Second Chances (13 page)

“Thanks, Ell,” I told her, and moved inside. Behind me I heard the girls start yelling, “Hi Dad!” and didn't have to look to know that Jackson was pulling into the lot.

I poured a cup and drank it at the counter, wondering where Jilly and Gran were. Mom appeared in the server window then. She said, “I'm glad you're back, honey.”

“Hey, Mom,” I said, before swiveling on the stool to peer out the window. Jackson caught the girls in a hug, one in each arm. He was wearing his swim trunks and a sun visor, grinning at whatever Tish was chattering about; I couldn't make out all the words even with the open windows. Ruthie bounded ahead and banged through the porch door, Jackson, Clint and Tish not far behind.

Dammit
. I wondered just how much of his precious vacation time Jackson was planning to spend here. Or for that matter, how many days before Lanny got suspicious about his absence and decided to drive up to Minnesota to collect him. I pictured her clearly, gliding through the screen door on her ultra-long legs with a look of distaste at what she would consider the tackiest of surroundings, staring down her perfect nose, artificially full lips drawn up like an old-fashioned purse string. I almost giggled, imagining offering her a bottled beer and a plate of fried fish.
Ha
. In some ways it was odd that Jackie would be drawn to someone so snobbishly sophisticated, so
Chicago
. He had grown to fit the part in some ways, but I knew the real him. Or at least I'd thought I did, once upon a time.

“Morning, Jo,” he said, ridiculously polite. And then,“Tish, sweet pea, will you grab me a cup before we go?”

“I'm getting the cooler!” she said, heading for the kitchen, Clint on her heels.

“I'll get it, Jackie,” Mom said easily. I just barely refrained from rolling my eyes.

“Thanks, Joan,” he said, taking a sip as he claimed a stool near mine, conspicuously keeping one between us. Tish and Clint chattered with Mom back in the kitchen, seemingly oblivious to any strain that I might be feeling. Ellen set a second tray of blueberry-crumble muffins on the counter. I studied the server window and imagined how amazing it would be if Blythe were to magically appear there, conjured by the intensity of my longing.

I sighed and finally gave in, asking my husband, “So, where are you guys going today?”

“Washout, I was thinking,” Jackson said, eating a muffin in two bites. It was a stretch of river that flowed between Landon and Rose Lake, then out towards Fairfield. In high school we'd gone tubing there many a time and had dubbed it ‘Wipeout.' And then, oh so casually, “You'd be welcome to join us.”

“Yeah, Mom! Come on,” Tish said. “It'll be so much fun!”

“I have a lot to do today,” I said firmly. “Thanks, though.”

Jackson shrugged. I really hated how he had the power to make me uncomfortable in my own home. I also hated that, by contrast, he seemed so damn composed. And I couldn't even be justifiably rude to him, because our children were in the room.

“Be careful,” I told Ruthann, who was spinning on the stool between Jackie and me. “And don't forget the sunscreen. And lots of water.”

“Got it,” Tish said, appearing with a cooler hefted in arms, Clint with a second.

“Jackie, good to see you, boy!” Dodge said then, coming in the screen door, sunglasses pushed back on his head. So everyone was turning traitor on me. Jackson was just too familiar around here for anyone to truly shun him. Except Gran. Good old Gran.

“Hey, Dodge!” Jackie replied with fondness, finishing his coffee and rising to shake the older man's hand. “You want to join us on the inner tubes today?”

Dodge laughed and his barrel-shaped torso quivered. “Are you shitting me? You kids have fun though.”

And a minute later Jackie was loading them into the station wagon, which Mom had been gracious enough to lend him. I bit down the resentful comments I wanted to make to my mother, and instead found a notebook and a pen. I slid into a booth, all the way over to the window, and flipped past random notes and scribbles, a grocery list that was probably two years old, to a blank page. Twenty minutes later I was so absorbed with writing my letter that I jumped when Camille asked at my elbow, “Whatcha doing, Mom? Homework?”

