And Then I Found You (5 page)

It was Katie’s mom who sent the most pleading letter, asking why Katie didn’t love
them anymore. Katie tried to assure her parents and sisters that it wasn’t love’s
absence, but her own love of the girls, that kept her in the wild.

Her teenage sister, Molly, responded with,
You sound like those stupid boys who say, “it’s not you, it’s me.”
Katie told her sister that although the adage might be stupid, it was true. It wasn’t
that she didn’t want to come home to the family; she just wanted to be exactly where
she was. And she meant it, too, until Tara wrote a quick and cryptic P.S. on the bottom
of a letter:
Saw Jack in Atlanta at a concert. His date seemed nice.

three

BLUFFTON, SOUTH CAROLINA

2010

Mimsy Clothing had opened for the day, and Kate stood at the front counter rearranging
the bracelets hanging on a dress-shaped wire. Exposed brick walls were adorned with
black and white photographs of South Carolina, while free-floating iron racks were
loaded with women’s clothes. Unadorned iron-framed windows allowed light to pour like
lemonade into the store. Carla Bruni sang in French through the overhead speakers,
and Kate sang along in words she didn’t understand but had heard a hundred times.

The front door opened and a gust of spring’s pollen-laden breeze entered the store.
Kate looked up to see Susan Neal walk through the front door. “Mornin’, Kate.”

Susan was dressed as if she were headed to a photo shoot, lovely and crisp in her
grey silk Helmut Lang dress with a trench coat cinched at her waist. Susan had been
Kate’s employee, mentor, and friend in that exact order. Even at fifty years old,
Susan looked younger than Kate’s own thirty-five years. That’s what Kate thought,
anyway.

“What a nice surprise.” Kate walked out from behind the counter and hugged Susan.
“When did you get in town?”

The Neal family lived in Atlanta, but owned a house twenty minutes away on Hilton
Head Island. “This morning. We’re only here for a day, so I didn’t think I’d stop
by, but of course I couldn’t resist. I’m trying to take care of some maintenance issues
on the house, and I decided to come hug you.”

“You looking for anything?”

“Nope, but I wanted to tell you about these two boutiques I saw. One in Atlanta. One
in Birmingham. They’re similar to ours, but they’re doing business hand over fist.”

“Hand over fist?” Kate asked, grinning with a teasing smile.

“Bad cliché, sorry.” Susan said with a laugh, shooing her hand through the air. “I
thought about our store when I visited there. They are doing some innovative things
and…” She handed two cards to Kate. “You might want to check them out.”

“Okay,” Kate said. “But more importantly, how is
my
Mimsy?”

Susan grinned. “You forget, she’s mine
and
she’s a mess.”

Before opening the boutique, Kate had been a nanny for Susan’s oldest child, Mimsy.
Kate had then named the store after the little girl who had brought Kate back to feeling
the goodness of life. Led by a small child’s laughter and her pure curiosity about
life’s most mundane moments, Kate had begun to heal while taking care of Mimsy. Kate
laughed deeply. “Yes, I imagine. Tell her to come in here and I’ll put her back on
the straight and narrow.”

“Even if Jesus came to visit her with the Holy Mother, I don’t think Mimsy would be
on the straight and narrow.” Susan rolled her eyes, but they both knew she was exaggerating.
Mimsy was not only the joy of the family, but also very far away from a mess, at least
as far away as any fifteen-year-old girl could be.

They hugged good-bye as Susan reminded Kate to send her any and all new arrivals she
thought Susan might like. Her Mimsy partner wanted to be the first to see the best
of everything.

The door swished shut and Kate stood in the middle of the boutique, dazed. Although
she’d heard every word Susan had said, only one word had stood out.

Birmingham.

A million times Kate had thought about Birmingham, about the city and the name and
the ivy-covered house on a hill. But hearing the city’s name in Susan’s voice—an echo
of Kate’s innermost memories—caused her to sit in the lounge chair meant for tired
husbands waiting on their wives.

Lida blew through the front door of the store the same way the incoming storm would
arrive any minute. She carried two coffee cups, and a large tote dangled precariously
off her wrist. Her dreadlocks were pulled into a ponytail and the wrist tattoo of
a small sacred heart with a sword slashed through its red center was hidden under
a cuff bracelet. Her smile, the most beautiful and hard-won aspect of self, was radiant.

