The Summer Everything Changed

by Holly Chamberlin

  Jeff let go of Isobel’s hand and leaped to his feet. “Let me help you with those packages,” he offered.

  Mrs. White showed her gleaming, perfectly straight teeth in appreciation. “Why, thank you,” she said, holding out her shopping bags for Jeff to take. The diamonds on both hands winked blindingly.

  Jeff went ahead of her into the inn. Mrs. White stopped to smile down at Isobel.

  “What a nice young man,” she said. “Such manners. You don’t find that often these days, even in men my husband’s age. Somewhere along the line they lost the training they might once have gotten. Either that or they just stopped caring.”

  “Yes,” Isobel said, smiling up at the woman. “Jeff is very polite.”

  “And so handsome . . .” Mrs. White sighed. “I’d call that one a keeper!”

  She followed Jeff inside, leaving Isobel to ponder those final words. Yes, maybe Jeff was a keeper. Maybe what had happened yesterday afternoon at the party was just an anomaly, just one of those things that was the odd result of a series of odd circumstances coming together in a rare and random way . . .

  Jeff rejoined her a moment later. He took both of her hands now in his, and looked into her eyes. “Thank you, Izzy,” he said. “Maybe I don’t deserve to be forgiven, but thank you for doing it.”

  “You’re welcome,” she replied. His eyes, she thought, were really so expressive. Eyes as windows to the soul. She wondered who had been the very first person to express that lovely truth.

  He leaned down and kissed her gently and lingeringly on the lips. Isobel felt happier, more blissful, than she remembered ever having felt.

  “I have to go,” he said finally. “I’m needed at Dad’s office. But I’ll check in with you later, okay?”

  Isobel nodded. Happiness, it seemed, had robbed her of the ability to speak.

  Jeff then got into his car. Isobel watched him drive off. She felt so, so much better than she had earlier, before his visit. He had been so kind and gentle. And Mrs. White’s appreciation of Jeff’s gentlemanly behavior had helped her to see and to understand the good things about Jeff that she might have been missing or underestimating.

  Isobel sighed in sheer contentment. The bracelet Jeff had given her winked and sparkled in the sun, almost as brightly as Mrs. White’s rings! Or maybe not quite, but it was a beautiful piece. If Jeff hadn’t given it to her—if she had seen it in a display case in a jewelry store—she might not have considered it as something she would like to wear. But somehow Jeff had known . . . Better than she had known her own taste, Jeff had known that the bracelet would suit her.

  She couldn’t wait to show the bracelet to her mother. On second thought, Isobel considered, maybe she would keep it to herself for just a little while. She would treasure it like the very special gift that it was—like the flowers Jeff had given her, like the way he held the door for her, like his incredibly exciting kisses.

  Isobel looked up at the lovely green leaves of the big oak tree down by the white picket fence and smiled. I am such a lucky, lucky gal, she thought.

  Chapter 29

  “No . . . No! Please!”

  Louise’s eyes flew open and she gasped, struggling for a normal breath. The sheets were tangled around her ankles. Her nightgown was soaked through. One of the pillows had fallen to the floor.

  It hadn’t happened for a long, long time.

  Louise managed to find the switch on the bedside lamp and struggled free of the sheets to a seating position against the remaining pillow. Her heart was still racing. Her mouth was dry; she reached for the bottle of water on the bedside table and drank deeply, spilling some of the water on her already wet nightgown. It was just about three o’clock in the morning, the dead of night, the time when demons both real and imagined invaded and tormented the soul.

  It had been so horribly real—the fear, the dread, and then the panic, the certainty that something very, very bad was about to happen. And then the worst of it all, the absolute inability to move, to run, to escape the dread that was inexorably descending.

  It had been so long, almost a year now . . . Still, how could she have forgotten the intensity of the nightmare? She put her hand on her stomach, as if to protect what she had not been able to protect all those years ago, in the cold, hard light of day . . .

