by Mary McNear
She wondered briefly if he would mind her surprising him like this, since, as a general rule, he didn’t like surprises. But when she pulled up in front of his cabin and he came out on the front porch, he didn’t look irritated. He looked worried.
“Everything all right, Caroline?” he asked, coming down the steps to meet her.
“Everything’s fine,” she said, giving him a kiss on the cheek. But it wasn’t, of course. And Buster knew it wasn’t.
“Why don’t you come inside, Caroline, and I’ll pour you something to drink,” he said. And the way he said it told her that now they were both dreading the conversation they were about to have.
“Okay. Thank you, Buster. I’d love a glass of water,” she said.
The two of them went into the cabin together, and Buster went into the kitchen, leaving Caroline alone in the living room. She sat down on the couch and looked around her. This living room should have been utterly familiar to her after three years of dating Buster, but tonight, for some reason, she felt as if she was seeing it for the first time. It was neat and orderly, with not a thing out of place, not a speck of dust anywhere. She didn’t mind that, of course. But she minded something. Her eyes traveled over to the card table, where Buster played gin rummy with friends one night a week, then over to a dining table that Buster had commandeered for one of the jigsaw puzzles he loved to do, and finally over to the bookshelf where Buster kept his prized collection of military history books. And she suddenly realized what it was about the room that she minded: it never changed. Not really, not in any meaningful way.
It was like their relationship, she suddenly understood. Their relationship was comfortable too, and pleasant, and predictable. But it never changed, and it was never going to.
Her eyes settled on Buster’s armchair then. There, on its arm, was today’s paper, neatly creased and waiting for Buster to return to it. And on the small table beside the armchair was a single glass of scotch, waiting for Buster to drink it. He always had exactly one glass of scotch, never more. Not like Jack, she thought; his philosophy had always been if one was good, then more was better. He’d been that way about their lovemaking, too, she remembered, and then, realizing she was sitting in Buster’s living room, and thinking about being in bed with Jack, she had the decency to blush.
But Buster was back then, carrying a glass of ice water, and as Caroline took it from him, she smiled. Or she tried to, anyway. Buster sat down on the couch and smiled back at her gently, a little sadly. And Caroline understood that when he’d gone to the kitchen, he hadn’t just poured her a glass of ice water, he’d accepted, in some fundamental way, what was going to happen next.
“Buster,” she said softly.
“Yes, Caroline,” he said with the same gentleness.
“I . . .” she stopped.
“I know,” he said quietly. “I know why you’re here. It’s been coming for a while now, hasn’t it?”
She nodded, feeling miserable
“I’m sorry, Caroline.”
“You’re sorry?”
He nodded.
“Buster, this is not your fault.”
“Yes, it is, Caroline,” he said, his blue eyes pained. “I couldn’t give you what you needed.”
But Caroline shook her head. “No, Buster, I couldn’t give you what you needed,” she said, her eyes glazing over with tears. And it was true, she thought. Because what Buster needed was so simple: affection, companionship, respect, and yes, predictability and routine. And what was wrong with that? Nothing, she told herself. There was nothing wrong with that. It had been enough for her until . . . until when? When had it stopped being enough?
“Look, Caroline, I appreciate that,” Buster said now, his face pained. “But I think we both know I’m just an old bachelor, too set in my ways for my own good. I wish I’d met you when I was younger. But I was married to the army for so long”—he gave a little shrug—“it’s hard to shake.”
She blinked, and a tear rolled down her cheek. “You loved the army, Buster,” she said softly.
“And I love you,” he said quietly. “But that doesn’t change anything, does it?”
She shook her head, slowly, knowing he was right.
“Now, if you don’t mind, I’ll walk you out to your truck,” he said, his expression stoic.
“Of course,” Caroline said, wiping a tear off her face with the back of her hand. She saw she’d been wrong about one thing. Breaking up with Buster may have been hard and painful, but it hadn’t been messy. He was too dignified for that. Whatever grieving he would do, he would do privately.
