Blue Jeans and Coffee Beans (18 page)

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Chapter Fifteen

L
auren knows what it feels like to have a wave wash over her. The force of the swell stays with her, becomes a part of her even. Because she learns from it instantly. She learns not to resist it and face its force, but instead to move with it, to become a part of its motion until it eventually releases her. There’s really no beating it, no escaping it, once she’s caught in that wave’s path anyway. She’s not fast enough, or soon enough, or strong enough, to do so. Once the wave is upon her, that’s it. She goes with it, and becomes a part of it.

When she waded into the sea water earlier today, standing only ankle deep, the tug was there, pulling at her feet, luring her closer, leading her to step deeper, then deeper until she stood waist high in the salt water, the ever-present undertow pulling more at her body the deeper she went. But the thing about an undertow is that it begins with those waves, which have rolled ashore and broken on the beach. The wave comes first, then the undertow returns the water back to the sea, beneath the surface of the successive waves. Always. It never stops.

So sometimes she stops it her own way, at least for a while. She pulls one bottle of gin and one of tonic water from her straw beach tote and sets it on the old table at Foley’s.

“What the hell?” Eva asks. “What are you, the designated bartender?”

“Drink up,” Lauren answers, reaching back in that tote for three plastic glasses stacked inside each other along with a zipped bag filled with sliced lime. She knew before she even came in here, she knew when Eva called her and told her their plan to revisit the past at Foley’s. That wave would take her down, left to its own devices. So she brought along her coping device. Because that darn wave rises up every time she thinks of the night Neil grabbed her arm and led her up the stairs to this funky old beach joint. It was the middle of August and the place had been neglected and closed up all season, but Neil yanked the screen door open and jimmied the lock into Foley’s. Or his fury did, fury at her continued wedding plans with Kyle. Fury insisting she break it off with Kyle before the wedding got any closer. The wave that night, it held her against the wall just inside the doorway, his arms locking her in place, his hands taking her face in them before he kissed her and she went with the wave, completely. There was no fighting it. And diving into that wave, letting it carry her along, she agreed that when she saw Kyle next, she’d tell him.

Eva sits beside her now in the old restaurant booth. “Maris, shut off that ceiling light, would you?”

And Maris does, but not before plugging in the old jukebox and dropping a quarter in, choosing a familiar Creedence song. The glow of the jukebox illuminates the dark room like misty moonbeams.

“Great, between the liquor now, and Eva breaking and entering, we’re screwed if someone sees us.” Maris slides into the booth seat across from them.

“I’m telling you it’s not breaking and entering, Maris,” Eva insists. “You’re considering making an offer on this place.”

“I am?”

“Yes. I even brought a contract in my purse. Just in case. Okay guys? That’s the story.”

“It’s no skin off my back.” Lauren adds more gin to her own glass. “I’m just the bartender. That’s what happens when you’re married to a cook. You’re always thinking food and drink.”

“Well hey, that’s a nice fringe benefit to having a cook around. You’ll never worry about entertaining.”

“Oh yeah, great benefit. Goes right along with finding the money to put the food on the table.”

“Things will turn around for you and Kyle. Just hang in there,” Eva says.

“You know,” Lauren answers, “I get so sick of hearing that. Especially from people like you.”

“Like me? What’s that supposed to mean?” Eva drops a lime in her drink and takes a sip.

“Like both of you. We’ve got Maris the fashionista sitting here all gussied up in her latest denim board shorts, looking hot with her hair cut just so, wearing just the right sandals, the perfect beaded summer cuff on her wrist. And you,” she says, turning to Eva beside her. “Miss Life-At-The-Beach. Oh poor me, I’m having a tough time selling million dollar waterfront beach properties, browsing through exclusive homes, all prettied up to fit the title, wearing big old fancy amethyst stud earrings and all. Just where do you get off telling me to hang in there? I’ve been hanging in there for years now.”

“Amethyst studs?” Maris asks, reaching over the table and lifting Eva’s hair to take a look. “Whoa. Those look a little familiar, Eva. Did you actually take them from that cottage?”

