Most of the population of Fleetbourne, like groupies, followed her, one after another, exchanging greetings and gossip and corny jokes. They mixed with the tourists, who spend their summers in the little rental cottages that line the main road and are within walking distance.
As usual, tourists and “Fleeties” alike emptied us of bread and milk, jars of the Cape’s famous homemade beach-plum jam, plus enough bacon and egg sandwiches to feed breakfast to Disney World.
The tourists are really no problem. They shop quickly and leave, sometimes checking the whiteboard where I post the Marine Conditions or repeatedly asking for directions to the many local tourist spots; but the good people of Fleetbourne linger. They seem to share a relentless need to delve into one another’s lives, blithely poking around personal business like beachcombers looking for lost engagement rings. I had already endured ten “Are you dating yet, honey?,” six “You must be lonely rattling around that big old house all by yourself,” and four promises to introduce me to perfectly lovely men who’d just been divorced, released from jail, or finally having great success with their new meds. I generally shrug them off.
But the last question left me rattled.
Martha Winston, who owns the florist shop, leaned across the counter, clutching her coffee and a half-pound plastic container of fruit salad, and asked me in a confidential tone, “I often wondered, honey, did they ever find the boat?”
“Shay!” I called out.
“Coming.”
Dear Shay. She immediately took my place at the counter while I sneaked off into the little kitchen in the back of the store to regain my composure. The boat. I had almost stopped thinking about the boat. Almost stopped looking for it. Waiting for it. Listening for its soft growling motor as it pulled up to the dock.
No, they never found the boat.
* * *
Baking calms me down and whipping up a few cranberry-pecan loaves was what I suddenly needed to be doing right now. After I mixed the dough, I sat on a stool and watched them bake through the glass oven door as their moist paleness slowly gave way to a rich brown. It’s called the Maillard reaction, this process that caramelizes their crusts and transforms them into proper breads. I was so proud of them.
The little kitchen felt comforting and protective. The ceiling fan creaked overhead, driving the scent of fresh loaves throughout the store. The shelves surrounding me were laden with glass canisters, neatly labeled, holding a variety of flours, brown sugar and white, almonds and pecans and walnuts, chocolate chips, bottles of boiled cider, molasses, and honey, all kinds of flavorings. There were shining copper-bottomed pots and pans hanging from the wrought-iron ceiling rack and cookie sheets and rolls of parchment paper and aluminum foil stored in a corner. My father had collected ingredients and kitchen tools. If I had nothing else, I had the neatly labeled canisters and glass jars that he kept in stock, the big silver mixer, the measuring cups and scoops and dented tins, every one of them a piece of my heritage, and every one of them reminding me of him.
When the loaves cooled, I wrapped them in aluminum foil ready to be sold.
Usually my cakes and cookies and pies became spontaneous gifts to friends and good customers, but these loaves will all be sold, because my heart has frozen over. I bake now only to make extra money for the store.
* * *
I peeked outside to see if the pit bull was still there. To his credit, he was staying out of the way, tucked under a nearby tree and curled into a ball, his eyes tightly shut. His stomach was full, he had found a place to sleep, and, too much like me, he was content with that, as little as it was.
Chapter 3
The dog was waiting for me again the next morning, sitting by the front door of the Galley, his square lug-nut head tilted; he was watching me intently as I approached. He looked hopeful when I greeted him, his stumpy tail wagging very hesitantly, before he turned his face away as though he didn’t want to intrude. One eye was swollen shut and crusted over, and he had only one ear, the right, which had been cut down into a small triangle, the way they do with pit bulls that are used for fighting. It looked like the missing left ear had been ripped off; the edges had healed close to his skull in a lumpy line. There was a map of white lines tracing across his muzzle and right shoulder and down his front legs. His skin looked raw; thistles of reddish fur poked through crusty scabs that covered him like a threadbare blanket. He backed up a short distance and whined softly, then looked away again.