“Wow,” Lida said, handing Kate the coffee. “You look like you haven’t slept all night.
What is up with that?”

“So I look that good?” Kate rubbed her forefingers under her eyes.

“You always look good, boss. I’m just sayin’, you look tired.”

“I am.”

“How did the dinner with the parents go last night?”

“Really well,” Kate said. “I didn’t sleep much, though.” She paused. “Listen, can
you take over for a bit; I’m running upstairs to try and look more presentable. I’ll
be right back.”

“That’s why I’m here,” Lida said with no evidence of any bug whatsoever, the kind
that came inside a liquor bottle or a virus.

Kate rode the elevator to her loft. Since seeing the ring in Rowan’s drawer she’d
been gripped with a headache that seemed to dissipate only when she thought of something
else, anything else but getting engaged.

“Focus,” she told herself out loud. “Think about something else: clothes.” She needed
to decide what to wear that night for a party at Larson’s house. Outfits preoccupied
her the way she believed painting or writing occupied others. She could fill her mind
with the nuances of color and style, mixing and matching, making something new of
something used.

Larson was the one friend left over from her high school days who was also friends
with Rowan. His annual St. Patrick’s Day party had been cancelled for thunderstorms
that shut down the town’s electricity. That night, although it was the twenty-first,
they would all pretend it was the seventeenth, dressing up in green and listening
to too-loud Irish music.

Kate pulled out a bright green Vince sundress and held it up to the light, finally
finding her mind somewhere else other than an engagement ring or even worse, a certain
man in Birmingham.

*   *   *

The party was too much. Everything about it was amped up to a level that made Kate
slink back to the corner of the room. The music’s base was cranked too high. The crowd
sang along to “Danny Boy” in perfect disharmony. Bodies were slammed between couches
and chairs, the food flowed off overcrowded plates, and wine, beer, and liquor bottles
were lined up on a bar at the far end of the room, seeming to push each other off
the tabletop. And the heat, relentless and grasping, filled whatever space was left.

Why was she the only one bothered by all this too-much? Kate squeezed her eyes shut
and took a long soothing swallow of the drink Rowan had brought her, some concoction
made of lemonade, vodka, and ginger. Sweat trickled down her back and into the small
space where she’d once threatened to get a tattoo. She never could decide what image
was worth being on her skin forever.

“You okay, baby?” Rowan’s voice came from far away, and yet when Kate opened her eyes,
he was standing right next to her.

“It’s ten thousand degrees in here.”

“When the rain quits, everyone’ll go back out.”

Kate nodded. “Can we leave?”

“Are you kidding?”

“No, I don’t think I am.”

Rowan backed away two steps and wiped his damp hair off his forehead. “Just hang a
bit longer, okay?” His green Tommy Bahama shirt clung to his chest. His khaki shorts
were secured with a canvas belt decorated with tiny red crabs. This boy from Philadelphia
had turned into a South Carolina boy.

These were mostly Rowan’s friends, and Kate knew that he desperately wanted them to
be “their” friends, combining lives slowly, friend by friend, day by day, then house
by house. She knew what he wanted and damn, she wanted to give it to him. She stepped
closer to him. “It’s not the people; it’s how loud and crowded it is.”

“When the rain…”

“I know. I know.” Kate dropped her head back and exhaled. “We’ll stay.”

Larson and Jimmy came full bore across the room, high-fiving Rowan and greeting Kate.
“Hey, y’all. Sucks the rain killed the oyster roast,” Larson said.

“It’ll stop,” Kate said.

Thunder echoed nearby. “Sure it will,” Larson said, lifting his grossly green beer
high. “And Santa will get me a Red Ryder BB Gun for Christmas.”

Kate laughed. “You crack me up,” she said.

“Yeah, it’s a gift.” Larson walked away, waving across the room to someone else.

“See, this is fun, right?” Rowan asked.

Kate looked to him and his smile cracked her heart. Why couldn’t she find the generosity
to show him that she wanted to be a part of all he was a part of? Just being present
couldn’t be good enough. It was easy to fake it, right? Then why did she find that
so-easy thing so-hard to do? She took Rowan’s hand and squeezed.

Norah showed up exactly when Kate thought she’d hit her last minute of party time.
Together they stood on the covered back porch. But at least they weren’t in the stifling
boiler room full of partiers.

