Blue Heaven (Blue Lake) (18 page)

“Mom, you have to come up here and see this place,” Eva said, for the hundredth time.

“I saw it online, honey. Your cousin Marcie sent me the link.”

“Marcie!” Eva let that go for the moment. “I didn’t know you had a computer!”

“I had to get one. My friend Ernst has one with a little camera and he talks to his grandkids that way.”

“Oh, a webcam. Good idea. Let’s do that. Who is Ernst?”

“He’s my neighbor, dear. We’re not having sex, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

Eva hadn’t been thinking any such thing. She looked in the mirror and realized she’d forgotten to put on make up this morning. Which is probably why all the women were so friendly. She was for sure no competition. She grabbed a mascara wand from the basket of make up under the sink, hesitated, and snagged her blusher, too.

“Okay, well, Mom. Back to Marcie. I didn’t know you talked to her.”

“Yes, that was your father’s fight. When he died, the fight died with him, bless his heart.”

Eva felt a sense of calm she’d been missing since she’d started this project. She’d gotten a couple of her cousins’ email addresses off the internet and sent them the link to Blue Heaven. Just in case they might be interested in seeing their childhood summer home again. She hadn’t heard back from any of them, and that stung, but apparently at least Marcie had seen the website.

Someone knocked on the door. “Mom, I have to go. I’m having a party.”

“Oh, I’m glad you’re making friends, dear.”

Eva was glad, too. This was a small town and she intended to spend the rest of her life here, so it would be good if she liked the people.

She opened the door. Jane stood there.

“Oh, hey you.”

“Hey you, too.” They grinned at each other like fools. She’d never have been able to do any of this without Jane’s help. From the first day, Jane had been there for her, even way back when Daniel wasn’t.

“Thank you,” she told Jane.

“For what? Putting ranch dressing in plastic shot glasses and sticking in a few raw veggies?”

“No, for this. For everything. You are the person who started everything in motion. I can’t thank you enough.”

“It was nothing,” Jane said. “Wait for me, I want to ask you something.”

So Eva went into the kitchen and talked with people until Jane joined her.

“Let’s go sit on the porch,” Eva said. Jane laughed, and in a minute Eva knew why. The big covered porch was strictly standing room only. But that was okay.

“What did you want to ask?” Eva said, going outside, heading for the shed, where her plan for Daniel was ready to spring.

“Just, well. I wondered about you and Daniel.” God, the girl had ESP.

“Not much to tell. We’re taking it slow.” Eva wasn’t going to tell anyone, not even Jane, what she had planned.

“I know, I know, but I keep getting a bad vibe.”

Eva shook her head no. “You worry too much.”

Just then Daniel came up behind her and Eva figured it was now or never. She took him by the hand, pulled him closer to the shed, looked back at Jane, and winked.

“What? Where are we going? I wanted to introduce you to…”

She pulled open the shed door a crack with the stealth of a top notch sleuth. She went in sideways, pulling Daniel after her. It was dark, but she didn’t turn on the light. Daniel stopped protesting even before she kissed him.

She relaxed into an embrace that had become her main source of comfort. Even joy. It felt like an old song her mother had loved, something about fading into your lover. Not that he was yet. And this was not the place for that. But soon.

After their skin had connected through their clothes and it truly felt as if she’d fade into him, Daniel moved his lip an inch from her own. “What are you up to?”

“Nothing,” she answered back. “Just kissing you.” And she did. She planned to kiss him until someone noticed one or both of them were missing from the party. If things went her way, that would be at least an hour from now.

The shed door banged. Damn. Way too soon.

“What are you guys doing in there?” Jane whispered.

“Shhh. Nothing. Kissing.” Eva laid her head on Daniel’s flannel shirted shoulder. “Go away for awhile.”

Jane didn’t say anything else, but someone noticed her there and soon several voices could be heard. Busted. But that had been her plan all along. Now it just needed someone opening the door and catching them in the act. Well, the act of kissing.

Jane was busy trying to divert people from the shed. “Nobody. It’s nothing. Let’s get you a drink!” But it didn’t work. Lily had noticed that both Eva and Daniel were missing.

“They’re in there!”

“What? Who?”

“Come on, guys. Out with it or I’m coming in.” Lily again.