“I know,” I said to him. “I’ll feed you.”
Mine was a simple reaction. He needed to eat and I wanted to feed him. I let myself into the Galley, grabbed the dog food, took two clean bowls from the dishwasher and filled them, food and water, and left them several feet away from the door. He waited until I went back inside before he started eating.
Turning on the flattop was next. It was exactly six a.m. I had been up since five. I had showered and dressed, jeans and a tee, then walked the five blocks from my home to the Galley. I try to walk to work every day, straight down Mainsail Road, which cuts the town in half, five blocks, a right onto Beach Six. The Galley is on the right side.
Alone. I always walk alone.
Our village is safe and quiet, twenty-two blocks long and ten blocks wide. My house is on Beach One Street, sitting right on the sand. The village ends at Beach Twenty-two. I like walking past the small Cape Cods painted in pale Easter colors, blue or green or pink or yellow, all with white shutters and doors. I know whose children are getting up for school, who has left for work, who likes Danish with their morning coffee, who likes buttered rolls. I like that the cross streets are named for sea things, Neptune Road, Anchor Road, Mooring Way, all of it fenced in by low white wooden posts and rails and looping white-painted anchor chains and white buoys hanging here and there. It’s the perfect seafaring landscape come to life. You would think the Little Mermaid lived here. The Galley is seven hundred steps from the corner and is painted a soft gray with marine blue trim. Everyone knows the Galley.
I arrive the same time every morning. Five forty-five. I live by routine; its rigidity and repetition keep me together.
* * *
“I knew he’d be back,” Shay announced from the front door at six a.m. She had more yellow daffodils. Her hair was wrapped in a yellow scarf; she was wearing long, yellow bead earrings and looked like a flower herself. I had to admire her style. She always looked so pulled together.
I shrugged. “I don’t think it’s personal,” I said. “He came for the food.”
“Probably.” She nodded in agreement. “But you should adopt him. It looks like he could use a friend and you need something in your life again.”
I had to turn away, so powerful was my reaction. My stomach cramped, sending a wave of nausea through me. I had a sudden vision of Dan, in our living room. It was a winter evening and we were lying together on the rug in front of the fireplace. His face was glowing from the fire he had just built in the hearth. Life was wonderful. I was chairing the science department in a private school that I loved. And we were both euphoric because Dan had just made partner in the small architect firm in Boston where he had worked since graduating from college. He was going to design us a totally green house, he said with a wide grin, with four bedrooms, because we were going to need the extra space. We had just agreed to try for a baby.
Shay put her hand on my arm. “You don’t want to live alone forever, Aila.”
I held up my hand to silence her. “It was never my intention to live alone.”
“I know.” The conversation was finished. She left for the side door to bring in the bakery items. I took out the eggs and the bacon and ground the coffee and put fresh water into the pot. I saw with satisfaction that three of my six loaves had been sold the day before. When they were all gone, I would make more. Mix the dough, watch it brown, sell the loaves, make more.
Routine.
Routine is my savior.
* * *
The rest of the morning p
assed quietly. I usually close the Galley at four, but Shay came over to me much earlier. “When is the last time you took a break?” she asked.
“Never,” I said, laughing, then stopped abruptly, realizing I didn’t want a break.
“There’s hardly anyone coming in,” she said. “Why don’t you knock off early? Do something else.”
“What would I do?” I was genuinely puzzled. I hadn’t taken a day off in two years. Not one day. I even opened the Galley on Christmas in case anyone needed something. My mother was in a nursing home; I visit her every Saturday after work and this was only Thursday. What else was there to do?
“Get a haircut,” said Shay, tugging gently at a strand of my hair. “Your hair could use an update.”
“Miss Phyllis says the David Cassidy look is coming back,” I protested. Miss Phyllis owns Phyllis’s Follicles, the local hair salon. It featured an ugly name, two chairs, and hairstyles from the seventies.
