The Christmas Promise

by Janice Carter

  “I’m sorry, though, that you were blamed all these years,” she unexpectedly murmured, looking directly at Ella. “I wouldn’t have wished that on you, despite my jealousy over you and Ben that summer.” Her mouth twisted. “I’m guessing everything worked out for you and Grace anyway. Maybe with Ben, too. I saw him on my way to Portland. From up there.” She gestured to the dunes behind them.

  The three women stared at one another until Cassie mumbled, “Guess I should head out. I just saw on my phone that part of the highway is open.” She placed her hand on the car door.

  “Wait! Tell us how you’ve been and what you’re doing. We could...we could talk a bit more.”

  “I really ought to go, but thanks for asking, Grace.”

  “Are you sure? The hotel here is open,” Ella suggested.

  Cassie smiled. “Always liked that place. I appreciate that both of you are asking me to stay longer, considering the damage I brought you. Not that I’ve kept track of either of you, but from the way life turned out for me after—at school and even when I went to college—I’m thinking your lives must have been affected, as well. Am I right?”

  Ella nodded and heard Grace murmur a faint “Yes.”

  “What I thought. I’m sorry about that. It was all my fault and I never said a word when I could have. I wish I had, but—”

  “I didn’t speak up when I should have either, Cassie. You weren’t alone in that.”

  “You always were sweet, Grace. I’m sorry I pulled you into it.”

  “Let’s stop blaming ourselves and each other,” Ella cried. “I was jealous of the connection between you two, your high school friendship that was a new thing for me that summer. Grace was ticked off because Ben was getting more of my attention than she was. As for Ben, he was the attraction for both of us, wasn’t he, Cassie? All three of us were on this roller coaster of insecurity that we couldn’t have controlled even if we’d wanted. Until everything crashed that Labor Day weekend.” She took a deep breath, adding in a calmer voice, “We were teenagers with adolescent behaviors.”

  “And undeveloped prefrontal cortexes to boot. I’m a social worker, mainly dealing with teenagers,” Cassie explained.

  Ella heard Grace say, “Oh my,” and added, “That’s awesome, Cassie.”

  “Thanks. Took me a while to get there, mind you. Anyway—” she opened the car door “—I really need to leave. If either of you are ever up Bar Harbor way...” She climbed inside and shut the door, then rolled the window down. “And I know I can get in touch with you, Grace, through The Beacon. I saw Ben’s name on the masthead in this last issue. Also saw your article in the Press Herald, Ella. Nice piece. Thanks, you two, for...for this talk. I’m guessing we all needed it.” The window rolled up.

  Grace and Ella stood back as the car inched forward, then picked up momentum, heading toward Main Street and the road out of town.

  “A social worker dealing with teens!”

  “Makes sense, though.” Ella stared at the car until it disappeared from view.

  “How?”

  “That’s Cassie’s way of making up. Atoning. Like you and the memorial.”

  “And you and your novel.”

  Ella couldn’t help wondering if any of their atonements would ever bring them peace of mind. Yet what could possibly be gained from continually fanning the fires of blame? Suddenly Ben’s face from that morning appeared in her mind. Her response to his confession about the note had been to blame him. He’d been a teenager then, too. She took a deep breath. Maybe it was time she fixed things.

  “Come on, Grace. We have doors to knock on.” She tucked her arm through her friend’s as they left the Fielding cottage behind.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  HIS BACK WAS killing him. Ben didn’t know how many sidewalks and porches he’d cleared, but he did know his body felt years older. Midafternoon he texted Drew to ask about Henry and to see if Drew wanted to meet him at the hotel to look for Grace and Ella. Maybe they could grab a bite to eat at the soup kitchen they’d been telling some of the snowbound people about, those who could walk to the hotel for food. Drew had texted that Henry was okay, happy to subsist on cheese and crackers until the power returned. It was late afternoon by the time Ben met Drew inside the ballroom of the hotel. They scanned the room for Ella and Grace but found Suzanna instead.

