Blackberry Winter: A Novel (8 page)

The next morning, snow still blanketed the streets, and forecasters warned that more could be coming. I made the hike up to Café Lavanto, this time in more suitable footwear. I had agreed to meet Abby there at nine, and she waited at a table by the fireplace, which I was happy to see stoked and roaring.

“Morning,” she said, sipping her trademark triple Americano.

“Hi,” I said, sliding into a chair next to her.

She frowned. “What’s with the sad face?”

I set my bag down dejectedly. “Ethan.”

“Sorry, hon,” she said. “What’s the latest?”

I sighed. “Oh, Abs, I don’t even know where to begin. It’s that bad.”

“Well,” she said, “you two have been through something major. You don’t come through that unchanged.” Even though unmarried herself, Abby was the best marriage counselor I knew.

“You’re right,” I replied. “I don’t want to lose him, but I don’t know how to fix things, either.” I paused and looked around the café, noticing Dominic behind the espresso bar. “Ethan had lunch with Cassandra again.”

Abby frowned. “That woman’s toxic, I tell you.”

“You’re telling me,” I said, noticing the faint ring of my phone in my bag. “Sorry,” I said. “I better get this.”

I didn’t recognize the number. “Hello?”

“Ms. Aldridge?”

“Yes?”

“This is Jerry from Elliott Bay Jewelers. Your watch is ready for pickup—the special order came in from New York this morning,” a man said. I’d almost forgotten about the watch I’d ordered for Ethan on a whim a month ago. He’d been wanting a Hugo Allen for at least a year. It had a stopwatch feature, which he’d said would come in handy for kids’ games and sports. For a daddy. Father’s Day was approaching, and I’d felt that a gift on the third Sunday in June might make him smile. It was going to be an olive branch.

“Oh, yes,” I said, half-wishing I’d never ordered it in the first place. “I’ll…come in to pick it up.”

“Did you want us to engrave something on the inside?”

“Engrave something?”

“Well, you certainly don’t have to,” he said. “But a lot of our customers like to personalize their gifts. It just makes it more special.”

“Oh,” I said. “Right.”

“So what would you like the engraving to say?”

What would I like to say? To my husband. The man who is slipping away from me. The man I worry I no longer know.
I shook my head.
How do you sum up your heart in a single sentence?

He obviously recognized my apprehension. “Do you want to think it over and then call us back when you decide?” Jewelers have a sixth sense about love.

“Yes, that would be helpful,” I said. “Thank you.”

I ended the call and looked at Abby. “I couldn’t do it.”

She shrugged. “What?”

“That was the jeweler. I bought Ethan a watch,” I said. “It’s this stupid overpriced watch that he saw somewhere. I was going to give it to him on Father’s Day.” I tugged at my sleeve, feeling the heat from the fireplace in full effect. “They asked me what I wanted the engraving to say, and I totally blanked. I couldn’t think of anything, Abby.”

She opened another packet of sugar and swirled it into her cup. “Can I tell you something?”

“OK.”

“I don’t think he has any interest in Cassandra,” she said. “I think he wants you.”

“He
has
me.” I smirked.

“No, honey, he doesn’t. Not the girl he married. She’s been gone for a long time now, drowning in grief.”

I studied my hands in my lap and the diamond solitaire on my finger. She was right. I was a lemming heading for the cliff, unable to stop myself.

“Listen,” she continued. “Yesterday at the office, I saw something in your eyes I hadn’t seen in a long time. For a moment, you were back again. You were excited about
something
. God, Claire, I haven’t seen you excited about anything for a long time.”

I nodded, feeling a flicker of emotion inside before it fizzled out.

“I think this story, this little boy, is resonating with you,” she continued. She took a sip of her coffee. “What was his name again?”

“Daniel,” I said, staring at the flames in the fireplace. “Daniel Ray.”

I felt a tap on my shoulder and turned around to find Dominic standing at the table. “Morning,” he said cheerfully. “Hope I’m not interrupting.” He set a mug in front of me, topped high with whipped cream. “Thought you’d like your hot chocolate.”

My cheeks burned. I had to be blushing, but I hoped they wouldn’t notice. “Thank you,” I said, gesturing to Abby. “Have you two met?”

He shook his head.

“Abby, Dominic. Dominic, Abby.”

“Nice to meet you,” Abby said, grinning more at me than at him.

Dominic knelt down and put another log in the old fireplace. “I hope it doesn’t get too warm for you,” he said.

“It’s great,” I assured him, slipping off my sweater. I studied the brickwork on the hearth, remembering the tile I’d seen from across the room the day before. I looked at it more closely now. The text read, “Lander’s Pub House.” “That tile,” I said to Dominic, “what does it mean?”

“Oh,” he replied, glancing at the ceramic. “This place used to be a pub—or a saloon; whatever they called those places back then. It survived Prohibition, too.” He pointed to a dent in the floorboards that had apparently escaped repair. “It’s where the town drunkards congregated. The police just sent them over here. It was a rowdy place back in the day. We still have a couple antique beer barrels and a stein or two up in the loft.” He ran his hand along the fireplace, pulling a wedge of loose gray mortar free. “But this,” he continued, “this is special. See the initials here?” He pointed to the edge of the tile, signed “S. W. Ivanoff.” “One of Seattle’s most famous masons. The man did the majority of the decorative hearths in the old Olympic Hotel and other landmarks in the city. A true artisan.
Of course, his work was never truly recognized until after his death.”