  This time, caught fast in the bondage of the dream, she had seen Ted’s bloody death, had heard the sound of the gunshot that had brutally ended his life. He was only twenty-three when he died. But he had already wasted his life almost beyond salvation. And he had ended the life of his child. The fact that it was an unwitting act didn’t matter to Louise. When he had pushed her down that flight of stairs, after beating her and chasing her out of their apartment and through the hallways when she had finally broken away, he had destroyed the life of his own flesh and blood. Not that he had cared. How could he have? Maliciously, he had tampered with her birth control pills. When she found out she was pregnant, he had roared with laughter, and, as quickly as the laughter had erupted, it changed to insults and vile condemnation. “You were stupid enough to make that thing,” he had snarled. “Now, get rid of it.”

  But he had taken care of that . . .

  Louise put her hands to her face and pressed her fingers against her eyes. She wished she had some antianxiety pills on hand. Her doctor had prescribed a medication for her after Andrew had moved out, but she hadn’t taken it for long. The last thing she had wanted was to risk becoming dependent on prescription drugs. How would having a junkie for a mother have helped Isobel cope with the divorce and its attendant upheaval?

  Well, she thought now, getting slowly out of the wreck of her bed, there’s always booze . . . But the problem with booze was that it made you fat. The inane thought almost made her laugh. To be worried about weight gain . . . Wouldn’t life be a joy if your biggest worry were gaining a pound or two?

  Louise set to work putting the bed back into some order. While she retrieved and plumped the pillows and shook out the covers, she wondered why the dream, the nightmare, had visited her just now. Stress, of course. Inordinate stress could resurrect the terrors you had tried so hard to face down and put behind you. Flora Michaels was at fault. That was it . . .

  When the bed was done, Louise went out into the hall and headed for the bathroom. A few ibuprofen were in order. She glanced toward Isobel’s closed door. All was quiet. Ah, the sleep of the young and the innocent and the blameless . . .

  When she got back to her room, she changed into a fresh nightgown and collapsed into her bed. Reason was returning. The occurrence of the dream could not be blamed entirely on Flora Michaels, if at all. The real culprit was probably the fact that Isobel was entering the world of dating. That reality must have triggered Louise’s deepest fears, the store of bitter memories she thought she had permanently locked away, the nasty old demons she hoped she had exorcised forever.

  Louise adjusted the pillows under her head and sighed. Thank God Isobel’s first experience with the opposite sex was with such a decent guy. If there was anything bad to know about Jeff Otten, surely she would have heard it by now. Just because a dog didn’t like him didn’t make him a criminal. And Flynn had vetted him and surely Bella had her ear to the ground, even though she didn’t indulge in the worst sort of small-town gossip like so many others. Even the sometimes prickly, suspicious Catherine had come around enough to admit that Jeff did seem to be a genuinely decent person.

  And then a thought came to her . . . She felt ashamed it hadn’t occurred to her before now. Did Andrew know that his daughter had a boyfriend? She hadn’t asked Isobel if she had told her father about Jeff, and she was not in touch with her ex-husband in any regular or consistent way. The child support checks arrived on time each month, as did the check for spousal support. Other than that . . .

  And when, Louise asked herself, was the last time she had reproved Andrew for not being in closer or more frequent touch with Isobel? She had been remiss there, probably because Isobel having more
contact with her father might mean more contact with Vicky, and that was something Louise wasn’t eager to encourage. Of course, as she told herself (and anyone else who would listen) all the time, she would never actively stand in the way of a relationship.

  Suddenly, Louise felt she had been neglectful. Maybe her guilty conscience had punished her with the dream, as well it should. She vowed that she would have a talk with her ex-husband. She would urge him to call his daughter more often, especially now that another baby was on the way and his attention would be more and more required at home. That would be understandable, of course, but it would only add to the estrangement that had grown up between Andrew and Isobel.

  And that estrangement was troubling enough. Louise had asked to see the birthday card Andrew had sent to Isobel; Isobel had shrugged and said that she had thrown it out.

  “But why?” Louise had asked. “I mean, not that you have to keep a card forever, but it’s only a day after your birthday. You usually keep—”

  “It was nothing special,” Isobel had interrupted. “It’s not like it was handmade.”