“Then buy shoes,” Shay continued “Or take yourself out for an early dinner at the Lobster Pot. I can close up and drop your keys off later.” She handed me my striped canvas purse and pushed me out the door with a firm good-bye. I walked home. The dog started to follow me.
I turned around to face him. “Go home,” I commanded.
He blinked at me and looked away; his stump tail drooped.
“I’m not kidding,” I said firmly. “Go away. I can’t take care of you. Go find your owner.”
I continued walking—I admired the sight of one pastel house after another, almost all of them flanked with magenta and cerise beach roses in full bloom—ending at my house, and yet fully aware that he was following me anyway.
* * *
Late June is the best time of the year. The weather runs from mellow warm to meltingly hot, the breezes blow fair, as my father used to say, the tourists are plentiful, and the public beaches are dotted with colorful umbrellas and laughing children. Our village beach is private, dotted mostly with shells and pebbles and an occasional human, and we like it that way. That day it was empty.
I stood on my deck and stared out over the bay. But this time, the dog was also standing on the deck, across from me. He had followed me up, one hesitant step at a time.
I sat down on the top step. He sat down where he had been standing. I considered having dinner at the Lobster Pot. It had been a longtime family favorite and they knew me there, but I pictured myself as they would, the pathetic young widow, sitting alone at a small table with her outdated haircut, staring through the big glass windows that overlooked the bay, watching the water and sipping white wine. Thinking about him, they would say, and they would be right. I hate clichés.
* * *
I cleared my throat and the dog stood up as though we were going to have a formal discussion. “You can’t stay here,” I told him. “I have to work every day and I don’t think it’s a good idea to have a pit bull at the store. Also, I don’t want to get involved with a dog. You need somebody better than me to take care of you.” He tilted his head and sighed, like he had heard it all before. I got up and went through the back door that led into the kitchen. He crept up to the storm door and peeked in through the glass. We stared at each other, him using his good eye. He licked his lips. I took a Portuguese muffin from a plastic bag, buttered it, and opened the door to toss it at him, but the muffin fell to the deck outside while the dog bolted in. It wasn’t what I intended. He immediately sat in one corner of the kitchen and trembled, as though realizing his lapse in manners. His eye certainly looked infected and needed to be cleaned off. I took a paper towel, wet it with warm water, and slowly approached him. Holding my breath, I extended my hand toward him. He held his neck rigid and trembled even more. I spoke softly and finally touched his face, wondering which finger I could live without. But he squeezed his eyes shut, and after a minute or so I was able to turn his muzzle to me and gently wipe his eye.
It’s not like I don’t care about animals. When I was a child, I tried to save every living thing that crossed my path. Nestlings that fell out of trees, abandoned kittens, baby mice after their mothers were killed in traps behind the store, broken butterflies, even worms that had been dug up by the local fishermen and discarded on the beach at the end of the day. I would bring them to the Galley and set up a nursing unit in the back. Everything has a right to live. I do have a heart, but it’s been gated, much like the front door of the Galley when I leave at night. I lost too much when Dan died and a gated heart is necessary because it locks out pain and protects everything left inside.
“I’m not looking for a dog,” I said softly while washing away the accumulations that had gathered around his eyes. “And even if I wanted a dog, I kind of like poodles.” He looked up at me, his chunk of a head resting ever so lightly in my hand. “I don’t know where you came from,” I said, “and maybe someone is searching for you right now.” He sniffed the air as if to double-check my statement. Then he sniffed my hand.
Dogs have 140 million scent receptors, more or less, and he was evaluating me. I noted his tattered ear, then the snipped ear, his prominent ribs, the scars, the wretched skin draped like tattered crepe around his bones. No, it wouldn’t be such a good thing if he was found by the person who had allowed him to get like this.
I buttered him another muffin and left it on the floor as a goodwill gesture. He crouched toward it, ate it slowly, then licked all the crumbs from the floor, leaving it polished clean, also a goodwill gesture. We were one for one. We sat there for a while, both of us thinking.