  “Haven’t seen them for a while. Ella suggested they go through the residential areas to check on people. Seniors or others who may not know the assistance locations.”

  “Ella said that?”

  “Yep, and I bet she and Grace are still canvassing. Some of the volunteers they enlisted have gone home, but not those two. I’ve seen them coming and going all day, delivering items to people who can’t make it to the hotel. A lot of people who managed to get here did so because Grace and Ella told them what we were doing. Some of them had no cell phone connection and were very appreciative of the information. When you see Grace and Ella, pass on my thanks, too, will you?”

  “For sure.” Ben found Drew talking to someone from the historical society, a man whose name Ben couldn’t remember. “Sorry to interrupt,” he said with a nod to the man before focusing on Drew. “Zanna says Ella and Grace are out spreading the word about where to get help. I’m going to text Ella and see if she’s ready for a break. Maybe we’ll go back home for a bit since it’s pretty crowded in here.”

  “Sounds like a plan. Leonard says parts of the highway have opened up but no word yet on utility crews.”

  Ben immediately wondered if Ella had heard the same news about the highway. What if she went back to Boston without seeing him? An irrational sense of urgency swept through him until he remembered her car was still at the worksite. This was his chance, and he wasn’t going to let a snowstorm ruin it. He turned his back on the two men while he texted her.

  Are you and Grace finished yet? Meet up back at the house? Please!!

  * * *

  ELLA’S FATIGUE WAS the good kind—the physical euphoria after a strenuous workout. Her mental state was another matter—a mind in turmoil that needed rest more than her body. She and Grace had traveled more streets in the Cove than she’d known existed, and her head was full of all the smiles, thanks and best wishes heaped upon her throughout the long day. Although they’d split up, they’d kept in touch by text and had seen one another on the trips back and forth to the hotel, collecting things for people. Fortunately, those items were fairly small, like batteries for flashlights, candles, matches and bottled water. Two of the volunteers had brought sleds to ferry bulkier items.

  When she got Ben’s text, relief seeped through her. The urgency of that last word was oddly touching, as if he seriously needed to see her as soon as possible. Her phone died before she could reply, and Grace was nowhere in sight, so she decided to walk back to the Winters home. Trudging up the snow-covered hill leading to the highway, she heard the rev of an engine behind and moved to the shoulder. Craning her neck around, she waved when she recognized the car.

  “Want a lift?” Ben called through the open passenger-side window.

  “You bet.” She opened the door, letting a blast of icy air into the car and exhaling loudly as she plunked onto the passenger seat. “Good timing!”

  He took his foot off the brake and pulled back onto the road. “Do you know where Grace is?”

  “She got a text from Drew just before you sent yours and has gone to meet him at the hotel. She thinks he’ll probably go back to Portland if the highway’s open.”

  “And what about you?”

  “What do you mean?” She hated to play coy, because she knew exactly what he meant but wanted him to say it.

  “I mean, will you have to leave?”

  “Well, I can’t stay forever, can I?” She regretted her tone, but seriously, why didn’t he simply ask her to stay, if that’s what he was hinting at?

 
“Why not, Ella? Why can’t you stay? Here in Lighthouse Cove, with me? I know you haven’t had time to accept what I told you this morning, and it’s way too early to expect you to forgive me, but I’m hoping you can at least let me know if I have a chance of being forgiven. I...uh...I need that to be able to get through the days ahead.” He took a deep breath. “The thing is, I can’t lose you again. A life without you will have no meaning at all for me.”

  Ella looked out the car window, struggling to control herself. The car slowed as he pulled it over to the side of the road again. She heard Ben shift gears and then his soft voice. “Hey, are you crying?”

  She knew if she tried to speak, the emotions from the past two weeks would spill out into loud, embarrassing sobs. But she couldn’t keep it inside a moment longer.

