Fly Away with Me

by Susan Fox

  “Could she be my aunt?”

  “No, sorry. I told her about your mission and she said her name’s always been Marlise, and she and her sister, who lives in Kelowna, are in touch often. She said she’d think back to the commune days to see if she remembered anything that might help you.”

  “I look forward to meeting her.”

  “You’ll meet Lionel, too. We’re dining at his house.”

  “They’re the couple who are, uh, friends with benefits, right? Who don’t want to live together?”

  “That’s them.”

  And Lionel was Aaron’s mentor. “I’m looking forward to meeting them. They speak like normal people, don’t they?”

  He threw back his head and laughed. “Yeah. And they both have sharp brains. But still, they’re islanders. Don’t go all lawyerlike on them.”

  “I’ll try to refrain.”

  Aaron pulled into the parking area in front of a small store called We Got It. “We can buy wine here. The owner prides himself on carrying the essentials of life: food staples, a bit of fresh produce, basic bathroom stuff.” Mischief tweaked his lips. “Condoms.”

  “If you’re buying condoms, I’m not coming in with you.”

  He gave a snort of amusement. “You’re acting like a teenager. Anyhow, I’m not buying them. I already have enough.”

  Enough for what? Were they really going to have sex? She accompanied him inside. We Got It had an old-fashioned country store feel to it. While Aaron went to choose wine, she got sidetracked by a big bulletin board plastered with notices of items for sale or wanted, services offered or sought, upcoming meetings and events, even a birth announcement complete with a photo of a bald, beaming infant. She decided there’d be nothing lost, tomorrow morning, in creating a poster with the photos of Lucy and asking anyone who had information to give her a call. Hopefully, the GPS on her phone could lead her back to this store.

  Aaron returned with a bottle of Destiny Cellars riesling and another of zinfandel, saying that Marlise and Lionel liked them both. The wine wasn’t cheap and she insisted on paying. “The whole purpose of the dinner is so I can get information. Besides, you bought dinner last night. This is the least I can do.”

  From the store they drove east, past cottages with artisan signs and fields with crops, sheep, and cattle. One place even had alpacas, which Aaron told her produced wool weavers valued. The bucolic feel of the area relaxed her, and it was a surprise when the scenery changed again and they drove into a forest of tall evergreens. “For one small island, there’s a lot of variety in terrain,” she commented.

  “Wait until you see the rest of it. Especially the beaches.”

  The road here was single lane and paved, though the pavement was well-worn. They passed a couple of long, dirt-track driveways that disappeared off into the woods, and then Aaron turned onto the next one. A few hundred yards along, the road ended in a gravel cul-de-sac, where he parked beside a battered old black truck and a yellow Volkswagen Beetle—one of the original ones, nicely maintained. Behind a screen of leafy green trees, she glimpsed a wooden A-frame house. A medium-sized brown dog of no discernible breed came slowly down the gravel walk from the house, tail wagging amiably. The white around its muzzle told her it was elderly.

  “Hey, Chester,” Aaron greeted the dog, bending to give him a good rub.

  Eden leaned down, extending her hand, and when Chester sniffed it and wagged his tail, she, too, stroked him. Unless the dog was Marlise’s, Lionel didn’t live entirely alone.

  Aaron took a small cooler out of the back of the Jeep, Eden carried the bag with the wine, and Chester followed as they walked along the gravel path to the door.

  The house wasn’t large and the weathered wood suggested it had been here quite a while. The yard, if it could be called that, featured only a few randomly planted rhododendrons, flowering in shades of pink, purple, and orange-yellow. A man’s home, not a woman’s, but attractive in its own way, like a small oasis only semicarved out of the surrounding wilderness.

  The front door had a dog door in it and a tarnished brass bell hanging beside it, which Aaron rang. A male voice hollered, “We’re decent. Come on in.”

  As they entered, with Chester choosing to stay outside, a woman came toward them. Like Azalea, she was slim, tallish, and tanned, though the wrinkles fanning from the corners of her eyes were less sharply etched. In every other way, she was Azalea’s stylish opposite. Her hair, a mixture of blond, brown tones, and silvery gray, was short and fashionably layered. She wore a silk-screened blouse in shades of blue and silver over narrow-legged jeans, and her feet were in jeweled sandals. Her jewelry—dangly earrings and a pendant necklace—was silver with deep blue stones Eden thought were lapis lazuli.

