Crossing the Bridge (35 page)

“Yeah, but you didn’t sound like it.” She smiled at me. To the best of my knowledge, she had no idea where I had been the past two days or why, but she seemed to have concluded that it had something to do with my personal satisfaction.

“Everything go okay here?” I asked.

“Yeah, of course. Monster day yesterday. But we just bore up.”

“I owe you one.”

“What you owe me is time and a half. I’m going to have a ton of overtime this week. But I’ll forget about it if you tell me why you look like you’re in such a good mood.”

I laughed. “Overtime is fine.”

“Too bad. Howard Crest called a few minutes ago. Asked that you call him when you got in.”

I went to the back room and called Howard’s office.

“Pat Maple has come through,” he said when he came to the phone.

“Come through with another counteroffer?”

“Come through with your precise asking price. He went for the whole thing. I guess his daughter liked Amber very much and, while he was a little dubious about the last month’s sales figures, he was also very impressed.”

I felt slightly disoriented by this news. I’d begun to believe over the past few weeks that Maple would in fact ultimately make an acceptable offer, but I’d also come to understand that negotiating was a sport to him, one he played with the avidity of a semipro golfer. I expected that we’d get to the point where we were arguing hundreds of dollars before he finally forced me to concede. Of course, the first thought that crossed my mind was that we’d underpriced the store, though I knew that wasn’t the case at all. If anything, Maple was willing to pay slightly above market value.

“What do we do now?” I asked.

“We make a deal. I assume this is where you need to turn it over to your father. I’d like to set up some time to talk to him and your mother this afternoon. Should I give him a call?”

“No, I’d like to do it. He’s gonna be thrilled. I think. I mean, I think he’ll probably be a little sad that this is the beginning of the end, but he’s going to be happy with the deal we got.”

“It’s a great deal, Hugh.”

“I know it is. Thanks.”

“You had a lot to do with it. Between what you put into the store and how you held out for the best price. You did a great job for Richard and I’m sure he appreciates it.”

I guessed that he did appreciate it, though I had no real way of knowing. We’d hardly talked about the process of the sale, even when he came into the store to see the changes I’d made.

“You’ll set something up for this afternoon, then?” Howard asked.

“Yeah, I’ll set it up. I’ll call you back. Thanks again, Howard.”

“You’re welcome. I’m glad I could do it for Richard.”

I hung up the phone and then started to dial home. I stopped, realizing that this was news I should deliver in person. I walked to the front of the store. Jenna was ringing up a sale and I helped the next customer in line and another after that.

“I have to head out again,” I said when there was no one left at the counter.

“Is this a test of some sort?”

“It is, and you’re doing fabulously,” I said as I walked away.

The sidewalks of Russet Avenue were already active even though it was before noon. A small child weaved around pedestrians while his mother struggled to keep up. A gaggle of teenagers gathered outside of Bean There, Done That listening to hip-hop and pretending to be “street,” a gesture that would have seemed humorously incongruous if I hadn’t known it to be enacted in some form by every generation of homegrowns to come before them. A tourist couple in their late forties held hands and swung arms while moving from shop to shop. I’d been back in Amber for more than four months and had seen all of these things before. But for so many reasons I saw them with new eyes today. I saw the interconnectedness and the continuity and, even though I once believed that I would never use the term in association with the town I grew up in, I saw the evolution.

I looked back at the store. Continuity and evolution. Would Pat Maple continue to call the place Amber Cards, Gifts, and Stationery or would he change it to something more clever?

By the time I got to the car, I’d already made up my mind. In all likelihood, I’d made it up weeks ago without realizing it.

When I arrived at the house, my parents were sitting on the back deck with my Aunt Rita. I’d only seen her a few times since my Memorial Day melt-down and every instance had been very uncomfortable. Today, though, I walked directly over to her and kissed her on the cheek before saying to my
parents, “I need you for a minute.” We sat at the dining room table and my mother asked me if I wanted coffee, which I’d had more than enough of at that point.

“The buyer has come up to our number,” I said.

My father took a deep breath and nodded slowly. My mother said, “That’s great” wanly.

“I don’t want you to take it.” Both of them turned to look at me. I shut my eyes and gave myself a moment before continuing. “I want it. I’m here now and, completely without intending to, I’ve kind of gotten attached to the place. It’s supposed to stay in the family.”

My mother reached out and took my hand. My father took another deep breath.

“Howard Crest wants to meet with you this afternoon to finalize the deal. I’d like to call him and tell him that we’re taking it off the market if that’s okay with you. There’s enough money in the store for all of us.”

My father looked at me carefully. I imagined that he was recalibrating, though it’s entirely possible he was gauging my sincerity.

“You’re the boss,” he said. “If you think this is the right decision, tell him.”

I called Howard, who seemed relatively unsurprised and only mildly peeved at having lost the commission, and then, after my parents had gone back out to the deck with Rita, I called Iris to give her the news.

“You’re doing the right thing,” she said.

“God, I hope so. Do you realize what I just committed to doing?”

“You know you’re doing the right thing. You don’t have to wonder.”

“You’re right. I do know it. Jeez, a shopkeeper. Can you believe that’s what I’ve turned out to be?”

“As long as you don’t develop a paunch and start wearing an apron, I think you’ll be okay. Hey, come on up tonight. We should celebrate in person.”

“This commute is going to kill me.”

She hesitated for a beat and then said, “Yeah, we’ll have to think about that.”

I sighed. I cradled the phone between my head and my shoulders, imagining that I was nuzzling Iris’ face instead. “I think the last couple of days officially qualify as a whirlwind.”

“I suppose they do.”

“I can’t wait to see you tonight.”

“Come up now. I’ll make some excuse.”

“I think Jenna would hunt me down and kill me if I did that to her again.”