“Maris, first of all, they’re from my mom, okay? Amethyst is my birthstone? February? And second, Miss Lauren. You’re right, I get to tour some fabulous beach homes. But have you seen mine lately? It’s about as far from fab as it can get, and I’ve got years of work ahead of me to fab it up. I’ll need lots and lots of commission checks to pay for it. As for Maris, she practically gave up her whole personal life building her amazing design career. Fashion is no easy industry to conquer. Okay? So back off and let her be stylin’ in peace.”

“Wait,” Maris says. “Wait, wait. What’s going on here?”

“What’s going on?” Eva asks. “Lauren thinks we’re some hoity-toity bitches, and then you insinuate that I stole these earrings! Maybe coming here was a bad idea.”

“I’m sorry, Eva,” Lauren says. “I didn’t mean that the way it sounded. Sometimes things at home, and with Kyle, just get to me and quite honestly, your lives look pretty damn glam.”

“Glam? Try watching me search online for my birth mother, getting sucked into that endless void with tears dripping down my pathetic face. Or try helping Maris clean out the family home by herself when her father just died. Glam my ass.”

“Just stop it now. Lauren,” Maris says, “how about a refill on the gin and tonics instead? And go light on the tonic this time. And you, Eva. Quit being a drama queen. I’m putting a few quarters in that jukebox and I swear, the first one to whine again has to take the stage, karaoke style. And I mean it, you two!”

The
Closed
sign hangs in the diner window, so Jason looks in through the glass door. Every chair is pushed in snug, every napkin dispenser jam-packed, every table wiped to a dull shine, every salt and pepper shaker filled. More than running a tight ship, the order leans toward manic. It is a diner, after all. He pulls on the door, surprised to find it unlocked. Inside, there is more of the same. Pink and white sugar packets are neatly sorted in the curl of their silver stands. Silverware settings are placed evenly across the counter for the breakfast crowd. Even the fishing net falls in perfect folds over the wall.

He takes a seat on a counter stool and waits, his hands clasped beneath his chin, his thumb finding the scar there. Minutes pass in such silence he doubts that Kyle is even here, somewhere, hidden away in the back. So he hooks two fingers in his mouth and gives a quick whistle.

“That you, Barlow?” Kyle calls out from his office.

“Who do you think it is? Either you better be cooking me up something good for dinner, or let’s get a move on out of here.”

“Cooking’s done, man,” Kyle says as he comes in from the back, pulling off his white apron. He loops it over his arm, presses out a crease and grabs the keys from the counter. “I’ve had it.”

“Again?”

“What’s that?” Kyle asks, straightening a stack of menus and switching off the main ceiling lights.

“Never mind. What’s wrong with your pickup?”

“Battery’s dead.” They walk out the front door and Kyle locks up, pulling on the doors twice, and then again, after locking them.

“Where’s Lauren?” Jason asks.

“I don’t know. Couldn’t reach her at the cottage. Couldn’t get Matt either. He must be working. So thanks for the ride, guy. Appreciate it.”

“No problem.” Jason puts the key in the ignition. “Where do you want to go, your house or the cottage?”

“Take me to the beach, okay? I’ll need to take Lauren’s car in the morning.”

Jason pulls out into the traffic. He glances over at Kyle, who is reaching for a pack of cigarettes on the dashboard. “Buckle up.”

Kyle taps out a cigarette, then clips his seatbelt. “Hey listen, about that night on the boardwalk.”

“Forget about it. We all have our days.”

“Yeah, well. You’ve got some lousy shit to deal with, and I didn’t mean to screw you up like that.”

As easy as that, one grateful sentence from a friend, and all the shit can come rushing back, washing over everything else. Jason is tired of it and doesn’t want to go there today. “You working things out? You and Lauren?”

“Not yet. But you know, thanks.” Kyle slips the cigarette back into the pack and sets it on the console between them. “You saved my life that night. Seriously.”

Kyle might have been dead, if it weren’t for him. It’s no easy thought for either of them. But still, something about the whole thing is really about Neil. Insinuating its way into the truck now. “What’s up with the smokes?” Jason asks. “Either you want one or you don’t. Quit dicking around with everything, Kyle.”

“What are you talking about?”