  Marlise and Aaron embraced, and then she held out her hand to Eden. “Hi, I’m Marlise. Welcome to Destiny Island.”

  “Thank you. And thanks to you and Lionel for the dinner invitation.”

  “It’ll be casual. I hope that’s okay.”

  “Of course.” She held out the bag. “Here’s my contribution.”

  “Wonderful. Come on through to the kitchen.”

  Aaron picked up the cooler again and followed Marlise. Eden trailed behind, casting a glance around. The front room was small, with a single bed shoved against one wall, a desk under the front window, and a couple of oil seascapes. On the other side of a narrow hall was a closed door, and a flight of wooden steps led to the second floor.

  She entered the kitchen, which was larger than the bedroom/office. Big windows drew her, and she walked over to see the view. “Wow.” The house stood near the edge of what looked like a cliff. In front of her, past a wood-slatted deck, was a weathered rock outcropping, and beyond it the intense, almost indigo bluish-green of the ocean, broken by white curls lacing the tops of waves. A stunning tree framed the view, its trunk and limbs curved in graceful, feminine lines. The bark was orange-brown, lighter than cinnamon, and the leaves were a deep, shiny green.

  A male chuckle, raspier than Aaron’s, broke the spell, and the man said, “Not much I can do to compete with a view like that.”

  She turned, embarrassed, to see a stocky, gray-haired guy in jeans and a plaid shirt, his grin a flash of white against skin the color of black coffee. “I’m so sorry. That was rude of me. You must be Lionel.” She walked toward him to shake his hand.

  “And you’re Eden, Aaron’s new friend.” Dark brown eyes studied her from behind horn-rims.

  She hoped she measured up to whatever he was looking for. “Thank you for inviting me for dinner.”

  “Aaron says you’re not the typical tourist.”

  Marlise chimed in. “Tourists rarely get invited to islanders’ homes.”

  “Should I ask why?”

  “We have a love-hate relationship with them,” the woman said. “Destiny Islanders are possessive about this place. We figure we’re the only ones who truly understand and appreciate it. Besides, we think of the stores, marinas, parks, and so on as ours. In tourist season, day-trippers flood in on each day’s ferry, families come to camp, visitors fill the B and Bs and resorts, and boaters clog the marinas and harbors. In off-season, you walk down the street and recognize ninety percent of the people you see. In tourist season, it’s the opposite.”

  “But,” Aaron said, “the island’s economy is based in large part on tourism. Hence the love part of the equation.”

  “I’ve only been here a couple of days, but I can see the island’s appeal.”

  Lionel gave her that assessing gaze again. “The superficial appeal. There’s a whole different appeal when you live here and a winter storm takes out your power lines.”

  “Or when you break your ankle and a neighbor you’ve been squabbling with shows up with casseroles and beer,” Marlise said. “For us longtimers, our relationship with Destiny is like a marriage that’s stood the test of time. Or”—she winked at Lionel—“a non-marriage that’s stood the test of time. There’s frustration and crankiness
sometimes, but there’s a bond, soul deep, connecting you.” Cocking her head, she asked Eden, “Do you understand what I mean?”

  “It sounds like me and my little sister,” she said wryly.

  Aaron gave a snort and Marlise laughed and said, “I think you’ve got it. Of course, not all islanders feel that way. Some hate being cut off from the world or have itchy feet or are drawn to cities or job opportunities. A number of our young people leave.” She glanced at Aaron. “But a lot return. And some visitors do fall for the island’s quirky lifestyle and decide to build their lives here. The population’s always a bit in flux.”

  Eden nodded, and Marlise said briskly, “Why are we all standing here in the middle of the room? Eden, you go sit at the kitchen table and enjoy the view. Aaron, if you’d be so kind as to open that lovely wine and pour for us? Lionel and I will finish the dinner preparations.”

