Summer at Oyster Bay: A gorgeous feel good summer romance (20 page)

I
t had been
a whole week since Emily had seen Charlie that day on the front porch. Seven days. Flash was settling in at the condo. They went to the marina every day after work to play Fetch and then she took him for long walks on the beach. Like it always had, the bay relaxed her. But she missed Charlie.

Today, she’d driven Flash to Wiley’s pier, and they’d walked for miles in both directions on the sand before finally going out on the pier. It was a big day because today was Closing Day. Gram had signed over the papers for Papa’s house this morning, and it was officially gone.

She sat on the pier like Gram had done all those years ago, hoping to feel the calm that Papa could always bring, Flash lowering himself down beside her. She handed him his bone. The weather was mild for a summer day. It was in the eighties with a nice breeze and not a cloud in the sky. As she looked out at the bay, she could almost feel Papa sitting next to her. She wanted to let him know that she was okay. That, even though she didn’t have anything but his note and a few photos of him, she knew he was close by.

Something about her life, though, just didn’t feel right, and it wasn’t losing Oyster Bay. She hadn’t imagined this for herself. Sometimes, when she was out walking Flash, she thought about what others around her must see—her upscale work clothes, her well-behaved dog, her new condo. She looked like a person she’d never wanted to be. She was supposed to be that woman who had a loving husband who would play out in the yard with their children; she was supposed to be that woman who took her kids to the pier, telling them stories about their great-grandfather and how he’d built one for her a long time ago; she was supposed to be the woman who spent all day on the beach, running with her dog in the woods, catching lightning bugs at night; she was supposed to be the woman who heard her children call out “Mommy” when she’d tucked them all into bed, put away their bedtime stories, and turned on their nightlights.

But she wasn’t.

She wanted to call Charlie, to hear his voice, but she knew it wouldn’t do any good. Maybe they’d just have to go on with life and see what happened. What worried her was that she wouldn’t get to see what happened with him.

With a deep breath, her lungs full of fresh air, she stood up and patted her leg for Flash to do the same. He followed her lead, his bone in his mouth, his tail swooshing back and forth.

“Time to go home,” she said. She was having her family over for dinner now that she was finally settled, and it was nearing time to get ready.

“
H
ey there
,” Jeff said, offering a side hug as he and Clara met Emily at the door of her condo. She let them in. “Nice place!”

Clara went running inside.

“Thank you.”

Rachel helped Gram out of the car and Flash had already exited the house and made it over to them to say hello.

“Aunt Emily,” Clara said, returning and tugging on her shirt at the back. “Are those cookies in there for us?”

“Yes! But I’ll bet your mom will say you have to have your dinner first.”

Flash had gone back inside ahead of Rachel and Gram. He nudged Clara in the doorway, asking her to pet him. She giggled and put her little hands on his face awkwardly covering his eyes, but he didn’t seem to mind.

“This is lovely,” Gram said as she reached the door.

“Oh! You’ve hung Papa’s hat rack!” Rachel said, coming into the small entryway, helping Gram inside. “It looks great there.”

Gram peered over at it for a little while before turning and heading toward the kitchen.

Jeff took Flash and Clara outside. Emily brought over a plate of casual hors d’oeuvres and set it down on the coffee table in front of Rachel and Gram as they sat down on the sofa.

“Wow. You didn’t have to go to all this trouble,” Rachel said, smiling up at her sister as she took a small puff pastry off the plate.

“I enjoyed it!” Emily liked entertaining, and this was the first time she’d been able to since she’d been back home. She’d found an unfussy dinner recipe that had been given to her by a friend in Richmond for salmon with lemon and dill over rice. “Eat up,” she said with a grin, “before Flash comes back in and helps himself.”

Gram picked up a pastry. “How do you like living here?” she asked.

“It’s different.” she said. “It’s good! But I like having you all over and being together like we always have.”

“Too bad Charlie couldn’t be here. He was a lot of fun. Have you spoken to him?” Gram asked.

“No.”

“Did you see this?” Rachel said, pulling a rolled magazine from her handbag. She opened it, and slid it toward Emily. “Rodger Simpson did a story on your guy… I thought you might want a copy.”

“He’s not
my
guy,” she said, peering down at the professional shot of Charlie in his suit, leaning against a table in the Concord Suite, the beautiful room behind him and sailboats on the glistening water out the window, and then another of him at the pier—she remembered he’d mentioned that.

