When Dawson returned from his run, several other guests were sipping coffee in the parlor, reading free copies of USA Today. He could smell the aroma of bacon and eggs wafting from the kitchen as he climbed the stairs to his room. After showering, he threw on a pair of jeans and a short-sleeved shirt before going down to breakfast.
By the time he got to the table, most of the others had already eaten, so Dawson ate alone. Despite the run, he wasn’t very hungry, but the owner — a woman in her sixties named Alice Russell, who’d moved to Oriental to retire eight years ago — filled his plate, and he had the sense she’d be disappointed if he didn’t eat everything. She had a grandmotherly look about her, right down to the apron and plaid housedress.
While he ate, Alice explained that, like so many others, she and her husband had retired to Oriental for the sailing. Her husband had grown bored, though, and they’d ended up buying the business a few years back. Surprisingly, she addressed him as “Mr. Cole” without any sign of recognition, even after he’d mentioned that he’d grown up in town. She was clearly still an outsider here.
His family was around, though. He’d seen Abee at the convenience store, and as soon as he’d rounded the corner he’d ducked between some houses and made his way back to the bed-and-breakfast, avoiding the main road whenever possible. The last thing he wanted was any trouble with his family, especially Ted and Abee, but he had the disquieting feeling that things weren’t quite settled.
Still, there was something he needed to do. After he finished eating, he picked up the flower bouquet he’d ordered while still in Louisiana and had sent to the bed-and-breakfast, then got in his rental car. As he drove, he kept his eyes on the rearview mirror, making sure that no one was watching him. At the cemetery, he wound his way through the familiar headstones to Dr. David Bonner’s grave.
As he’d hoped, the cemetery was deserted. He laid the flowers at the base of the headstone and said a short prayer for the family. He stayed for only a few minutes before driving back to the bed-and-breakfast. Getting out of the car, he looked up. Blue skies stretched to the horizon, and it was already growing warm. Thinking the morning was too beautiful to waste, he decided to walk.
The sun glared off the waters of the Neuse and he slipped on a pair of sunglasses. Crossing the street, he surveyed the neighborhood. Even though the shops were open, the sidewalks were largely empty, and he found himself wondering how they were able to stay in business.
Eyeing his watch, he saw he still had half an hour until his appointment. Up ahead, he spied the coffee shop he’d passed earlier on his run, and though he didn’t want more coffee, he decided he could use a bottle of water. Feeling a breeze pick up as he set his sights on the coffee shop, he saw the door swing open. He watched as someone stepped out, and almost immediately he began to smile.
Amanda stood at the counter of the Bean, adding cream and sugar to a cup of Ethiopian coffee. The Bean, once a small home that overlooked the harbor, offered about twenty different kinds of coffee along with delicious pastries, and Amanda always enjoyed coming here when she visited Oriental. Along with Irvin’s, it was a place where locals congregated to catch up on whatever was happening in town. Behind her, she could hear the murmurs of conversation. Although the morning rush had long since passed, the café was more crowded than she’d expected. The twenty-something-year-old behind the counter hadn’t stopped moving since Amanda had walked in.
She desperately needed coffee. The exchange with her mom this morning had left her feeling listless. Earlier, while she’d been in the shower, she’d briefly considered returning to the kitchen to attempt a real conversation. By the time she’d toweled off, though, she’d changed her mind. While she had always hoped that her mother would evolve into the sympathetic, supportive mother she had often longed for, it was easier to imagine the shocked, disappointed expression her mom would flash when she heard Dawson’s name. After that, the tirade would commence, no doubt a repeat of the outraged, condescending lectures she had delivered when Amanda was a teenager. Her mother, after all, was a woman of old-fashioned values. Decisions were good or bad, choices were right or wrong, and certain lines were not to be crossed. There were nonnegotiable codes of conduct, especially regarding family. Amanda had always known the rules; she’d always known what her mom believed. Her mother stressed responsibility, she believed in consequences, and she had little tolerance for whining. Amanda knew that wasn’t always a bad thing; she’d adopted a bit of the same philosophy with her own kids, and she knew they were better for it.
The difference was that her mother had always seemed so sure about everything. She had always been confident about who she was and the choices she’d made, as though life were a song and all she had to do was march in rhythm to it, knowing that everything would work out as planned. Her mother, Amanda often thought, had no regrets at all.
But Amanda wasn’t like that. Nor could she ever forget how brutal her mother’s reaction to Bea’s illness and eventual death had been. She’d expressed her sympathy, of course, and stayed to take care of Jared and Lynn during many of their frequent visits to the Pediatric Cancer Center at Duke; she’d even cooked a meal or two for them in the weeks after the funeral. But Amanda could never quite grasp her mother’s stoic acceptance of the situation, nor could she stomach the lecture she’d delivered three months after Bea died, about how Amanda needed to “get back on her horse” and “stop feeling sorry” for herself. As if losing Bea were nothing more than a bad breakup with a boyfriend. She still felt a surge of anger every time she thought about it, and she sometimes wondered whether her mom was capable of any sort of compassion.
She exhaled, trying to remind herself that her mother’s world was different from hers. Her mom had never gone to college, her mom had never lived anywhere but Oriental, and maybe that had something to do with it. She accepted things because there was nothing else to compare them to. And her own family had been anything but loving, from what little her mother had shared about her own upbringing. But who knew? All she knew for sure was that confiding in her mom would lead to more trouble than it was worth, and right now, she wasn’t ready for that.
As she was putting the lid on her coffee, Amanda’s cell phone rang. Seeing that it was Lynn, she stepped out onto the small porch as she answered, and they spent the next few minutes chatting. Afterward, Amanda called Jared on his cell phone, waking him and listening to his drowsy mumbles. Before hanging up, he said he was looking forward to seeing her on Sunday. She wished she could call Annette as well but consoled herself with the knowledge that she was almost certainly having a great time at camp.
