Easter egg Adirondack chairs. It shocked her how happy this world she’d created made her. She liked watching her customers settle into the painted chairs and enjoy samples of her honey. She enjoyed seeing them testing her lotions, sniffing her soaps, and pondering her candles. If only she could live in a perpetual summer, with no threat of winter, no obsessing over money, no worries about Toby. She sighed, gazed at what she could see of the sunset through the trees, and headed for the house.
The first thing she noticed as she stepped inside was that the kitchen smelled delicious, like real food. “Toby?”
He wore his favorite jeans and T-shirt along with a baseball cap and a pair of red oven mitts with the batting coming out of one thumb. He took a casserole dish from the oven and set it on the stove next to a pair of wrinkled baked potatoes. “I made dinner,” he said.
“By yourself? I didn’t know you could cook.”
“Gram taught me some stuff.” Steam rose from the casserole as he pulled off the aluminum foil. “I wanted Mike to come eat with us, but he had business.”
“He has a lot to do,” she managed, without sarcasm. “What did you fix?”
“Cowboy casserole, noodles, and baked potatoes. Plus we have the bread Lucy made today.”
Not exactly carb light, but she wasn’t going to criticize. She washed her hands, avoiding the pan of cold, soggy noodles in the sink, then took two plates from the cupboard. She pushed aside a copy of
The cowboy casserole turned out to be a concoction of ground beef, onion, pinto beans, and, judging from the empty can on the counter, tomato soup. Six months ago, she’d never have eaten anything like this, but despite some undercooked onions and overbrowned ground beef, she had seconds. “A great meal, Chef,” she said when she finally put down her fork. “I didn’t realize how hungry I was. Anytime you feel like cooking, you go right ahead.”
Toby liked having his work appreciated. “Maybe. How come you don’t cook?”
Exactly when was she supposed to add that to her schedule? But the truth was, she’d never liked to cook. “I’m not much of a food person.”
“That’s why you’re so skinny.”
She gazed around at the kitchen with its dated pickled oak cabinets and yellowing vinyl floor. How odd to feel more comfortable in this shabby cottage than she’d ever felt in the luxurious house her cheating husband had bought. As for the money she’d once spent so freely… Not a penny of it was as precious as what she was earning for herself with her own hard work and imagination.
“Your mother liked to cook, too,” she said.
“Really?” Toby stopped eating, fork poised in midair. His eagerness made her feel petty for not talking to him about Star. Just as Mike had asked her to.
“Gram never told me that,” he said.
“Sure. She was always trying out new recipes-not just cookies and brownies, but things like soups and sauces. Sometimes she’d try to get me to help, but mainly I just ate what she made.”
He cocked his head, thinking that over. “Like you’re eating what I made.”
“Exactly.” She searched her mind. “She wasn’t crazy about bees either, but she loved cats and dogs.”
“That’s like me, too. What else about her?”
She made a play out of pleating her napkin. “She liked to play cards. Gin rummy.” Star cheated, but Toby had heard enough negatives about his mother. “She loved Janet Jackson and Nirvana. All we did one summer was dance to ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit.’ She stunk at softball-none of us wanted her on our team, but we always let her because she made us laugh. She liked to climb, and when we were younger, she’d hide from me in that big old tree in the front yard.”
“My tree,” he said with so much wonder that her heart ached.
She told him what she should have understood from the beginning. “Your mom wasn’t perfect. Sometimes she didn’t take life as seriously as she should, but I can tell you this. She never intended to leave you. She always meant to come back.”
Toby dipped his head so she wouldn’t see his eyes filling with tears. She reached out to touch him, then thought better of it. “Let’s go to Dogs ’N’ Malts for dessert.”
His head came up. “Could we?”
“Why not?” She was so stuffed she could barely move, but just once, she wanted to be the fun person in Toby’s life.
They climbed into her car, and she drove to town. Toby ordered a super-size concoction of ice cream, M &M’s, sprinkles, peanuts, and chocolate sauce. She ordered their smallest vanilla cone. As luck would have it, Mike showed up not long after they’d sat at one of the picnic tables. “Hey, Toby. Sabrina.”
Toby jumped up from the bench. “Sit with us, Mike!”
Mike glanced toward Bree. She wasn’t going to be the bad guy, and she nodded. “Sure. Come and join us.”
A few minutes later Mike returned with a small chocolate sundae and settled next to Toby, which put him directly across from her. Her heart twisted as Toby shot her a pleading look, imploring her not to ruin this. Mike avoided looking at her altogether.
Her cone was beginning to drip, but she couldn’t take another lick. She didn’t like feeling as if there was something wrong with her because she refused to join the Mike Moody fan club. Even Lucy liked him. But how could Bree forget the past? Except wasn’t that beginning to happen? Each day it grew more difficult to reconcile the adult Mike Moody with the boy she remembered.
A young couple-the husband carrying a baby in a Snugli-stopped to talk to him, followed by an older man hauling an oxygen tank. Everybody was glad to see Mike. Everybody wanted to say hello. Toby waited patiently, as if he’d been through this before. Finally they were alone. “Toby, this sundae is so good I think I’ll have another.” Mike dug in his pocket and handed over a five-dollar bill. “Mind getting one for me?”
As Toby went off, Bree noticed that Mike had barely touched his first sundae. He finally looked at her. “I was coming out to see you tomorrow.”
“I thought you were done with me.” She managed not to sound too petulant.
“This is about Toby.” He pushed aside his ice cream. “The Bayner boys aren’t coming back to live on the island.”
It took her a moment to place the name. “The twins who are Toby’s best friends?”
“His only real friends. Their parents are splitting up, and his mother is staying in Ohio with them. Toby doesn’t know about it yet, and this is going to hit him hard.”
“Great. One more problem I have no idea how to solve,” she said.
He wiped his mouth with his napkin. “I might be able to help out.”
Of course he could. Mike could fix everything, something she should have thought harder about before she’d dismissed him.
He balled the napkin. “I never liked how Myra kept him so isolated, but she was odd that way, and she refused to talk about it. Toby’s with other kids at school, but she wouldn’t let him invite them to the cottage or go to their houses. The only reason the twins were friends was because they lived close enough to walk. She overprotected him.”
“What am I supposed to do about it?” It was odd asking Mike for advice, but he didn’t seem to find it strange.
“I coach a soccer team,” he said. “It’ll be a good place for him to start making new friends. Let Toby join.”
She’d already become a beekeeper. Why not add soccer mom to her resume? “All right.”
He seemed surprised that she’d agreed so quickly. “I’m sure you have some questions. I’m not the only coach. There’s another-”
“It’s fine. I trust you.”
“You do?”
She pretended to examine a ragged fingernail. “You’ve been a good friend to Toby.”