Eva didn’t move from her spot in Daniel’s arms. She kissed him again. He might be confused by her willingness to be caught, but he kissed her right back just the same.

A few minutes later a real ruckus had started outside the shed.

“Hope you have all your clothes on!” Bob said, then opened the shed door. Eva and Daniel continued to kiss amid a chorus of glee and a few less tasteful remarks.

“I knew you two were doing it!” Frank said.

“Young love,” said an older woman Eva didn’t know.

They broke off their kiss and Eva held Daniel’s hand as they faced the world. Well, at least one little piece of it.

“Doing what?” Daniel asked. “I didn’t know there was a law against kissing a pretty girl.” They walked out of the shed and he raised the hand he held and kissed her like an old-fashioned gentleman.

Eva looked around, but she didn’t see Jane. She hoped her friend wasn’t offended because she hadn’t clued her in on the shed secret.

A very loud “Meow” sounded from the shed rafters as Papa cat protested the noise in his cozy abode. Bob had built him a little door so that he had free access at all times and, after jumping down from his perch, he ignored it and twisted out among the crowd, loudly meowing hellos to everyone. Papa was the talker in the cat family.

Everyone pelted them with questions and comments all at once.

“We’ve been seeing each other a while,” Daniel said. “Just taking it slow.”

“Since when have you ever taken anything slow?” Luke shouted from the back of the crowd. Everyone laughed and somebody popped a champagne cork. That had not been part of her plan, but she liked it. Bob came through and handed Eva and Daniel each a glass. A real flute. Probably borrowed from Daniel’s house because Eva had no flutes. Everyone else raised their paper cups as Bob said “Here’s to Eva and Daniel for finally admitting what everybody already knew!”

Daniel looked into her eyes as they clinked glasses. “You are really something,” he said so only she could hear.

“I thought it was time to properly announce our being a couple.”

“Wasn’t anything proper about that.” Daniel laughed and turned to a few of his buddies who were mercilessly teasing him.

Eva heard a voice from her past. It couldn’t be. Lord, say it wasn’t so.

“Peanut!” She turned around and there was Marcus, holding yet another bottle of champagne in one hand and a dozen yellow roses in the other.

****

“It’s my fault. I sent out a massive email announcing the opening of Blue Heaven and he was likely on my list.” Eva whispered to Jane as the party swirled around them and Daniel, of all people, gave Marcus a tour of the house. Marcus brought the rain, which thinned the crowd somewhat, although there were still small knots of folks in the house and under the beer tent.

Jane and Eva sat in the gazebo. Watching it rain. Jane knew the Marcus story. There was nothing to say, so they watched the rain pelt into the churning gray water of Lake Huron.

“Guess I should go rescue Daniel,” Eva said.

“You sure surprised everyone with that shed trick.”

“I just wanted everyone to know we’re a couple.”

“Everyone except me.”

“You knew. I told you. Said we were taking it slow.”

Jane pursed her lips.

“Hey, sorry if you felt excluded.” Eva got up from her seat. “I need to change into dry clothes and see what the hell Marcus is up to.”

“I’m coming.” Jane put on her game face and pulled a plastic garbage bag from her jeans pocket. They began loading it with dirty paper plates and plastic cups and napkins. By the time they made it back to the house they were both soaked, but the bag was full, they were friends again and the yard was tidy.

The beer tent buzzed with old timers from the bar. Not only the three wise men, whose names she could never remember, there were a dozen or so more wizened souls, elbows on picnic tables, grinning at her, saying her daddy would be proud. That she and Daniel were made for each other. She thanked them and double checked to make sure none of the kids were sneaking beer. They weren’t. No kids in the house either, which meant they’d probably left. Or maybe they were in the cottages. With alcohol.

“If you happen to run into Marcus and Daniel, tell them I’ll be right there. I want to lock up the cottages,” Eva said to Jane.

Nobody in Peach, Watermelon, Kiwi, or Blueberry. Eva locked up after surveying the premises. She and Lily would have to clean in the morning, but they’d expected that. No irreparable damage, which is what she’d really been worried about. The other two cottages, Cherry and Coconut were still Bob’s and Lily’s cottages, at least for tonight.