After some hesitation, she also called Frank at the office. She hadn’t had a chance earlier that morning, despite what she’d told her mom. As usual, she had to wait until he had a free minute between patients.
“Hey, there,” he greeted her when he came on the line. As they talked, she deduced that he didn’t remember calling the house last night. Nonetheless, he sounded glad to hear her voice. He asked about her mom, and Amanda told him that they were going to have dinner later; he told her that he had plans to go golfing on Sunday morning with his friend Roger and that they might watch the Braves game afterward at the country club. Experience told her that those activities would inevitably involve heavy drinking, but she tried to suppress her surge of anger, knowing that challenging him wouldn’t do any good. Frank asked about the funeral and what else she planned to do in town. Though Amanda answered the questions honestly — she didn’t know much yet — she could feel herself avoiding Dawson’s name. Frank didn’t seem to notice anything amiss, but by the time they finished their conversation, Amanda felt a distinct and uncomfortable frisson of guilt. Alongside her anger, it was enough to leave her feeling unusually unsettled.
Dawson waited in the shade of a magnolia tree until Amanda slipped the phone back into her purse. He thought he saw something troubled in her expression, but as she straightened the strap on her shoulder she became unreadable again.
Like him, she was wearing jeans, and as he started toward her he noticed the way her turquoise blouse deepened the color of her eyes. Lost in thought, she started when she recognized him.
“Hey,” she said, breaking into a smile. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”
Dawson stepped onto the porch, watching as she ran a hand over her neat ponytail. “I wanted to grab some water before our meeting.”
“No coffee?” Amanda gestured behind her. “It’s the best in town.”
“I had some at breakfast.”
“Did you go to Irvin’s? Tuck used to swear by the place.”
“No. I just ate at the place where I’m staying. Breakfast comes with the room and all, and Alice had everything ready.”
“Alice?”
“Just some swimsuit supermodel who happens to own the place. No reason for you to be jealous.”
She laughed. “Yeah, I’m sure. How was your morning?”
“Good. Went for a nice run and had a chance to take in the changes around here.”
“And?”
“It’s like stepping into a time warp. I feel like Michael J. Fox in Back to the Future.”
“It’s one of Oriental’s charms. When you’re here, it’s easy to pretend the rest of the world doesn’t exist and that all your problems will simply float away.”
“You sound like a commercial for the Chamber of Commerce.”
“That’s one of my charms.”
“Among many others, I’m sure.”
As he said it, she was struck again by the intensity of his gaze. She wasn’t used to being scrutinized this way — on the contrary, she often felt virtually invisible as she went through the well-worn circuit of her daily routines. Before she could dwell on her self-consciousness, he nodded at the door. “I’m going to get that bottle of water, if that’s okay.”
He went inside, and from her vantage point Amanda noted the way the pretty twenty-something cashier tried not to stare at him as he walked toward the refrigerator case. When Dawson neared the back of the store, the clerk checked her appearance in the mirror behind the counter, then greeted him with a friendly smile at the register. Amanda turned away quickly, before he caught her watching.
A minute later, Dawson emerged, still trying to end his exchange with the clerk. Amanda forced herself to keep a straight face, and by unspoken agreement they moved off the porch, eventually wandering toward a spot with a better view of the marina.
“The girl at the counter was flirting with you,” she observed.
“She’s just friendly.”
“She made it pretty obvious.”
He shrugged as he unscrewed the cap of his bottle. “I didn’t really notice.”
“How could you not notice?”
“I was thinking about something else.”
By the way he said it, she knew there was more, and she waited. He squinted out at the line of boats bobbing in the marina.
“I saw Abee this morning,” he finally said. “When I was out for my run.”
Amanda stiffened at the sound of his name. “Are you sure it was him?”
“He’s my cousin, remember?”
“What happened?”
“Nothing.”
“That’s good, right?”
“I’m not sure yet.”
Amanda tensed. “What does that mean?”
He didn’t answer right away. Instead, he took a sip of water, and she could almost hear the wheels turning in his mind. “I guess it means I stay out of sight as much as possible. Other than that, I guess I’ll play things as they come.”
“Maybe they won’t do anything.”
“Maybe,” he agreed. “So far, so good, right?” He screwed the cap back on the bottle, changing the subject. “What do you think Mr. Tanner’s going to tell us? He was pretty mysterious when we talked on the phone. He wouldn’t tell me anything about the funeral.”
“He didn’t say much to me, either. My mom and I were talking about the very same thing this morning.”
“Yeah? How’s your mom doing?”
“She was a bit upset that she missed her bridge game last night. But to make up for it, she was nice enough to coerce me into having dinner at a friend’s house tonight.”
He smiled. “So… that means you’re free until dinner?”
“Why? What did you have in mind?”
“I don’t know. Let’s find out what Mr. Tanner has to say first. Which reminds me that we should probably get going. His office is just down the block.”
After Amanda secured the lid on her coffee, they started down the sidewalk, moving from one patch of shade to the next.
“Do you remember when you asked if you could buy me an ice cream?” she asked. “That first time?”
“I remember wondering why you said yes.”
She ignored his comment. “You took me to the drugstore, the one with the old-fashioned fountain and the long counter, and we both had hot fudge sundaes. They made the ice cream there, and it’s still the best I’ve ever had. I can’t believe they ended up tearing the place down.”
“When was that, by the way?”
“I don’t know. Maybe six or seven years ago? One day, on one of my visits, I noticed it was just gone. Kind of made me sad. I used to take my kids there when they were little, and they always had a good time.”
He tried to picture her children sitting next to her at the old drugstore but couldn’t quite conjure up their faces. Did they resemble her, he wondered, or take after their father? Did they have her fire, her generous heart?
“Do you think your kids would have liked growing up here?” he asked.
“When were little, they would have. It’s a beautiful town, with a lot of places to play and explore. But once they got older, they probably would have found it confining.”
“Like you?”
