Tell Me

by Strom, Abigail

  “Well, the point of art and fashion and all that isn’t just to be useful. It’s like the Book of Kells.”

  Her mind had made one of those leaps again, leaving him struggling to follow.

  “The book of what?”

  “It’s this medieval illuminated manuscript. The calligraphy and illustrations are incredibly elaborate. Irish monks spent years on it, sometimes taking months to decorate a single letter.”

  “And your point?”

  “They didn’t need to do that. It wasn’t useful. I mean, the text was the four Gospels of the Bible. They could have just written out the words. But they spent years, maybe decades, illuminating them with this gorgeous calligraphy. To the glory of God.”

  “I refuse to believe that puffed sleeves have anything to do with God.”

  Jane laughed. “No. But doing more than what’s strictly necessary is part of what makes us human. We make flourishes. Gestures.”

  “If you say so.” He turned the audiobook back on. “I just want to see what happens next.”

  What happened next was that Anne had to cut off her hair, after accidentally dying it green.

  She also nearly drowned in the Lake of Shining Waters (at least now he knew what that was) and had to be rescued by Gilbert.

  In the book, the lake was originally called Barry’s Pond. But Anne, who had an imagination like Jane’s, had a habit of renaming places and had christened it the Lake of Shining Waters instead.

  “And it’s a real lake? I mean, a real place in real life?”

  Jane nodded. “Well, a pond, anyway. In a town called Cavendish, which is what Avonlea is based on.”

  “Is that scene the reason Horn-Rims picked it for his meeting? Because Gilbert rescues Anne there?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe?”

  “I guess you could consider that romantic. Except that Anne snaps at Gilbert even after he rescues her.”

  “But she—”

  “She always snaps at Gilbert. Or pretends he doesn’t exist.”

  “That’s not—”

  “For a mistake he made five years before and totally apologized for. And she broke her slate over his head when it happened, so they should have called it even.”

  Watching her out of the corner of his eye, he could see Jane gathering herself up to deliver a stinging defense of her favorite book. Then she must have noticed the quirk at one corner of his mouth, because she relaxed and contented herself with a dignified glare.

  “I’d be happy to turn the book off if you’re so unimpressed with it.”

  She’d called his bluff.

  “You might as well leave the damn thing on now. I mean, we’ve made it this far.”

  By the time they pulled into the parking lot of the Owl Mountain Motor Lodge, Anne had won a scholarship to go to college, and she and Gilbert still hadn’t made up.

  He turned off the engine but not the power, waited for a break in the narration, and paused the audio. “How much more is there to go? Maybe we should stay here and listen to the end.”

  Jane grinned at him. “So you’re buying dinner, huh?”

  He couldn’t stop himself from reaching out the way he used to, giving her braid a quick tug. “Yeah, you win. It’s a good story. So should we listen to the end or what?”

  She shook her head. “I’m starving, and there’s forty-five minutes left. We can listen to the rest tomorrow.”

  “Fine, whatever. Don’t encourage my newfound love of literature. See if I care.”

  She rolled her eyes at him, and he realized suddenly that after ten hours in the car listening to a hundred-year-old children’s book, things between them were as close to normal as they’d been since before Sam’s death.

  Relief spread through him as he reached to unplug the phone, and she reached out at the same time.

  Their hands touched.

  How many times in his life had his hand brushed a woman’s? Whether it happened accidentally or on purpose, that one hint of contact could tell you everything you needed to know about your chemistry with another person.

  Touching Sam had felt secure and familiar, like touching a sibling. Touching the last woman he’d dated had felt anonymous, as though if he’d taken her hand in the dark, he wouldn’t have been able to tell her apart from anyone else.

  But he would know Jane’s hand with his eyes closed in a roomful of strangers.

  It wasn’t just the electricity that made the fine hairs on his forearms stand up. It was the feel of her skin and her faint, unmistakable scent, like sunlight and cinnamon. It was the click that happened somewhere deep inside him, as though magnet and metal had come together.