  “Did he at least write you a nice note?”

  “No.”

  “Did Vicky sign it, too?”

  “Yeah. I mean, he signed it for her.”

  Louise rubbed her eyes now until they hurt. Why hadn’t she taken Andrew to task for not even having written a note to his daughter? Sixteen was a special birthday; even someone as unconventional as Isobel admitted that. And she couldn’t help but wonder why Vicky, the mother of two girls, hadn’t urged Andrew to make the day special.

  Then again, she had no idea what part Vicky played in Andrew’s current relationship with Isobel. Did Vicky know how he ignored her? Did she demand that he do so? Or did she encourage him to maintain his relationship with his child?

  Louise sighed and turned out the light. She doubted sleep would come again. That was all right. She feared that if it did come, the nightmare would come with it. One horrible dream a night was quite enough. Better to lie awake and have your guilty conscience berate you.

  Chapter 30

  CITYMOUSE

  Hey, Everyone!

  Today, I’m returning to an oldie but goodie, the Three Corners Flea Market held every Saturday in a big old dusty field in Brunswick. Gwen and I were last there back in April, and for some unaccountable reason I neglected (and just realized this!) to tell you about and to show you some of the fun-eriffic things we discovered!

  So scroll down for a look at:

  *An awesome brocade jacket that weighs about twenty pounds (no joke!); the vendor told us that it dates from the 1940s. I tried it on (very carefully!) and felt like a screen siren out of some moody old black-and-white film . . . But alas, the price was astronomically out of our range, so the jacket remained.

  *A simple and elegant strand of jade beads. Gwen suggested we buy it for Miss Kit-a-Kat, which we did! The green of the stone goes so well with the green of her eyes.

  *A lone teacup hand-painted by the vendor’s great-grandmother. (Why she was selling such a treasure she didn’t say and I didn’t ask.) I hope you can see the delicate brushstrokes. What a lovely and lively depiction of a spray of lilacs!

  *And last but not least, take a look at this funky crystal chandelier! Can you imagine what it would take to keep such a sparkly thing sparkly?? CityMouse admits to not having the required patience for such a responsibility.

  Well, Dear Readers, that’s all for now. I hope everyone has a fantastic day!

  Isobel closed her laptop. She would have had something new and interesting to write about if she had gone with Gwen to that antiques mall in South Portland. But Jeff had invited himself along, and Isobel, knowing that she would have spent the entire time worrying that he was bored and dealing with Gwen’s being annoyed that Jeff was there, had told Gwen she didn’t feel well. So Gwen had gone on alone.

  It was not an ideal situation, lying to a friend, and then flaking out on her readers by dredging up stuff she had already discarded as not blog-worthy (not uninteresting, but not super-exciting, either) and making it sound funtastic. (In fact, the brocade jacket had been moth-eaten and the chandelier decidedly dingy.) The whole enterprise felt dishonest. It was the first time Isobel had resorted to that sort of thing, and it didn’t sit well with her. But she just hadn’t seen any other way.

  But it was okay, Isobel told herself resolutely. The important thing was that she would be spending the afternoon with her boyfriend. Her boyfriend who was crazy about her.

  Just ahead of Jeff and Isobel on Main Street was a group of older people; there were three women and a man. The man and one of the women were walking with the aid of canes; the other two didn’t appear to be that much more mobile than their friends. Each of the four wore those big dark wraparound sunglasses a lot of older people wore. (Personally, though Isobel thought they were kind of awful-looking, she also thought they made a lot of sense. Sometimes when she was in Portland, she had to squint down to slits and put her hand over the top of her sunglasses just to see enough to cross a street without getting run over by a car!) Though the day was very warm, almost ninety degrees, the man wore a Windbreaker and each of the women wore a cotton sweater. That made sense, Isobel thought. Old people were said to feel the cold pretty easily. And all of the local restaurants were seriously air-conditioned.

  “If old people can’t walk faster than a freakin’ crawl, they should stay home,” Jeff declared.

  Isobel was stunned. “Hey,” she said, “come on. Everyone gets old. If they’re lucky.”