I pulled out my notebook and scrawled the name down. “Who knows?” I said. “The architecture section might be interested in profiling his work.”

“Well,” Dominic said, the bell on the door alerting us to an incoming customer. I felt a blast of icy air on my cheeks, which tempered the warmth of the blazing fire. “Good to see you again,” he said, looking directly at me.

“You too,” I replied, as he turned and walked back to the bar.

“
Someone
has a little crush on you,” Abby said in a singsong whisper.

I looked away. “Oh, stop.”

“All right, all right,” she conceded. “But, hey, at least you
have
an admirer.”

“So do you,” I added. “Do I need to bring up Rick in news?”

We both burst into laughter. Rick—sweet, yes, with a full mullet—had a long-suffering crush on Abby. Sadly, he had the charm of a red-foot tortoise—and lived with his parents.

Abby took a final sip of her coffee, then reached for her white puffy down thigh-length North Face coat. She zipped it up and grinned. “Does this thing make me look like the Michelin Man?”

“Do you want the truth?” I asked, trying to stifle a laugh.

She nodded.

“Sorta,” I said, letting a giggle slip through. “But at least you’re warm.”

She grinned. “Well, I better get this Michelin Man butt of mine into the office. Frank’s got me working on a stack of research for the Sunday paper, and you wouldn’t believe the requests Cassandra threw at me last night.”

Cassandra.
I cringed. Her name had a prickly feel to it. I wanted to say
ouch
when anyone said it aloud.

“The woman wants an entire tome on the city’s Italian restaurants in the 1980s and 90s,” Abby continued. “Food critics take themselves a
leetle
too seriously. Anyway, the only thing I’ve come up with thus far is a killer craving for baked ziti.”

I smiled. “Good luck with that.”

Abby glanced at Dominic across the room. “You staying here to work?”

“Nah,” I said, standing up. My eyes met Dominic’s. I quickly looked away. “I’ll head in with you. We can share a cab.”

“Knock, knock.”

I looked up from my computer to see Ethan standing in the doorway. “Hello, stranger,” he said stiffly, handing me an enormous bouquet of tulips, pink, white, orange, and yellow. Wrapped in brown butcher paper and tied with twine, they bore the telltale signs of the Pike Place Market.

I blinked hard, taking in a whiff of the pastel petals, letting their lemony sweetness momentarily intoxicate me. “They’re beautiful,” I said, coming to my senses again. “Thank you.”

“I was just passing through the Market, and I thought of you,” Ethan said, sliding into the guest chair. Tall, with broad shoulders, chestnut-brown hair, and a knee-weakening grin, he didn’t have to try to be charming. He just was. The grandson of the newspaper’s patriarch, Ethan had cut his teeth at a big newspaper back east, and when he walked into the
Herald
building so many years ago, the newly minted managing editor, I was attracted to him immediately. And I still was. But things were different now. We were once two
people madly in love. And now? Well, I couldn’t even remember the last time we’d been intimate.

“That was sweet of you,” I said in a tone I normally used with coworkers. I heard the chime of an incoming e-mail and turned back to my computer.

“Oh,” he said, “are you on deadline?”

“No,” I said. “Well, yes, actually, sort of. Frank’s got me on a goose chase of a story, and I think I’m finally making headway on an angle that’s worth researching.”

Ethan stood up abruptly. “Well, I won’t keep you, then. I guess I’ll see you tonight at the gala?”

“The gala?”

“You didn’t forget, did you?”

“I’m sorry,” I said, confused. “I guess I did.”

Ethan frowned. “The Ronald McDonald House Charities gala,” he said. “The one my parents are chairing? My grandfather is being honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award tonight.” He sighed. “Claire, you’ve known about this for months.”

I
had
known about it for months. Hazily. I recalled talk of the event, and mostly fuss from Ethan’s mother, Glenda, about how I’d need to find a suitable, formal floor-length gown. I don’t do floor length, but my meek protest had been no match for Ethan’s mother.

“Oh, yeah,” I said blankly.

“Did you find a dress?”

“No,” I replied.

“Can you wear something you already have?”

How insensitive, especially after everything I’ve been through.
“You know I can’t fit into any dress in my closet!” I said a little more loudly than I’d anticipated. I looked at my feet and dug my toe into
the carpet. I regretted snapping at him. After all, he was only trying to help. “Sorry,” I said. “Your mother’s going to hate me for forgetting.”

Ethan crossed his arms. “Claire, she’s not going to
hate
you.”

“Don’t worry,” I said in more of a huff than I intended. “I’ll be there. And not in a paper bag. I’ll stop by Nordstrom on the way home.”

Ethan’s eyes looked tender for a moment. “Claire,” he said, softly, “I’ve been thinking, and I…”

I sat up straighter in my chair. “What?”

“Nothing,” he said, his voice quickly switching back to the businesslike tone we typically used at work. “It’s nothing.” He gave me a forced grin before heading out the door.