“Yeah,” she said. “Like me. I couldn’t wait to leave. I don’t know if you recall, but I applied to NYU and Boston College, just so I could experience a real city.”
“How could I forget? They all sounded so far away,” Dawson said.
“Yes, well… my dad went to Duke, I grew up hearing about Duke, I watched Duke basketball on television. I guess it was pretty much etched in stone that if I got in, that’s where I’d go. And it ended up being the right choice, because the school was great and I made a lot of friends and I grew up while I was there. Besides, I don’t know that I would have liked living in New York or Boston. I’m still a small-town girl at heart. I like to hear the crickets when I go to sleep.”
“You’d enjoy Louisiana then. It’s the bug capital of the world.”
She smiled before taking a sip of her coffee. “Do you remember when we drove down to the coast when Hurricane Diana was coming? How I kept begging you to take me, and how you kept trying to talk me out of it?”
“I thought you were crazy.”
“But you took me anyway. Because I wanted you to. We could barely get out of your car, the winds were so strong, and the ocean was just… wild. It was whitecaps all the way to the horizon, and you just stood there holding me, trying to convince me to get back in the car.”
“I didn’t want you to get hurt.”
“Are there storms like that when you’re on the oil rig?”
“Less often than you’d think. If we’re in the projected path, we usually get evacuated.”
“Usually?”
He shrugged. “Meteorologists get it wrong sometimes. I’ve been on the fringe of some hurricanes and it’s unnerving. You’re really at the mercy of the weather, and you just have to hunker down while the rig sways, knowing that no one’s coming to the rescue if it goes over. I’ve seen some guys completely lose it.”
“I think I’d be like one of those guys who lost it.”
“You were fine when Hurricane Diana was coming in,” he pointed out.
“That’s because you were there.” Amanda slowed her pace. Her voice was earnest. “I knew you wouldn’t let anything happen to me. I always felt safe when you were around.”
“Even when my dad and my cousins came by Tuck’s? To get their money?”
“Yeah,” she said. “Even then. Your family never bothered me.”
“You were lucky.”
“I don’t know,” she said. “When we were together, I’d see Ted or Abee in town sometimes, and every now and then I’d see your father. Oh, they’d have those little smirks on their faces if our paths happened to cross, but they never made me nervous. And then later, when I’d come back here in the summers, after Ted had been sent away, Abee and your dad kept their distance. I think they knew what you’d do if anything ever happened to me.” She came to a full stop under the shade of a tree and faced him. “So no, I’ve never been afraid of them. Not once. Because I had you.”
“You’re giving me too much credit.”
“Really? You mean you would have let them hurt me?”
He didn’t have to answer. She could tell by his expression that she was right.
“They were always afraid of you, you know. Even Ted. Because they knew you as well as I did.”
“You were afraid of me?”
“That’s not what I meant,” she said. “I knew you loved me and that you’d do anything for me. And that was one of the reasons it hurt so much when you ended it, Dawson. Because I knew even then how rare that kind of love is. Only the luckiest people get to experience it at all.”
For a moment Dawson seemed unable to speak. “I’m sorry,” he finally said.
“So am I,” she said, not bothering to hide the old sadness. “I was one of the lucky ones, remember?”
After reaching Morgan Tanner’s office, Dawson and Amanda sat in the small reception area replete with scuffed pine floors, end tables stacked with outdated magazines, and fraying upholstered chairs. The receptionist, who looked old enough to have been drawing social security for years, was reading a paperback novel. Then again, there wasn’t much else for her to do. In the ten minutes they waited, the phone never rang.
Finally, the door swung open, revealing an elderly man with a shock of white hair, gray caterpillars for eyebrows, and a rumpled suit. He waved them into his office. “Amanda Ridley and Dawson Cole, I presume?” He shook their hands. “I’m Morgan Tanner, and I’d like to express my sympathies to both of you. I know this must be hard.”
“Thank you,” Amanda said. Dawson simply nodded.
Tanner ushered them to a pair high-backed leather chairs. “Please sit down. This shouldn’t take long.”
Tanner’s office was nothing like the reception area, with mahogany shelving neatly stacked with hundreds of law books and a window that overlooked the street. The desk, an ornate antique with detailed molding on the corners, was topped with what appeared to be a Tiffany lamp. A walnut box sat in the center of the desk, which faced the leather armchairs.
“I want to apologize for being late. I was tied up on the phone, taking care of some last-minute details.” He kept talking as he shuffled around the desk. “I suppose you’re wondering why all the secrecy about the arrangements, but that was the way Tuck wanted it. He was rather insistent and had his own ideas about things.” He inspected them from beneath his bushy eyebrows. “But I suppose you two already know that.”
Amanda stole a look at Dawson as Tanner took his seat and reached for the file in front of him. “I also appreciate that both of you were able to make it. After listening to him talk about you, I know that Tuck would have appreciated it as well. I’m sure you both have questions, so let me go ahead and get started.” He shot them a quick smile, revealing surprisingly even and white teeth. “As you know, Tuck’s body was discovered on Tuesday morning by Rex Yarborough.”
“Who?” Amanda asked.
“The mailman. It turns out that he’d made it a point to check in on Tuck fairly regularly. When he knocked at the door, no one answered. The door was unlocked, though, and when he went in, he found Tuck in his bed. He called the sheriff, and the determination was made that no foul play was involved. That was when the sheriff called me.”
“Why did he call you?” Dawson asked.
“Because Tuck had asked him to. He’d made it known to the sheriff’s department that I was his executor and should be contacted as soon as possible after he passed.”
“You make it sound like he knew he was dying.”
“I think he had a sense that it was coming,” Tanner said. “Tuck Hostetler was an old man, and he wasn’t afraid to confront the realities of his advancing age.” He shook his head. “I just hope I can be as organized and resolute when my time approaches.”
Amanda and Dawson exchanged glances but said nothing.