  Jeff shook his head. “I know. I was only kidding. Jesus, you’re a sensitive girl. Don’t you have a sense of humor?”

  Isobel felt her cheeks flush. “Oh. Sorry. I mean, yeah, I guess I am pretty sensitive.” People had been telling her that since she was little, after all. Still, she didn’t see what was funny about people walking with the aid of a cane . . .

  “You know,” Jeff said, putting his arm through hers, “I didn’t tell you before because I didn’t want to sound like I was trying to impress you or something, but back in Vermont I do a lot of volunteer work at a local nursing home. A lot of the residents are in their eighties and nineties, and even more of them can only get around in wheelchairs.”

  “Oh,” Isobel said. She felt chastened. “You do?”

  Jeff shrugged. “Yeah. It’s no big deal. I do whatever is needed, help people get in and out of bed, read to them, play cards.” Jeff laughed. “There’s this one old guy, I just know he must have been a professional poker player at one point. He swears it’s only luck, but that guy beats the pants off me every time.”

  Isobel imagined big, handsome Jeff sitting across a table from a little old man in a worn-out cardigan, youth and age personified. The image made her smile. “That’s so nice of you,” she said.

  “I do what I can. Hey, I’m glad you’re wearing the bracelet. I hope you never take it off.”

  Isobel smiled. “Not even when I shower?”

  “Not even then. Not ever.”

  Isobel held out her arm to better see the piece. The stones twinkled in the sun. She wondered again how much he had paid for it. The money didn’t matter, of course. It was the thought that counted, the fact that the bracelet had served as an apology for his having gotten mad at her at that party and unjustly accusing her of coming on to another guy.

  The memory brought with it a twinge of discomfort, not really anger but something like it. What? Isobel skillfully pushed the feeling away. Everybody made mistakes, and Jeff had apologized in a pretty major way.

  Besides, it really was romantic, Jeff wanting her to wear the bracelet always, like you would wear a wedding ring, something you cherished and treasured and didn’t take off until the day you died . . .

  It was a bit odd, Isobel thought, that she hadn’t shown her mother the bracelet. And that she still wasn’t entirely sure why she hadn’t. It wasn’t like she was hiding the bracelet from her; she had worn it every day since Jeff had given
it to her. In fact, she was kind of surprised that her mother hadn’t already commented on it. Her mother was usually pretty observant. Then again, she had been so busy planning for the wedding; she could be forgiven for not noticing a new bauble.

  Suddenly, Jeff put his hand on the back of her neck and gently turned her face up to his. “Those are real diamonds, you know,” he said. “Only the best for my girl.”

  “Oh. Oh, I—” She felt tears come to her eyes. Before she could say more, Jeff released her and pulled his phone from his pocket. He scowled down at the screen.

  “I have to get going,” he said.

  Isobel’s spirits sank as quickly as they had risen. “I thought we were going to get lunch.”

  “Something came up.”

  “At work?” Isobel asked.

  Jeff glanced up and down the block as if looking for someone or something to appear. “Yeah, sure. Can you get home on your own?”

  “Oh. You can’t take me home first?”

  Jeff looked back at her. “This is important, Isobel,” he said. His tone was a bit patronizing, a bit stern. Isobel felt as if she were being gently scolded for failing to understand the gravity of whatever it was that was happening. Then again, he was older and he was working for his father, someone everyone knew was a big businessman . . . And he had bought her a gold and diamond bracelet . . . That wasn’t something a boy got his girl. That was something a man got his woman.

  “Um, sure,” she said. “Sorry. I guess I could call someone. It’s no problem.”

  “Thanks, Izzy. You’re the best. I’ll call you later.”

  Jeff dashed off in the direction of his car. She had hoped for another kiss, but his business was obviously pressing. Since she had started dating Jeff, Isobel had done some research about the Ottens and their empire. She hadn’t seen anything on the company’s website about connections in Dubai—maybe that was top-secret corporate information!—but what she had seen was pretty impressive. In fact, with Jeff working for his father’s company she was surprised he had any time at all to spend with her. Well, she thought, he must really like me!