University always made me crabby.
Sam flung back the kitchen door and stared at the room with a look of awe on her face.
“Come on,” I said. “It’s not that great.”
“It’s perfect! Look at this countertop.” She caressed the red-and-gold flecked pre-Formica. “And this floor!” She stooped to take a closer look at the rubbery tan and black tiles.
I supposed I shouldn’t expect anything less from a woman who owned a ’50s diner and a ’70s VW bus.
“Well, where do you want me?” Sam asked, adjusting the overnight bag on her shoulder.
I swallowed. My room upstairs was my cozy haven. I wasn’t about to give it up for company. That left the downstairs bedroom, the only one with a bed. But that had been my mother’s snug harbor. I wasn’t sure I could give it up to Sam either.
I sighed. It was only temporary.
I walked down the hall to the door. “You can sleep in here for now, I guess.” I swung it open. The picture window on the far wall framed the lake view to perfection. Even with the tatty mattress showing, the room felt bright and clean.
Sam brushed past me to the window ledge. “It’s gorgeous.” She turned back to look at the bed. “I brought my own stuff, so you don’t have to worry about sheets and towels and all that.” She peeked around. “I’ve even got my own bathroom!”
“Uhh . . .” I followed her in while she flipped open the medicine cabinet and checked out behind the shower curtain. “This is the only bathroom that’s working a hundred percent right now, so we’ll have to share.”
“Goody!” She slung her arms around my neck like some sugar-fed sorority sister.
All that huggy-huggy stuff had been nice once a week on Sundays back in Rawlings. But somehow now, here at the cottage, it felt more like an endurance test.
I gave her a momentary return squeeze, then pulled away. “Okay. Just so we’re straight, I get the right side of the sink top and the bottom two shelves of the medicine cabinet. We each do our own laundry and we alternate cleaning up.”
She stared at me, with a look of surprise on her face. “Yeah. Sure. Sounds good to me,” she said.
The instructions had slipped out without much forethought. Now I wondered by her look if I had said something off-base. “You’re okay with that, then?”
“I guess so. It seems kind of formal, but whatever.”
I swallowed. My hands twisted. “Did you have something else in mind?” I didn’t want to seem too stiff. She was Brad’s sister, after all. We were practically family.
Sam shrugged. “Not really. I just figured I’d set my stuff wherever there was room. I don’t want to put you out.”
I nodded, glad I hadn’t offended her in any way. “That’s fine. I’ll just leave my stuff right where it’s at then.”
“Okeydoke. So what’s for lunch? I’m starved.”
“Oh my goodness.” I clamped my hand over my mouth. “I’m supposed to be at my friend’s house for tea right now. Just help yourself to the fridge.”
I raced out the door and headed to Candice’s house, glad at least that Sam was there to guard the lodge.
“Love is patient, love is kind,” I repeated over and over along the way. I pulled into Candice’s drive. Heaven knew I’d need a good dose of patience and kindness to make it through the months ahead with Sam.
21
“There you are,” Candice said when I arrived.
In the two weeks since I’d last visited, her porch had become an oasis of flowers. Between each white post hung pots dripping with bright pink impatiens.
“I thought you weren’t planting until after Memorial Day,” I said in a half-whine as we touched cheeks.
“I listen to the weather report,” she said. “If there’s even a chance of frost, I bring my babies indoors.”
“Well, everything looks beautiful.” I gave a pitiful sigh. “With my garden shed burnt to the ground, I’m ready to give up on my landscaping plans.”
“Oh, pish, Tish.” She waved a hand at me. “You make it sound like it’s the end of the world. Plow forward. Don’t give those wretched men that kind of power in your life.”
We walked into the house together.
“I know you’re right,” I said. “But I’m feeling kind of vulnerable now. First my garden shed, then what? I can’t fathom the kind of people that do that stuff.”
“Welcome to Port Silvan. I warned you how things could be around here.”
“You did. I’ve just been so good at minding my own business. I can’t imagine this even happening to me. It wasn’t my fault Drake Belmont got put in jail. But I still took the blame.” My whine grew louder with Candice’s sympathetic ear.
She walked toward the kitchen. “I wonder who did nark on Drake?” she asked over her shoulder.
I waited for her return before replying. The china clinked as she set it out. She poured the steaming liquid.
I sipped Candice’s flavor of the day, some kind of tangy orange and cinnamon combination. “Did anyone really have to nark on Drake, or are the cops finally doing their job?” I asked.
She tilted her head, as if considering. Her long neck added grace to the movement. “The cops generally take a hands-off approach to the area. Port Silvan is too far from civilization to be much of a blip on their screen. Still, when there’s a tip on a big dealer, they’ll make a move.” Her voice took on a cynical tone. “We wouldn’t want the rest of humanity contaminated by the filth around here, now would we?”
I stared at her for a moment, amazed at her enigmatic personality. “So which is it, Candice? In one breath you condemn Port Silvan, and in the next, you defend it.”
She laughed and rocked backward. “I know. I guess it’s a bit of a love/hate relationship. I’ve had the best times of my life here on the peninsula.” She paused and looked down into her tea. “And also my worst.”
I nodded, empathetic.
She stirred another scoop of honey into her cup as if to sweeten the memories. “I had so many plans when I was young. Noble plans. Good plans. But everything went wrong. I married wrong, I left my husband wrong, I never had those kids I wanted.” She looked at me, misty eyed. “I even messed up royally with your grandfather. I mean”—she half smiled—“the damage was already done. I should have stayed with him and proved, if only to myself, that I could make a relationship work.” She tapped the spoon on the edge of her cup and laid it back on the table. She took a sip of tea. “Instead I held a grudge against him all these years. It’s as if I went out of my way to be alone and miserable my whole life.”
I stared at the tray of tea and sandwiches on the table in front of me. I knew all about the psychology of self-deprivation. It was infinitely simpler to identify when it glared like a gaping wound in someone else’s life. “You can’t go back and do it over,” I said. “But did you ever think about making another go at it with my grandfather? A fresh run?”
She waved a hand. “No, no. Too many years of hurt between us. Some things are better left the way they are. Why open a can of worms?”
I shrugged. “Maybe the label just says worms but there’s really something beautiful inside.”
She bit her lip and gave a nod. “Maybe. But I’m not sure at my age I have the strength to find out.”
I reached across the space between us and touched her hand, lightly wrinkled but still soft and smooth. “Look at you. You have so much life. I can’t believe you’ve gotten this far with a defeatist attitude.”
She grinned. “Maybe not. But still, I’m just a crotchety old lady. I’m too old for love.”
“Nobody’s too old for love.” I put on my choir robe and started preaching to myself. “Especially not the kind God has to offer.”
I recognized the defiant set of her chin.
“Just hear me out, Candice.”