“I urged him to let you both know about his final wishes and plans, but he wanted to keep them secret for some reason. I still can’t explain it.” Tanner sounded almost paternal. “He also made it obvious that he cared deeply about you two.”
Dawson sat forward. “I know it isn’t important, but how did you two know each other?”
Tanner nodded, as if he’d expected the question. “I met Tuck eighteen years ago, when I brought in a classic Mustang for him to restore. At the time, I was a partner at a large firm in Raleigh. I was a lobbyist, if you want to know the truth. Did a lot of work with agriculture. But to make a long story short, I stayed down here for a few days to monitor the progress. I only knew of Tuck by reputation and I didn’t quite trust him with my car. Anyway, we kind of got to know each other, and I realized I liked the pace of life around here. A few weeks later, when I finally came back to pick up my car, he didn’t charge me near what I thought he would, and I was amazed at his work. Fast-forward fifteen years. I was feeling burned out and I decided on a whim to move down here and retire. Only it didn’t quite take. After a year or so, I opened a small practice. Not much, just wills mainly and a real estate closing now and then. I don’t need to work, but it gives me something to do. And my wife couldn’t be happier that I’m out of the house for a few hours a week. Anyway, I happened to see Tuck at Irvin’s one morning and told him that if he ever needed anything, I’d be around. And then, last February, surprising no one more than me, he took me up on the offer.”
“Why you and not—”
“Another attorney in town?” Tanner asked, finishing for him. “I got the impression that he wanted an attorney who didn’t have deep roots in this town. He didn’t put much faith in attorney-client privilege, even when I assured him it was absolute. Is there anything more I can add that I didn’t cover?”
When Amanda shook her head, he pulled the file closer to him and slipped on a pair of reading glasses. “Then let’s get started. Tuck left instructions on how he wanted me to handle things as his executor. You should know those wishes included the fact that he didn’t want a traditional funeral. Instead, he asked that, after his death, I arrange for cremation, and per his wishes as to the timing, Tuck Hostetler was cremated yesterday.” He motioned toward the box on his desk, leaving no doubt that it held Tuck’s ashes.
Amanda paled. “But we arrived yesterday.”
“I know. He’d asked that I try to take care of it before you arrived.”
“He didn’t want us there?”
“He didn’t want anyone there.”
“Why not?”
“All I can say is that he was specific in his instructions. But if I were to guess, I think he was under the impression that having to make any of the arrangements might have been upsetting to you.” He lifted a page from the file and held it up. “He said — and I’m quoting him here—‘ain’t no reason my death should be a burden to ’em.’ ” Tanner removed his reading glasses and leaned back in his chair, trying to gauge their reactions.
“In other words, there’s no funeral?” Amanda asked.
“Not in the traditional sense, no.”
Amanda turned toward Dawson and back to Tanner again. “Then why did he want us to come?”
“He asked that I contact you in the hope that you would do something else for him, something more important than the cremation. Essentially, he wanted the two of you to scatter his ashes at a place he said was very special to him, a place apparently neither of you has ever visited.”
It took Amanda only a moment to figure it out. “His cottage at Vandemere?”
Tanner nodded. “That’s it. Tomorrow would be ideal, at whatever time you choose. Of course, if you’re uncomfortable with the idea, I’ll have it taken care of. I have to go up there anyway.”
“No, tomorrow’s fine,” Amanda said.
Tanner lifted a slip of paper. “Here’s the address, and I took the liberty of printing directions as well. It’s a bit off the beaten path, as you might suspect. And there’s one other thing: He asked that I give you these,” he said, removing three sealed envelopes from the file. “You’ll notice that two have your names on them. He asked that you read the unmarked one aloud first, sometime prior to the ceremony.”
“Ceremony?” Amanda repeated.
“The scattering of the ashes, I meant,” he said, handing over the directions and the envelopes. “And of course, feel free to add anything either of you might want to say.”
“Thank you,” she said, taking them. The envelopes felt oddly heavy, weighted with mystery. “But what about the other two?”
“I assume you’re to read those afterward.”
“You assume?”
“Tuck wasn’t specific about that, other than to say that after you’ve read the first letter, you’ll know when to open the other two.”
Amanda took the envelopes and slipped them in her purse, trying to digest everything Tanner had told them. Dawson seemed equally perplexed.
Tanner perused the file again. “Any questions?”
“Did he give specifics on where at Vandemere he wanted the ashes scattered?”
“No,” Tanner answered.
“How will we know, since we’ve never been there?”
“That’s the same question I asked him, but he seemed sure that you would understand what to do.”
“Did he have a particular hour of day in mind?”
“Again, he left that up to you. However, he was adamant in his desire that it remain a private ceremony. He asked me to make sure, for instance, that no information be given to the newspaper regarding his death, not even an obituary. I got the sense that he didn’t want anyone, aside from the three of us, to know that he’d even died. And I followed his wishes, to the greatest extent possible. Of course, word inevitably leaked out despite my best attempts, but I want you to know that I’ve done all that I could.”
“Did he say why?”
“No,” Tanner answered. “Nor did I ask. By that time, I’d figured out that unless he volunteered it, he probably wasn’t going to tell me.” He looked at Amanda and Dawson, waiting to see if they had further questions. When they stayed quiet, he flipped the top page in the folder. “Moving on to the subject of his estate, you both know that Tuck had no surviving family. While I understand that your grief may make this feel like an inopportune time to discuss his will, he did ask that I let you know what he intended to do while you were both here. Would that be all right?” When they nodded, he went on. “Tuck’s assets weren’t insubstantial. He owned quite a bit of land, in addition to having funds in several accounts. I’m still working through the numbers, but what you should know is this: He asked that you help yourselves to any of his personal property that you may desire, even if it’s only a single item. He simply asked that if there was disagreement about anything, the two of you work it out while you’re here. I’ll be handling the probate over the next few months, but essentially, the remainder of his estate will be sold, with the proceeds to benefit the Pediatric Cancer Center at Duke University Hospital.” Tanner smiled at Amanda. “He thought you’d want to know that.”
