Fade to Blue

by Julie Carobini

  I picked up the receiver, but Timo appeared in front of me. “So.” He laid one hand casually onto the phone. “The ex is out of the pen now, eh? Bet he’s got stories to tell.”

  “Then you’d win.”

  I made another attempt to reach for the phone, but Timo continued to block my way, a creepy smile pressed into his face. Did he not realize that his skinny self could do little to conjure up fear in normal, balanced human beings?

  “So I bet you’re glad I told him how and where to find you.” In a really bad imitation of Inspector Clouseau, he pretended to examine his fingernails while pursing his lips and raising his eyebrows.

  “Timo! I hope my ears do not deceive me. You did not give out the whereabouts of this studio to a stranger.” Fred had arrived without my knowledge. He stood before us, his cheeks red.

  Timo hunched his shoulders and looked to me for support. Realizing that a lost cause, he stuck his hands into his pockets and dropped his head forward, as if to inspect the colorless ground.

  “Fred, you’re back!” I reached over and hugged him, hoping to wash away any tension Timo’s macho act, however lame, had brought on. I cupped his shoulders with my hands—trying not to wince from pain—and held my arms out straight. “You look amazingly well, boss. The rest suited you.”

  This time the tinge of his cheeks resembled a blush.

  “Stop badgering the man.” Letty flounced over and gave Fred’s face a thorough inspection. “Suz is right. You look good, Fred. We have much to discuss, so come with me.” Awkwardly, she linked her arm through his and pulled him away.

  Timo released a sputtering sigh, like a helium balloon with an untied knot.

  I gave him an innocent smile and slight shrug. “What can I say? You live right.” I paused. “Don’t expect to be rescued on a regular basis.”

  He slunk away as my hand reached for the phone.

  “Suz!”

  I whirred around and hung it back up as both Fred and Letty waved me over.

  “Show the man your hand,” Letty said as I arrived at our workstation.

  “Would you please stop worrying? I’m absolutely fine. See it feels just—yow!” I yanked my hand away from Letty, who had taken it into her grasp and accidentally poked a blister with one of her manicured nails. I think it was accidental.

  “She burned it in her kitchen. I don’t think she is able to hold a fine paintbrush for a few days.”

  Was I invisible? “Fred. It’s your first day back. Please don’t worry about me—I’ll be fine. Besides, if we give you too much to worry over, Sherry will string all of us up.”

  He gave me a fatherly smile. If he didn’t just remind me of a big ol’ teddy bear sometimes.

  “Leticia is correct,” he said. “You cannot work with an injury such as that.”

  Letty beamed.

  Fred fished around in his pocket and pulled out a key. “Take this.” He dropped the key into my good palm.

  “What’s this for?” My eyes examined it but I had no clue.

  “It’s the key to the log cabin. Take the next few days to wander around it a bit; take your boy and stay if you’d like. Get a feel for the blank walls and what the old place says to you.”

  I stared at him, speechless.

  “Oh, I know we’ve already talked over one idea and it’s lovely, but the walls are many.” He scooted his chin toward the door. “Go on now. You’re still on the clock.”

  I closed my fingers around the key, hungry for a chance at independence, if only for a few days. My hand felt heavy with the possibilities, my lungs nearly breathless. I looked up and nodded. “I’ll just run home for my sketchbook and our overnight things. Thank you, Fred.” My voice cracked and without much deliberation I rocked forward on my toes and planted a kiss on his bright pink cheek.

  Letty stood behind Fred, unsmiling and silent, as if unusually tongue-tied. My dear friend, Letty. If only I knew what you were thinking . . .

  “Surprised to find you here.”

  “Hey, Gage.” I stepped into his beach bungalow. “I could say the same about you. What’s up?”

  Gage continued to call out through the doorway to the kitchen. “Home for an early lunch. I’m meeting with a couple of prospective clients this afternoon . . . have to get my strength up.”

  “That’s so great.” I flopped onto the overstuffed chair and kicked off my sneakers. “Business going well, then?”