“The cigarette, your job, your wife. That night on the boardwalk. Jesus, that was some serious stunt you pulled. What the hell. Make a decision for once.”

Kyle picks up the cigarettes again and lights one, taking a long drag and opening his window. A mile passes in silence. “How’s your leg in this heat?”

“It’s okay.” Jason glances at him again. “The humidity’s a bitch though. I have to wipe it off sometimes. You know. The perspiration’s tough.” He turns under the railroad trestle into Stony Point. It is just after nine o’clock and pale moonlight falls on the beach streets. It’s that kind of slow summer night when it’d be easy to while away the hours on a front porch with a cold drink. “Lauren know you’re coming?”

“No.” Kyle points for him to take the next left and Jason pulls into the driveway alongside the cottage. “Come on in and have a beer,” he says as he opens the door.

“You’re busy.” Jason noticed the bag of paperwork Kyle brought from the diner.

“Nah. Just menu planning. Come on, we’ll put the Yankees game on. A drink for my life, okay?”

“Jesus, let it go, man.” He opens the door and checks his watch. “One brew, then we’re even.”

“All right, Barlow. You’ve got a deal.”

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Chapter Sixteen

T
he undertow sneaks up on her, she doesn’t realize it at first, until its insistence keeps at her. Then she pays attention. Lauren makes it through the wave, through picturing Neil pinning her to the very wall in this very room, demanding they stop keeping what they had a secret. It was time, he’d argued. She finishes her second gin and tonic and pours the next.

“Did you bring your paints to the cottage?”

Lauren looks at Eva beside her. Her paints. She could name all the beautiful pieces of driftwood she painted years ago. Seagulls on gray piers, a stormy sea beyond. The boardwalk reaching across the morning sand. A sailboat docked just offshore. The blue cottage on the beach, facing the sea. The rowboat painting, her first, that Eva has now.

“No,” she finally answers. “They’re up in my closet at home. I thought about it when I saw the rowboat painting at your place.” She felt so happy that day thinking she might paint again. So many of the images she painted held memories of her and Neil. Then the washing machine broke, weeds choked the lawn, the employment agency called with an assignment. “Things just got too uptight with me and Kyle.”

“Maybe in the fall,” Eva suggests. “When the kids are in school, you could paint and put them on Etsy. I’ll sell them from my office, too. People love buying souvenirs like that.”

“Now that’s a great idea,” Maris says. “Selling a little piece of Stony Point, captured by the hands of a local artist.”

“You make it sound so easy. And it used to be, but not anymore.”

“Used to be?” Eva asks.

Lauren looks from Eva beside her to Maris across the table. “I could’ve had the life you guys have. Creative, fun. Living your passion. I was this close to having it.” She holds up her hand, her thumb and finger spaced just so. “With Neil.”

“You mean Kyle,” Eva says.

“No. Neil.”

Maris chokes on her drink and presses a paper napkin to her mouth. “Neil? You had a thing with Neil?”

Lauren takes in a long breath, going with the pull, letting the undertow take her out now. She sips her drink. “I did.”

“When?” Eva and Maris ask at the same time.

“When I was engaged to Kyle.”

“No way! How? Where?” Maris asks.

“Right here. He saw me painting on the beach one time and we got to talking and stuff and, I don’t know. Then he’d come looking for me painting, and the next thing, we were together. But nobody knew.”

“Holy shit. You were two-timing Kyle?”

“I was about to break up with Kyle, Maris. Okay? I was so, so close to having a really different life with Neil.”

“Wait. Wait,” Eva says. “You mean, you two were like, together? Like, serious? In a relationship? How could I not know this?”

“Hey. You were busy with those glam lives, like I said. Maris, God only knows where you were living at the time, climbing that elite fashion ladder. And Eva, your hands were full raising your love child. Taylor. She was just a kid.”

Maris reaches into her purse and slides a quarter across the table. “Now you’ve got to stop doing that, Lauren.”

“Stop what?”

“That sounded like more whining to me, and I thought we weren’t going there anymore. It’s not our fault, or our
glam
lives, that caused your dilemma. Pick a song. It’s karaoke time.”