Caroline let Buster walk her out to her pickup, but when he opened the door for her, she turned to him. “Buster,” she said, a little sob escaping her. “Just for the record? It’s been a good three years.”
“It’s been a great three years,” he corrected her, reaching over and hugging her gently. She was so tempted then to tell him she’d made a mistake, that she’d changed her mind, that she wanted to stay with him here, tonight, at his cabin. But she knew in her heart that it wouldn’t work. She knew that she needed something different, something more, than Buster could give her.
So she climbed into her pickup, and Buster closed the door for her. But he left his hand on the door frame for a moment.
“Caroline, promise me something?” he said.
“Of course.”
“Promise me you won’t let him hurt you again?”
She stared at him. “You mean . . . Jack?”
He nodded.
“What? Buster, no,” she said, shaking her head. “Is that what you think? That I did this because I’m going to get involved with him again? Because I’m not. I haven’t even seen him since he came to Pearl’s that day.”
But Buster looked unconvinced. “Drive safely,” he said, taking his hand off the door frame and stepping back.
And she started to say that he was wrong about Jack, and that none of this had anything to do with him, but then she stopped herself. If Buster was going to believe that, there was nothing she could do to persuade him otherwise.
She pulled her seat belt on and turned the key in the ignition, and, as she turned her truck around, Buster went back up onto the front porch. She saw him there, in her rearview mirror, until she went around the bend in his driveway. How like him, she thought, to be concerned about her when she was the one who had broken things off.
“Oh Buster,” she said, fighting back tears. And as soon as she turned out of his driveway, she pulled over to the side of the road and let herself cry, really cry. Most of those tears, of course, were for Buster, and for what they had had together, but a few of those tears were for herself. Because ever since the day when Jack had walked into Pearl’s, nothing, nothing had gone as planned. Sometimes she felt as if she was letting go of everything that was safe and familiar to her, and sometimes she felt as if it was being taken away from her.
The next day, after closing time at Pearl’s, it was Jessica who was crying.
“Daisy, what are you doing?” she asked, sniffing loudly as she wiped her tearstained face with a napkin.
“I’m making you a root beer float,” Daisy said, standing behind the counter and scooping vanilla ice cream into a tall glass of root beer. “Remember how much you used to love these when we were kids?”
“I remember,” Jessica said, and another sob escaped her.
Daisy brought the glass, a spoon, and a straw over to Jessica and set it down in front of her on the counter. “Here, drink this. Or eat it or whatever. I promise it’ll make you feel better.”
“You think so?” Jessica said doubtfully. “You think it can cure a broken heart?”
“Why not?” she said, thinking that the only upside to Jessica’s heart being broken so often was that it had learned to repair itself so quickly. Daisy poured herself a Diet Coke from the soda dispenser, came around from behind the counter, and slid onto the stool next to Jessica’s.
“Come on, Jessica,” she
coaxed when her friend only stared at her root beer float. “Just try it.”
Jessica sighed, but she picked up her spoon and dipped it tentatively into her glass. “I thought it would last this time, Daisy,” she said, lifting a spoonful of ice cream to her mouth. “I really did. I thought this was it; I thought we’d be together forever.”
But you always think that, about everyone you date, Daisy wanted to say. Instead, she reminded herself that her role as Jessica’s friend was to support her, not to judge her.
So she patted her on the back and listened patiently while Jessica recounted, again, her brief, tumultuous relationship with Steve Owen, which had ended the same night that Will had come over to Daisy’s for their first date.
“God, I really know how to pick them,” Jessica said, depositing another spoonful of ice cream into her mouth. “But he seemed like such a nice guy.”
No, he seemed like a jerk, Daisy thought, but she nodded sympathetically.
“Daisy, seriously, why can’t I meet a real nice guy?” Jessica asked, using her spoon to fish around in the root beer float for some more ice cream. “Just one?”