  She had to tell him how she’d treated Brandon that night, laughing in his face and humiliating him. What did her silence say about their chances of being together in an honest, trusting relationship like the one Grace obviously had with Drew?

  “This morning you took the brave step of confessing about the note and I let my hurt and anger get control of me, but I also had a secret shame. When I realized Brandon and I had been set up, I was embarrassed and took it out on him. I was mean, even though he’d been duped, too. If I’d been nicer, he might not have run away. We could have had a laugh about the whole thing and our lives would have turned out so differently.” She had to stop, overcome with tears.

  He pulled her away from the window into an awkward embrace over the car’s console. She laid her head against the damp fabric of his down jacket and closed her eyes, her whole body soaking up the warmth of the car, his arms and the low shushing sound he was making, as if she were a baby needing to be rocked to sleep. Ella nestled farther into his arms, ignoring the gear shift digging into her thigh, her mind lulled into a kind of hypnotic state that she wished she could float in forever. But eventually she could no longer ignore the hard metal of the gear shift, and she moved away.

  “This morning—no, maybe it was last night—you asked me if I thought it was too late for us. Do you remember?” Ben asked, keeping his eyes on hers.

  “Yes,” she whispered. She reined in the questions and thoughts that had been racing through her mind since he’d told her what he’d done with the note. She knew she’d been mean to him afterward, but now she could see his admission as courageous. He could have kept quiet about it, and she’d never have known.

  “My answer is still no, I don’t think it’s too late, but—”

  He stopped, and Ella stiffened at that conditional last word. “I have to pass that question back to you, Ella. After what I told you this morning, do you think it’s too late for us?”

  She pivoted around, reaching for his hand. “No! Oh no, Ben. I...I don’t want it to be too late and I’ll do whatever needs to be done to make it not be too late.”

  He drew her to him. “I may hold you to that promise,” he whispered, his lips brushing the strands of hair across her ear.

  Ella kissed his neck and the underside of his chin until he got the message, lowering his mouth onto hers, and she knew she wanted to be like this—in his arms with his lips on hers—for the rest of her life.

  Then the rumble of a stomach echoed in the car, and they broke apart, laughing. “Yours or mine?” she asked.

  His grin was the answer. “Can we take a lunch check for the rest of this conversation?”

  “Is that a promise?” she teased.

  “Definitely.” His eyes lingered on hers a moment longer, then he shifted the car into gear and they headed home.

  * * *

  MUCH LATER, AS THEY were finishing lentil soup at the island counter in his mother’s kitchen while his parents napped upstairs, Ben watched Ella scrape her spoon around her empty bowl, transfixed by the concentration in her face and the way she ran her tongue along her lower lip after every lick of the spoon. He recalled the night they’d sipped hot chocolate down by the harbor her first weekend back in Lighthouse Cove and the way she’d enjoyed it, uninhibited by him sitting next to her.

  This Ella Jacobs was a contradiction in many ways, he now realized, and far more complex than the sixteen-year-old girl he’d fallen for that summer. She could be coolly aloof, her emotions tightly held in check until a simple word or gesture shattered the icy calm, exposing the vulnerable woman inside. That was the woman he wanted to shelter, but at the same time, he knew Ella could stand very well on her own. She didn’t need his protection.

  But Ben also knew in his heart that his desire to keep her from harm was linked to the past and what they’d both experienced. She’d been brave to expose her pain from that summer, and he’d been hiding his own behavior. All through lunch, he’d been thinking about that and wondering what he could do to compensate. An idea didn’t actually take shape until after she set her spoon down and said, “Grace and I met Cassie Fielding today, near her old house.”

  The comment, delivered in such a matter-of-fact tone, left him speechless.

  “I’ll tell you the whole story later,” she went on, “but I think she’s suffered as much as Grace and I have. Maybe more. I realized after talking to her that her suffering wasn’t caused so much by whispers and innuendo, because she’s been away from here. It was caused by guilt and shame. Maybe even by the choices she made later, too. All of us have made some questionable choices since then, haven’t we?”

