady as a heartbeat.

  Could she really contemplate selling this to keep Leila? Could she give up what Sam had loved most in the world? She could still repair clocks without having a retail space, but the store brought in the bulk of her income. And the building was paid for, along with the house; she wouldn’t be able to find a place cheaper without leaving the area. And that’s not something she wanted to consider.

  This is where she had learned to be human. To stop hating and being afraid, to trust and to love. She wasn’t sure she could keep all those in her heart if she had to give up her soul, which was forever a part of Sam and his shop.

  Sarah smiled for a moment, thinking of Sam, could swear she could hear his monotone humming as he worked in the back room.

  She walked around the perimeter of the room, letting her hand run over the carved cabinet of the old Bavarian cuckoo clock, the beveled glass of the grandmother clock that she and Sam bought from an estate sale. It had been in terrible repair but together they had brought it back to life. It was not for sale.

  She should have asked Reesa just what amount of money she would need to hire Ilona Cartwright. She’d pay whatever it took, but the cottage and the store were more than buildings; they were her center, her soul. Surely the sale of a couple of clocks would be sufficient.

  ILONA MANAGED TO concentrate for about an hour while her coffee grew cold and she tried not to think about the Hargreave folder sitting unopened on her desk or to be impatient with the intern who was taking a hell of a lot of time researching something that was probably easily found by googling. She could have done that herself.

  After an hour, she’d satisfied herself that she really didn’t have to open the folder and convinced herself that it was mere curiosity about the case that let her hand slide over and open it.

  She’d prepared herself for seeing the name again—she knew right where it was on the page. She steeled herself and read the initial removal report. Birth mother, Carmen Delgado, history of drug and alcohol abuse. Known prostitute. Father, Sonny Rodrigues, deceased. Leila Rodrigues. Seventh of eight children, different fathers, all in foster care. The future didn’t look bright for Carmen Delgado.

  Like Reesa said. A no-brainer.

  In a few years Carmen would probably be dead. Leila would forget her, hopefully.

  Ilona didn’t remember either of her birth parents. But she’d had Aunty. Aunty was good; she’d made sure Ilona went to school and learned her lessons and her manners. As it turned out, Aunty wasn’t really her aunt, but she didn’t care. Ilona had thought it would last forever, but the only thing that lasts forever is misery.

  Aunty starting forgetting things; sometimes she couldn’t remember Ilona’s name. She forgot to buy milk, didn’t know what the salt was for. She got afraid of Ilona, thought she was trying to steal her social security check. Wandered off and one day the police found her. Alzheimer’s, they said.

  The service came and got Ilona; she scratched and kicked and screamed, begged them to let her stay and take care of Aunty, but they wouldn’t. They pushed her into a car and drove away. Aunty went to a home. Another home that wasn’t a home.

  Ilona jumped when the intercom buzzed. She reached for it and knocked over the cup of cold coffee. The coffee spread out over the desk blotter. She grabbed all the folders she could muttering, “Dammit, dammit.”

  She dumped the folders on the chair Sarah Hargreave had sat in and punched the intercom. “Inez, bring some paper towels, pronto. There’s a bit of a spill.”

  It galled her to have to admit it. She never did things like that. Wasn’t clumsy. Didn’t make messes. Never.

  “ILONA, WHAT IS wrong with you? How many times do I have to ask you not to run through the house like a hoodlum? Look what you’ve done.”

  Ilona looked down at the shards of the coffee cup on the white tile floor, the coffee making a puddle at her feet and the grotesque stain down her mother’s white wool skirt. She’d been so excited, she’d forgotten to pay attention to how she was behaving. Stupid. She’d been so stupid.

  “So what do you want?”

  Ilona hung her head and thrust out the soggy report card without looking up. “I made all A’s.”

  Chapter 9

  Usually Sarah could lose herself in her work, but not today. Today she was alternately bombarded with replays of the morning’s meeting with Ms. Cartwright and worrying about having to tell Leila about the supervised meeting on Wednesday.

  She couldn’t put it off any longer. By the time she left for the bus stop Sarah was sick with fear that this would be the time that she would lose Leila forever.

