by Nancy Thayer
The Nordic couple went out. A man came in. He was around Marilyn’s age, bald except for a rim of gray hair, spectacled, lanky, and lean. Like Marilyn and the young couple, he wore hiking clothes. He greeted Marilyn with a nod and a smile, then sat down at the remaining table, opened a folder, and took out a sheaf of papers. Marilyn strained to read them—it was an unbreakable habit of hers, spying on other people’s work—but they were too far away.
She’d finished her breakfast, except for the odd brown substance. Now she decided to try it—why not? When in Rome, after all. She tasted a forkful—hm. Perhaps onions and pureed corned beef?
“Pardon me,” the man asked from across the small room. “But do you know what that is?” He had a marvelous Scottish accent.
Marilyn hesitated. She didn’t want to seem like an ignorant tourist. But actually, she was an ignorant tourist, so she confessed, “I have no idea.”
“Blud pudding.”
“Excuse me?”
“Blud pudding. Blood and suet and seasonings.”
“Ah.” Marilyn put her fork down. “Thank you for telling me.”
“Some develop a taste for it.” His eyes sparkled.
“Yes, well, perhaps not for breakfast.” Washing down a big swallow of coffee, she rose. “Have a good day.”
“Aye, you, too.”
Back in her room, she checked her pack: bottles of water, some trail mix, a chocolate bar, maps, tissues, and sunglasses, in case the weather changed. She pulled on her rain jacket, skipped down the stairs, and went out into the Loch Ness day.
For twenty-three miles, Loch Ness cut like a narrow knife blade through the Great Glen dividing the north of Scotland from Inverness to Fort William. Geologists knew the loch lay in a fault line active since mid-Devonian times, 400 million years ago, but on this lovely summer day, Marilyn forgot all that, as her senses exulted in air softened by a gentle rain, the tantalizing azure sparkle of the water, and the emerald hills rising steeply on either side. She was here, now.
Leaving her car in the B&B lot, she strode downhill and along the road toward the Loch Ness Monster Exhibition Center. It was hardly a scientific headquarters, but she wanted to tour it nonetheless, and she was not disappointed. Ignoring the souvenir shop with its Nessie dolls and mugs, she focused on the sketches and detailed accounts by witnesses who’d testified to the creature’s existence over the years. St. Columba saw the monster in A.D. 565. Would a saint lie? In 1987, a million-dollar sonar exploration called Operation Deepscan found evidence of a mysterious moving mass larger than a shark. And most recently, a member of the coast guard discovered with his own sonar an enormous underwater cavern, which he called “Nessie’s Lair.” A professor at Harvard and MIT had also spent years searching for the creature.
Crowds shuffled past the exhibits and clogged the passageways. Most of them were families with children hugging soft stuffed toys of a friendly, smiling, slightly goofy Nessie. This wasn’t a sweet cartoon character invented by Disney, Marilyn wanted to remind them.
Leaving the throngs, Marilyn returned to the fresh air. Just on the other side of A82 and down by the loch was Castle Urquhart, a stony ruin set on a small promontory. Marilyn wished its stones could talk.
The rain had stopped, and shafts of sun striped the landscape. Marilyn wanted to lean against the rocks and stare out at the blue waters, but a busload of senior tourists arrived, clucking like chickens as they fluttered down to the castle, so she dug out her map, planned a route, and set off walking.
Paths wound up- and downhill, through forests and bogs, past streams and rivulets. Marilyn wandered along, taking her time, never getting too far from a view of the lake. Occasionally, she thought of her Hot Flash friends, or wondered how Ruth was doing, and whether her granddaughter was over her cold. Sometimes she thought of Faraday, and wondered whether she’d ever be with a man she loved.
But mostly she let her mind drift through the ages. She thought about the geology of this land, the metamorphic schists underlying the hills, the altered limestones, the shattered granite. She imagined the last Ice Age, just a geological moment ago, when this great glen was occupied by an enormous glacier. Everything would have been white then, blindingly white beneath the sun. She thought about the moving on and holding of time, how it never stopped but often saved.