Emily had to work to pull her eyes from his face. She missed him. She felt bad for blowing up at him. A wave of mortification washed over her as she thought of how she’d acted sometimes around him, her emotions getting the better of her. But at the end of the day, she still regretted losing Oyster Bay.

“Thanks,” she said, shutting the magazine and setting it on the coffee table.

“If it’s meant to be, it will be,” Rachel said. She looked down at the magazine before meeting Emily’s eyes and smiling.

“Think so?”

“I believe so,” Gram said. “Just look at me and Papa.”

Emily wasn’t convinced—she thought her grandparents were just lucky—but she hoped Gram was right.

“Has anything happened on the property yet?” Rachel asked. “Anyone know when they’re starting to build?”

“I’d given Charlie the go-ahead as soon as we were out,” Gram said. “There’s no reason to hold things up just because of paperwork. But I don’t know what’s been done at the moment. I haven’t been by to see it.”

“I don’t want to see it,” Emily said. She thought about the tree swings being cut down, the yard overrun with machinery, the house falling to pieces. She didn’t want that mental picture among her collection of memories. Emily stood up. “I’m going to have a drink. Would anyone else like one?”

“Would you please get us all one,” Gram said. “I’d like to propose a toast.”

She obliged and got them all a glass of local white wine. Then she took a seat in the living room, glad to have everyone together again tonight.

Gram held up her glass. “To family,” she said. “And to life. It is a glorious ride no matter where we are! Cheers.”

They clinked their glasses.

“Speaking of family, have you thought any more about staying in Clearwater?” Emily asked. “I was thinking that we could look for a place together.”

Gram smiled and set her glass down, fiddling with the stem. “That’s really nice of you. But I still need to think about what’s best. I don’t want to be a burden to anyone.”

“You wouldn’t be.”

She nodded and then said, “Well…,” like she did, letting Emily know she wouldn’t have any answers right now. “No matter what, it’ll all be okay.”

“You’re very positive in your old age,” Rachel said. “I hope I can be as upbeat as you are.”

“I fully believe both of you will be,” Gram said.

“Why do you think so?” Emily asked.

“Because once you’re sittin’ on my side of this lifetime, you’ll look back on all your struggles and know that they were just blips between the better things—the wonderful things—that happen. Yes, I lost my son but I got to raise his two daughters at an older age. I embraced it, and it was wonderful. Every time I brushed your hair and braided it for school, I stored that memory away so that it could warm me on those cold nights. Yes, Papa left us. But I got all those decades with him, all that time… I have more to be thankful for than I can even recollect in one sittin’. My heart is full.”

Emily took Gram’s words to heart. Her failed relationship with Brad, losing Papa’s house, and Charlie… They were just blips. She wanted to believe that. She focused on the positive: She had Gram and the rest of her family right here at this moment. It was time to celebrate that. “Let me find Jeff and Clara so we can eat.”

E
mily knew better
. She knew better than to take the long way to work and drive past Oyster Bay. Like her other losses in life, she’d finally made it over the coping stage, and now she could breathe again. While she missed the house terribly, she knew that she could handle living without it.

It was probably for the best, but the house was still mostly hidden from the road, and she couldn’t pull into the drive because construction cones had blocked it off. As she drove slowly by, she couldn’t see the entire state of the farmhouse through the trees—the bulldozers were lined up in front of it—but she caught a glimpse of an empty spot where she swore the roof had been, the spot where she remembered Papa patching it when there had been a leak.

She rolled her window down, the low hum of machinery coming from behind the trees, and her heart sank. Pretty soon the walls would be crumbling beneath the impact of a wrecking ball, the handprints on the pavement breaking apart as the jackhammers plowed into it. She hit the gas, speeding away from the scene.

At least with Charlie gone, she didn’t have to try to avoid him. Long past his flight, he hadn’t contacted her anymore, and she knew he was back in New York. Perhaps, by not getting in touch again, he was trying to make things easy on her. She needed to make a clean break and get him out of her mind. The only problem was that she’d fallen hard, and she couldn’t deny the heartbreak that she felt without him.

Emily pulled into the parking lot and tried to clear her head. She saw Libby with a big smile on her face, standing at the entrance with two cups of coffee. She’d been there, waiting for her every day for the last week. As Emily walked up, she handed one to her.

“Can you see the construction at all yet?” Emily asked after thanking Libby for the coffee. She took a sip and let the warmth spread through her. It was a balmy, sunny day, but she felt cold on the inside after seeing the house.