  Maybe she shouldn’t have taken the book out. The Everyone Loves Me book. Photos of Leila with her two families. Sarah had made it when Leila came for the first time. So one day when she became curious about her past, there would be a sympathetic record of her early years. Sarah had put it away after the last failed visit. And it hadn’t been out since. Maybe she should try to hide the book when they got home. Talk about the visit then bring it out. She just didn’t know what was best.

  Sarah was suddenly second-guessing everything she did or thought and that wouldn’t get her anywhere but tied up in knots.

  She was smiling when Leila climbed down the steps of the minibus. The bus driver waved and the door closed. Sarah took Leila’s hand and they walked back to the cottage, Leila chattering about school and McDonald’s and Sarah thinking about the big scrapbook waiting for them on the kitchen table.

  They reached the porch steps all too soon. They went straight to the kitchen, where Sarah emptied the contents of the backpack onto the table and washed out the plastic containers of fruit she’d sent for snack. Then she reached into the cupboard for some graham crackers.

  When she turned back, Leila was sitting in her booster seat looking at the book.

  Sarah put the crackers on a plate and placed them on the table in front of Leila.

  “Remember this?” she said brightly, moving the book around for Leila to see.

  Leila looked up, took a square of graham cracker, and bit into it. “Milk, please.”

  Sarah poured milk and put the glass on the table. She pulled a chair close to Leila and slid the book closer.

  “Can you read this?”

  Leila glanced at the scrapbook. Shrugged.

  “Everybody Loves Me,” Sarah said, pointing to the words as she spoke. “Remember who’s in here?”

  Leila shrugged again. Sarah’s stomach tightened even further. She opened the book to the first page and a photo of the three of them, Sarah on one side of Leila, Carmen on the other, back in the first days of her fostering, when Carmen was clean for a moment and Sarah was doing her best to be understanding.

  Leila was just a toddler.

  “See, that’s you.”

  Leila shook her head.

  Don’t read too much into it, Sarah warned herself. “That’s you.” She pointed to a much younger, much frailer Leila and quelled the anger that rose inside her
. “That’s me.” She pointed to herself, a little over two years ago; she looked much younger . . . and optimistic.

  “And that’s Carmen. Your bio mother.” She didn’t know if Leila even remembered what that meant, though she’d tried to explain it several times. But to Leila, Sarah was her mommee. And Sarah hoped she had no memory of the squalid conditions child services had rescued her from, or the deplorable situation they’d returned her to, twice.

  “Mr. Noyes is going to take you to see her on Wednesday.”

  “I don’t want to.”

  “It’s just for a couple of hours. You can take Mickey Mouse. And when he says it’s time to go, Mr. Noyes will bring you home.”

  “I don’t want to.”

  And I don’t want you to, Sarah thought. “What color sticker shall we put on the calendar?”

  Leila crossed her arms. Scowled. When Sarah got up to get the stickers, Leila threw the book onto the floor.

  ILONA SPENT THE evening googling Sarah Hargreave and reading the dossier the intern had compiled that afternoon. Unfortunately he hadn’t been able to obtain her foster and adoption record.

  But she did find the name of the family she lived with. Gianetti. Sam Gianetti owned a clock retail and repair store. How quaint. And a house next to it, both of which were now in Sarah Hargreave’s name.

  They must have left her both the house and the business. Not a spectacular outcome, but it sounded comfortable.

  All this time, she had been living right here, less than ten miles from where Ilona had lived. For a while after she left the group home, Ilona had consoled herself with thinking Sarah had been taken away to another state, maybe across the country even. That in the move she’d lost Nonie’s—Ilona’s—address. She’d written to the group home and asked them to send it, but they never had.

  She’d imagined all sorts of scenarios. One was that Sarah had been fostered to someone who killed her; then Nonie would cry and say she was sorry that she couldn’t save Sarah after all.

  Sometimes she imagined Sarah living with people who loved her and she never thought about Nonie. Maybe even wanted to forget her. And then she’d get angry and hope Sarah was dead, and then she’d feel guilty and cry herself to sleep.