  His fingers closed over hers before he knew what he was doing. Their eyes met for one instant, but Jane’s expression was startled and wary. She pulled her hand away and opened her door.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Jane had been half joking when she’d started the audiobook, figuring Caleb would put up with it for ten minutes before insisting on music. Then, after an hour had gone by, she’d assumed he was humoring her.

  Until she realized he was actually caught up in the story.

  Anne had always been special to her. The girl with the wild imagination, the girl who loved books, the girl who saw fairies in raindrops and thought amethysts were the souls of good violets. The orphan who didn’t belong, who was odd and plain and not quite like her peers, but who still managed to find a family and form friendships and even fall in love.

  The part of herself that loved Anne was the part she’d been sure she could never share with Caleb. The part that, even if she did share it, she was sure he wouldn’t understand.

  That was one of the things she’d told herself this past winter, when the thought of him halfway around the world had been like a knife in her heart. She’d reminded herself that they had nothing in common, that a relationship between them would be impossible—and not just because he’d never stick around long enough to actually have one.

  She closed the car door and leaned back against it, waiting for Caleb to get out and open the trunk. Her hand still tingled where he’d touched her.

  The air was colder here than it had been in Brooklyn, and she wrapped her arms around her waist for warmth. It was dark, too, the few lights of the motel not doing much against the pitch-blackness of a rural Maine night. In the woods surrounding the parking lot, she could hear the rustling of trees and the hooting of owls and other sounds she couldn’t identify, and she remembered with a sinking feeling that she’d be hiking into that wilderness tomorrow. During the drive, listening to a favorite book and trying not to admire the muscles in Caleb’s arms and the ease and competence of his driving—the same ease and competence he brought to any physical task—she’d managed to forget about tomorrow’s leg of their journey.

  Behind her, she heard the driver’s side door slam. When she turned, the sight of Caleb’s broad shoulders reminded her of the weight of him above her, pressing her down into the couch cushions on a snowy night.

  She shivered. Caleb was more dangerous to her peace of mind than any mountaintop.

  He went around to the trunk. He left his pack in there but pulled out a small duffel along with her suitcase. When she reached for it, he shook his head.

  “I’ve got it,” he said, and his willingness to carry a burden for her—even just her suitcase—made her feel suddenly weak in the knees.

  And that, of course, was the problem. She couldn’t let herself get used to this feeling or to having Caleb around. With her only sister gone, she was living with a new kind of loneliness, and she needed to be strong. She couldn’t let herself sink as low as she had last Christmas, especially since Caleb wouldn’t be around to help her again.

  He’d be in Australia or Venezuela or Bali—or anywhere but where she was.

  When they went into the motel office, she had a sudden vision of how this would go if they were in a romantic comedy. In a movie, there’d be only one room available, and they’d have to share
.

  But this wasn’t a movie. It was real life in rural Maine, and there were plenty of vacancies.

  They took their room keys and went back outside. Their rooms were next to each other on the ground floor, not far from where Caleb had parked. Caleb handed Jane her suitcase before swiping his key card into his lock.

  “Dinner’s not going to be that elegant,” he said, pausing in the doorway. “The motel sells premade sandwiches, and there are vending machines at the end of the building. I’ll dump my stuff and grab us something. Anything you won’t eat, sandwich-wise?”

  “The only thing I don’t like is egg salad.”

  “Got it.”

  He started to go into his room, but she grabbed his arm. “Caleb.”

  He paused. “Yeah?”

  “Could I borrow the car keys?”

  “Sure, but what for? There’s nothing in there except . . .” He stopped.

  She felt like an idiot. “It’s just . . . the weather app on my phone says it’s going to get down into the forties tonight. I don’t . . . I don’t want to leave her out in the cold.”

  He looked at her for a second and then fished the keys out of his pocket.

