The grief counselor had told her Shelly and Jason needed to get away, to be somewhere free of memories, somewhere they could just be kids again. Implied in the suggestion was a need for them to get away from her for a while. So when her mother and father had suggested Shelly and Jason spend the summer with them on the farm and they'd responded as if they'd been offered tickets to a Dixie Chicks' concert, Julia had agreed to let them go. Reluctantly.
They might require time away from her, but she could hardly bear the thought of being away from them. They'd been gone less than a week and it seemed an eternity.
She had no idea how she would make it through the summer alone.
A tree squirrel cautiously moved to the rip of a branch on the Jeffry pine at the end of the porch. It surveyed its world, spotted Julia and chattered a noisy alarm. A Steller's jay hopped to a nearby branch to see what the fuss was about. It cocked its head in Julia's direction, swooped down and landed in the middle of the lawn, looking at her expectantly.
"Sorry," Julia said."I didn't think to bring birdseed. You'll have to wait until I get back from the store this afternoon."
One by one other sounds broke the stillness—the high-pitched chirp of a chipmunk, a low whisper of wind in the tops of pine and fir trees, a pine cone bouncing off branches on its way to the forest floor. Minor intrusions into the peace and quiet and solitude she was there to experience. The cure-all everyone had insisted was what she needed for her broken heart.
What no one understood was that her heart wasn't just broken; it was empty—
something far worse. The passion that had driven her from bed every morning was gone. She drifted through her days, micro- managing the lives of two independent and self- sufficient teenagers, who vacillated between tolerance and rebellion.
She was just so sad all the time. She'd cried more in the past six months than she'd cried the entire five years Evan was missing. She didn't want to be this way. She wanted to be stronger, to go on with her life the way she absolutely knew Evan would want her to, but she couldn't pull together the pieces that would let her look at her future and not see a lifetime of aching loneliness. She'd learned how to be alone; she had no idea how to be lonely.
The cold, damp air finally made its way through her sweatshirt. She shivered, stretched and went inside to make coffee, leaving the sunrise for another morning when she'd dressed warmer.
The "cabin" had been built in the twenties, when people of means escaped the Sacramento Valley's summer heat by fleeing to the mountains. Made out of logs and stone, it had a wide, covered porch that faced the lake and was the equivalent of the lavish vacation homes constructed at the turn of the century at Lake Tahoe. Surrounded by dense forest on three sides, the four hundred acres still owned by the Stephens'
family backed up to land held in trust by the Nature Conservancy. The nearest neighbor was two miles away; the nearest town, almost twenty; the Oregon border, less than fifty.
Mount Shasta was to the southeast; the coastal city of Eureka, a hundred miles or so to the southwest.
An expanse of tended lawn went from the house to the rocky shoreline of the lake, open room for a game of croquet or volleyball. It really was a shame no one came here anymore.
Despite this, the inside was as carefully and lovingly maintained as the outside, kept that way by the wife of a local fishing guide. Craftsman-style sofas and chairs upholstered in maroon and green fabrics sat in front of a large stone fireplace. The walls held original watercolors of local wildlife; an oil of Mount Shasta in its winter glory hung above the mantel.
The bedrooms were upstairs, five of them, each with bedspreads and curtains in fabrics popular in the twenties. Beautiful, handmade rag rugs protected the polished pine floors, stepping-stones of warmth on cold mornings.
She'd chosen the bedroom with the view of the lake. For almost half her life she'd made decisions based on what she believed Evan would want. Were he with her, they would be in the back bedroom, the one the sun would hit first in the morning, calling him to start his day. He loved the sunrise above all times of day, and would watch in rapt attention as the sky turned from black to purple to shot with gold. He said it was a renewal, the slate wiped clean, a chance to begin again.
She had never known anyone who loved life as much as Evan.
Julia went into the kitchen and opened the box of supplies she'd brought, basic things to last until she could get to the grocery store. She started the coffee and then got her jacket from the bedroom. By the time she came back down the coffee was ready.
She chose the largest mug, filled it to the top with the steaming, dark liquid and went outside again. Settling on the top step this time, the mug warming her hands, she stared at the dock, or what she could see of it.
Her eyes softly focused, her mind lost in memories, she was slow to register the dark shadow that appeared in the gray mist at the end of the dock. Her eyes narrowed in concentration. What...?
The shadow moved. It was a man. Her heart did a quick, panicked dance when she heard his boots striking the rough planking and realized he was coming toward her.
After leaving her parents' farm she'd become a city girl, the fear of strangers as ele-mental as navigating freeways.
He came nearer and she saw his red plaid shirt, his Giants baseball cap.. .his fishing pole.
The caretaker.
Feeling like an idiot, her heart still beating as if she'd run a marathon, she sat perfectly still, hoping he wouldn't notice her.
The man reached the end of the dock, hesitated, looked longingly to his left, and then with a slumped- shoulder show of resignation headed her way.
"I didn't think you'd be up this early," he said, stopping several feet from the porch.