Before I realized what I was doing, I'd inadvertently moved a forearm to cover my words. I sat back and then swept the notebook closed with what I hoped was a business-like air. I said, “Yeah, school does start in a few weeks.”

Camille slid opposite me and stacked her hands on one another, studying me from three feet away. Her eyes were the soft golden-green that was so particular to the women in our family. I looked back at her lovely face as though I hadn't seen it in months; maybe that was part of the reason she'd gotten pregnant. A mother whose own problems had so occupied her thoughts that her daughter had turned into a woman overnight, unnoticed. Camille's hair was soft over her shoulders, dark and wavy, just like Jackson's. Her face was brown and sprinkled with freckles from the summer sun; her breasts appeared half again as large as they had a month ago. I remembered well that swelling ache of early pregnancy, especially the first time through, when your breasts outpaced your belly in growth and would for a few months, at least. Her eyebrows were dark, the left one quirked a little as she tried to puzzle out my expression. I knew she would be irritated if I suddenly turned sentimental.

Then her mouth twisted slightly and she said, “About that.”

“About what?” I asked.

“School,” she said in a tone that suggested I needed to keep up with the conversation. “I don't want to go, Mom. It would suck worse than I could possibly imagine. None of the girls I made friends with this summer have even called me since word got out that I'm having Noah's baby. It's like I have the plague, like I'm this dumb slut who got him in trouble.”

Oh no. Shit, shit, shit
. Before I said anything that might be the wrong thing, I reached and caught her rather unwilling hands in both of mine, squeezing her gently.

She allowed my touch, speaking on in a rush. “It's like I'm a prisoner out here. I mean, I love it at Shore Leave, and I love being here, but I can't
do
anything anymore. I'm so tired, and Dad won't let me go tubing with them. Last night I tried calling Cara back home, to tell her the news. But she's in Florida with her grandparents, having fun. She couldn't talk long, and in the end I didn't even tell her about the baby.” Tears were spangling her lashes now, and my heart ached for her. I parted my lips to speak, but she continued before I could make a sound. “Mom, seriously, I can't deal with this.” She looked searchingly into my eyes, and the question she wanted to ask but didn't hovered like something tangible in the air between our heads.
How did
you
deal with this?

“Camille, I'm sorry we haven't had a better talk yet,” I said quietly. “That's my fault. Everything that has happened this summer has caught me off guard a little bit here. But honey, you can't deal with it all at once, you'll go crazy. Just a day at a time. You'll love your baby, and he or she will be the best part of your world.”

“She,” Camille said softly, and her eyes softened a little, as though looking inward.

“A girl, then?” I asked, smiling at her.

“Aunt Jilly says so,” she responded with total seriousness.

I let that sink in a beat. Obviously she accepted this as a given. Finally I said, “Well I'm glad. I hoped for daughters when I was pregnant with all of you. Great-Aunt Minnie used to tell us it was like being linked to a chain of mothers since the beginning of time, or something like that. She was fairly poetic.” I laughed a little at the memory, with affection. I wished my girls could have known her.

“But Mom, please don't let Dad go talk to him, seriously. I would die of shame,” she implored, slipping her hands from mine and then sliding them beneath her thighs on the vinyl seat. “Please, Mom.”

Again I chose my words with great care. “Honey, Dad is just worried about you. You know that it's wrong for Noah to just go back to school and act like nothing happened. It's way worse than wrong, Milla, it's downright cowardly.”

She swallowed hard and closed her eyes for a moment. She said, “I know that. But he's going to pay me child support. He said so. He's just in shock over all of this.”

“No more than you are! I could beat his face for not being here for you,” I told her.

Her lips trembled a little, but she bit down rather hard on the lower one and then asked, “So, how long does it take to fall
out
of love with someone?”

No one can explain to you how much your children's suffering physically hurts you. It's like being kicked in the gut. I said, “Oh, sweetie. He's not worth your love, I hope you know that. I'm so sorry.”

