6
Now
Friends. Sure.
He says it so softly that I strain to hear it. For the rest of the drive, I keep my eyes shut, examining those two syllables and what they mean. We had been inching closer to something that felt like friendship before I messed up.
I don’t know if it’s the scent of the ocean, or if my body knows the twists of the road, or if Summer Wind is imprinted on me at a cellular level, but I can feel when we’re almost there. I open my eyes when the truck slows. I don’t want to miss my first glimpse. The cedar shingles, the yellow door, the red dirt road snaking through the grass, the Gulf of St. Lawrence glittering behind it.
The house stands as it always has, in all her sturdy glory. Just seeing it feels like taking a deep breath. I’m here. The place that calls to me more than anywhere else.
Felix lifts my suitcase from the back and carries it into the house. Bridget wraps her arm around my waist, and as we follow behind, she pops onto her toes, kisses me on the cheek, and says, “Welcome back, Bee.”
Summer Wind is as spellbinding inside as it is out. You enter through a shaggy mudroom. It smells like wood and damp wool. There are shoes scattered over the floor, and a stratum of raincoats and scarves and umbrellas cover the hooks. It’s the middle of summer, but the winter boots and jackets haven’t been put away. It reminds me of the closet that leads to Narnia, and just like in the story, traveling through it makes real life feel a world away.
I unbuckle my sandals and follow Bridget into the main space, feet already gritty with sand. There’s a large living area that opens into the kitchen at the far end, with tall windows that look over the wide expanse of sky and sea. The white linen couch and armchairs are rumpled and so soft, they threaten to swallow you when you drop into them. Braided rugs lie higgledy-piggledy, a patchwork of color over wide knotted floorboards. A fireplace is set into a brick wall, painted white and stained with smoke from years of use. There’s a stack of logs on one side and a vintage steamer trunk that’s full of blankets on the other. An upright piano stands under the staircase that leads to the second floor. There’s a five-disc changer on the sideboard. Bridget’s dad, Ken, is the resident Summer Wind DJ and swears CDs are coming back. When he’s home, the evenings are set to a Canadian rock soundtrack. Joel Plaskett, Feist, the Tragically Hip, Sloan. There used to be books piled on every surface, but they belonged to Felix, and he no longer lives here.
Summer Wind has never been polished or even overly tidy, but it has the feeling of being wholly loved, so different from my parents’ house in St.
Catharines, with its colonial furniture and formal sitting room. I never really felt at home there.
When I was growing up, the Ashby family’s schedule revolved around my older brother’s hockey—Lyle was promising enough to capture the attention of scouts. Sometimes, on tournament weekends, my parents would send me to Toronto to stay with my aunt. Her yard was where I could get messy and be silly. Stacy showed me how to start seeds and deadhead petunias. She let me ransack her beds, picking whatever I fancied to fill a vase for her kitchen windowsill. Sometimes, if I was lucky, she’d bring me around the corner to hang out at In Bloom. With Stacy, I felt like I belonged.
Much of the Clark house is unchanged from my first visit, but the kitchen has been totally renovated. Christine had it redone after the hurricane two years ago. I wander through the space, running my hand over the cabinets.
They’re sage green now, the hardware gold, and there’s a large butcher block island.
I stop in front of the sliding glass door, taking in the vista. A lawn of vibrant emerald stretches to the grassy dunes that buttress the beach. The gulf unfurls in the distance, a brilliant royal blue. It still amazes me how beautiful it is here, how my chest feels like a tightly wound bobbin in the city, but just standing in this spot loosens me enough that I can feel the difference in my lungs.
“I’ll see if I can get the Mustang started before I go,” I hear Felix say. He and Bridget are standing by the foot of the stairs. “I put Lucy’s suitcase in my old room.”
“Actually,” Bridget says, “I wanted to talk to you about that. I was hoping you’d stay here. With us.”
My eyes fly to Felix, but he’s frowning at his sister.
“Bee can sleep with me,” Bridget goes on. “And you can have your old room. All of us home together, just like it used to be.”
Felix rolls his shoulders. “I can’t,” he says. “This isn’t my home anymore, Bridge.”
“No, I know that. But I was hoping we could spend time together. I want my best friend and my brother with me right now.”