Libby shook her head. “They haven’t knocked down trees yet on this side. I know they’ve started, though. I already have invoices for materials from the architects.”

Emily took a deep breath and let it out.

“Try to get your mind off of it.” Libby said.

“It’ll be okay,” Emily told her friend.

“It’s a go for the regatta by the way,” Libby said, her eyebrows raised in excitement.

“Oh, that’s fantastic! Now I can immerse myself in the planning of that.” Before she knew it, the summer would be over. She’d be waist deep in paperwork and planning, Rachel would probably be back to work, and Gram would be in sunny Florida. How things move along…

Emily still wanted everyone together, happy, sitting on a back patio somewhere like they had when the summer began. At night, she thought a lot about Papa. Last night, she’d dreamed of him. He’d sat down next to her on Wiley’s pier, the water completely obscured by fog. He didn’t talk; he just held her hand while she tried to see the bay. The more she tried to see it, the more he squeezed until they were hugging out of nowhere. She was her younger self again and she could feel the cotton of his cardigan against her cheek. She took in the familiar smell of him, the strength in his protective arms, and her fear melted away.

Emily’s phone rang in her handbag, pulling her from her thoughts. Libby offered a quiet wave, allowing her to answer the call. It was Rachel.

“Hello?” Emily said, waving goodbye to Libby as she passed by the front desk and headed to her office.

“I have some great news!” Rachel said.

“You got the job?”

“Yes! Oh, I’m scared and excited at the same time!”

“I’m so happy for you!” She closed her office door, sat down, and turned on her computer.

Then the line went silent, and she realized that her sister’s delight was for show. She thought she heard a sniffle. “Jeff doesn’t know if he wants to be with me anymore. He stayed with Jason last night.”

“What? That’s ridiculous,” Emily said, frustrated. She knew how perfect Jeff and Rachel were for each other, and she just couldn’t face them splitting up. “How can he give up on all those good years that you’ve had? Just because you want to live your own life and do something that makes you happy? It makes no sense at all.”

“Ridiculous or not, it happened. And the worst part was this morning when Clara asked for her daddy. I didn’t know what to tell her.”

“What did you do?”

“I told her he went to work early. I can’t lie to her indefinitely.”

“Rach, you have to do what is right for you, and Jeff needs to support that. I can’t believe that he isn’t. He’s always supported everything you’ve done. And I know that this might change the way in which you go through life, but it shouldn’t change whether or not you go through life together!”

“It’s simply not what he wants for his family.” She got quiet and Emily allowed the silence. “I just always thought he was perfect for me. I guess I was wrong.”

“I’m coming over,” she said. Emily had already gotten up from her desk and was fishing in her bag for her keys. Rachel needed her.

“No, no. Stay at work.”

“Absolutely not.”

“It won’t solve anything if you come. It’ll just disrupt your day.”

“Then disrupt it. Who cares? It’s just work. You and Jeff are family and we need to figure this out.”

“Well, we won’t figure it out right now. Go back to work and I’ll call you if anything changes.”

Emily was frustrated, but she knew that it was something Rachel and Jeff would have to work through. “Life doesn’t end up the way we expect it to, does it?”

“Not at all.”

“When do you start?”

“In two weeks.”

“That’s awesome. You’ll be great! I’ll be here if you need me.”

“Thank you. Well, I should be going. I just wanted to tell you the news. Have a good day at work.”

Emily said her goodbyes, settled in at her desk, and then scrolled through her emails. There was nothing new—no requests for tours, no inquiries regarding facility rentals. She checked her phone. Nothing there. She even searched online for property listings for her and Gram briefly, and there were a few hopefuls she made a note to call. It was a slow day, and she didn’t want a slow day. She wanted to be overwhelmed with work so she didn’t have to think about everything. She picked up her office phone and decided to begin planning the regatta.

She set out scribbling down initial plans. With every idea, she felt more energized, more focused than she’d been in a long time. She was in her element. This was what she was meant to do. She searched for possible vendors and advertising options, she scouted locations in Clearwater where she could begin the race. As she planned, she imagined all those beautiful sailboats gliding past the inn. How stunning it would be.

By the time she left work, Emily had made a sizeable list of things she’d need to work out for the regatta, and she was feeling accomplished.

But she wanted to share her good mood with someone. She wanted to talk about nothing and everything, and she knew just the person she wanted to speak to. Emily took out her phone but then put it back in her bag. She wouldn’t let herself call him. It was clear by his silence that he’d made his choice.