“I don’t know what to say.” She could feel Dawson’s quiet alertness beside her. “It’s so generous of him.” She hesitated, more affected than she wanted to admit. “He — I guess he knew what it would mean to me.”
Tanner nodded before sorting through the pages and finally set them aside. “I think that’s it, unless you can think of anything.”
There was nothing else, and after their good-byes Amanda rose while Dawson lifted the walnut box from the desk. Tanner stood but made no motion to follow them out. Amanda accompanied Dawson to the door, noticing the frown forming on his face. Before they reached the door, he paused and turned around.
“Mr. Tanner?”
“Yes?”
“You said something I’m curious about.”
“Oh?”
“You said that tomorrow would be ideal. I assume you meant tomorrow as opposed to today.”
“Yes.”
“Can you tell me why?”
Tanner moved the file to the corner of his desk. “I’m sorry,” he said. “But I can’t.”
“What was that about?” Amanda asked.
They were walking toward her car, which was still parked outside the coffee shop. Instead of answering, Dawson put his hand in his pocket.
“What are you doing for lunch?” he asked.
“You’re not going to answer my question?”
“I’m not sure what to say. Tanner didn’t give me an answer.”
“But why did you ask the question in the first place?”
“Because I’m a curious person,” he said. “I’ve always been curious about everything.”
She crossed the street. “No,” she finally said, “I don’t agree. If anything, you lived your life with an almost stoic acceptance of the way things are. But I know exactly what you’re doing.”
“What am I doing?”
“You’re trying to change the subject.”
He didn’t bother to deny it. Instead, he shifted the box beneath his arm. “You didn’t answer my question, either.”
“What question?”
“I asked what you were doing for lunch. Because if you’re free, I know a great place.”
She hesitated, thinking about small-town gossip, but as usual Dawson was able to read her.
“Trust me,” he said. “I know just where to go.”
Half an hour later, they were back at Tuck’s, sitting near the creek on a blanket that Amanda had retrieved from Tuck’s closet. On the way over, Dawson had picked up sandwiches from Brantlee’s Village Restaurant, along with some bottles of water.
“How did you know?” she asked, reverting to their old shorthand. With Dawson, she was reminded of what it was like to have her thoughts divined before she uttered them. When they were young, a momentary glimpse or the subtlest of gestures had often been enough to signal a world of thought and emotion.
“Your mom and everyone she knows still live in town. You’re married, and I’m someone from your past. It wasn’t too hard to figure out that it might not be a good idea for us to be seen spending the afternoon together.”
She was glad he understood, but as he pulled two sandwiches from the bag, she nonetheless felt a quiver of guilt. She told herself that they were simply having lunch, but that wasn’t the full truth, and she knew it.
Dawson didn’t seem to notice. “Turkey or chicken salad?” he asked, holding both of them out to her.
“Either,” she said. Then changing her mind, she said, “Chicken salad.”
He passed the sandwich to her, along with a bottle of water. She surveyed her surroundings, relishing the quiet. Thin, hazy clouds drifted overhead, and near the house she saw a pair of squirrels chase each other up the trunk of an oak tree shrouded in Spanish moss. A turtle sunned itself on a log on the far side of the creek. It was the environment she had grown up in, and yet it had come to feel strangely foreign, a radically different world from the one she lived in now.
“What did you think about the meeting?” he asked.
“Tanner seems like a decent man.”
“What about the letters Tuck wrote? Any ideas?”
“After what I heard this morning? Not a clue.”
Dawson nodded as he unwrapped his sandwich and she did the same. “The Pediatric Cancer Center, huh?”
She nodded, thinking automatically of Bea. “I told you I volunteered at Duke University Hospital. I also do some fund-raising for them.”
“Yes, but you didn’t mention where at the hospital you worked,” Dawson replied, his sandwich unwrapped but still untouched. She heard the question in his voice and knew that he was waiting. Amanda absently twisted the cap on her bottle of water.
“Frank and I had another child, a baby girl, three years after Lynn was born.” She paused, gathering her strength, but knowing that, somehow, saying the words to Dawson wouldn’t feel awkward or painful the way it so often did with others.
“She was diagnosed with a brain tumor when she was eighteen months old. It was inoperable, and despite the efforts of an incredible team of doctors and staff at the Pediatric Cancer Center, she died six months later.” She looked out over the ancient creek, feeling the familiar, deep-seated ache, a sadness she knew would never go away.
Dawson reached over and squeezed her hand. “What was her name?” he asked, his voice soft.
“Bea,” she said.
For a long time, neither said anything, the only sounds the burbling of the creek and the leaves rustling overhead. Amanda didn’t feel that she needed to say more, nor did Dawson expect her to. She knew he understood exactly how she was feeling, and she had the sense that he felt an ache as well, if only because he couldn’t help her.
After lunch, they gathered the remains of their picnic along with the blanket and started back toward the house. Dawson followed Amanda inside, watching as she vanished around the corner to put the blanket away. There was something guarded about her, as if she were afraid of having crossed an unspoken line. After retrieving glasses from a cupboard in the kitchen, he poured some sweet tea. When she came back to the kitchen, he offered her one.
“You okay?” he asked.
“Yeah,” she said, taking the glass. “I’m fine.”
“I’m sorry if I upset you.”
“You didn’t,” she said. “It’s just that talking about Bea is still hard for me sometimes. And it’s been an… unexpected weekend so far.”
“For me, too,” he agreed. He leaned back against the counter. “How do you want to do this?”
“Do what?”
“Go through the house. To see if there’s anything you want.”
Amanda exhaled, hoping her jumpiness wasn’t obvious. “I don’t know. It feels wrong to me somehow.”
“It shouldn’t. He wanted us to remember him.”
“I’ll remember him no matter what.”