Because you have lousy taste in men, Daisy said to herself, but to Jessica she said, “I don’t know why you haven’t met one yet, Jessica. But you will. Just . . . just be selective, okay? Try . . . try not to jump into things too quickly.” Even as she said it, Daisy knew this advice was lost on Jessica. She was a true romantic, falling in love as often as she did her nails.
“But it’s not only that,” Jessica said, putting a straw into the root beer float where the melted ice cream was puddling on top and taking a long pull on it. “Nothing else is going well for me this summer. I mean, I’m not getting the hang of this whole waitressing thing, for one. Your mom was so mad at me this morning, Daisy, I thought she was going to fire me on the spot.”
“Yeah, about that, Jessica,” Daisy said worriedly. “You’re going to have to be on your toes for the next couple of days. No more mistakes, all right? Or at least as few of them as possible. Because my mom’s mood this morning might be the new norm around here for a while.”
“You think so, Daisy? Because your mom’s bad moods usually blow over pretty quickly.”
“Well, not this one.” Daisy sighed. “My mom and Buster broke up last night.”
Jessica’s mouth dropped open. “They did?”
Daisy nodded.
Jessica thought about that, and then asked, “Who broke up with who?”
“My mom, I think, broke up with Buster.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know,” Daisy said. Actually, she had a theory about it, but she wasn’t about to share it with anyone else. “I came home last night,” she said to Jessica, “and there was my mom, sitting at the kitchen table, drinking coffee, in full crisis mode. She didn’t want to talk about it, though. And this morning, well, you saw her this morning.”
“I saw her,” Jessica said with a shudder. “But still, poor Buster.”
Daisy nodded, a little sadly. She’d always liked Buster, partly because he was a nice guy, and partly because, for a long time, he’d seemed to make her mother happy.
“Do you think he’ll still come in here?” Jessica asked.
“I don’t know,” Daisy said. “Probably not right away.” Which meant that now there’d be two men in Butternut who wouldn’t be coming into Pearl’s.
“He was such a good tipper, too,” Jessica lamented. “I mean, he even left me good tips.” She finished her root beer float with a majestic slurp, and she seemed to feel better, too, because when she pushed her glass away and turned to face Daisy, her big brown eyes were free of tears and they only looked a little bit swollen.
“All right, change of subject,” Jessica said. “What about you, Daisy? How’s your love life?”
“Mine?” Daisy asked, feeling suddenly self-conscious.
Jessica nodded. “You never told me how your date with Will went last week.”
“It was . . . it was good,” Daisy said, evasively.
“So what did you two do? On your first date, I mean?”
Daisy shrugged. “Not much. He came over, and we had pizza and watched a movie.”
“And . . .” Jessica prompted.
“And that was it,” Daisy said. Well, that and he kissed me. Five times. Not that she’d counted. And not that she’d replayed every single one of those kisses over and over in her mind, because obviously, she hadn’t.
“Well, have you seen him since then?” Jessica asked.
“Uh-huh,” Daisy said. “A couple of times.”
“So what did you do?”
“Oh, we just went out,” she said vaguely. After Will had come over to watch the movie, he’d taken her the next night out to dinner at a nice restaurant in a nearby town. It had felt a little like an apology to Daisy, almost as if Will was saying, This is the date I should have taken you on that first night. But the best part of the night wasn’t the dinner; it was after the dinner, and after Will had driven her home and walked her to her front door. Because that’s when he’d brushed a strand of hair off her cheek, leaned down, and given her a long, lingering kiss that seemed to hold the promise of the whole summer in it.
