The One Who Got Away: A Novel (3 page)

“You’re the first to know,
actually. We decided to keep it to ourselves for a bit. You know…percolating
it.”

“Oh, okay. I guess I get that.”
She poured a splash of Frangelico into her cup and another, larger one, into
Olivine’s. “So, I guess there’s only one question then.”

“What’s that?”

“Why do you think this makes you
cry?”

 Olivine shrugged. “They are tears
of joy?”

“Oh.” Yarrow wrinkled her nose. “Really?”

“I don’t know.” Olivine rubbed
her palms on her jeans. “He’s fantastic. He’s beautiful. He’s successful. He’s
kind. And he’s helping me find
my
purpose, too. ” She stared into her
cup for a moment and then looked up to meet her sister’s gaze. “Like you said,
I’m just emotional. Let me tell you how he proposed. It was perfect.”

And she told Yarrow how Paul had
lifted her up and sat her on the car and how it had been raining and how he had
touched her face and her neck and how he had kissed her. Yarrow clutched at her
chest with her left palm in that way she had, like her heart might physically
stop beating from the sheer beauty of it all.

“So. That’s
my
story,”
Olivine said. “Now, since my engagement came as such a surprise, what were you
going to tell
me
?”

“Oh. It’s nothing.” Yarrow held
up her arms and twirled her hands at the wrists as if dismissing her thoughts.

“It sure was something ten
minutes ago.”  

“You know what? I’m not sure it’s
relevant now.”

“What could have been relevant
ten minutes ago… but not relevant now?”

“Nothing. Really. It’s better to
not say anything at all.”

“Tell me.”

“Nope.”

“Tell me.”

“Uh-uh.”

“Tell me or your matron of honor
dress will be electric pink and
tiny.
”

“I’m a matron now? Can we just
call
me a maid of honor. I’m not ready to be a matron, Olivine.”

“No changing the subject. What
were you going to tell me?”

“Oh. Alright then.”

“What is it?” Olivine felt
suddenly breathless.

“Henry Cooper is coming to town.
And he’s going to be looking for you.”

*****

Learning new information, Olivine
thought as she drove from Yarrow’s house, was like trying on a new pair of
running shoes. The old shoes work just fine until you slip on the new ones and
you feel the way the arches hug your feet and buoy you up in the world and your
old shoes seem suddenly shabby and worn and not at all right.

Paul was a good man. And she knew
it wasn’t fair to see him in this new, hard light. This new light where he was
suddenly all pores and hairs and downcast eyes. This man who wanted to medicate
her into a dizzy kind of submission and tell her how to live her life and never
bothered to ask her what she wanted. No, that wasn’t at all right. And it
wasn’t fair. Paul was tall and fair and handsome. He had the financial means to
take care of her for the rest of her life. And he did care for her. He loved
her. Deeply. More than that, he needed her in a way that no man ever had
before.

Certainly, it wasn’t fair to
compare Paul with a man she had known so long ago. With Henry Cooper. A man she
had spent five or so years grieving and the next five glorifying. In fact, why
didn’t she
despise
Henry Cooper, running away like he did? Why didn’t
she despise even his memory? Henry Cooper was the only man she had ever let do
this to her. The only man who had ever made her think she might need someone—
want
someone—and the only man to leave her. Who did Henry Cooper think he was, and
why would he think she would even
want
to see him after all this time?

No. Things were figured out now. They
were already determined. The fact that Henry was returning just as she was
planning her wedding was perfect timing. Because she was committed now. She was
getting married. She had a ring in her pocket, and just as soon as she
announced her engagement to her mother and father, she would move it on a
permanent basis to her finger.  

And she remembered how, the night
before, when Paul had returned from the gym after work, she asked him when they
should call his father, to tell him about their engagement. Paul had slurped
from a bowl of fruit and stared straight ahead, and then he asked her how she
was doing in Anatomy.

Olivine was taking two
prerequisite classes at the local community college. Meanwhile Paul was trying
to get her enrolled in a nursing degree program in the city. And when she was
finished with her degree, she could work side by side with Paul, eventually
even in the operating room. Then she would have a career where she could really
make a difference. But first, he reminded her, she had to ace Anatomy and
Microbiology, or no connections of his were going to make any difference.