  After the microwave bell dinged, he joined me in the living room with a bowl in his hands. “It is.” He blew on the hot chili. “You going to tell me why you’re here?”

  I exhaled and dropped my purse at my feet, my head flopping back against the chair. “Fred gave me the key to the log cabin. Said Jer and I could stay a few days while I got a feel for the place.”

  Gage swallowed the bite he’d been savoring. “You were kind of glowing so I figured it was something good.”

  I laughed. “Glowing?”

  He shrugged. “Don’t laugh. I may be a dumb guy, but I know what glowing is.”

  “Especially since Callie’s been doing so ever since taming you. Ha ha.” I pulled myself out of the chair and gave my brother a brief hug.

  “Taming me?”

  I wandered toward the hall, still laughing. “That girl’s a miracle maker in my book. Thought you’d never settle down.”

  “Hey, where’s my credit in all of this?”

  His voice trailed after me as I reached the room I shared with Jeremiah. “Can’t hear you!” I spied an overnight bag and began tossing in clothes and toys Jer and I would need.

  “So.” Gage appeared in the doorway. “Heard from him?”

  “Who? Len?”

  He took another bite, his face serious, almost stoic. He tried to act nonchalant, but a little sister knew better.

  Jeans, extra socks, a pair of flip-flops . . . I shook my head. “Nope. We talked it out last night and he promised to call this morning to set up a time to see Jeremiah, but”—I dug my phone out of my pocket and held it up for Gage to see—“no calls.”

  “And what did you and he decide about, you know, the two of you?”

  I stopped packing to look up at him. “I don’t understand.”

  “C’mon, Suz. The guy came here for more than Jeremiah.”

  Toothbrushes. Don’t forget the toothbrushes! Oh, and toothpaste too. Sometimes my brother knew me too well. Instead of this being a blessing, at the moment, his uncanny ability resembled a curse. For if he continued to read my thoughts like this—thoughts I didn’t care to confront—I might just have to banish the man. Or at least pretend I didn’t hear a thing he said.

  “Suz?”

  I dropped a set of Jer’s undies into my bag and took in Gage’s face, his lips pursed, his brow furrowed. “Our marriage is over. We’re divorced. Why do you continue to hint that there could be anything other than mutual parenthood between us?”

  He stepped into my room, something he had not done since Jeremiah and I arrived unannounced on his front porch those many months before. Now as he set his half-eaten bowl of chili on the dresser and approached me, I saw something pleading in his eyes. With one emotion-filled look, Gage was asking for a promise of some type.

  “I understand that you and he are legally divorced. And I believe with everything in me that this was the best decision for you. For Jer.”

  I frowned. “It wasn’t my idea. You remember that, right?”

  He reached for me. “Of course. You would never have asked that man for a divorce, no matter what kind of jerk he’d been to you.”

  “So why do you keep bringing up the divorce?”

  “Because, you’re you and he’s, well, he’s him.” Gage let go of a sigh. “I’m afraid he might try to talk you into something that you haven’t . . .” He looked up. “Please, Suz. Think everything through here. Don’t let him sweet-talk you, not without talking it all out with Callie and me. Will you promise me that?”

  I shut my overnight bag and scooched next to it on t
he bed. He was right, at least partially. I had been struggling, not with my feelings for Len per se, as the love I’d had for him was long gone. But I wondered, at times, if perhaps God wanted me to do the unthinkable and invite Jeremiah’s father back into my life in a more real way. I’d wondered that ever since overhearing the women outside of Jeremiah’s Sunday school class.

  “You worry too much,” I tried to assure him.

  Gage sat on the rumpled bed next to me, playfully bumping my hip. “That’s what big brothers are for.”

  “Is that right?”

  “Yeah.” He paused, as if formulating what to say to the little sister with a mind of her own. “Do what you really want to do, Suzanna.”