  After offering to help and being waved aside, Eden obeyed instructions. The others got to work with amiable teasing but a fair degree of efficiency. The kitchen was hardly modern, but it had the basics, along with a few relatively gourmet touches like an espresso machine.

  It turned out Aaron’s cooler held crabs bought fresh that afternoon at the dock, which he nonchalantly tossed in a huge pot of boiling water. Eden had a horrible feeling those crabs had been alive, but she didn’t look too closely nor ask.

  Lionel took place mats, napkins, and cutlery out to a table and chairs on the deck. Marlise, standing at the counter, assembled a giant salad. A delicious yeasty smell came from the oven, and when a timer went off, Marlise took out two loaves of Italian bread. In an amazingly short time they were sitting down outside to eat. It wasn’t chilly yet, but the approach of evening lent a crispness to the air that had Eden and Marlise donning cardigans.

  After Eden inquired about the beautiful orange-barked tree and was told it was an arbutus, they all began dismembering their crabs and dunking pieces of meat in melted butter. “This is the east side of the island, isn’t it?” she asked. “So we won’t see the sunset?”

  “Right,” Lionel said. “Except we often get a kind of echo of it. A pink glow in the sky, a reflection in the ocean.”

  “The sunrises are incredible, though,” Aaron said. “Moonrises too.”

  Eden realized he’d never said where he lived. Lionel had been his mentor, so was it possible Aaron roomed with the older man? The deck was large, running past the kitchen and outside what was obviously another room. The house was big enough, just barely, to hold two people. “Do you live here, too?” she asked.

  “Close enough.” He pointed past one end of the deck to a trail that ran off into the trees. “That’s the path that leads down to the beach, and another branch of it goes to my place.”

  Lionel must have had another cottage on his land or perhaps let Aaron build one. What a generous guy. The two men might call themselves loners, but in the half hour she’d been with them she’d seen the clear affection between them.

  Talk over dinner was relaxed: the food, the island, places Eden should see, the climate here and in Ottawa. Eden got Lionel to tell her about teaching Aaron to fly, which he did with enthusiasm, saying Aaron was a natural. She heard about Marlise’s experiences as a social worker, and how she played the cello in a chamber quintet. By the time the four crabs had been reduced to a pile of shells and both bottles of wine had been consumed, the air had cooled off enough that Eden suppressed a shiver.

  Marlise rose. “We’ll have dessert in the front room.” She began to clear the table.

  The others followed her example and then she took their requests for coffee or tea and shooed them all out of the kitchen. Eden discovered that the other room on the ocean side was a living room. It, too, had large windows, and a big fireplace made of unevenly shaped rocks, along with an overstuffed couch and a couple of chairs. Chester lay curled up in a dog bed by the fireplace.

  Lionel opened a window a couple of inches. “Get a fire going, Aaron. If there’s any problem with the wood, you know who to blame.” As he gestured Eden to the couch and seated himself in one of the chairs, Lionel told her, “The boy cuts down the trees and chops up the wood.” He held up a gnarled hand. “Damned arthritis. I can do most things, but chopping’s a hard one.”

  Marlise entered the room holding a tray. She put it on a coffee table made from a wooden burl and handed out their drinks. “Back in a minute.”

  Aaron’s fire had caught, and he pulled the screen across the fireplace and came to sit beside Eden, his thigh brushing hers and sending sexual awareness rippling through her.

  Marlise returned, this time with bowls full of something pink and smelling of fruit, with vanilla ice cream on top. “Strawberry-rhubarb crumble, made with fruit from my garden.”

  Eden took a bite and sighed with pleasure. Because she so rarely ate dessert, this was a special treat. “What a wonderful meal.” Glancing at her host, she asked, “Lionel, how long have you been on Destiny Island?”

  “Since the end of ’69.” He put down his coffee, spooned up some dessert, and chewed and swallowed. “You’re too young to know what it was like back then. I was an American, my country involved in that crazy war in Vietnam, boys going off and getting killed. And for what?”

  “You’ve probably heard of the draft,” Marlise said. “It was a lottery. Who’d be sent off next to be killed? Only the boys, of course. And all because of a war that many, many people considered to be immoral. There were a lot of protests. Pacifists sticking flowers in rifle barrels. Maybe you’ve seen some pictures.”