“Then how about this? He wants to be more than just a memory. He wants us to have a piece of him and this place, too.”
She took a sip, knowing he was probably right. But the idea of rooting through his things to find a keepsake right now just felt like too much. “Let’s hold off for a bit. Would that be all right?”
“It’s fine. Whenever you’re ready. You want to sit outside for a while?”
She nodded and followed him out to the back porch, where they seated themselves in Tuck’s old rockers. Dawson rested his glass on his thigh. “I imagine that Tuck and Clara used to do this quite a bit,” he commented. “Just sit outside and watch the world go by,” he said.
“Probably.”
He turned toward her. “I’m glad you came to visit him. I hated the thought that he was always all alone out here.”
She could feel the moisture from the sweating glass as she held it. “You know he used to see Clara, right? After she was gone.”
Dawson frowned. “What are you talking about?”
“He swore she was still around.”
For an instant, his mind flashed on the images and movement that he’d been experiencing. “What do you mean, he saw her?”
“Just what I said. He saw her and talked to her,” she said.
He blinked. “Are you saying that Tuck believed he was seeing a ghost?”
“What? He never told you?”
“He never talked to me about Clara, period.”
Her eyes widened. “Ever?”
“The only thing he ever told me was her name.”
So Amanda set her glass aside and began to tell him some of the stories that Tuck had shared with her over the years. About how he’d dropped out of school when he was twelve and found a job in his uncle’s garage; how he’d first met Clara at church when he was fourteen years old and knew in that instant that he was going to marry her; how Tuck’s entire family, including his uncle, had moved north in search of work a few years into the Great Depression and never came back. She told Dawson about his early years with Clara, including the first miscarriage, and his backbreaking work for Clara’s father on the family farm while he worked on building this house at night. She said that Clara had two more miscarriages after the war and talked about Tuck building the garage before gradually beginning to restore cars in the early 1950s, including a Cadillac owned by an up-and-coming singer named Elvis Presley. By the time she finished telling him about Clara’s death and how Tuck talked to Clara’s ghost, Dawson had emptied his tea and was staring into the glass, no doubt trying to reconcile her stories with the man he’d known.
“I can’t believe he didn’t tell you any of that,” Amanda marveled.
“He had his reasons, I guess. Maybe he liked you better.”
“I doubt that,” she said. “It’s just that I knew him later in life. You knew him when he was still hurting.”
“Maybe,” he said, sounding unconvinced.
Amanda went on. “You were important to him. He let you live here, after all. Not once, but twice.” When Dawson finally nodded, she set her glass aside. “Can I ask a question, though?”
“Anything.”
“What did the two of you talk about?”
“Cars. Engines. Transmissions. Sometimes we talked about the weather.”
“Must have been scintillating,” she cracked.
“You can’t imagine. But back then, I wasn’t much of a talker, either.”
She leaned toward him, suddenly purposeful. “All right. So now we both know about Tuck and you know about me. But I still don’t know about you.”
“Sure you do. I told you about me yesterday. I work on an oil rig? Live in a trailer out in the country? Still drive the same car? No dates?”
In a languid motion, Amanda draped her ponytail over one shoulder, the movement almost sensual. “Tell me something I don’t know,” she coaxed. “Something about you that no one knows. Something that would surprise me.”
“There’s not much to tell,” he said.
She scrutinized him. “Why don’t I believe you?”
Because, he thought, I could never hide anything from you. “I’m not sure,” he said instead.
She grew quiet at his answer, working through something else in her mind. “You said something yesterday that I’m curious about.” When he fixed her with a quizzical expression, she went on. “How did you know that Marilyn Bonner never remarried?”
“I just do.”
“Did Tuck tell you?”
“No.”
“Then how do you know?”
He laced his fingers together and leaned back in his rocker, knowing that if he didn’t answer, she’d simply ask again. In that, she hadn’t changed, either. “It’s probably better if I start from the beginning,” he said, sighing. He told her then about the Bonners — about his visit to Marilyn’s crumbling farmhouse so long ago, about the family’s years of struggle, that he’d begun sending them money anonymously when he got out of prison. And finally, that over the years he’d had private detectives report on the family’s welfare. When he finished, Amanda was quiet, visibly struggling with a response.
“I don’t know what to say,” she finally burst out.
“I knew you were going to say that.”
“I’m serious, Dawson,” she said, her anger evident. “I mean, I know that there’s something noble about what you’re doing, and I’m sure it made a difference in their lives. But… there’s something sad about it, too, because you can’t forgive yourself for what so clearly was an accident. Everyone makes mistakes, even if some are worse than others. Accidents happen. But having someone follow them? To know exactly what’s happening in their lives? That’s just wrong.”
“You don’t understand—,” he started.
“No, you don’t understand,” she interrupted. “Don’t you think they deserve their privacy? Taking photos, digging through their personal lives—”
“It’s not like that,” he protested.
“But it is!” Amanda slapped the armrest of her rocker. “What if they ever found out? Can you imagine how terrible that would be? How betrayed and invaded they’d feel?” Surprising him, she placed a hand on his arm, her grasp firm and yet urgent to make sure he heard her. “I’m not saying I agree with what you’re doing; what you do with your money is your business. But the rest? With the detectives? You’ve got to stop. You’ve got to promise me you’ll do that, okay?”
He could feel the heat radiating from her touch. “All right,” he said finally. “I promise I won’t do it again.”
She studied him, making sure he was telling the truth. For the first time since they’d met, Dawson looked almost tired. There was something defeated in his posture, and as they sat together she found herself wondering what would have happened to him had she never left that summer. Or even if she’d gone to visit him while he’d been in prison. She wanted to believe that it might have made a difference, that Dawson would have been able to live a life less haunted by the past. That Dawson, if not happy, would have at the very least been able to find a sense of peace. For him, peace had always been elusive.
But then he wasn’t alone in that, was he? Wasn’t that what everyone wanted?
“I have another confession,” he said. “About the Bonners.”