Both were occupied, music and laughter coming from inside, so Eva decided to let them carry on. She hoped they weren’t drinking, but she was not cut out to police the world of teens, nor was she a parent. You had to grow into parenthood, she thought, wondering about Daniel, what he would do right now. She decided to ask him. Maybe he’d invade their space and check for contraband for her.

The house was emptying out, at least the main floor. Meg and Steve had left awhile ago with most of Daniel’s friends. A few people sat in the living room, looking out at the rain and sipping wine.

Four or five women, wives of the crew who took a touching pride in their project, were putting away food and cleaning up party damage in the kitchen.

“Thanks so much.” Another of the wives had gone out to the porch with a large garbage bag. “But you don’t have to do this.”

“Look at you! Soaked to the bone,” Luke’s mom—was her name Wanda?—said. “We don’t mind a bit. Go on and get into some dry clothes. Jane already borrowed a pair of your jeans and a T-shirt.”

Eva craved a warm shower and her fuzzy robe and slippers, but that would be rude.

“Thanks, then,” she said, smiling at them before taking the baby gate down and slipping into her bedroom to change. She grabbed a clean towel from the hallway linen closet to dry her hair. Then she spent a few minutes combing it. After she smoothed on a coat of clear lip gloss and washed the mascara from under her eyes, she couldn’t stall anymore. She went upstairs to face her doom.

The room smelled like apple wood. Lamps glowed warmly in the darkening space and around her sectional, a half full bottle of wine rested in a cloth napkin on the coffee table. Jane, Daniel, and Marcus sat there, looking like the best of friends.

The roses Marcus brought, her favorite, were spread out in all their splendor in a cut crystal vase she didn’t remember owning. Marcus, no doubt, had brought it along, the better to display his gift. She had to admit that the beautiful crystal against the rustic dark wood was a gorgeous pairing, although the bowl of oranges she’d so carefully arranged that morning had disappeared. Amazingly, nobody was upstairs but the four of them.

Daniel smiled at her as she came into the room.

Jane and Marcus were involved in a discussion of the best area of Manhattan for apartment hunting.

Daniel got up and came over to pull her to the seat next to his. He handed her a clean wine glass and poured Chardonnay into it as Jane and Marcus looked over, both of them laughing at something Marcus had just said.

“Okay I borrowed some togs?” Jane asked.

“Sure.”

“You’ve got more jeans than I do.”

“And probably in more sizes,” Eva laughed. “Except you’re so tall.”

“I’m calling them capris,” Jane said, stretching out her long leg to show bare inches above her ankle.

The guys looked mildly befuddled, but when nobody spoke for a minute, Marcus came into the breach smoothly saying, “You done good, Peanut.” She’d never liked the pet name. At five-foot-three, she wanted to forget she was shorter than the average girl. “Thanks,” she said, smiling painfully. Glad that Daniel and Jane didn’t remark on the Peanut moniker.

“If I weren’t moving to New York, I’d come here myself this summer,” he said. “I was so impressed with the video online.”

Eva smiled her gratitude at Daniel, hoping today’s video wouldn’t feature a single frame with Marcus in it.

Again the room fell silent, but she didn’t feel like she needed to fill it. She had nothing left to say to Marcus, and both Jane and Daniel knew the story.

The three of them curled up cozy and at home, Marcus the odd man out. Until he picked up the guitar. He tuned it for a few minutes, even though she’d had it restrung and tuned, then started plunking out the opening to an old punk anthem. He even got that high note right where you have to press your pinky and twist it to make the note tremble.

Showing off.

He segued into more of his idea of what kids listened to, except those songs weren’t new anymore. He riffed a few notes before moving on to something else, but she knew his songbook by heart.

Marcus played the piano, and didn’t fool much with the guitar, except when he was trying to impress the younger generation.

Like now.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Eva ignored Marcus and turned to Daniel.

“Do you think the new video is up yet?”

Daniel’s videographer had left an hour ago swearing he’d do a quick edit and have it up and running by evening.

Daniel smiled at her. “Could be,” he took out his phone and checked the internet, chuckling after a few minutes. He handed her the phone, and she saw a mini Blue Heaven in full party mode. She grinned back at Daniel, delighted.