She looked into my eyes and insisted, “But how long? How long did it take you to fall out of love with Dad?”

Ouch
.
Fuck
. There was a subtle undercurrent of something negative in her tone. Resentment, maybe. Accusation. Anger. I finally said, “Camille, when I was younger, when you guys were all born, I loved your dad very much. Don't ever think I didn't. But we got married way too young. Before we knew what we really wanted out of life. And—”

“Because of me,” she said, not pulling any punches now. “Because of me you had to get married.”

No use acting otherwise. I said, “That may be partly true, but we loved each other too. It wasn't just because we were going to have a baby. Honey, you and your sisters are the best thing that happened between your dad and me. You three make everything worth it. Do you think for a second that I would feel differently? Your dad loves you guys so much too and I know he feels the same. But you know what?” She opened her mouth but I gave her a look and continued, determined, “You girls are getting older. You'll move out, leave us for your own lives. Don't you think Dad and I deserve to have lives that make us happy too?”

Stubbornly she remained silent.

“Camille?” I pressed. The day had brightened around us as we'd been absorbed in conversation. The air in the café was glowing with morning sun, the lake sparkling to life under its golden rays, the whine of outboard motors meeting our ears now through the open windows. Mom and Ellen were chatting with the new cook, a friend of Rich's, who had been hired to fill in for Blythe. Gran and Jilly had come in at some point; Jilly was on the phone by the register, Gran making a fresh pot of coffee. A big SYSCO restaurant supply truck was just pulling into the parking lot.

Finally she asked, her voice carrying a tentative wobble, “Mom, aren't you…aren't you sort of embarrassed that Blythe is in jail? That he's a criminal?”

My spine straightened almost inadvertently. I said, “First of all, he's not a criminal. If you knew the whole story you wouldn't think that at all. Just trust me. And secondly, he is one of the kindest people I've ever met.”

She was looking into my eyes as though to pluck answers directly from my brain. She asked, “And you really love him, don't you?”

“I do, Camille. I wasn't expecting it, but I do. And when you find the right someone for you, you'll understand. I promise.”

She glared at me for a moment, but then sighed with an air of long-suffering and said, “All right, Mom. I trust you.”

“Good,” I said decisively, catching up the notebook with my letter to Blythe. “And by the way, you are going to school this fall.”

I walked towards the kitchen before she could reply, hoping to find my apron and get the day started.

Jackson brought the kids home around supper
time, covered in dried mud, scrapes, bug bites, smelling of lake water and sunscreen. The café was busy with the usual Wednesday night crowd, and I was on the porch taking an order as the station wagon chugged into the lot. I watched as the kids piled out, laughing, and Jackson called after them to help him unload. He was wearing his Bears cap again, swim trunks but no shirt. His sporty sunglasses hung on a cord around his neck, bumping against his chest. As he headed after the kids, towards the café, he shrugged into a t-shirt in the one-armed way he'd always had. I turned back to the table and finished up their drink order, ducking conveniently back inside.

I busied myself at the bar so I wouldn't have to talk to him. The girls and Clint headed directly for the counter, where Mom made sure they got plates of fried fish. I could hear the girls babbling with excitement even over the din of chatter in the two rooms. Jackson joined them, straddling a stool and giving Mom his toothy grin. She made sure he had a plate of fish before you could say
hood-winked
.

On my way back through the dining room, Ruthie called, “Hey Mom! We had fun!”

“Good,” I called back, pretending to be too busy to come over. Jackson, his mouth full of food, gave me a speculative look that I ignored.

Minutes later Camille joined them for supper; her appetite was slowly returning, I was relieved to observe. I was legitimately busy as the four of them, plus Clint, consumed plates of fish and fries. Something about being on the water all day makes you 10 times more hungry when you actually sit down to eat. And to my relief Jackie didn't linger afterward. I was again on the porch, clearing a table as he left. He took a moment to drag the inner tubes from the edge of the parking lot where the kids had dumped them, pulling them up to the far side of the building. He didn't look back as he got into his car and drove away.