She felt her breath as it left her lungs. “More?”
He scratched the side of his nose with his free hand, as if to buy time. “I brought flowers to Dr. Bonner’s grave earlier this morning. It was something I used to do when I got out of prison. When it got to be too much, you know?”
She stared at him, wondering if he was about to tack on another surprise, but he didn’t. “That’s not quite on the level of the other things you’ve been doing.”
“I know. I just thought I should mention it.”
“Why? Because now you want my opinion?”
He shrugged. “Maybe.”
She didn’t answer for a moment. “I think flowers are fine,” she finally said, “as long as you don’t overdo it. That’s actually… appropriate.”
He turned toward her. “Yeah?”
“Yes,” she said. “Placing flowers at his grave is meaningful, but not invasive.”
He nodded but said nothing. In the silence, Amanda leaned even closer. “Do you know what I’m thinking?” she asked.
“After everything I’ve said, I’m almost afraid to guess.”
“I think you and Tuck are more alike than you realize.”
He turned toward her. “Is that good or bad?”
“I’m still here with you, aren’t I?”
When the heat became stifling even in the shade, Amanda led them back inside. The screen door banged shut gently behind them.
“You ready?” he asked, surveying the kitchen.
“No,” she said. “But I suppose we have to do this. For the record, it still seems wrong to me. I don’t even know how to start.”
Dawson paced the length of the kitchen before turning to face her. “Okay, let’s do this: When you think about your last visit with Tuck, what comes to mind?”
“It was the same as always. He talked about Clara, I made him dinner.” She gave a small shrug. “I put a blanket over his shoulders when he fell asleep in the chair.”
Dawson drew her into the living room and nodded toward the fireplace. “Then maybe you should take the picture.”
She shook her head. “I couldn’t do that.”
“You’d rather it be thrown away?”
“No, of course not. But you should take it. You knew him better than I did.”
“Not really,” he said. “He never talked to me about Clara. And when you see it, you’ll think about both of them, not just him, and that’s why he told you about her.”
When she hesitated, he stepped toward the fireplace and gently removed it from the mantel. “He wanted this to be important to you. He wanted the two of them to be important to you.”
She reached for the photo, staring at it. “But if I take this, what’s left for you? I mean, there’s not much here.”
“Don’t worry. There’s something I saw earlier that I’d like to keep.” He moved toward the door. “Come on.”
Amanda followed him down the steps. As they approached the garage it dawned on her: If the house was where she and Tuck had forged their bond, the garage had been that place for Dawson and Tuck. And even before he found it, she already knew what he wanted.
Dawson reached for the faded bandanna folded neatly on the workbench. “This is what he wanted me to have,” he said.
“You sure?” Amanda squinted at the square of red cloth. “It’s not much.”
“It’s the first time I’ve ever noticed a clean one around here, so it has to be for me.” He grinned. “But yeah, I’m sure. To me, this is Tuck. I don’t think I ever saw him without one. Always the same color, of course.”
“Of course,” she agreed. “We’re talking about Tuck, right? Mr. Constant-in-All-Things?”
Dawson tucked the bandanna into his back pocket. “It’s not such a bad thing. Change isn’t always for the best.”
The words seemed to hang in the air, and Amanda didn’t reply. Instead, when he leaned against the Stingray, it triggered something in her memory, and Amanda took a step toward him. “I forgot to ask Tanner what to do with the car.”
“I was thinking that I might as well finish it. Then Tanner can just call the owner to pick it up.”
“Really?”
“As far as I can tell, all the parts are here,” he said, “and I’m pretty sure Tuck would have wanted me to finish it. Besides, you’re going to dinner with your mom, so it’s not like I have anything else to do tonight.”
“How long will it take?” Amanda scanned the boxes of spare parts.
“I don’t know. A few hours, maybe?”
She turned her attention to the car, walking its length before facing him again. “Okay,” she said. “Do you need help?”
Dawson gave a wry smile. “Did you learn how to fix engines since I saw you last?”
“No.”
“I can take care of it after you leave,” he said. “No big deal.” Turning around, he gestured toward the house. “We can go back inside if you’d rather. It’s pretty hot out here.”
“I don’t want you to have to work late,” she said, and like an old habit rediscovered, she moved to the spot that had once been hers. She pushed a rusty tire iron out of the way and lifted herself onto the workbench before making herself comfortable. “We’ve got a big day tomorrow. And besides, I always liked watching you work.”
He thought he heard something akin to a promise in that, and it struck him that the years seemed to be looping back on themselves, allowing him to revisit the time and place where he’d been happiest. Turning away, he reminded himself that Amanda was married. The last thing she needed was the kind of complication that comes from trying to rewrite the past. He drew a slow, deliberate breath and reached for a box on the other end of the workbench.
“You’re going to get bored. This will take a while,” he said, trying to mask his thoughts.
“Don’t worry about me. I’m used to it.”
“Being bored?”
She tucked her legs up. “I used to sit here for hours waiting for you to finish so we could finally go and do something fun.”
“You should have said something.”
“When I couldn’t take it anymore, I would. But I knew that if I pulled you away too often, Tuck wouldn’t have let me come around anymore. That’s also why I didn’t keep you talking the whole time.”
Her face was partly in shadow, her voice a seductive call. Too many memories, with her sitting there the way she used to, talking like this. He lifted the carburetor from the box, inspecting it. It was refurbished but obviously done well, and he set it aside before skimming the work order.
He moved to the front of the car, popped the hood, and peered in. When he heard her clear her throat, he peeked at her.
“Well, considering Tuck’s not around,” she said, “I suppose we can talk all we want now, even if you are working.”
“Okay.” He stood straighter and stepped toward the workbench. “What do you want to talk about?”
She thought about it. “Okay, how about this? What do you remember most about the first summer we were together?”
He reached for a set of wrenches, considering the question. “I remember wondering why on earth you wanted to spend time with me.”