“Fine.” Lauren swipes the quarter from the table and walks across the shadowy space to the illuminated jukebox. After working on her third drink, there is a definite wave swaying her with each step, pulling at her as she stands in the warm room. The jukebox becomes a time machine, each song a memory. “See if I tell you the rest of the story,” she calls over her shoulder.

“Tell us in song,” Eva calls back. “Pick a good one!”

Waves are most often formed by distant winds, sometimes from far, far away. While the wind is blowing, they move over the surface of the sea, varying in size. But once the wind stops, the waves continue to roll and change from a wave, into a swell. They keep travelling across great distances before they come to a beach to break on. In intervals, one swell after the other will continue rolling in. Grief, for Lauren, comes in swells. The distance she travelled with Neil, from painting a piece of driftwood, to agreeing to leave Kyle, to facing Neil’s death, gave their affair time, lots of time, to grow into swells of grief once it hit her.

Lauren considers the record selection. And while looking, she braces herself, leaning her hands on the jukebox, head bent down, studying the songs. The swell is coming straight at her, lifting her right off reality as she drops in the quarter. No one but Janis Joplin will do, will capture her feelings.

So in this musty room, with the soft light of only the jukebox seeming like hazy moonlight of another time, catching dust particles in its glow, particles that have lingered from past nights with Neil, bringing those nights back to life, breathing life into her memories, and into her grief, she pleads with him to just take her heart, pieces of it over and over again in such a way that at first Maris and Eva are silenced by her performance, by her, standing on the small wooden floor, swaying in front of the old jukebox, pleading for him to tear apart her heart, please, because she’d rather have the pain of that than nothing.

And in her insistence, in her honesty, Eva and Maris have to believe her. When she sings about Neil holding her, when she pleads with everything she has, orders him to rip apart her heart again, they do too, and she is no longer alone in that desire. They sing with her, tormenting her with the awareness that he took pieces of her heart with him when he died, somehow, as she bends over and twirls around and sways in such a way that she doesn’t realize when her friends go suddenly silent, though the song on the jukebox continues as she closes her eyes, throws her head back and feels his arms gently come around her waist. And Lauren leans into those sweet, strong arms, into the moment the song brings her, and she feels him sway with her, leaning down, his face pressing into the side of hers, and she knows she’s gotten Neil back tonight, because in his arms, once again, her heart’s there too.

“She doesn’t even know,” Maris says to Eva. “Holy shit, she’s wasted.”

“And screwed.” They had watched Kyle pull open the screen door and walk into Foley’s right as Lauren was lost in that song, and he stood still for a few moments before moving behind her and slipping his arms around her waist.

Just as the song ends, Lauren turns and gasps, jumping back. “Whoa, whoa! Kyle.”

He looks long at her in one of the most uncomfortable pauses Maris has ever seen, then asks in the silence, “Who’d you think it would be?”

She stands there, catching her breath, her hand to her neck, and Kyle looks past her into the shadowed room, toward the old booth, a couple dusty tables, the pinball machine in the corner. When Lauren takes a step and stumbles, he catches her arm and leads her back to the booth where she slides in beside Eva.

It isn’t until then that Maris notices Jason standing in the doorway too, taking it all in. She gives Eva a swift kick beneath the table and Eva spins around to see him. That’s when she starts gathering the cups, but not before Lauren grabs hers and takes a long sip. Kyle leans over and reaches for the gin, holding up the bottle to see how much they’ve drunk already, before letting out a low whistle.

“Really,” Eva begins. “We should go now, guys.”

Kyle swings a folding chair around and sits at the end of the booth. “I’m not going anywhere until I hear what’s going on.”

“It’s nothing, Kyle.” Eva extends her hand for the gin bottle.

“Nothing? After that performance we just walked in on?”

Maris looks over to Jason and motions for him to join them as she slides over in the booth to make room.

“Listen,” Eva explains. “The place is for sale and we just stopped in to take a peek before we never get to see it again. And then, well, we just got to reminiscing.”

“Looks more like partying to me.” Kyle takes Lauren’s cup, adds a splash of gin and takes a long drink.

“How’d you find us here?” Lauren asks.

“Barlow gave me a ride to the cottage so I can use your car tomorrow. My truck battery died.” He looks at Eva then and raises an eyebrow. “Taylor and Alison said you might be here.”