Paul wanted only what was best
for her, Olivine reasoned. He was a good man. He simply wanted her to transition
into a career that they could enjoy together. And she was lucky. There were
plenty of women around the hospital, around town, even, who wanted Paul with a fervor.
But Olivine and Paul were meant to be. Paul’s father had even told her that she
was the only woman he had ever opened up to; that, to his knowledge, there had
been no serious girlfriends before her.

She and Paul had been dating only
a few months when Paul introduced her to his father, who ran a thriving
cardiology practice in the city. Paul’s father had the same broad face and jaw,
both of which hardly moved as he regarded Olivine. He raised his eyebrows and
then looked at the floor just as Paul had when they first met. But there were
differences, too. His father’s hair was silver instead of red; his brow more
creased; his skin more fair; his eyelashes so light they were barely visible.

After dinner, Paul had excused
himself to check in with his office. As soon as he left the dining room, Paul’s
father cupped her hand with his. He looked her straight in the eye, and in a low,
even tone, he told her that Paul needed her. That he had never seen him open up
to someone so much. That he had always worried, after Paul’s mother abandoned them,
that Paul would never be capable of connecting with a woman. That it was vital
for her to understand how much Paul needed her.

“His mother left a simple goodbye
note for Paul one morning, you know,” Paul’s father had said.

Olivine shook her head. She
didn’t know.

“She did. She left a note for him
to find near his favorite cereal box, when he was thirteen years old. The note
said she loved him and always would but she couldn’t live in this house
anymore.”

Paul’s father let go of Olivine’s
hand and picked up his beer bottle, tossed back a swig, and then cradled it in
folded hands, staring blankly at the label and peeling at it with his thumbnail.
“Paul was angry. Still is. Never got over it. Probably never will.”

“Paul never told me any of this.”

“That doesn’t surprise me. Does
it surprise you?”

Olivine shook her head. “So what
happened to her?” she asked.

“She lives on an island
somewhere.” Paul’s father scoffed and tipped his head back to drain the bottle.
His eyes were so unexpressive, his tone of voice so even that she had to
suppress a sudden urge to shake him by the shoulders. The same urge she had to
resist when she was talking with Paul, at times. 

“She has been trying to send him letters
ever since she left,” he continued. “Not that he and I speak about it. That’s
his business. I only know he doesn’t respond because his mother tells me. She
calls me, writes me, still, to this day, to bawl me out for it. She blames
me
for his detachment from her. She says I’ve poisoned his mind. But I don’t get
involved.
I
wasn’t the one who left.”

The dinner had wrapped up shortly
after that, and, on the long drive home, Olivine considered asking Paul about
his mother. But then she thought better of it. This, she was coming to
understand, was what their relationship was built on: giving one another space.
And if Paul needed space, she could give it to him.

As the years went by, she
wondered if he would ever mention his mother. He had come close, telling her
once, “My parents are divorced, and I don’t have much of a relationship with
her.” And then he returned to the quiet place inside where he spent most of his
time.

The important thing was that she
was needed. Paul needed her. Paul’s own father told her that his son needed
her. He needed her light, her spark. And even though sometimes it felt as
though Paul drained it from her, she could always regain it. She could always
find more. Maybe that was her problem now. Maybe she had simply been drained
too many times.

No, what filled her up was the
knowledge that she was satisfying a need in the world. A need that only she
could fill. When someone needed her, she knew that she was living a life of
significance. A rich, meaningful life.  The act of loving someone, of taking
care of his needs, of helping him…this was an important mission. And soon, she
would be taking care of people in the way Paul did. Helping their bodies to
heal.

It was enough, she had decided,
to
love
other people. Like Yarrow did. She could love her family, her
mother, her father, her sister, her sister’s kids, and she could love Paul. She
could let go of her own wants and love whoever needed it the most from her.