He was near enough for her to notice black hair on the long side of neat and lightly graying at the temples. She figured him to be a few years older than her, though not many. But then, she'd never been good at guessing people's ages. His eyes were dark and deep set, with fine lines at the corners. And he was taller than he'd appeared at a distance, but not as large. He seemed as if he belonged in this setting, a little on the raw side, able to take in stride whatever vagaries nature delivered. The kind of man you would want with you in a crisis.
"You knew I was here?" She hadn't seen any signs that anyone was around when she'd arrived, no lights or smoke from a fireplace.
"We're too far from the main road to pick up traffic noises so it's pretty obvious when someone arrives."
"And here I thought I was being so quiet." She stood and held out her hand. "Julia McDonald."
He shifted his pole to the hand with the stringer of fish, leaned forward and clasped her outstretched hand. "David Prescott." He smiled. For an instant his face was transformed and he went from ruggedly competent to heart-stoppingly handsome. Julia took this in the way she observed most things, with a detached wonder.
"I had the impression you were—I thought you'd be older." She wished she'd asked Mary more about him.
"We reclusive types usually are, I guess."
"Yeah...I guess."
He shifted position and made a move to leave."If you need anything, my place is a hundred yards, give or take, through those trees."
"Thanks."There was enough reluctance in the invitation that Julia smiled. Knowing he was content to keep his distance made it easier to be sociable.
"I just put on a pot of coffee. Would you like a cup?" she asked on impulse. Now, where had that come from?
He had the good graces to act as though he was considering her offer. "Thanks, maybe another tune." He held up the trout on the stringer. "When I come back empty-handed."
She nodded, relieved. "Another time it is."
She went inside and phoned her mother. "Just thought I'd check in," she said. "I got here too late last night to call." Even with the kids in residence, her mother maintained her nine o'clock bedtime.
"How is it?"
"Nice. At least, what I've seen so far. It's a little q
uiet, though ."What seemed like a long time ago, she'd cherished her rare moments of quiet. Now they weighed her down like a wet wool coat.
"Quiet is good, Julia."
She laughed. "The kids driving you crazy already?"
"Not at all. Your dad has them with him most of the day. Shelly's showing signs of being a real farmer. Could be we've finally found someone to take over the farm when we retire."
"My Shelly?"
"That's the one."
"We can't possibly be talking about the same girl, the one who would rather stay home from a party than be caught wearing the wrong jeans."
"I don't know what brand she's got on right now, but she didn't appear to mind wearing them to shovel the manure out of the barn."
Julia felt a guilty surge of pleasure at the news .There was no way Shelly would last the entire summer doing those kinds of chores. She'd be on her way home the minute she thought she could get away with it.
"How is Jason?"
"Limping. I told him how you broke both your legs jumping out of the hayloft that summer you were seventeen and he thought he'd give it a try. I don't know why everyone thinks kids are so different nowadays."
"He's okay?"
"If you could bottle embarrassed and sell it for a dime ajar, he'd be going home rich."
"Is he around? I'd like to get my two cents in."
"He's off fishing with your dad. They left before sunup. They swore they'd bring back enough bluegill for supper, but I took a chicken out of the freezer, just in case."
Her father had been promising Jason he'd take him fishing for years."Tell them I'll call back tonight."
"Better make it early. They're going into town with Fred to have dinner and see some new vampire movie. He promised it was funny and wouldn't give Jason nightmares."
"How long has Fred been there?" Last she'd heard he was spending the summer on some archeological dig in Utah.
"When he found out the kids were going to be here, he canceled his trip."
"Oh, great." Her slim chance of getting the kids home early had just dropped to none.
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing."
"Did I mention how good it is for your father to have the kids here? Every night he tells me how much they remind him of Evan."
It was her mother's gentle way of saying that while it might seem that she and her father were moving on with their lives, they hadn't forgotten. "Tell them to have a good time at the movie and that I'll catch them tomorrow."
"Take care of yourself, Julia."
"I love you, Mom."
"I love you, too, sweetheart."
David cleaned the trout, put it in the refrigerator for that night's dinner and began his morning routine—an hour going over the pages he'd written the day before in an attempt to breathe life into them with revisions. At the end of the hour, he would give up, delete everything and begin the three hours he spent at the typewriter each day creating the prose that would end up deleted the next day. Only twice since he'd been there had he kept any of his work longer than twenty-four hours.
His agent insisted it wasn't David's talent that had dried up; it was his ability to judge his own work. But he was the only one he cared about pleasing, and in his mind he hadn't written anything worth publishing in four years.
Today it was more than the usual fear and frustration that kept him from sitting at his desk and starting work that used to come as easily as breathing. When Mary Stephens made her monthly call to find out how things were going and see if he needed anything, she'd told him about the recently widowed woman who would be staying at the main house for the summer and asked if he would mind seeing that she got settled in okay.
Widow implied a stereotype that Julia McDonald didn't fit. He'd expected someone older, someone content to sit on the porch or watch talk shows on the satellite television in the afternoons, someone with enough life experiences to actually want her privacy, too.
Instead, this wounded creature had arrived, still young and vibrant and undoubtedly aching to be a part of life again—not a combination for a woman content to keep her own company.