She loved the ache in her legs from all the climbing up and down the lumpy, uneven, tufty hills, so unlike the flat streets of the city where she worked. She felt she was breathing differently, seeing more, hearing more clearly. She felt her body sparkle as her lungs pulled in new air, skimming through her blood like transparent vitamins.
In her excitement, she forgot to eat. It was nearly four in the afternoon when she felt her physical system plummet. Shaky, tired, and weak, she collapsed on a rock on the edge of the loch while she munched her trail mix.
Today there was no wind, so the loch lay still, except for the occasional wake caused by a boat. Some enterprising soul motored by, his launch loaded with tourists fishing off the side or taking pictures or gazing through binoculars. Marilyn sat watching for over an hour, but not a ripple disturbed the surface.
When she’d regrouped, she rose and headed back to her B&B. She showered, then collapsed on the bed for a nap, waking two hours later with a rumbling stomach.
Outside it was still light—the sun stayed up past nine o’clock in the summer. She went down to the front hall to study the brochures and decide where to eat.
The Scotsman she’d met at breakfast this morning was there. He wore jeans and a flannel shirt and smelled of the same soap Marilyn had just used in her shower.
“Hello,” he greeted Marilyn. “Did you have a good day?”
“It was bliss,” Marilyn told him.
“Are you a Nessie hunter?”
She hesitated. She didn’t want him to think she was just some kind of superstitious cryptozoologic nut. “I’m a paleontologist, actually. I teach in Cambridge— the American Cambridge—and I study trilobites, which are—”
“Trilobites, you say! Indeed! I know what they are. I’m a paleoartist.”
“Get out!” Marilyn exclaimed.
“But it’s true.” He held out his hand. “Ian Foster.”
Marilyn looked at his hand as if it were made of diamonds. “ The Ian Foster? You’ve done the restoration drawings of the plesiosauria?”
“That’s right.”
“Oh, my gosh!” Marilyn had to restrain herself from going into adolescent shrieks. “Oh, what a pleasure to meet you! What are you doing here?”
“The same thing as you, I imagine, taking a little holiday, going for walks, airing out my poor old brain.” Folding his arms, he leaned against the wall. “I’ve just finished a critical analysis of existing and dependent phylogenies via cladistic methods.”
“How fascinating!” Marilyn was too enthralled to be shy. “I’d love to hear about it.”
The Nordic couple came through then, muttering to each other in guttural tones. They stopped to say hello, then passed on, out the door.
Ian looked at Marilyn. “Listen, would you like to join me for dinner? There are several fairly decent restaurants in Inverness, which is only about fifteen miles from here.”
“I can’t think of anything I’d rather do!” Marilyn told him, adding to herself, Except wait on the banks of the loch, watching for Nessie.
They sat together at a small table in a large pub, eating fresh trout, drinking Scots lager, and talking about paleontology like reunited old friends.
Thin and gawky, Ian was not a handsome fellow. His Adam’s apple protruded sharply, bobbing up and down as he spoke, and pouches bagged beneath his dark eyes, slightly hidden by his heavy glasses. His forehead bulged out, and his bald head stuck up from his rim of hair like an ostrich egg from a nest. But his hands were beautiful, his fingers long, lean, and supple, and he had nice, even white teeth. Something about him was very attractive to Marilyn. Perhaps she was high on simply being here, but the longer she
spoke with Ian, the more she wanted to touch his elegant hands. She even found herself fantasizing about pressing her lips to his, and she didn’t feel the slightest bit guilty, because Ian was widowed, with a grown son living in Australia.
After dinner, they ordered fresh berries for dessert. Wanting to linger, they asked for cheese and crackers, and after that, they had a brandy. Finally, they left the pub and drove back along the loch to the B&B. It was raining again, so for a while they sat in Ian’s car, talking, until the windows misted over and Marilyn shivered— she assumed from the damp. They ran inside to find the lights were dim, the common rooms empty, the building hushed.
Ian looked at his watch. “It’s almost midnight.”
“Oh, dear. We should go to bed,” Marilyn said reluctantly.
“How much longer are you here for?” Ian asked.
“Ten more days.”