Yes, she had once loved Henry
Cooper. It was an aching, deep, fierce love. But he had left. He hadn’t respected
her enough, even, to call. To tell her he was safe. She was left to assume that
he had either died, or, more likely, went on to live another life. One that
didn’t involve her. And this proved to Olivine that, though loving was her
purpose, she didn’t get to choose
whom
to love. And she was grateful for
Paul. He was a kind and giving man. Any woman would be pleased to date him. To
marry him.

As she drove from Yarrow’s house,
she reminded herself of all of these facts. Her mind churned, gnawed, circled
back on them. By the time she pulled into her driveway, she had come around
again, as she always did. She had come around to the knowing that she belonged
with this man, her fiancé. She belonged with Paul.

Olivine arrived home, expecting
to see Paul’s car, but his side of the garage was empty. It was his day off, so
she decided he was probably at the gym, which was just as well. She had some
studying to do.

She shuffled toward the kitchen, so
different from her sister’s. The face of the refrigerator, like the
countertops, were bare. The toaster and the coffeemaker each had an appliance
garage to tuck into, with an accordion-style door that slid down. Keeping the
home clean was a simple matter of creating proper habits for yourself, Paul had
said when they first moved in together. Countertops were scrubbed before the
meal began. Afterwards, they were disinfected and the floors swept and mopped.  

But today, an unopened can of Paul’s
energy drink lay on the floor near the sink. Without caffeine, what would
become of him, Olivine wondered. She sat on the floor, cross-legged, popped the
top and sampled the fizzy syrup. It cloyed in her mouth, like liquid Pez. She
downed a glug or two, leaning against the cupboards, and she made up her mind
to start in on her biology homework before the two o’clock class.

And then Olivine looked over and
noticed a series of black scuff marks near the edge of the baseboard. There, in
the corner, So she decided to scrub the baseboards first. Paul would have
wanted her to study, yes, but he also would have wanted those marks removed.

She retrieved a bucket from the
hall closet, filled it with cleaning solution and water so hot it seared her
hands, even through the plastic gloves, and she scrubbed the spot on her
painted baseboards until the tiny black scuffs began to disappear. And then she
moved on, scrubbing the rest of the baseboard in the kitchen for good measure. And
then she went on through to the dining room. And while she scrubbed, she
allowed herself to think about him. About Henry and the day they met.

He had been standing behind a
white Formica countertop, under fluorescent lights. He wore a collarless button-down
cotton shirt, long sleeved and pinstriped with navy blue and gray. His face was
smooth, freshly shaven. He had high cheekbones and full, fleshy lips. But it
was his eyes—a twinkle there, a luster, an energy, something—which made Olivine
tell her friends, “I volunteer to get everyone’s drinks tonight.”  

“Why?” they asked, in unison.

“Look at the bartender.”

The other ladies snapped their
heads around to look and giggled. “Oh alright,” they said, sighing and shaking
their curls. “But only because you since you saw him first.”

Olivine had just returned from
college when a few of her high school friends convinced her to come along to a
wedding. The bride was someone she knew only vaguely, and they had just
performed the ceremony in a town park. The adjacent community recreation center
was serving as the reception hall, with a kitchen of gleaming white linoleum
and shallow countertops. This is where Henry now stood, flanked by a blue
plastic cooler and a stack of clear plastic cups, some half-filled with white
wine and set in rows.

Olivine approached him, and his
eyes went straight to hers. He held her gaze and tilted his head to the side.
Olivine felt her face flush. Henry gave her a shy, barely upturned smile and offered
her one of the plastic cups.

“Oh.” Olivine said, taking her
eyes off his. “Can I get a beer instead?”

“Oh. Sure. Sorry. Most of the
women have been asking for wine.” His voice was soft, yet deep. He opened the
cooler and shuffled around inside. “Is a can okay? No glass…park rules.”

“Preferred,” she answered. “I
like my wine from a box and my beer from a can.”

“Just my kind of girl.” He
laughed.

And then she introduced herself,
and she said, “So, is this what you do? Bartend at community rec center
weddings?”