  He nodded in spite of the small stab of regret that the talk was turning serious. He’d been hoping for a return to that moment in the car when his lips had been on hers.

  “I can’t speak for you or Grace,” Ella said, “but I think I can live with my choices, knowing—”

  “Knowing what?” he asked, every nerve in his body on full alert. When she glanced quickly away, as if afraid to continue, he said, “What I know is that I’ll do whatever it takes to convince you to stay.”

  “Here in the Cove?”

  He saw the apprehension in her face. “I know it’ll be a challenge, but you’ve got my whole family on your side now, and I’ll be with you. Always. Like the title of your book.”

  Her laugh filled the kitchen and his anxiety eased enough for him to add, “I have a feeling in a very short time you’ll be a townie, like the rest of us.”

  “You mean I won’t always be summer people?”

  “Nope. Never again.”

  “My job—”

  “You can have a job here if you want one.” The offer was impulsive, but he liked the idea at once. “My friend Paul, who’s part owner with me at The Beacon, wants a year off to travel with his wife. I’ll be looking for a temporary manager-editor. Someone with established newspaper experience.”

  “Wouldn’t that be a conflict of interest?” She arched an eyebrow.

  He pretended to seriously mull over her question. “Not if we set up a ground rule or two.”

  “Such as?” She was grinning now.

  “What happens at the paper stays at the paper and what happens at home—”

  “Stays at home. I think I can live with that.”

  It was all coming together now. A way for her to be in the Cove and hopefully not have to put up with the stress of being misjudged.

  Another, more important thought took shape. “There’s something else. A challenge, if you’re willing to take it on.” She looked so serious he rushed on, “Why not tell your story to the town? I mean, I know Grace plans to let her circle of friends in on what happened to you, but the community that judged you then and now needs to hear the truth—from you.” The sudden flash of interest in her eyes told him he was on the right track. “I think your first task as managing editor of The Beacon should be an editorial on community loyalty and solidarity—focusing on how those very values failed a sixteen-year-old girl one summer. Write your story for the Cove to read.”

  She didn’t speak for such
a long time he began to have second thoughts about the idea. Then she said, “I’d like that, Ben. Very much. It would give me hope about staying here with you and feeling like a part of the town. A real part, as a resident.”

  He reached across the counter to clasp her hand. “I love you. I have always loved you and I will always love you.”

  “I love you, Ben.”

  When he trusted himself to speak, he asked, “Then I suppose you’ll agree to spending the night here, at home with us? And will you come for Christmas? I can round up some borrowed furniture for my place.”

  That brought a smile. “I’m all yours, Ben. Always have been and always will be.”

  He stood up and rounded the counter to pull her into his arms. “That’s what I’ve been waiting to hear,” he whispered as he kissed her.

  * * *

  THE TOWN SQUARE Christmas tree wasn’t as pretty as it had been a couple weeks ago. The crane was back and workmen were restringing the tree with lights. Other than losing lights, some decorations and a few broken branches from the weight of the snow, the tree had managed to withstand the brunt of the storm. Ben watched them for a few minutes after leaving Town Hall from his meeting with the mayor and a few councilors.

  Hard to believe that four days ago the square was hidden beneath a massive blanket of snow, and even more incredible that less than two weeks ago, he and Ella had stood here as the tree was officially lit. Ben was beginning to understand what his parents meant when they lamented the rapid passage of time. Except in his case, the sense of fleeting time wasn’t due to aging—though he did feel years older—but to the turmoil and upheaval of the last fourteen or so days.

  But he wasn’t about to waste the day before Christmas ruminating about all that had occurred since Ella’s return to Lighthouse Cove. Finding out his condo project had been given the green light from town council was a big step toward healing from all the recent “bad vibes,” as Gracie would say.