“And now we’re leaving,” Eva insists, reaching for Kyle’s cup.

But Kyle is quicker and leans back with it. “Oh no. Not yet, we’re not.”

Jason sits beside Maris. “Well. This is something. You ladies doing a little time travelling tonight?”

Lauren divvies up what is left of the gin between the three glasses, finishing off the tonic water, too. Maris wonders now if she’s ever stopped living in that other time.

“We were just having some fun,” Eva says, “and one thing led to another when Lauren snuck in the booze. I’ll definitely lose my license if anyone sees us. Really, we have to go.”

“Hang on, Eva,” Kyle says. “Let me just soak some of this in.”

“If anyone asks,” Eva says, “Maris is thinking of buying this place. She’s our out.”

“Considering staying on, are you?” Jason asks, nudging her arm.

“Don’t fight it, Maris,” Kyle adds. “Chicago can’t hold a candle to this place.”

And in that moment, seeing them all here again, seeing Lauren missing the life she lost, seeing Kyle reach out for her, seeing Jason without his sidekick brother and seeing Eva ever searching for the mother she never knew, Maris wonders which is true. Is Stony Point the place they forever return to for comfort, or is it the source of all their troubles?

“Come on,” Kyle says to Lauren.

“Where?”

“Let’s dance.” He takes her hand and stands up, giving a tug so that she’ll follow him to the jukebox, where they choose a slow song.

Maris watches as Lauren leans into Kyle even though he seems uncertain, his arms stiff around her. “Hey,” she says quietly to Jason. “Did Lauren have a thing with your brother, back in the day?”

“Why do you ask?”

“Because that’s what she told us, right before you and Kyle got here.”

He watches Lauren dance with Kyle, her eyes closed, her face on his shoulder. “She did. I guess they were pretty serious.”

“Shit,” Eva says. “So she wasn’t kidding. Did Kyle ever know about it?”

“I don’t know,” Jason says, talking quietly. “Sometimes I wonder. But I do know that Neil was crazy about her. He told me she was going to break it off with Kyle. That was right before the accident.”

“Wow,” Maris says. “I never even knew.”

“Yeah. Honestly? When I got out of the hospital, I was surprised Kyle and her were still together. I don’t know why Lauren stayed with him, after all that.”

“Who knows what the heck goes on in people’s lives?” Eva asks.

“No kidding. I have a hard enough time keeping up with my own. And right now I do know what’s going on in mine. That music needs to be kicked up a serious notch.” He looks at Maris beside him. “Dance with me?”

Okay, so it is this place. It is Stony Point, the candle flame drawing them all to it. Where else would Maris ever get to hang out in an old beach joint, pick some rocking tune from a vintage jukebox and dance with an old friend on a hot summer night? Chicago? Never.

And now, tossing a look over her shoulder to Eva as she and Jason choose a song, as he turns her to the dance floor and as his hand strokes her arm before pulling her in closer, she wonders if Eva’s curious interest can see through the dance to every moment of hers and Jason’s time together during the last week. Oh, she and Eva go way back and can read each other in a glance. So will Eva’s eagle eyes see through the way he touches her, the way he holds her, the way he watches her, to their time at the carousel, to the moment he kissed her on the chariot?

But Springsteen gets them going with the mention of the glory days gone by, with the idea of getting together and talking about those old days much like they do tonight, and instead of feeling sad about the past, they think about their good times, and it makes Maris want to celebrate the ones that passed even more, to relive some part of them, because, really, why not?

And Kyle must have the same thought as he repeats the song one more time, and during the second go around, Jason turns her away from the booth, his back blocking Eva’s watchful eye when his lips brush her forehead, pressing them there for a long second, until Kyle taps Jason on the shoulder and they switch dance partners, before the four of them, Lauren, Kyle, Jason and herself just get down with the song all together. Kyle sings every line, Lauren, oh yes, Maris sees it, Lauren wipes away a tear too many times, craving, missing, longing for stories to tell of her and Neil, and in some way, they all hope those days aren’t over, but if they are, can’t they bring them back to life, for a night even, a song, a look? Can’t they bring the past back, somehow, tonight?