“I’m serious.”
“So am I. I had nothing and you had everything. You could have dated anyone. And though we tried to lie low, I knew even then that it would only cause you problems. It didn’t make sense to me.”
She rested her chin on her knees, hugging them tightly to her body. “You know what I remember? I remember the time you and I drove to Atlantic Beach. When we saw all the starfish? It was like they’d all washed up at once, and we walked the entire length of the beach, tossing them back into the water. And later, we split a burger and fries and watched the sun go down. We must have talked for twelve straight hours.”
She smiled before going on, knowing that he was remembering as well. “That’s why I loved being with you. We could do the simplest things, like toss starfish into the ocean and share a burger and talk and even then I knew that I was fortunate. Because you were the first guy who wasn’t constantly trying to impress me. You accepted who you were, but more than that, you accepted me for me. And nothing else mattered — not my family or your family or anyone else in the world. It was just us.” She paused. “I don’t know that I’ve ever felt as happy as I did that day, but then again, it was always like that when we were together. I never wanted it to end.”
He met her eyes. “Maybe it hasn’t.”
She understood then, with the distance that age and maturity brings, how much he’d loved her back then. And still did, something whispered inside her, and all at once she had the strange impression that everything they’d shared in the past had been the opening chapters in a book with a conclusion that had yet to be written.
The idea should have scared her, but it didn’t, and she ran her palm over the outline of their worn initials, carved into the workbench so many years ago. “I came here when my father died, you know.”
“Where? Here?” When she nodded, Dawson reached again for the carburetor. “I thought you said you started visiting Tuck only a few years ago.”
“He didn’t know. I never told him I came.”
“Why not?”
“I couldn’t. It was all I could do to keep myself together, and I wanted to be alone.” She paused. “It was about a year after Bea died, and I was still struggling when my mom called to tell me that my dad had had a heart attack. It didn’t make any sense. He and my mom had visited us in Durham the week before, but the next thing I knew, we were loading up the kids to go to his funeral. We drove all morning to get here, and when I walked in the door, my mom was dressed to the nines and almost immediately began to brief me on our appointment at the funeral home. I mean, she showed hardly any emotion at all. She seemed to be more worried about getting the right kind of flowers for the service and making sure that I called all the relatives. It was like this bad dream, and by the end of the day, I just felt so… alone. So I left the house in the middle of the night and drove around, and for some reason I ended up parking down by the road and walking up here. I can’t explain it. But I sat here and cried for what must have been hours.” She exhaled, the tide of memories surging back. “I know my dad never gave you a chance, but he wasn’t really a bad person. I always got along better with him than I did with my mom, and the older I got, the closer we became. He loved the kids — especially Bea.” She was quiet before finally offering a sad smile. “Do you think that’s strange? That I came here after he died, I mean?”
Dawson considered it. “No,” he said. “I don’t think it’s strange at all. After I served my time, I came back here, too.”
“You didn’t have anywhere else to go.”
His raised an eyebrow. “Did you?”
He was right, of course: While Tuck’s had been a place of idyllic memories, it had also been the place she’d always come to cry.
She clasped her fingers tighter, forcing the memory away, and settled in, watching Dawson as he began to piece the engine back together. As the afternoon wound down, they talked easily of everyday things, past and present, filling in pieces of their lives and exchanging opinions on everything from books to places they had always dreamed of visiting. She was struck by a sense of déjà vu as she listened to the familiar clicks of the socket wrench when he adjusted it into place. She saw him struggle to loosen a bolt, his jaw clenching until it finally came free, before carefully setting it aside. Just as he had when they were young, he would stop what he was doing every now and then, reminding her that he was listening intently to everything she said. That he wanted to let her know, in his own understated way, that she had been and always would be important to him, struck her with almost painful intensity. Later, when he took a break from his labors and went to the house before returning with two glasses of sweet tea, there was a moment, just a moment, when she was able to imagine a different life that might have been hers, the kind of life she knew that she’d always really wanted.
When the late afternoon sun hung low over the pines, Dawson and Amanda finally left the garage, walking slowly back toward her car. Something had changed between them in the last few hours — a fragile rebirth of the past, perhaps — that both thrilled and terrified her. Dawson, for his part, ached to slip his arm around her as they walked side by side, but sensing her confusion he stopped himself.
Amanda’s smile was tentative when they finally reached her door. She looked up at him, noticing his thick, full eyelashes, the kind that any woman would envy.
“I wish I didn’t have to go,” she admitted.
He shifted from one foot to the other. “I’m sure you and your mom will have a good time.”
Maybe, she thought, but probably not. “Will you lock up when you go?”
“Of course,” he said, noticing the way the sunlight skimmed over her glowing skin, the stray wisps of hair that lifted in the gentle breeze. “How do you want to do this tomorrow? Should I meet you up there or do you want me to follow you?”
She weighed the options, feeling conflicted. “There’s no reason to bring two cars, is there?” she finally asked. “Why don’t we just meet here around eleven and drive up together?”
He nodded and looked at her, neither of them moving. Finally, he took a slight step backward, breaking the spell, and Amanda felt herself exhale. She hadn’t realized she’d been holding her breath.
After she slid onto the front seat of her car, Dawson closed the door behind her. His body was outlined against the setting sun, almost giving her the impression that he was a stranger. Feeling suddenly awkward, she pawed through her purse to find her keys, noting that her hands were trembling.
“Thanks for lunch,” she said.
“Anytime,” he answered.
Peeking in the rearview mirror as she pulled away, she saw that Dawson was still standing where she’d left him, as if hoping she’d change her mind and turn the car around. She felt the stirrings of something dangerous, something she’d been trying to deny.
He still loved her, she was certain of that now, and the realization was intoxicating. She knew it was wrong, and she tried to force the feeling away, but Dawson and their past had taken root once more, and she could no longer deny the simple truth that for the first time in years, she’d felt like she’d finally come home.