  All I wanted to do right now was pick up Jeremiah from preschool and head up to the cabin. I imagined us warming up yummies for dinner and sitting cross-legged with a game of dominoes in front of the old stone fireplace. While he slept on a feathery soft rug, I planned to walk and pray and contemplate the best placement for artwork on the walls. For a few days, at least, I hoped not to have to think about Len or what the future might possess.

  “What is it you want to do about Len?” My brother wore anxiety like a closely tucked T-shirt.

  I leaned into him and rested my head on his shoulder, hoping to calm his fears. Instead, as I gave him the most honest answer that came to mind, it occurred to me that those fears might just turn up a notch.

  “Maybe life’s not all about what I want.”

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Len never called. Not that I checked all that often or waited by the phone as in those years during our marriage, but the truth is, Len said he would call and he didn’t.

  This shouldn’t have surprised me, but it did. I glanced at Jeremiah, his body melted into his booster seat, his face a picture of contentment as he gazed out the window at passing pines. Light through the trees skipped and darted across his precious face.

  Jeremiah was the main reason Len’s silence bothered me.

  “We’re almost there, Mama. I can tell!”

  I glanced at him again in my rearview mirror. “You can? Then you are a smart boy all right.”

  He nodded two times for emphasis.

  After picking up Jer from school, we stopped at the grocery store up on the hill, the one overlooking the town of Otter Bay, and bought vacation food: fresh fruit, chips, sandwich fixings, and makings for a pie. I hadn’t baked in six months, and although the dough was ready made, I snatched it up from the refrigerated case on a whim.

  Jer had wrinkled his nose at that. “You gonna make a pie? I thought you only did that at our old house.”

  This was a problem. I tweaked him on the nose and pushed my cart away from the cold case with its foggy glass doors and enticing offerings. “I’m starting up again—just you wait.”

  He held on to the cart, the one he was getting much too big to be sitting in, and threw back his head. “I! Can’t! Wait!”

  Now as our car pulled into the drive, the afternoon sun moving toward the horizon, I realized that Jer was not the only one who couldn’t wait. I whipped the key out of the ignition, dashed over to Jeremiah’s door, and opened it up, watching him spill onto the pine needle-strewn driveway.

  He dashed off, calling over his shoulder. “I’m gonna go play on the jungle gym!”

  “Not so fast!”

  He skidded to a halt.

  “There’ll be time for that. First, come help me with our bags. You don’t want all that food we bought to spoil, do you?”

  He picked up the pace at the mention of food and wrapped his arms around a bulging bag. Together, we made our way to the front door, and with a quick uptick of my heart, I slid the key into the lock and twisted until it opened with a click.

  Gently scuffed wood floors ran the length of the long, narrow living room, but Jer had no time for the quiet admiration I felt for the old place. Seeing an indoor playground every bit as enticing as the one outside, Jer plunked the grocery bag on the floor, kicked off his shoes, and slid around on his socks.

  A contented smile warmed me as I bustled inside with the rest of the bags, pulling the door shut. This place, with its soot-stained fireplace, cozy rooms, and white walls looking every bit the blank canvas, felt like home. Seven hundred and fifty square feet of home.

  In the ultrawhite kitchen, I began to unpack our groceries, piling everything onto a round glass top. Jer padded into the room and climbed onto a chair. “Wow! That’s more food than an army.”

  “You mean we have enough to feed an army, right?”

  “Right!” He nodded dramatically. “Can I go outside now?”

  “Go put your shoes back on then, yes, you may go outside.”

  He scrambled off the chair and back into the living room, just steps away. He must have jumped into his shoes because he whipped past me in the kitchen and careened outside through the narrow kitchen door.

  My eyes took in all the food I’d brought for the two of us, and I shook my head. No way can we eat all this. When we moved in with Gage, I’d decided the least I could do was cook meals and store the leftovers in one of the Tupperware containers Mom had left me from her side business. No wonder I had no idea how to shop these days, though. Between working and mothering, I’d done the shop and dash more often than not. And half the time, my dear brother insisted on filling in the wide gaps in my budget by stopping twice weekly for the important things, like ice cream for Jer and half-and-half for our morning coffee.