“Well.” He hesitated. “Would you like to join me tomorrow? We could hire a boat to take us out on the loch. Have a little picnic.”
“Oh, that would be wonderful!”
He smiled at her enthusiasm. “Good, then. I’ll see you at breakfast.” He held out his hand and shook hers. “I’m awfully glad I met you, Marilyn.”
“Yes,” she said, flushing. “Me, too.”
In all her life, Marilyn had never experienced the kind of happiness she felt over the next few days. In her twenties, she’d married Theodore for three reasons. First: she knew she was a science nerd, too engrossed with her studies to be attractive to most men. Second, the time was right. Third, Theodore had been the one to ask her. But during the long years of her marriage, her own scientific interests had been overshadowed by her husband’s brilliance, and by his lack of interest in anything that didn’t further his own career or studies. Then he left her for a younger woman.
She’d shared common scientific interests with Faraday, but she’d never felt like she felt right now with Ian: as if they were two halves of a whole, two pieces of one jigsaw puzzle, best friends who’d been waiting all their lives to meet.
Ian made her laugh. She made him laugh. Often they said the same word at the same time. They walked at the same pace—they were so comfortable together.
Ian was from Edinburgh. He taught at the university there, and he was an ardent Scotsman. One day when the rains poured down, he drove her to visit Cawdor Castle, where Shakespeare set Macbeth and where, after a delicious lunch, Marilyn got to lean on a fence and gaze to her heart’s delight at a herd of shaggy red-haired Highland cows. But mostly they hiked the hills around Loch Ness, sharing lunches from their backpacks, talking, or silently enjoying each other’s company.
The night they met, Ian had shaken her hand when they parted. The next night, he pressed a gentle kiss on her forehead. The third night, he kissed her cheek. By the fourth night, Marilyn thought she’d hit him with a full-body tackle, wrap her legs around his hips, and clutch him like an octopus if he didn’t get a little more passionate—and he either read her mind or sensed her urges, because that night he pulled her to him and kissed her heartily.
“Oh, my!” she sighed when he released her.
They were sitting in his little car, rain singing down all around them.
He pulled back, studying her face as well as he could. It was late. They could only barely see each other’s face.
“Marilyn,” he said softly. “What shall we do? I’d like to take you to bed, but we’re both practically strangers, and you’re going back to the States in a few days.”
Her mouth had gone dry. Her heart was thudding. “I think you should take me to bed.”
Quietly, they crept into the B&B and up the stairs to Marilyn’s room. They locked the door. Ian put his arms around her and they pressed against each other, all up and down. This kiss was different from the others, rougher, warmer, more urgent. Marilyn wanted him inside her so much she was afraid she’d explode.
They pulled the covers back and fell on the bed with all their clothes on. As they kissed each other’s mouths and eyes and faces, Marilyn unzipped her denim skirt and wrenched it off while Ian unzipped his khakis. Ian rose up on his arms and Marilyn tilted her hips up. He slid inside her, fitting as perfectly as the loch outside fit into the glen. Marilyn felt her eyes go wide with surprise as her body adjusted to this delicious intrusion. Ian moved slightly, and they both groaned. He lowered his head and brought his mouth down to kiss her. She clutched him to her and kissed him back. They rocked together slowly, letting the tension build. Something loosened inside her. A landslide of sexual pleasure rode through her pelvis. Clutching him for dear life, Marilyn surrendered to a force she’d never known her body contained.
After a while, she opened her eyes to see Ian smiling down at her.
“Okay?” he whispered.
She nodded. He moved again, quickly now, and she felt his own release inside her. When he fell against her, drained, she hugged him to her while tears tracked down her face.
“Do you know,” he whispered, stroking her hair away from her face, “we’re both still wearing our shoes.”
She laughed as she cried.
Over the next week, Marilyn made love more than she ever had in all her life. Even if she added together all the times she’d ever had sex with her husband or that cad Barton or Faraday, she thought the sheer quantity surpassed them—and the quality! My God! She’d never realized! They made love in her room and his, in his car and in hers, standing up in a forest, lying down in a valley, and every time she wept with joy. When they hiked, they held hands. When they drove to a restaurant, she kept her hand on his thigh. When they ate, they sat next to each other, or twined legs under the table. She was giddy with sensuality. She ate more than she’d ever eaten, she drank more wine, she sang when she showered, she laughed about nothing. She felt like a teenager—no, she felt like some kind of angel.