  “Here you go,” he said. “I’ll get us some food.”

  Her hand closed around the keys. “Thanks.”

  She opened the back door and lifted the urn out. It felt heavy in her arms—heavier than it had that morning, as though it had gotten bigger or she’d gotten weaker. She carried it into her room, looked around, and set the urn down on a cheap-looking bureau under the ugliest painting she’d ever seen in her life. It appeared to be a farmhouse at sunset done by a grade-school kid with a set of neon markers.

  She looked at the urn, touching one of the white seagulls with a fingertip.

  “I should just leave you here to spend eternity with the most hideous painting in the universe. It would serve you right for dying.”

  There was a knock on the door, and she went to let Caleb in.

  He was holding a saran-wrapped sandwich in one hand—ham and cheese, it looked to be—and a Diet Coke in the other.

  “Your dinner,” he said with a smile. “Congrats on winning your bet.” He glanced over her shoulder into the room, his gaze falling on the urn. “Do you want company? I could grab my sandwich and eat in here with you.”

  She shook her head. “No, that’s okay. I’m just going to watch some TV and go to sleep.”

  “Good idea. We need to get an early start tomorrow.”

  “How early?”

  “I’d like to be at the trailhead by eight. It’s ten minutes from here, so we should leave around seven forty-five.”

  She sighed. “I can’t believe you’re making me do this.”

  He grinned at her. “You can’t pin this on me. Your sister was the one who told you exactly where to scatter her ashes. I’m just the chauffeur.”

  She sighed again. “Good night, chauffeur. Thanks for dinner.”

  He handed her the sandwich and soda. “Good night, Jane.”

  Then he was gone, pulling the door closed behind him.

  She ate in bed, watching an old episode of Law and Order and wishing she’d brought a book with her. She had e-books on her phone, but tonight she craved one of her battered old paperbacks, smelling a little musty, with lines in the corners where she’d dog-eared pages over the years.

  She felt wide awake after eating, and the urge to go next door and see Caleb was overwhelming. But she could feel the fault line in her heart where he was concerned, and she knew the wrong kind of pressure there would crack her wide open.

  Tomorrow she would be scattering Sam’s remains from the top of a mountain. That was enough emotion to deal with right now.

  It was only nine o’clock, but she had a big hike tomorrow and should get as much sleep as possible. She took a shower, not bothering with soap or shampoo once she discovered there wasn’t much water pressure, and braided her damp hair afterward.

  A hot shower—even one with lousy water pressure—could usually soothe her into sleepiness, but she knew as soon as her head hit the pillow that it wasn’t going to work tonight.

  She tossed and turned for an hour before giving up. She craved a cup of tea or hot chocolate, and she wondered if the vending alcove had an appliance that dispensed hot drinks.

  A few minutes later she learned that the answer was no. She settled for iced tea even though it was sweetened and flavored with lemon, which she hated. When the bottle rumbled down from the innards of the machine, she grabbed it and started back toward her room.

  She was still in the shadows near the vending area when she spotted a figure standing outside her door.

  She froze and moved closer to the wall, not wanting to be seen. An instant later she realized it was Caleb, and relief flooded through her.

  It must be his own door he was standing in front of, not hers. But as she waited for him to go inside, it occurred to her that his behavior was a little odd.

  He was standing absolutely still with his hands and his forehead pressed against the door.

  Was he okay? A part of her wanted to emerge from the shadows and go up to him, but what then? An awkward conversation in the middle of the night?

  What the heck was he doing, anyway?

  Eventually he pushed himself away from the door, but he still didn’t go inside. Instead, he crossed the parking lot to their car and got in the driver’s seat.

  Where could he be going at this hour? They were in the middle of nowhere.

  She waited, but the engine didn’t start. After a minute she realized it wasn’t going to and that, for some reason, Caleb just wanted to sit in the car for a while.

  The reason was none of her business. She should go back to her room and try again to sleep.