The next
couple of days passed with the comfort of routine working on me like anesthetic. I worked in the café, registered the girls for school, and took a couple of drives with Jilly to check out houses for rent in the greater Landon area. The population of Landon was just over 3000, and most people lived within a few miles of downtown, in small neighborhoods with overgrown maples, cedars and sunburst locusts. The more expensive homes ringed Flickertail Lake, and I couldn't imagine being able to afford renting one of those, even with the child support that Jackie would be paying me as soon as the details of our divorce were hammered out. After Wednesday I hadn't talked to him, but was planning to make it a point next time he stopped out at Shore Leave. He hadn't mentioned the divorce papers he'd supposedly dragged with him from Chicago, but it was high time I signed them, or at least sat down and read them. I wondered, ironically, if I'd need a lawyer, despite the fact that my husband was one.

Rich had called Thursday to say that he and Christy had been to visit Blythe and that he was doing all right and that he told them to tell me he'd call Saturday evening sometime. I was hopping with anticipation all that afternoon, studying the phone as though willing it to ring. I craved hearing his voice. I craved
him
, but I would take the sound of his voice right now. Rich had told me Blythe would have to call the café since it would be collect and so I hovered around the phone like an electron. It was busy as hell and everyone was annoyed with me for constantly reminding them to answer if I wasn't near. Gran finally made a show of dragging a stool near the register and taking a seat with a sigh. I kissed her cheek before scurrying back outside to grab a drink order from a new two-top.

By 8:30 he hadn't called yet, and I was getting that desperate, empty feeling in my stomach. I reminded myself that Rich hadn't given me a specific time. I agonized that I should have staying in Oklahoma for at least another few days, so I could have gone to visit him once before driving home. Gran had abandoned her post and was chatting with an older couple in one of the booths. My tables were closed out for the evening and I was about to take a seat on the stool when Tish came through the café for a refill and told me, “Mom, Dad's outside on the porch. He wanted me to ask you if you had a second to talk with him.”

“Tell him I'm busy,” I said distractedly. I craned my neck to look outside; I hadn't realized he'd shown up. But sure enough, he was leaning on his elbows, beer in one hand, chatting with Dodge, who'd taken a seat across from him. Dodge had brought his daughter Liz's kids, the triplets, out to see Ruthie, and the four of them were scampering down by the water's edge, playing fetch with Chester and Chief. Tish shrugged, clapping her red plastic cup against the pour spout for the root beer and filling it to the brim. “Okay. Hey, do you care if we have a fire tonight?”

“Ask Dodge,” I told her, turning back to the phone.

A few minutes later Jackson himself appeared before me. I was in the process of writing Blythe another letter in my notebook, leaning over the waist-high counter where the register and the phone both sat, one palm braced against the side of my face as I wrote. I'd mailed him my first letter a few days ago, kissing it before slipping it into the envelope as though I was a middle-school girl. The pen was flowing across the paper with my words as I realized I was being studied and looked up to see Jackson gazing me with a look of wry amusement.

“Homework?” he questioned.

I slapped the notebook closed and straightened.

“Hey,” I said, attempting to sound somewhat composed.

“You have a minute?” he asked.

“So how much time off did they give you?” I asked in response, trying and failing to keep a note of irritability from my voice. “How do Rocky and Bullwinkle get by without you?”

Jackson snorted and then laughed a little, rocking back on his heels. He used to hate how I'd nicknamed his partners, whose real last names were Rockford and Bunnickle.

“They gave me August. They know I've been going through some stuff,” he said.

Stuff.
Trust Jackson to use such a flippant word for his failing marriage and pending divorce.

“And what about Lanny? She's all right with you being gone so long?” I asked, studying his familiar face for signs of discomfort.

“She knows where I am,” he said, though somewhat stiffly.