“Well, as enjoyable as it is, no.
I’m here with my roommate. He told me there was a beautiful woman who would be here.
He wanted me to meet her.”

“Is that so?” Olivine’s stomach
fell.

“Yes, it is. I told him I didn’t
want to go to a wedding between two people I didn’t know. And I told him I
definitely didn’t want to work the bar for a wedding between two people I didn’t
know, but he told me this woman’s legs would tell me otherwise.”

“Huh.”

“So now I’m here. And I see that
it is
you
, and I am definitely glad I came to this wedding between two
people I do not know.”

“Oh, wow.” Olivine rolled her
eyes. “You are a little too smooth for me,” she said, turning away and looking
out into the room.

“No, I’m not, actually. I’m not
smooth at all. See, you don’t even like that I said that. Not smooth.”

Just then, a man sporting a
fedora and a spotty chin beard approached the counter. He raised his can toward
Henry and gave it a quick shake. Then he nodded to Olivine. She knew him by
name (Carter, was it?) but she hadn’t spoken with him since they shared a table
in Trigonometry class, sophomore year.  “Well, I see you’ve met Olivine already,”
the man said, “She’s the one I was telling you about. Funny that you met on
your own.”

Henry handed him another beer,
and Carter popped his eyebrows at Olivine. Then he turned and moved toward
Olivine’s group of friends.

“You do have a magnificent set of
legs, by the way,” Henry said, avoiding her eyes. “But I know you have other
qualities, as well.”

“I really don’t know what to
say,” Olivine said.  

“Sorry to objectify you there.
Carter is kind of…like that.” Henry turned the box of wine around so it faced
the crowd, pushed the plastic cups toward the spigot and opened the cooler to
reveal sodas, water bottles and beer cans. “So now that I’ve met you, I can
quit my little farce.” He leapt over the counter, balancing on one arm and
swinging his legs over in one smooth motion, and then he offered her the crook
of his elbow. “Would you like to take a walk?”

She felt a leaping in the base of
her stomach. She placed her hand in the crook of his arm, and he placed his
hand on hers. “My, but you
are
smooth. I must remember to be very
careful with you,” she said, laughing, and she felt a giddiness ripple through
her, a looseness in her limbs and in her belly.

It felt good to flirt, to be
free, to feel his bicep beneath the thin cotton of his shirt. It was a time in
her life, Olivine reflected as she scrubbed lint from her baseboards, when she
was as confident as she would ever be. Just returning from school. The feeling that
she could do anything. She would go and travel and be an essayist. A novelist.
And she could go to weddings and parties and flirt
with strange men just
because they made her feel good, important, special.

Henry had led her on a cobblestone
path through the park. He asked her what she loved beyond all else, and she
said she loved to write and that she would like to set off across the country
and write about the people and the details she saw along the way. Off the
interstate. Those out of the way places where people live and breathe and eat
Frito pie on Wednesday nights for supper.

Henry listened until she finished
speaking, and then he said he had always wanted to be a professional adventurer
but that he hadn’t figured out who would pay him to be one of those. But, he
had said, if she could write, well, then, she had that part figured out and
then he said that he wanted to travel and to explore and to never be tied down
to someone else’s expectations and that the key to life was living it your own
way. And then he stopped under a towering Englemann spruce at the far corner of
the park, and he pulled her over to him and his hands reached around to the
back of her neck and lingered there and he barely touched her as he leaned in,
and he rubbed his closed mouth against hers and then sucked gently on her lower
lip. He tasted like mint leaves, freshly crushed. The feel of his soft, full lips
made her belly lurch upwards and fill with a fullness, velvety and smooth. And
she felt as though she had known him forever; as though she were coming home.

After a single lingering kiss, he
pulled her around the tree on the other side of the cobblestone path, where the
tennis courts bordered the park, and he held her hand. His grip was gentle but
firm and the skin on his palms and his fingertips was rough, almost rasping.

“How did your hands get so…coarse?”
she asked, her voice low.

“I’m a framer.”

“You frame pictures? Like art or
photographs?”

“No,” he said, laughing softly
and shaking his head. “I frame houses.”