  Instead, she stood in the shadows by the vending machines and watched the car for five minutes.

  Damn that man, anyway. What was he doing? She wouldn’t be able to sleep until she was sure he was okay.

  She crossed the parking lot and went up to the driver’s side window. Caleb was frowning down at the steering wheel and didn’t notice her. She rapped on the glass, and he jumped.

  “Jesus Christ,” he said, lowering the window. “You scared the shit out of me.”

  “I just wanted to see if you were okay,” she said. “What are you—”

  Then, suddenly, she heard a familiar voice.

  “Marilla went to town the next day . . .”

  “You’re listening to Anne of Green Gables,” she said, seeing Caleb’s phone hooked up to the audio port.

  He shrugged, looking embarrassed. “I downloaded it, but I don’t have headphones with me. It sounded kind of tinny without the car’s speakers, so I came out here.”

  She started to smile. “You’re listening to the end of the book.”

  “I couldn’t sleep,” he said defensively. “And I wanted to know how it turned out.” He paused. “Matthew dies,” he said, almost accusingly.

  She went around to the passenger side and got in beside him. “You can’t be mad at me because a fictional character died.”

  Caleb shifted in his seat to face her. “Are you saying you didn’t feel sad when you read that part?”

  “No, I totally did. But Matthew lived a long and full life. And he’s fictional.”

  Caleb didn’t look convinced. “I didn’t think this was the kind of book where someone would die. I mean, it’s a kids’ book. It sort of took me by surprise.”

  She reached out and un-paused the audio. “Let’s listen to the rest.”

  And so they sat in the cold, dark car and listened to the last chapter together. After it was done, they sat for a minute in silence.

  “So, did you like it?”

  Caleb nodded. “Yeah. I’m glad Anne and Gilbert finally made up. They waited until the very end of the book, though.”

  “I know, but they have plenty of time together in the rest of the series. They fall in love and get married and have kids.”r />
  “It’s a series? Damn. Are you going to make me listen to more books?”

  Jane smiled. “No, the first one’s the best.” She paused. “But isn’t it nice to know that Anne and Gilbert have a happy ending, out there in bookland?”

  “Yeah, I guess it is.” He unplugged his phone and slid it into his pocket. “It’s pretty cold out here. We should probably—”

  “Wait.”

  She put a hand on his shoulder, and a little tingle of electricity shot up her arm.

  She pulled her hand back as he turned to look at her.

  “What?”

  “I want . . .” She swallowed. “I want you to tell me something.”

  He looked puzzled. “Sure.”

  “I want you to tell me why you always spend Christmas alone.”

  With the phone unplugged and the car’s power off, it was dark in the front seat of the car. Maybe it would be easier for Caleb to tell her something personal in the dark, when they couldn’t really see each other’s faces.

  When he didn’t answer her right away, she felt a little encouraged. He could’ve just said no and left, after all. But he was still here.

  “You know the worst thing that ever happened to me,” she said after a moment. “Can’t you tell me the worst thing that ever happened to you?”

  Caleb shifted in his seat. “See, now, this is what happens when a woman sees you cry over a children’s book. She thinks she can ask all kinds of personal questions.”

  She could tell by the tone of his voice that he wasn’t going to walk away.

  “Did you actually cry about Matthew? Seriously?”

  “There might have been a few tears.” He paused. “Okay. Well. My father killed himself when I was twelve years old.”

  It was like a punch in the gut. She’d expected to hear about a death, but she’d thought it would be cancer or a car accident.

  Not this.

  “Oh, Caleb.” A horrible thought occurred to her. “He didn’t do it at Christmas?”

  Caleb gave a short laugh. “No, he was very careful not to do it at Christmas. Or on New Year’s Day. In his suicide note, he explained that he didn’t want me and my brother to associate ‘the event’ with any special date. So he waited until December 27.” He paused. “But that only meant the entire fucking holiday season was associated with ‘the event.’”