“What’s going on?” Clearly Felix is in the dark as much as I am. He doesn’t play games, so it doesn’t surprise me when he comes right out and asks, “Did something happen with Miles?” I can tell he doesn’t like asking, that he doesn’t believe anything could happen. Bridget and Miles have been together for three years now, and he’s as solid as granite. They both are.
Bridget blinks three times in quick succession. “No, of course not.”
The twin lines atop Felix’s nose deepen. “So he’s okay with you being here?”
She shrugs one shoulder in the manner of all Clark family members.
“Sure.”
I want to believe her, but I have a sinking feeling that this is about Miles.
Bridget has a track record of chewing over her problems in silence.
Sometimes she deliberates for days. She hates asking for help, and she rejects unsolicited advice. If the wedding is in jeopardy and her relationship is on the brink, there’s a strong possibility she won’t tell me until she has decided on a
full course of action. Coming here was the right thing to do. I’ll be by her side when she’s ready to lay it all out.
“Wolf, come on,” she says. “Who’s going to keep Bee and me in oysters if you’re not here? Who’s going to light the bonfire?”
Felix gives his sister a flat look. “You can do both those things.”
“But why should I when I have my wonderful baby brother who I hardly ever get to see around to do it for me?” Her smile is sweeter than a sugar bowl.
Felix runs his hand over his forehead. He’s good at setting boundaries, but I know it’s difficult for him to let anyone down, especially his sister. “I’ve got stuff to take care of out at the cottages.”
Felix and his best friend, Zach, own a strip of land south of Souris, where they’ve built four vacation homes. Salt Cottages have been hugely successful.
The buildings are stunning, the view is phenomenal, and their reviews are gushing. They’re booked through the high season—I checked online.
Zach lives in Summerside and continues to work as a project manager for his family’s design/build company, but Felix’s cabin is close to the cottages.
He handles everything except for the cleaning, so when he says he has stuff to take care of, he’s not lying. But he’s also his own boss. If he wanted to stay at Summer Wind, he could find a way to make it happen.
There’s one explanation why he won’t: me. I feel myself flush.
“I get it,” Bridget says, squinting. “I do. But I miss you, Wolf.”
“I’m sorry.” His eyes skate almost all the way over to me but stop short.
“I just can’t.”
Felix grabs a set of keys off the hook by the door, and my stomach twists.
I know I’m the one who put this awkwardness between us.
I’m cautious as we follow him to the large wooden shed at the end of the driveway.
Felix opens the barn door, and pulls the cloth off a very shiny, very red car. Five minutes after meeting me, Ken brought me outside to show off the Mustang, telling me about the months he and Felix spent fixing it up.
I think it’s a sixties model, but I know it’s a stick. Bridget tried to teach me to drive it once, but I stalled so many times that it took ten minutes to
make it to the end of the Clarks’ winding driveway. Bridget and I were laughing like hyenas, and I had to pull over before I turned onto the road. We climbed out of the car and lay in the field, holding our sides and cackling up at the clouds.
Felix gives the car a pat hello on the hood and gets into the driver’s seat.
The engine refuses to turn over. He taps his fingers on the steering wheel, thinking, and I make the error of looking at his hands. Those hands. Those long fingers. Thick. Dexterous.
“Probably the battery,” Felix says, climbing out of the car. “I told Dad we should put a new one in not long ago. I think he ordered it.”
He pops the hood. Pokes around in an assured way that makes me avert my gaze. What’s so fascinating about tendons anyway? Bridget surveys the
shelves in the shed.
“This it?”
Felix glances over his shoulder. “Yeah. I’ll switch it out, and hopefully that will do the trick.”
I step outside. I do not need to watch Felix work on a car. When I hear the engine rumble to life, I’m hit with loss. Felix will be on his way now. He’ll return to his side of the island. But it’s for the best.
“I’ll stop by in a couple of days. With oysters,” Felix says as he hugs his sister goodbye.
He heads to his pickup, lifting his hand in my approximate direction. His eyes meet mine. But they don’t twinkle, they burn. Darker than ever—deeper than before. “Good to see you, Lucy.”
Bridget drapes her arm around my shoulder, and we watch the truck bump down the driveway, leaving behind a cloud of reddish dust. And me.