“Is she in the townhouse?” I asked then, anger swelling in my stomach for a moment. But I let it go; no point.

Jackson's eyes narrowed a little. He said, a bite in his tone, “No, she's got her own place. Why? Jealous?”

I was about to turn away, not about to put up with this shit, when the phone rang. I snatched it up and said breathlessly, “Hello?”

My heart was suddenly thundering so hard it seemed to be in my throat instead of behind my ribs.

“Hi, how late are you open?” asked a woman I didn't know.

“We're closed,” I snapped, slamming the receiver back into its cradle with so much force the bell inside the phone tinged a little.

“What in the hell?” Jackie asked, his dark eyebrows arching over his eyes.

“What do you want?” I demanded, tapping my pen furiously against the countertop.

“Jesus, Jo, I just want to talk with you for a minute. Can we go sit on the dock for a sec?”

“Not right now,” I insisted. “Come out tomorrow and we can talk.”

He stared at me for a moment, as though judging the wisdom of pressing me further. I glared up at him until he finally backed off, agreeing, “Tomorrow then.”

I had to go to the bathroom shortly after, and again intercepted my middle child on her way to get a refill.

“Come sit by the phone for a sec, will you?” I implored, and she rolled her eyes but came willingly enough.

And sure thing, as I hurried back out, Tish saw me and wiggled the receiver in my direction. I sprinted to it.

“I just accepted the charges,” she whispered before heading back outside. Again my heart was throbbing as though I'd just swum across the lake to get to the phone.

“Hello?” I said, my voice small and breathless.

“Joelle,” Blythe said, so warm and immediate, it was as though he was just around the corner in the bar, where he'd been the first night I met him.
If only
. My heart hammered even harder to hear his voice. I felt as though weeks had passed since I'd spoken to him, rather than days. His voice was husky with longing as he said, “It's so good to hear your voice, baby.”

“Blythe,” I said gladly, and longing saturated my voice too. “Sweetheart. Oh God, I miss you. How are you? I haven't been able to think of anything else. I've been so worried about you. Are you all right?” I was babbling, my words gushing on top of one another. I clutched the phone as though it was a part of him.

“I'm fine, baby, just crazy with missing you,” he said then. “I got your letter. I keep it in my pocket and sleep with it at night. Just so you know.”

I laughed, but it came out sounding more like a sob. “Just three more weeks. I can hardly wait. Oh Blythe, are you sure you're all right? I can't tell you how much I miss you. I think about you every second.”

“Aw, Joelle, I miss you so fucking much. And when I read what you wrote…you can read me pretty well, can't you?”

“I would hope so,” I said. “I love you. You're mine, mister, so you better get used to it.”

“I love you too, baby. This reminds me of the first night I called your phone,” he added, his voice so deep and warm, and I was heartened to hear a hint of his usual good humor. “It was too late to call, but I just wanted to hear your voice before I went to sleep.”

“After you'd kissed me for the first time,” I added. “I had been dreaming about that kiss for weeks. Just imagining what it would be like.”

“Me too, you don't even know,” he said. And then, “Joelle, I only have a minute left. Literally, a minute. They time us. But I'll call next week, same time, okay?”

“Okay,” I whispered. “Has your mom been to see you again?”

“Twice now,” he said. “She told me about how you cried and cried. I can't bear to think about you hurting, baby, so give the girls a hug and go sit on the dock, okay? And don't worry about me, I'm just fine here.”

“Okay,” I whispered again. “Blythe, I love you. Just know how much I'm thinking of you. I can't wait to get my arms around you, sweetheart.”

“I'm counting the hours,” he said, and then in a rush, “I gotta go. I love you, Joelle.”

“I love you,” I told him, but the phone was hung up with an abrupt clunk, as though someone on the other end had taken it from his hands. I held the receiver for a long time, just cradling it, until I realized I should take his advice and go find the girls, hug them, and then sit on the dock and let my senses imbibe the night air for a while.

One week down.