  I pressed my nose against the backdoor window and watched Jer send dust and pine needles flying in his wake. Lord, you provide enough for us to eat—and somewhere for Jeremiah to play. You are amazing. I let the flimsy curtain drop and turned back to puttering.

  Several hours later, as Jer played along the hearth and I contemplated the transformation of bare walls, my cell phone rang. I hesitated. What if Len was calling? Would I be obligated to tell him where we’d gone? What if he wanted to join us here? The thought dulled the excitement fluttering within.

  A glance at the screen did not indicate the caller’s name. Tentatively, I answered. “Hello?”

  “Suz, it’s me, Letty.”

  I collapsed into an armchair, relief at hearing a friendly voice. “Hi there.”

  “Hello there yourself.” She cleared her throat. “I’m wondering if you could tell me where you left the delivery list I gave you earlier. You did not have a chance to make those calls and I would like to do that myself when I get back to the studio.”

  I cringed. “Sorry, Letty. You’re right; I never finished. Never got started, actually. I dropped the list into my personal drawer beneath our workstation, figuring I’d pick up with it when I returned. But you know what?” I glanced around the bright kitchen, a new sense of purpose within me. “If you read the names and numbers to me, I’ll make those calls from here.”

  She paused. “So, you are already in Fred’s cabin, then.”

  It was more of a statement than a question. “We are. This cabin is a magical place. Oh, but I’m sure you already know that.”

  “On the contrary, I have never seen it.”

  An awkward silence followed. I rocked forward in my chair, sensing she had more to say. “Letty? Was there more?”

  “Yes.”

  When she didn’t continue, I prompted her. “Okay then. Why don’t you tell me?”

  A mixture of groan and sigh released from her. “I need help, Suz. Your help with something quite personal.”

  I straightened, intrigued. “Anything, Letty. Name it.”

  She chuckled, a welcome sound interjected into a mystifying conversation. “You don’t know what I am about to ask.”

  “Doesn’t matter.” My hand gave an involuntary wave into the air. “You’re my friend and I’m here to help. What do you need?”

  She hemmed. “This is not comfortable for me to say.”

  “But we’re friends. You should be able to tell me anything. Well, maybe not anything, but most things.”
<
br />   She hawed. “Okay, well . . .” Her voice sounded winded.

  My face froze in anticipation. “Yes?”

  “Okay, Suzanna. My car broke down and I need assistance.”

  “Of course.” I swished my head around looking for a pen and paper, knowing the chances were nil considering the spotlessness of the cabin. “Just tell me where you are and I’ll be right there for you.”

  “I am accustomed to fending for my own needs.”

  “I know that.”

  “How could you know? Have I ever told you?”

  I squinted at her impatience—and at mine. “Are you going to tell me where you are?”

  Her breathing became more pronounced. “I am outside.”

  “Outside . . . where?” I padded into the living room and peeked out the window. No Letty in sight. “Are you on Wickham?”

  “Yes, Wickham, like that dastardly man in Pride and Prejudice. I am only halfway up the hill.”

  “Stay where you are.” I grabbed my keys from the coffee table. “I’ll be right down to get you.”

  “Absolutely you will not.” Her voice had gained some strength, like she’d reached the first plateau. “I called to make sure you were there before making the climb. Don’t come for me; I am almost there.”

  Letty was a hard woman to cross. I dropped my keys into my purse and waited for her by the window. Jer pressed his nose to the window, his body wrapped in a robe and slippers after his bath in the antique claw-foot tub. In hindsight, Letty’s order to stay inside was a blessing.

  When we caught a glimpse of her at the corner of the property, Jer ran to the door and hung on the handle.

  “Wait a minute, buddy. Don’t go outside—you’ll catch a chill.” My own smile led the way to the door. Did I just sound like my mother?

  I unlocked the latch and Letty wafted in, smelling like vanilla with a dash of nutmeg. “Glad you could make it.”