“I hate this,” Kate said.

“I know.” Norah held her hand out from the porch, allowing rain to dance across her
palm and drip down her arm. “Good thing you’re dating the party boy of Bluffton. I’d
bet within a year he could be the mayor.”

“You’re crazy,” Kate said. “A Philly-boy mayor?”

“He’s best friends with everyone in town. He’s like a hurricane of friend-making.”

Kate laughed. “He’s charming. People like him.”

“Of course they do.” Norah shook the rain from her hand. “Everyone loves Rowan.”

“I know.”

They stood in the silence that best friends stand in; comfortable and knowing that
whatever words rested beneath “I know” would be discussed another day and time. They
talked about the store and a late shipment, about Charlie’s possible job promotion
and the never-ending rain, until Rowan burst through the back screen door.

“Ladies, what are you doing? The party is inside.” He swept his hand toward the house.

“We’re catching up,” Kate said.

“Oh, because you don’t see each other every day all day?” He smiled and took Kate’s
hand. “Come on, girl. Becky pulled out Brian’s
Cotton-Eyed Joe
CD and you know what that does for Larson.”

Kate groaned. “I’m really not sure I can see his version of clogging tonight.”

Rowan took her hand to lead her inside as the back door opened and a man walked outside,
barely missing Kate with the swinging door. “Whoa,” he said. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Kate said, taking a step back. “You missed me.”

“Katie? Katie Vaughn?” he asked.

“Hayes?”

“Yep, in the flesh.” The guy smiled.

Kate hugged him. “I thought you’d moved out West. Montana, right?”

Hayes nodded. He was tall, a shadow of beard on his chin. “Yep. I’m home for Mama’s
birthday, and Larson dragged me to his party.”

“It’s really good to see you,” Kate said, and then introduced him to Rowan.

“Nice to meet you. I’ve heard lots about you,” Hayes said. “Welcome to town.”

Rowan laughed. “Been here a few years.”

“Well, welcome anyway. Guess I’d follow cute Katie anywhere too.” Hayes turned to
Kate then. “You see much of the old gang?”

“Not really,” she said. “Just Larson and Norah.”

Hayes turned and saw Norah, laughing. “Hey, you,” he said, and hugged Norah, picking
her up and putting her gently down. “How you doing?”

“Great.”

“Hey,” Hayes said, holding his cold beer against his forehead. “Either of you ever
see Jack Adams? I thought about him the other day and couldn’t find him on Facebook
or anywhere else. No one seems to know what happened to him.”

Norah looked to Kate and then broke the silence, “Last I heard he was in Alabama somewhere.”

“Guess he stayed there after he moved.” Hayes took a long swallow of beer.

Rowan pulled at Kate’s hand and she took the hint. “Nice seeing you, Hayes, she said.”

“You too, darling.”

Rowan and Kate entered the living room the same way Kate imagined one might enter
a furnace: eyes closed, breath held. The evening passed in a heat-haze. They finally
left, hugging friends and then walking outside along the cracked sidewalk. Before
they reached Rowan’s car a block away, he stopped.

The rain had quit, but the leaves dripped onto Kate’s hair and arms, a welcome coolness.
A gas streetlight a few feet away cast a glow, causing the Spanish moss to appear
as downward curling smoke.

“Gorgeous night. Finally,” she said.

“It is,” Rowan said. “Did you have fun?”

“Sure. It was nice seeing a lot of people I haven’t seen in a while.”

“I wasn’t too fond of your high school buddy, Hayes.”

Kate laughed. “Why? He’s totally harmless.”

“Calling you Cute Katie and implying I followed you, and then asking about your high
school boyfriend. Kinda weird, I thought.”

Kate started walking again, making sure Rowan could hear her voice without seeing
her face. “That’s silly.”

“I knew that’s what you’d say.”

Kate stopped and turned on the sidewalk, wanting to wipe the conversation clean, remove
it from the air as surely as the rain had cleared the pollen. “Did you see Jimmy asleep
on the hammock?” She laughed and took Rowan’s hand, squeezing it. “I almost wish I
could see Larson’s face in the morning when he finds him out there in the back yard.”

Rowan laughed, and leftover rain dripped off the water-drenched leaves into his hair.
His quick slip into laughter made her heart unfold toward him, and she pulled him
into a kiss. “Take me home,” she said. And he did.