  “I learned a bit about it in school,” Eden said.

  “What she’s leading up to,” Lionel said, “is that a lot of the boys who were drafted, or might’ve been, didn’t stick around. They left the country, and most came to Canada. Draft dodgers, they called us.”

  Us. So that’s what had brought him here.

  “Some folks called us cowards and worse,” Lionel said. “Looking back, I can’t say I’m sure why I did it. I could tell myself it was the moral thing. I could espouse pacifism, which I do mostly believe in. But at that moment in time, maybe I was just scared of getting my ass blown off in some foreign country.”

  Marlise leaned forward to touch his hand. “If it had been a different kind of war, you would have gone. I know that, Lionel Williams, even if you don’t.”

  “I know it, too,” Aaron put in.

  “Well,” Lionel said, “it’s the past. I came north from California, across the border, heard about the Gulf Islands, and found myself on Destiny. Stayed. Found work doing this and that, learned how to fly the same way Aaron did, from an old geezer with time on his hands. Bought myself a little Cessna, built this place. Settled in.” He shot Eden a level gaze through his horn-rims. “I was never a hippie. Never set foot on that commune.”

  He could have said that right at the beginning, but instead he’d chosen to tell her his story. She appreciated his trust and knew it was due to Aaron’s befriending her.

  “But I did,” Marlise said. She put down her bowl, the dessert only half-finished. “Aaron told us about Lucy. I’ve searched my memory, but I honestly can’t remember anyone at the commune by that name.”

  Discouraged, Eden sighed. Had her aunt vanished into thin air?

  Chapter Seven

  Seeing the disappointment on Eden’s face, Aaron set down his empty dessert bowl and put his arm around her slumped shoulders. “Marlise,” he said, “what about Lucy’s boyfriend, a guy named Barry, last name unknown?”

  Eden’s shoulders straightened and she shot him a grateful look. “Yes, Barry. They’d have arrived in the spring or summer of 1969. Lucy was from Ottawa, and probably Barry was, too, though I’m not positive.”

  “I didn’t join the commune until a bit later.” Marlise pressed her lips together. “Eden, you need to understand what it was like. I was a Destiny Islander, but other members of the commune came from all over the place. Many were escaping things, like war or dysfunctional families or soc
ietal mores that didn’t make sense to them. Some were really just into the drugs, the free love, the seductive music. But most of us were actually seeking something better, a new, free, more natural, less judgmental way of life.”

  “That fits with what I know about Lucy.”

  “We lived in the moment,” Marlise said. “We rarely talked about the past, about homes, families, schools, old friends. Lucy and Barry might never have mentioned that they came from Ottawa. We didn’t use surnames. Some of the kids didn’t even use their real names. They rechristened themselves.”

  “Like Azalea,” she said.

  “Yes. And when they had babies, they gave them hippie names.” Her lips curved. “I always wondered how the little boy named Blueberry Rainbow made out, and whether he changed his name when he got older.”

  Aaron snorted with laughter at the name, but Eden had that scrunchy frown again. “So you’re saying that Lucy . . .” Her voice trailed off.

  “She could’ve been there but called herself Sunrise or Willow.”

  “Show her the photos, Eden,” Aaron prompted.

  She rose, and his arm felt cold without her inside its curve. She went out to the kitchen, where she’d left her bag. Returning, she pulled out her phone. “My grandparents tried to destroy all trace of Lucy, but Mom managed to hang on to a few things. This is a school picture, but Lucy was three years younger than when she left.”

  “Ah,” Marlise said, “the old Patty Duke hairstyle. She wouldn’t have been wearing her hair that way at the commune. Hmm. I’m trying to imagine her older, likely with long, straight hair parted in the middle. Either that or supershort like Twiggy, the model.”

  Aaron didn’t know the women she was talking about but did know that hairstyles could dramatically change a woman’s appearance.

  “And this is a picture of the two of them together,” Eden told Marlise, “but the girl facing the camera is Mom, not Lucy. You can only see Lucy’s profile.”

  Marlise looked at the second photo, then at Eden. “You favor your mother.”