The next time they’d gone out, a few nights later, Will had had to work late and by the time he’d picked Daisy up, she’d already had dinner. So he’d taken her for a drive on South Butternut Lake Drive, which followed the curving shoreline of the lake. And Daisy had been perfectly happy, alternately watching Will drive—he was an amazing driver, the kind who drives with the same naturalness most people breathe with—and looking out the window at the soft, twilit night. Will had the radio tuned to a classic rock station, and the windows opened to the sweet, piney air, and just when Daisy had thought things couldn’t get any better, he’d smiled at her and reached over and taken her hand. He’d held it there, too, resting on the seat between them, until he’d driven, one-handed, all the way back into town again. But after he’d parked on Main Street, he’d made no move to walk her to her door. Instead, he’d pulled her into his arms and kissed her, gently at first, and then harder, pouring so much desire, finally, into that kiss that it had left Daisy half wishing he’d take her out to the beach again. But he’d stopped kissing her as suddenly as he’d started, and when he’d kissed her again, at her front door, it had been a chaste, almost polite kiss.
“Honestly, Daisy,” Jessica was saying now, a little impatiently. “I don’t know why you’re being so secretive. You’ve always told me everything before.”
“I know; you’re right. I’m sorry, Jessica,” Daisy said, feeling guilty. She didn’t want to hurt her friend’s feelings, but she also wanted to be alone with her own feelings for Will a little bit longer.
But Jessica didn’t look hurt now. She looked bemused. “You really like him, don’t you, Daisy?” she asked.
And Daisy sighed, because she really did.
Jessica studied her, frowning slightly. “But what do you like about him, Daisy?”
“What do I like about him?” Daisy repeated, a little stymied.
“Yeah. Like with Steve, for instance, I liked his abs. That’s basically why I was going out with him.”
“Oh,” Daisy said, a little taken aback.
“In retrospect,” Jessica said seriously, “it might not have been enough to base a relationship on.”
“No, maybe not,” Daisy said. But the memory of Steve’s abs seemed to have sent Jessica into another funk, because she got up to make herself another root beer float, leaving Daisy to ask herself the same question Jessica had just asked her: What did she like about Will? Well, everything, she admitted, even his abs, though her exposure to them had been limited to that first night at the beach. Still, she’d be lying if she said she didn’t like the way he looked. She did. She liked all the things she’d noticed about him that day he’d repaired the pickup: his gold-brown eyes, his athletic shoulders, his worth-waiting-for smile.
But there were other
things she liked about him, too, things that were harder to quantify. She liked his quietness, for instance. It wasn’t the quietness of someone who had nothing to say. It was the quietness of someone who didn’t feel the need to fill every silence with empty conversation, especially since the silences, with him, never felt strained or uncomfortable. They felt right, somehow. And he was a good listener, too. He really paid attention to what Daisy said, and when he commented on it, or responded to it, he didn’t say a lot, but he always said something that was insightful, or perceptive, or funny.
“Daisy, honestly, you’re acting like me,” Jessica said, coming back with her new root beer float. “I’m the one who falls in love after three dates. Not you.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t say I was in love,” she said, thinking that, crazily enough, she might be. “But I think when I told you not to jump into things too quickly, I was being a little hypocritical.”
“Daisy,” Jessica said, her brown eyes widening. “Did you two, are you . . . ?”
“Oh, no,” Daisy said, shaking her head emphatically. “Not even close.” Since the night at the beach, they’d only kissed, and Daisy understood that that was all they would do, too, unless she told him or, more likely, showed him that she wanted to do more. And she did want to do more. But she was afraid of the more; well, not the more itself, but the feelings that came with it. Because even Will’s kisses left her feeling like she was being pulled into something, like the time she’d gone swimming in Lake Superior as a kid and she’d felt as if the lake’s current was pulling her in. It had been scary and exciting, all at the same time. Will’s kisses made her feel exactly the same way.
“Daisy, are you all right?” Jessica asked, clearly worried. “You have the strangest expression on your face right now.”
“What? No, I’m fine,” Daisy said, trying to keep the memory of those kisses at bay, at least temporarily.
“This really is different, though, isn’t it? This thing with Will.”
“It is,” she said, and something about the expression on Jessica’s face made her add, “Why, is there something wrong with that?”
