The Beach House
Contents
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Julia dug in her pocket for the key and opened the front door to the beach house. Instead of going in, she stood at the threshold and stared inside. Light from the evening sun spilled into the room, gaining entry from a missing slat on the shuttered window. Dust hung suspended in the stagnant air, silent and waiting.
She'd expected the inside of the house to look as abandoned as the outside. But it didn't. It was as if she and Ken had been there just that past weekend. Her sweater still hung on the back of the chair where she'd left it all those months ago; the book Ken had been reading lay open and waiting on the end table.
They'd left late that Sunday evening last September, reluctant to end what had been a wonderfully intimate weekend, where they'd wandered through the booths at the Capitola Art Wine Festival, taken long walks on the beach, and talked about everything from where they would go on their next anniversary to finally starting their family, and then, for the first time in their married life, having sex without protection.
It had been the beginning of their season at the beach house, the nine months that they kept for themselves each year when most of the tourists were gone and the area returned to the artists, musicians, and radically liberal populace who called the half dozen towns that made up the Santa Cruz area their home.
Planning to come back the next Friday, they'd simply gotten in the car and driven away. Now there were nights Julia put herself to sleep wondering if they would have done anything differently had they known what was ahead. An unanswerable question, an anchor to slow her as she navigated the waters of being alone.
Unable to postpone going inside any longer, she crossed the threshold and closed the door behind her. How long would it take to shake the feeling that being there without Ken was wrong? There was no place Ken had loved more than this small, familiar cottage, no house that felt more like home, no other refuge that gave him the freedom just to be himself.
In her mind, Ken was as much a part of this place as the walls and foundation. How could she convince herself that she was stronger than the memories if she stayed where they were the most powerful? At thirty-two, she had decades ahead of her, all of them without Ken. No one had loved life more. He would be furious if he knew she'd ever questioned being able to go on without him.
She hung her sweater in the closet, closed the book, and put it away, then went into the kitchen for a drink of water, pausing to look out the one unshuttered window in the house.
The view was one she'd shared up until now, Ken teaching her the nuances of the tides, the patterns of the birds, and how to spot the wandering otter in the rolling waves. Binoculars were an essential part of every rear-facing room in the nearly century-old clapboard house. Perched on top of a fifteen-foot cliff and located in almost the exact middle of a milewide cove, they had a panoramic view of not only their small section of the California coast, but much of the Monterey Bay.
They were part of an island of twenty-five houses surrounded by a forest of pine, redwood, and eucalyptus that was kept from further development by the state of California. Ken was convinced there was no more beautiful place on earth. He'd once told her his fondest dream was to live out his life in this house with her at his side.
It was one dream too many.
Perhaps if he hadn't experienced the unbelievable meteoric rise from college dropout to owner of one of the largest computer software companies in the world. Maybe if they'd been a little less in love . . .
Julia reached for a glass and noticed a lone ant wandering across the cupboard door. Out of the corner of her eye she saw another and then three more. Following their path to the corner of the windowsill, she watched as one disappeared through what appeared to be a surface crack in the wood.
In the eight years she'd been coming to the beach house, this was the first time she'd found ants inside. She began opening cupboards and was about to congratulate herself that she'd caught the invasion early when she discovered an inchwide trail of two-way traffic leading to an open bag of sugar. Ants with empty mandibles moved up the wall while those with full loads moved down.
Like the stressed-out executive who snaps when her shoelace breaks, Julia was almost undone at the sight of the entrenched insects. After all these years, why had the damn ants chosen now to invade? She felt overwhelmed, beaten down, and sorely tempted to simply turn around and walk away.
But walking away wasn't her style. She faced things head on. Which was why she'd come down herself to get the house ready instead of turning the job over to someone else. Ken would have been proud of her.
A half hour later, reasonably sure she'd won the battle, Julia scrubbed the cupboard and counters. Giving the sink a final wash down, she reached up to turn off the water and was dumfounded when the knob came off in her hand. She tried putting the knob back by carefully fitting the broken pieces together but she couldn't get the handle to turn enough to even slow the stream of water.
She didn't have a clue what to do next. With two brothers, a doting father, and a husband who'd prided himself on being able to repair anything, Julia had never had to fix so much as a clogged sink. She'd never even taken her car in for service herself. How could she ever hope to become independent if she couldn't take care of a simple broken faucet?
She'd never sought independence and hated that it had become the focus of her life. Even more, she hated that it had become a necessity. She'd never kept it a secret that she loved being taken care of by Ken. She gladly let him do things for her that she could easily have done for herself.
Some of their friends thought her spoiled, some of her friends were jealous. Both sets predicted sagely that she wouldn't be able to survive without Ken. They were closer to the truth than they imagined, but not for the reasons they believed.
The sound of water rushing down the drain in a county as drought conscious as Santa Cruz triggered her practical side. She'd work on being independent tomorrow when there was a plumber available. For now she would throw herself on the mercy of her next-door neighbor, Andrew.
The door to Andrew's bungalow opened before Julia had brought her hand down from knocking. A tall man with prematurely gray hair and dark blue eyesâsomeone she'd never seen beforeâanswered. He had a kitchen towel draped over his left shoulder, a glass of wine in his right hand, and an openly curious look on his face. “Yes?”