“Look,” Ian told her on the eighth night, “I’ve got to go back to Edinburgh tomorrow. I’ve got several professional matters to attend to.”
“I’m leaving for home in three days,” Marilyn told him. “Tomorrow night will be my last night here.”
“Do you fly out of Edinburgh?”
“Yes.”
“Then spend the last night with me at my house. I’ll take you to the plane.”
Marilyn began to cry. “Oh, damn, Ian. I don’t want to be away from you.”
“Can you rearrange your schedule? Stay a little longer?”
“I wish I could. But I’ve left my mother with friends, and I can’t impose on them any longer.”
“I understand. Well, look. I’ll come visit you, how’s that?”
“Oh, will you? When?”
“I’ll have to check my calendar. Perhaps sometime in early September.”
“That’s so far away!”
“We’ll e-mail every day,” he promised.
As Marilyn watched Ian drive away that sunny morning, she felt as if she were watching a lover go off to war or sail away to conquer new lands. She wanted to sob with grief. She felt as if her skin were being ripped from her body.
But the day was beautiful, and the hills surrounding the loch were filled with hikers who saluted her with good cheer as they stomped past. She couldn’t allow herself to stand weeping like an escapee from an institution for the demented, so she blew her nose, packed her backpack, and went out for a long hike around the lake.
That night she had dinner at the B&B, too weary to care about eating a gourmet meal. She couldn’t taste anything, anyway. She lay on her bed, staring at the ceiling, remembering every word Ian had said, every kiss he’d pressed against her. She cried some more.
Her mind was in turmoil. Was she in love? If she was, was Ian? Certainly he seemed to feel as strongly as she did.
Now she wished her Hot Flash friends were here. She longed to talk all this over with them. Since she couldn’t, she tried to imagine what advice they’d give.
Faye and Polly and Shirley would all probably say, Lovely, Marilyn, we’r
e so happy for you! But level-headed Alice would give her a look. Girl, Alice would say, I’m glad you had fun, but don’t try to make it into more than it is. Anyone who wants to base her future on sexual attraction is a fool.
Thinking of her friends calmed Marilyn’s nerves. She lay in the dark smiling, and her tears dried up and disappeared.
But her friends weren’t through talking to her yet. She couldn’t tell which one it was—maybe it was all of them—but a voice in her head said quite clearly, We thought you were on a pilgrimage, Marilyn. We thought this trip was about making your childhood dream come true, not about getting laid.
Although, they continued, getting laid is nothing to sneeze at!
She was restless. Marilyn tied her sneakers, grabbed up her fanny pack and a sweater, and went back out into the Scottish night.
It had not rained all day, and it was not raining now. A moon, not quite full, rode high in the sky, the occasional cloud sailing slowly across its face. The air smelled fresh, of grass and wild garlic and clover, as Marilyn sauntered down the long bank toward the loch’s edge. There was no breeze. The deep waters of the loch slumbered, dark beneath the sky, dark to their depths.
It was midnight, but cars still passed on both sides of the loch, their lights flashing off and on like signals as they wound over the curves.
She crossed the road, heading toward the loch, going slowly, for the land was boggy and uneven, perfect for turning ankles. As she walked away from her B&B and the road up the hill to other hotels, the civilized world retreated. Nature closed around her.
It felt good to walk. Concentrating on each step soothed her nerves. She came to a small, sheltered cove overhung with trees, dense with bushes, and settled into a gap just her size at the water’s edge. She could almost dangle her feet in the water. Instead, she drew her knees up, wrapped her arms around them, and gazed out at the loch.
She thought: Ian.
She shivered, remembering his touch, his breath, his body, his laughter.
Even if she never saw him again, the time she’d shared with him was a revelation. Love did exist. Love at first sight did exist. Even for a woman in her fifties, miracles could happen.
