The Courage To Love (Love On The North Shore) (12 page)

With the offending object gone, he reassembled the drain and let the guests—a dark-haired woman about his own age and her husband—know he was done.

***

“That didn’t take long.” Mia sat with her legs, tucked under her on the couch, a magazine in her hands.

Seated in his makeshift living room with its mismatched furniture, she looked out of place. Like something he’d dreamed up. “It was an easy problem to solve.”

“Do you really enjoy reading this?” She held up the scientific magazine in her hands.

Sean grabbed the remote from his desk before sitting next to her. “Yeah, why?”

Mia glanced down at the magazine as if it were an alien object. “I got a headache trying to figure out what the first article was talking about. Something called string theory. Whatever that is.” She tossed the magazine onto the side end table causing a paper to float down.

He grabbed the paper from the floor and stuck it under a stack of magazines. “In very simple terms it’s a mathematical model of theoretical physics. According to it everything in the universe including energy can be constructed by hypothetical one dimensional strings.” He stopped when he saw the glazed over look in her eyes.

“Okay, if you say so. Where the heck did you learn about that anyway?”

“MIT. I finished my master’s degree in physics this semester. I should get my diploma in the mail in a month or two.”

“You won’t get that at the graduation ceremony?”

He switched on the television and searched for the baseball game. “I’m not going.”

“What do you mean you’re not going? Not everyone earns a master’s degree from MIT. I bet your mom wants you to go.”

“She doesn’t know.” Not for a second had he considered attending the graduation ceremony. He had better things to do with his time than listen to speeches and wait for someone to call out his name.

Mia yanked the remote from his hand and turned off the TV. “What do you mean she doesn’t know?”

The outrage he heard in her voice seemed out of place. Why should she care?

“She doesn’t know when the graduation is?” She eyed him with suspicion. “Or she doesn’t know you earned a degree?”

“Ma, knows I take classes. She doesn’t know I’ve been working on a degree.” It had never crossed his mind to tell her. It didn’t affect their day to day life.

Mia grabbed his chin and turned his face toward her. “Are you serious?”

“What? Do you tell your family everything?” The way she acted one might think he’d kept proof aliens existed from the entire world.

Her hand dropped away. “Well, no, but something like this is impressive. If I’d earned a master’s degree from MIT, I’d make sure the whole world knew it. That’s one of the top schools in the world.”

“And you went to Harvard. Do you broadcast that to everyone?”

“I studied history and that’s not exactly the same thing. Besides I didn’t graduate, remember?”

“It’s a waste of a whole afternoon. I’ll get my diploma in the mail.” Finished with the discussion he took the remote back and turned on the television. “Looks like the Sox are down by four runs already.”

Mia leaned against him and turned her attention to the game. From time to time though he caught her throwing looks his way. At any moment he anticipated another argument from her regarding his graduation. He had no clue why it mattered so much to her. They’d known each other less than two full weeks and in about one more she’d check out of The Victorian Rose anyway.

“My dad would have given anything to see me graduate from college. Even now he urges me to go back and earn a degree.” Mia reached for his hand.

In the short time they’d known each other, he noticed how much she liked physical contact. Never one to be outwardly affectionate, the constant contact threw him off kilter.

“What about your mom?” He followed the movement of her fingers over the tops of his hands. Next to his, her hands, with their perfectly manicured pink nails, looked small and feminine.

“My mom never saw any reason for me to go. She said if I took time off from acting it might hurt my career.” She traced a path from his knuckles across his wrist and up his forearms. “She encouraged my sisters to go and would have had a fit it they hadn’t gone to their graduations.”

Single-minded determination came in handy in some situations, but in this case it wouldn’t change his mind. Rather then state his reasons again, he latched onto something else she said. “What about you? Did you go because you wanted to or because your father wanted you to?” In his opinion far too many people attended college because their parents’ expected it rather than because they had a clue as to what they wanted out of life.

Mia’s hand stilled on his arm and she tilted her head to one side. “A little of both. By the time Family Life ended I was eighteen. I’d been on the show for eight years and had done two movies. I needed a break from Hollywood. Don’t get me wrong, I loved doing the show, but growing up on television was hell. I wanted something normal again. College seemed like the logical choice, but it just wasn’t for me.”

“How could growing up while making more money per episode than most people make in a year be hell? Compared to what some people deal with, it seems like a walk in the park.”

“Most people only see the fame and fortune associated with Hollywood. Unless they’ve experienced it, they don’t know about the pressure and the abuses. Drugs and alcohol are everywhere. A lot of the friends I made early in my career got addicted and their careers tanked. One really good friend from the show overdosed and died halfway through season six.”

Though not a huge fan of Family Life, he remembered when the actress she referred to died. The media had portrayed her as a party girl who had let her fame go to her head. “You survived it though.” He couldn’t recall any negative media attention attached to Mia. Rather, the media portrayed her as the perfect Hollywood sweetheart.

“I had my own struggles, trust me, just not with drugs,” Mia answered. “In Hollywood there is no such thing as too thin. When I turned thirteen I had this birthday bash. Some photographer took a picture of me eating this huge slice of cake and it appeared on the cover of The Inquisitor with the headline ‘Someone’s going to need a new swimsuit soon.’ After that I started dieting like crazy. Eventually, I only thought about food and exercising. I weighed myself every day. The writers had to make up a new storyline for several episodes because I ended up in the hospital. That was my first bout with anorexia.” Mia paused to take in a breath. “I kept it together for three years. When I turned sixteen, I had a sudden growth spurt. The media swooped in and I became obsessed with how I looked again. I spent three weeks in the hospital and months in therapy after that. Somehow it all stayed out of the media. Outside of my family and a few other people, and now you, no one knew about any of that.”