“Well, you’re not a poodle,” I pointed out. He crawled a few inches on his belly, toward me, apologizing for not being the right kind of dog. I stared at him. I knew this much: that if I opened my heart it would crack apart from pain. I couldn’t have that.
He was shivering. I knew it wasn’t from being cold. How could I not respond?
“I’m cranky most of the time,” I warned. “And I can’t allow myself to love you.”
He knew. It was okay with him; he had nothing else. Our eyes met; then he looked away in deference. There was such misery in his face. “Oh, okay,” I heard myself saying. “Listen, you can stay on. Trial basis and all that. Don’t expect me to love you, but I will care for you. You have to eat, and you need medical care, which means the first thing I have to do is take you to the vet. You look like shit.”
He wagged his tail very slowly, his eyes still averted. Oh, he knew.
“And when I find you a good home, you will be leaving,” I said. “It would really be better for you.”
Yes, he agreed, it would be better.
It seemed I now had a houseguest, more or less. I didn’t want one, but I don’t think that was important to him. I sighed; he sighed back. We needed a walk on the beach to seal the deal.
Chapter 4
I cannot forgive the bay for taking Dan and my father, but I still need to see it every day. I need to stand watch on the old pier and supervise the movement and cadence of the water, to make sure that it is behaving, though I know it flows without a conscience. I rail at it sometimes, for being so selfish.
The beach was quiet, waiting for early evening to start. The water was flowing shoreward, ebbing and returning, giving and taking, trading old shells for new, old pebbles for new glistening ones, adding fresh seaweed to the clog already on the shore, as though all that swapping should appease me, but it is never a fair trade. It takes lives and never returns them.
The gulls, unfazed by the dog following me, walked behind us in a straight line, waiting for their bread. I always throw them stale bread, but I had nothing today. “Tomorrow,” I promised them aloud. “I’ll bring you food tomorrow.” They cried at me in disappointment before flying off, dipping and hovering over the water, looking for something else to eat. Ahead of me was the town dock, really a collection of old wooden boards fastened to weather-beaten pilings and fenced in by a wobbly rail. There is a staircase on one side that goes down to a lower pier, where the boats are nestled in their s
lips. I have a need to stand there every evening and stare across the water, listening to the wood creak from the undulating waves, and feel the boards sway under my feet. I always hope, without any reason to, that I will see a certain boat.
* * *
Everyone here owns a boat, and like their owners, they are practical and unpretentious. They were just ahead of me, boats of all sizes and colors moored in their slips like captured horses in their stalls, bobbing and tugging at their chains, impatiently waiting for their masters. I start thinking maybe I should have packed a few sandwiches from the store, for the two of us, dog and me, to spend the evening sitting on the dock. I would bet a dollar that the dog knew all about boating. He was behind me every step, keeping his distance, but there was longing in his eyes to come to me, though he couldn’t allow himself to do it. I understood that.
I had picked up a slow jog when my foot caught a coil of thick pink Asian seaweed. It twisted my ankle out from under me and landed me flat on my back, flailing like a fish fighting for its breath on the sand. I was wrapped in putrid seaweed and furious at myself. I know better than to run in flip-flops. I pulled myself to my feet and stood for a moment, testing my ankle, not sure what to do next. I felt a stabbing twinge, but it seemed tolerable, certainly not a reason to give up what little was left of the afternoon. I could make it to the dock if I walked carefully, but by the time I got there my ankle was swollen like a melon, and throbbing bitterly.
* * *
There was a pile of old blankets lying against one of the wooden benches along the pier. Sometimes people leave things to pick up later, especially if they are carrying a lot of fish home. Blankets, food chests, gear, all of it stays safe until they return. We are an honest town.
The dog sniffed at the blankets and started barking loudly. The blankets moved and I jumped.
And All the Phases of the Moon Page 2