“I’ll wait then.”

“I love you,” I said quickly, not even understanding how right it felt to say until after the words came out of my mouth.

“I love you, too, Hugh,” Iris said without any noticeable hesitation. “I love you, too.”

That I was able to go back to the store at all after hearing her say that was the clearest indication yet that I had found my place.

I decided to find a place to live just over the bridge from Amber in Milton. I needed to be at least that far from settling down in my hometown. Iris came along with me as a realtor showed us a variety of apartments. For the first time in my life, I didn’t simply take the first decent place that came along, and by the end of the morning I had three reasonable candidates to consider. Iris and I had lunch at a clam bar overlooking the water as we discussed my options.

“You really want my opinion, right?” she said.

“Of course I want your opinion.”

“Take the duplex. It was a good space and I can definitely imagine spending time there. Nice bathtub.”

“It did have a nice bathtub. Though realistically, you probably aren’t going to be there very often. We’re still going to want to have most of our time together in Lenox, right? I mean, Lenox is still exponentially cooler than it is around here, no matter how many handmade mugs I sell at the store.”

“That brings me to the other thing I’ve been
planning to tell you today. Have you ever heard of the Spring Street Theatre Company?”

“I can’t say that I have.”

“You really didn’t get out much when you were here, did you? Spring Street is an experimental theater group that puts on shows about ten minutes away from here. They’ve been around – getting great notices if you were paying any attention at all – for the past six years. For the past three, they’ve been trying to convince me to come on board.”

“‘Come on board’ as in leave the Ensemble?”

“It would be a little tough to do both. Anyway, I always told them that I didn’t have any interest in coming back to this area – until I agreed to meet with them tomorrow afternoon.”

“Do you think you’ll get it?”

She tilted her head. “I
know
I’ll get it. Did you hear the part about them coming after me for three years?”

I actually felt my eyes tearing. “So you’d be right here.”

“That’s the idea.”

“All the time.”

“Tell me you aren’t going to get hung up about that.”

I tilted my head. “Did you hear the part about my dreaming about you for the past eleven years?”

“I deserved that.”

Armed with this new information, we went to look at the duplex a second time. This time, as we walked through the rooms, I imagined how we would use each one. The bathtub took on new meaning. I signed the lease that afternoon.

That night we stayed at an inn just off Russet Avenue. Two locals pretending to be visitors for one more night before coming home. After dinner, we took a long walk and found ourselves at the base of the Pine River Bridge. We walked out onto it and leaned against the wall, looking upon the water.

It was August ninth, the day before the anniversary of Chase’s death. I wondered briefly if there would be a piece about it in the
Amber Advisor
tomorrow and then let it go. I wasn’t about to start reading that paper now. I’d get my community news elsewhere.

I reached an arm around Iris’ shoulders and she leaned her head against mine. Numerous cars passed us by, shuttling between Amber and Milton. I could hear a boat somewhere off in the distance. Down on the beach, a hit song played on the radio and teenagers laughed. But the water was remarkably calm, barely lapping in the August stillness.

Iris turned her head and kissed me on the cheek. I pulled her closer.

Eventually, and without a word, we walked arm in arm back over the bridge.

I grew up in the New York area and I’ve lived there my entire life. I worked in retail and taught high school English before I got my first book contract. I have gotten several additional book contracts since then, which is fortunate because I didn’t have the patience to work in retail and, while I quite enjoyed teaching, my approach was a bit too unconventional for most school systems. One school administrator told me that, “there are more important things than being a dynamic teacher.” Since I couldn’t name any of those things (at least in the context of school), I figured I didn’t have a long-term future in the profession. Hence, I became a writer, where I believe people appreciate a certain level of dynamism.

My first several book deals were for nonfiction books. Though I started with nonfiction, I have always loved fiction and I have always wanted to write it. I’ve always had a particular affection for love stories. In fact, the very first book-length thing I ever wrote, when I was thirteen, was a love story. Mind you, it was the kind of love story that a thirteen-year-old boy would write, but it was a love story
nonetheless. I have a deep passion for writing about relationships – family relationships, working relationships, friendships, and, of course, romantic relationships – and I can only truly explore this by writing fiction. My novels have given me a way to voice the millions of things running through my head.

My wife and kids are the center of my life. My wife is the inspiration for all of my love stories and my children enthrall me, challenge me, and keep me moving. One of the primary reasons I wrote my first novel,
When You Went Away
was that I wanted to write about being a father. Aside from my family, I have a few other burning passions. I’m a pop culture junkie with an especially strong interest in music, I love fine food (as well as any restaurant shaped like a hot dog), and I read far too many sports blogs for my own good.

“Michael Baron” is a pseudonym. This isn’t because I’m in the Witness Protection Program, or anything of that sort. I’m writing these novels “undercover” because they’re not entirely compatible with the nonfiction books I write and I didn’t want to confuse readers. We’re all different people sometimes, right? I just decided to give my alter ego another name.

My next novel is called
The Journey Home
. It’s a love story, too, naturally. It follows three people going through three different types of emotional battles.

Joseph, a man in his late thirties, awakens disoriented and uneasy in a place he doesn’t recognize. Several people are near him when he opens his eyes, all strangers. All of them seem perfectly friendly, but
none of them can explain to him where he is or how he got there. They offer him a delicious meal and pleasant conversation in a beautifully decorated room. This would be a very nice experience if not for one thing: Joseph doesn’t know where he is, and he has no way to contact his wife, who he is sure is worried sick over him. Thanking the people for their hospitality, he leaves to make his way back home. The only problem is that whatever happened to him has stripped him of most of his memories. He knows he needs to get back to his wife, but he doesn’t know how to find her. He sets out on a journey to find his home with no sense of where he’s going and only the precious, indelible vision of the woman he loves to guide him.