Her willingness to share such personal information touched him. In fact he’d only had one relationship develop enough that he’d even considered sharing such intimate details. At the time he’d thought he’d met “the one.” She’d been a woman he’d met while taking a college night course. He’d discovered just how wrong he’d been when she let him know she could never make a permanent commitment to someone still living with his mother. She’d given him the ultimatum: either her or his mom. After all his mom had been through, he couldn’t up and leave her. She depended on him, and with his sister in the Navy, he was all she had. So ever since that one relationship, he only dated women from the area. Women that knew up front that his life would always be in North Salem and at The Victorian Rose.

“I have kept a handle on it since then, but it’s hard sometimes even now. Every once in a while I catch myself starting to slip into old habits, like when that magazine claimed I was pregnant.”

“You have nothing to worry about. You’re gorgeous. You know that, don’t you?” Society’s obsession with image baffled him.

Mia shrugged, her eyes back on the game. “Sometimes demons are hard to keep under lock and key.”

Chapter 7

The barest scent of pumpkin and nutmeg drew Mia down the stairs and through the empty dining room. A coffee urn already stood on the sideboard, but the lights remained dim. Through the windows the first rays of sunlight changed the sky from an inky black to a dove gray. Stopping by the sideboard, Mia poured a cup of coffee before she continued on.

The oven door closed with a thump, and Maureen turned toward the table with the muffin pan she’d pulled from the oven. Steam rose from the golden brown treats, and the rich aroma of pumpkin that had teased Mia before now hit her full force.

“Good morning.” Maureen added the muffin pan to those already cooling on the table. “I’ll have breakfast out in about half an hour, but feel free to help yourself to a muffin now.” She pointed to the ones she’d put down. “These are pumpkin, but the ones on the counter are blueberry, and I’m about to mix up some banana.”

Her mouth watered and her stomach rumbled. “Both smell delicious, but if you’re making banana I’ll hold out for one of those.” Mia took a long sip of her coffee and watched Maureen pull out a clean mixing bowl. For a brief moment the sight reminded her of her grandmother. Mia had always loved baking cookies and before moving to California, she’d done it all the time with her grandmother.

“Can I help?” The question popped out with no conscious thought on her part.

Maureen blinked a few times. “Uh, well, I guess. I’ve never had a guest help in the kitchen, but then again you’re not just a guest.” Plucking the extra apron off the hook by the door, she handed it to Mia. “Have you ever made muffins before?”

Mia tied the apron decorated with pink and purple cupcakes around her waist. “No, but just tell me what to do.”

Maureen slid the measuring cup toward her. “You can start by measuring out three cups of flour.”

Mia scooped up the flour, then used a knife edge to level off the top. Next to her, Maureen peeled and mashed the overripe bananas. Neither spoke, but Maureen’s comment nagged at her. She’d said she wasn’t just a guest. What did she mean by that?

“You’ve done this before.”

“I used to make cookies all the time with my grandmother before we moved.” Mia poured the first cup of flour into the deep bowl and scooped up a second.

With a brief nod Maureen said, “Once you get the flour measured out you can add the baking powder. And the sugar is next to the muffin pans.” With the banana mashed, she cracked some eggs into an empty bowl. “I’m glad you and Sean have been spending time together. It seems like every time I turn around he’s working. He needs to enjoy himself more.”

“Have you told him that?” With all the dry ingredients measured out, Mia slid the bowl over to Maureen.

“More times than I can count. A few times I even suggested he join one of those online dating services. I’d love for him to get married like his sister. He brushes my suggestions off.”

The timer buzzed on the second oven mounted in the wall. “Do you mind getting those out?” Maureen asked as she beat the eggs.

A blast of hot air hit her in the face when she pulled open the oven door and took out the muffins. After she placed the hot pan on a cooling rack, she went back to where Maureen worked on the batter.

“Did you enjoy the ghost tour the other night?”

“I found it interesting. We didn’t finish though. My feet started to kill me.”

“I’ve been trying to convince the town to start up one here in North Salem. There are several spots that are reported to be haunted.” Maureen paused, stopped mixing, and looked over at her. “Has Sean said anything to you? He seems bothered by something. When I ask him, he insists he’s fine.”

Mia heard the concern in the older woman’s voice. Even though Sean was an adult his mom still worried about him, unlike her own mother. Not to say her mom didn’t care, but it had been a long time since she’d displayed any concern over Mia’s emotional life. Rather she was only concerned about  her career.

She suspected the appearance of his father was Sean’s problem. “No, he hasn’t said anything.” While lying to Maureen pricked her conscience, she’d promised Sean. For whatever reason, he wanted the truth kept from his mom.

Maureen sighed as she turned back to her muffin batter. “I figured as much. He’s not big on sharing. He never has been, but I thought I’d ask anyway, just in case he said something to you.”

While she couldn’t tell Maureen the truth, she could suggest Sean tell his mom next time they were together. “I can ask him. I can be very persuasive.”

With no warning Maureen gave her a hug. “I’m glad you’re here. I think you’re just what Sean needs in his life.”

Maureen’s statement stayed with her for the remainder of the day. Before her arrival in North Salem, she’d decided to put her love life on hold. Her last few relationships had been fun, but not the type she wanted. Each of them had lacked any deep emotions or thoughts of the future. They’d been more about furthering careers or plain old fun between movies.

She wanted a relationship with so much more. Someday she’d like a marriage and a family similar to her cousins or grandparents. A marriage built on affection and mutual respect. Since she seemed unlikely to find anything like that in Hollywood, she’d decided to focus on her career for now and put dating on a back burner.