Even recognizing the unfairness of his assumptions, David let them color his impressions. No wonder he'd slipped into this abyss of depression. Where was the man who'd eagerly sought out people, the one who got up in the morning knowing, without question, that something new, someone new, would cross his path that day and his life would be richer for it?
He'd found the caretaker's job through friends, the couple who'd hired him, Harold and Mary Stephens, unaware they were hiring a man to do menial chores whose wealth matched their own. He'd hoped the isolation would either rekindle the fire that once had fueled his passion to write or let him walk away.
What he'd learned was that his anger at injustice still burned as hot, but without the naivete of youth to sustain the belief that anger could foster change, he had no words.
He sat down at his desk, just him, a mug of coffee and his temperamental laptop...and thoughts of a beautiful and sad woman who'd appeared in his life unbidden and unwelcome.
Two more months and his self-imposed exile would be over. In a way the prospect intrigued him. Not since his years on the road had he felt the heady freedom that came with being unaccountable to anyone or anything.
Perhaps he should thank Julia McDonald for hurrying the process along. She certainly didn't deserve the misdirected hostility that had made him unfit to be around anyone, friend or stranger, for the past three years. He vowed to maintain his distance from her, considering it an act of kindness.
Six Months Missing
Everything I knew about sex I'd learned from books and farm animals and movies and television. Oh, and then there were several girlfriends who were curious or had the lethal combination of persuasive boyfriends and too much to drink and thought keeping a secret meant telling no more than five of your best friends.
After all the war stories, I was determined my first time would be cold sober, my choosing and with someone I loved. I must have sent out an invisible do-not-touch signal, because with the kind of boys who did ask me out, it was never a major problem. I'd never been outside my own house completely naked. Except, of course, showers after gym and changing into my swimming suit at the municipal swimming pool. Oh, and at the doctor's office. I even skinny-dipped in my underpants and bra.
Given the opportunity to go to a topless beach, I would have been easy to spot—the one with the top on. But then, I digress.
Which, I guess, was why I was so surprised that being naked with you that first time seemed so right. I'd left one world, the touch-me-and-you-die one, at the top of the slide and landed in a heap, full force, in another at the bottom. The two of us moved around on my grandmother's pinwheel patchwork quilt in a tangle of arms and legs, sighs and laughter, discovery
and passion. I never once hesitated or thought to cover up.
For two virgins we did okay. No, it was a whole lot better than okay. I don't know if you innately understood where to touch me or if you picked up on my reactions as you explored my body with those exquisitely gentle hands, but by the time you finally slipped your body between my legs, and after I felt a quick moment of pain, I was on a wondrous journey I hadn't come close to imagining. I was breathless, caught up in a whirlwind and just plain dumbfounded at the intensity of my reaction. I thought I would go crazy with desire.
This was a good thing. A really, really good thing. I wanted to do it again. I wanted to do it all the time.
You rolled over on your back and grinned at me. I rolled to my stomach, propped myself up on my elbows and returned your smile.
"I can see why my dad asked us to wait. I can't imagine studying when we could have been doing this."
You laughed. "I take it that means you liked it?"
I plucked a piece of grass and lightly ran the tip down your side. "Can we do it again?"
"When did you have in mind? Remember, I'm leaving tomorrow morning. Early."
"Now?"
You shook you head. "Uh-uh."
"Why not?"
You held up the empty condom wrapper.
"It's only good for one time?" If I'd known, I would have taken Fred's entire stash.
"So now what?"
You put your hand at the back of my neck and brought me to you for a kiss. "Now we lie here in the sun and listen to the birds and eat the lunch you packed and—"
How could you talk about listening to some stupid bird when all I could think about was your lips on my breast and your body between my legs? "I guess that means it wasn't as good for you as it was for me?"
"Why do you say that?"
"You're so...so., .casual about it. "Today was the most important day of my life.
Nothing before had even come close. And here you were cloud-gazing like it was any old day.
"I'm sorry. It's just the way I am, Julia."
I threw the grass at you. "You could at least tell me you liked it."
I know that I'd given as good as I got and I wanted you to be as eager for it to happen again as I was. But maybe most of all I wanted to know that while you were in Detroit you would remember me with the same longing that I had for you. I didn't know until that moment how afraid I was that you would go home and find someone you liked better.
How could I compete with sophisticated city girls? Everything I knew about the world outside Kansas I'd learned from magazines.
You didn't say anything for a long time and somehow I managed not to jump in with inane chatter to fill the silence. I could see that I'd dampened the joy that you'd been experiencing only moments before and didn't understand what was happening. Had it been awful for you and you were afraid to tell me?
"You have to realize that sex isn't the mystery for me that it is for you, Julia."
You confused me with that. "Are you saying I'm not—"
"My mother was a prostitute."
You said it with such acceptance that it almost seemed you were talking about the plot of some R-rated movie. In my world bad mothers were women who fed their kids a steady diet of fast food. I couldn't conceive what it must have been like for you growing up with a woman who earned the rent money selling her body.
If I'd Never Known Your Love Page 9