“Oh.”

“I’m a carpenter. Someday I
suppose I’ll build the entire house. As a general contractor. A designer. A
builder. That’s what my dad does.” He looked down just then. Then raised his
eyes again to meet hers. “But you’ve got to learn how to build a house with your
hands first. Or so they say. And so I came out here to see how the big, luxury
stuff is done. I’m working on a framing crew for peanuts right now. And I rent
a room in Carter’s house. Only because I answered an ad in the paper.” As he
spoke, he floated his hand in the small of her back, sending tingles up her
spine.  “Do you remember him at all?”

“Vaguely.”

“Well, he sure remembers you. And
I get it now. You are lovely.”

“You need to stop with the lines before
I disappear into the darkness,” she warned, but she was smiling. 

“I’m being sincere, Olivine. I
feel, I don’t know, charged up or buzzed or, I don’t know. Just right,” he
said, and Olivine remembered thinking that his words didn’t match the look in
his eyes, a veiled, sad expression, which lasted just a moment and then was
gone. He kissed her again, on the path, and then they circled the park until
the sun disappeared from the sky and a figure in the distance began to
dismantle the decorations. “Did we miss the bride and groom leaving?” he asked.

“Looks that way. I think the
wedding is over.”

He nodded and asked if he could
see her the next day, and she said he could.

They had spent the next week
together. And then the next. And she began to crave his company:  The buzz that
burst through her when he cradled the back of her neck in his hands, when he
grazed her lips with his. And then she introduced Henry to her grandfather.

Olivine had adored her
grandfather since she was a little girl. He would jump off the high cliffs at
the lake, turning flips all the way down. He would lasso objects in the front
yard. He would tell her what it was like to ride a horse standing up and how it
felt to jump out of airplanes in World War II. He had been an adventurer his
whole life. He had also been a carpenter, so he and Henry had a lot to talk
about.

The moment Henry was ushered into
her grandparents’ home, he had them smiling and nodding and laughing. She
remembered how Grandma leaned in close to him as he spoke. Henry asked
questions and listened to their answers in that silent way of his, like the
person speaking was the only person alive.

Grandpa talked about the homes he
had built across Wyoming, Montana and now Colorado and how he had been forced
to slow down once he turned seventy and needed that hip replacement, and then
Grandpa brought out photographs, which Olivine had never before seen, and they
looked at images of homes and cabinets and doors Grandpa had built. As he spoke
to Henry, Grandpa had become like a young man again, running his fingers
through his hair and shuffling through photographs and talking fast. And when
Grandpa had finished, when he had exhausted himself, and it was time to go,
Henry asked Grandpa a question.

“Do you have any nails from your
tool bags? The ones you used when you were framing?”

“Well now, I suppose I do.”

“Could I have some?” he asked,
low.

“Well, I suppose so, but I don’t
know why you would. They’re just like any other old framing nails,” Grandpa
said.

Henry looked down.  “I hope you
don’t find this too sentimental, but, in every house, I drive a nail from my
father’s bags. And I drive a nail from my grandfather’s bags. It’s a tradition
my father started, actually. And I’d like to drive one of your nails as well. I
don’t know why I do it. I usually don’t talk about it….”

“You know,” Grandpa’s raspy,
rough voice became very quiet, “I would be honored.” And he stood and went to
the garage, re-emerging with a leather pouch filled with a variety of dark
silver nails. 

And as Henry left her
grandparent’s house and they approached his Volkswagen, Henry swept to the
passenger side to open Olivine’s door and as she turned to hop in, he gazed at
her, and his breath caught and he said, “Olivine, I love your family.” And then
there was that look again. A wistfulness, just a flash and then it was gone.

In that moment she knew that she
would never be the same. It was true she didn’t need anyone. But
this
man. This man made everyday light dazzle. He made an obligatory visit with her
grandparents into one of the deepest, kindest experiences she had ever known.

With Henry, she felt herself become
the version of herself that she had always wanted to be. She was herself, but
more playful and fun. Herself, but more kind and interested. Herself, but more
comfortable, witty, accepted.