An enticing smell of peppers and onion and other things she couldn't identify wafted around him, reminding Julia she hadn't eaten since lunch. “Is Andrew here?”
He smiled. The effect was startling. A face that had seemed ordinary became enormously appealing. “I'm afraid not. Last I heard he was leaving Hawaii and headed for New Zealand.”
“Andrew?” He'd talked about sailing around the world, but never without the word “someday” thrown in, and certainly not before he was sure his business would survive without him. “Who's running the nursery?”
“The guy who bought it.”
She'd been away only eight months and it suddenly felt like years. “Andrew sold the nursery?” she repeated, convinced she'd heard him wrong.
“Completed the deal on Christmas Eve and took off in his boat on New Year's Day. He said he just woke up one morning and decided it was time he stopped putting things off.”
“You're a friend of his?”
“Since college. We were fraternity brothers.”
There were several other neighbors she could ask for help. Imposing on one she didn't know wasn't necessary. “I'm sorry I interrupted your dinner. Next time you hear from Andrew please tell him I said hi and that I'd love to see him when he gets home.”
“And you are?”
“Julia Huntington.”
“You're Julia?” He shifted his glass to his left hand and reached for hers. “Andrew told me to keep an eye out for you.”
“He did? Why?”
“No particular reason, just that you were a friend of his.”
“Uh-huh.” Andrew and Ken had known each other fifteen years. With Ken gone, it was only natural that Andrew would feel an obligation to look after her, if only by proxy.
“All right. He said you might need some help around the place getting it ready for summer and that part of my rent would be to see that you got it.”
Her hand still in his, she said, “I didn't catch your name.”
“Eric Lawson.”
“You have no idea how much I hate to admit this, Eric Lawson, but Andrew was right. I could use your help. Do you know anything about faucets?”
“Some.”
She took the chrome knob out of her pocket and handed it to him. “Any ideas?”
He studied it for several seconds. “Besides tossing it?”
“That's okay by me, as long as you can tell me how to turn the water off without it.”
“The shut-off valve doesn't work?”
She had no idea what a shut-off valve was. “I don't know. I didn't try it.”
“Hang on a minute.” He started back inside. “I have to check the stove, and then I'll come over and give it a try.”
“That's not necessary. If you just tell me whereâ” But he was already gone. While she waited, she looked around the living room, noting the changes Eric had made since moving in. Andrew's beaten-up recliner was gone, replaced by a computer desk. The normally empty bookshelves were filled to overflowing with what appeared to be old, leather-bound volumes of important literature. There were a few paperbacks and hardbound popular fiction titles scattered here and there as if to point out the owner wasn't a complete intellectual snob. The coffee table held stacks of magazines with
JAMA
written on the topâmedical journals.
Eric came back, minus the towel and wine. “Ready?”
“I'm sorry about taking you away from your dinner.”
“It'll keep. Besides, this shouldn't take long.”
The tone of voice was as familiar as the self-assured confidence. Ken had been the same way, supremely secure he could handle anything tossed his way. And he'd never been wrong, right up until the end.
As they headed toward Julia's house, Eric said, “Andrew mentioned you live in Atherton. How do you like it?”
“Fine.” There was no need to act like a reluctant guest on a talk show. He was making an effort at conversation, not prying. “Actually it's very nice.”
“My wife's father has his practice near there. He wanted me to go in with him and his partners when I completed my residency, but Sacramento seemed more my style.”
She'd never heard anyone give Sacramento credit for style. Even the legislators left what many still privately called a farm town every opportunity they got. “You're a doctor?”
“Nonpracticing at the moment.”
Her curiosity piqued, she asked, “On hiatus?”
“Of a sort.” He held the garden gate for her. As they made their way through the tangle of overgrown flowers that grew alongside the brick pathway, Eric asked, “Would you like me to take down the shutters tomorrow?”
“I'm not completely inept.” It would be a first, but how hard could it be?
“I didn't mean to imply you were. It's the rent thing. I take my obligations seriously.”
She opened the door and led him inside. “Andrew is a sweet guy, but he had no right to dump me on you.”
“He's not the only one around here who's been concerned.”
“Oh?”
“You're a real favorite in this neighborhood.”
“Thank you. That's nice to hear.” She didn't take the compliment personally. She'd been the beneficiary of the goodwill Ken engendered from the day they met. His loving her had been all the recommendation his friends and family had needed, a wondrous gift to someone as shy as she'd been her entire life.
When they reached the kitchen, Eric went straight to the cupboard under the sink and reached inside. Seconds later the water stopped.
“How did you do that?” she asked.
“Come here, I'll show you.” She moved next to him and lowered herself to her haunches. “See that handle?” He waited for her to nod. “It's called a shut-off valve. Every sink and toilet in the house has one. There's one outside that will turn the water off to everything in the house.”
She stood. “Please tell me I'm not the first person you've met who didn't know this.”
“Not the first.” He rose from his haunches and stood beside her.
“How did you find out?”
“My uncle was a contractor. I spent my summers working for him.”
She was abruptly and acutely aware how close they were. If either of them moved even an inch toward each other, they would be touching. The situation became claustrophobic. Julia took a quick step backward and caught her foot on the rug.
Eric reached out to steady her. “Are you okay?”
“I'm fine.” She forced a smile as she freed herself from his hand. “With Grace for a middle name, it was almost a given that I'd be clumsy.”
