Summer at the Shore Leave Cafe (5 page)

“I know, he was telling me that last night actually. She ties on a bandana just like— ” and for only a fraction of a second did I pause over his name, “Blythe, and then gets right to work.”

Jilly giggled. “We're going to get cited for child labor.” And then, her gaze lifting over my shoulder, she murmured, “Speaking of the devil.”

“Huh?” I asked, but my internal radar began humming and as I turned on the bar stool, towards the front door, I knew who was coming into Eddie's.

He grinned to see us, and my heart began slap-chopping my ribcage. I swallowed once, unable for a moment to tear my gaze away from him; because I was closest to the door, he claimed the open spot beside me, his eyes never moving from mine as he sat, with easy masculine grace.

His hair was tied back, though he was not wearing his customary bandana—the first I'd seen him that way. He had a high forehead, edged by his slightly wavy hair, which was a honey-brown.  His eyebrows, by contrast, were thick and shades darker, as were his enviable long lashes.  I had never been so close to him before, as the bar stool beside mine put our faces about eighteen inches apart, and my breath was tight, my nipples very much at attention. His eyes were dark blue, with flecks of gray throughout his irises, giving them a smoky appearance. His jaw was strong, his lips sensual, the lower just slightly fuller than the upper.  I observed all this quickly, before forcing myself to turn away, though it seemed to me that a space heater had taken up residence against my left side; I was burning up with him so close. 

“Hi, Bly,” Jilly said comfortably; I'd almost forgotten my sister was there.

“Hi, you two,” he returned. “So, you don't come out when I ask, huh? Am I interrupting a ladies' night?”

“Nah, we just needed to get out of the café for a while,” Jilly said, doing all of the conversing while I sat, tongue-tied and overwhelmed by the fact that Blythe was so near that if I shifted my left knee just a few inches, it would come into contact with his right one.

“I was driving home and saw the golf cart out front, thought I'd say hey,” Blythe explained, leaning both forearms against the bar. The position made his biceps and wide shoulders appear even more powerful. Eddie waved hello, and moved as though to get him a drink, but Blythe called, “I got it, Ed,” and so saying, rose and leaned forward over the bar, helping himself to a can of soda. He sat back, comfortably, and cracked the top on the can, his eyes skimming again to mine. “You guys managed to steal the cart from Clint, huh?”

“Yeah, he left it unguarded for a second, and we nabbed it,” Jillian said, her voice teasing.

“You two planning on getting wasted, or what?” Blythe joked back.

“Tempting,” I said, finally speaking up. “But no, we were just too lazy to walk.”

Blythe turned his gaze fully upon me, and my body seemed to be radiating with warmth and light. I took another very long drink and almost drained my glass. He went on, watching me, “Is it good to be back home? Jillian told me that you never really liked living in such a big city.”

And what else had she mentioned,
I took a moment to wonder. Then I replied, pleased that my voice sounded normal and not at all breathless, “Yeah, I miss it here. You never really get over where you grew up, you know?” I braved a look into those eyes and my heart again surged against my breastbone. I hoped my cheeks weren't as red as they felt. For the love of all things holy, I was just having a conversation. I was trying quite desperately not to think about the proximity of his shoulders and how strong they would feel if I put my hands on them…

“That's true,” he said, still a hint of a grin hovering around his mouth. “Your daughter Tish is a big help to Gramps. She told him yesterday she wants to be a chef, and can she practice with us? She's a hoot.”

He had just the slightest drawl in his deep voice, a hint of the south, and I recalled that he was from Oklahoma.  It was sexy. Everything about him was, dammit. I felt as though my clothes were too tight; I was surprised that sweat wasn't trickling over my temples. 

“Yeah, she loves Rich, he's like their grandpa, too,” I went on, hardly aware of what I was saying.

“Well they could all teach Clint a thing or two about work ethic,” Jilly said. “He's lazy as hell. Even Ruthie helps with rolling silverware.”

“Aw, it's summer,” Bly defended. “He's got the rest of his life to work, right?”

“Well he can quit asking me for money then,” Jilly said, then nodded at my empty glass. “Jo, you about ready for another one?”

“Yeah, thanks,” I told her.

She hopped nimbly to her feet and called over to Eddie, “I'm grabbing two more, k?”

“That's fine, sweetie,” Eddie called back.

Then Jim said, “Jillian, you got to watch this shot,” and she rolled her eyes, but collected both glasses and ambled over to the pool table amiably.

I was now sitting alone at the bar with Blythe. He was angled my direction, and I made myself speak, saying the first thing that popped into my mind, “So, how did you get your name, anyway?”

He laughed a warm, deep sound.  I felt it vibrate in my belly. “No one here has asked me that yet,” he said. “It's kind of a strange one, I know. It's my dad's name. It was his mother's maiden name. How about yours?”

“Oh, Mom put together her and Ellen's names,” I explained. “She thought it was an original, but I have met other Joelles before.”

“It's pretty,” he said, easily, and I swore his eyes were teasing me, daring me to misinterpret him. There was a merriment about him that was almost addictive. “Joelle what?”

“Well thank you,” I added politely. “And it's Joelle Anne.”

He tipped his head at me, just watching my face, and my heart was throbbing. I was unable to move my gaze from his and might have made a fool of myself if not for Jilly's tinkling voice coming back our direction. She asked, “You want the same thing, Jo?” and I looked back at her.

“Yes,” I responded.

“How about you, Bly?”

“I'm good with the soda,” he told Jilly, as she filled two more drafts for us, sliding one across to me.

“How is it going, living with Rich?” she asked Bly, sipping her own drink behind the bar, leaning back against the far counter as she did at Shore Leave.

“Good, he's such a good guy,” Blythe said. “He does so much for my mom and me, always has.”

“I don't remember Christy ever coming back up here after that one summer,” Jillian went on.

“We didn't often,” Blythe responded. “Mom likes it in Oklahoma, thinks that's where Dad will come back to look for her.”

“That sounds familiar,” I said, referring to our own mother and Mick. “But our dad never got back the Landon way.”

“Yeah, sometimes I think we should try to hunt him down on the Internet,” Jilly said. We'd talked about it before, but it had only ever been talk.

“No, I say let sleeping dogs lie,” I said.

“Okay, Gran,” Jilly teased, and I held up my right hand in defense, the other curled around my beer.

“Can you just see a man trying to help Mom and Ellen run the café?” I laughed at the very idea of my independent mother putting up with a husband. It was something I had not inherited from her; I had been long dependent on Jackson.

“Now that's a picture,” Blythe said, and he nudged me companionably with his right shoulder, sending my heart cartwheeling from the contact. Flustered, I took another deep drink and felt Jilly's speculative gaze linger on me for a fraction of a second.

“True,” Jilly acknowledged. From outside came the elongated moan of a train whistle, on the tracks just outside of town. Jilly listened for a moment, then said, “Jo, remember that night Jackie and Justin hopped the train on a dare?”

I shook my head slowly at the memory, wondering why she'd bring this up right now, other than the fact that she'd just heard a train. I said, sarcastically, “No, I'd forgotten.”

“What happened?” Blythe asked.

“They would have been fine, probably, but Jackie slipped and fell off the train, and then Justin freaked out and jumped off to see if he'd been hurt, and they both wound up in the hospital,” Jilly filled in. For me, the most vivid memory of that night was my fear that Jackson had been badly or permanently injured; I'd run into that hospital room with my heart in my throat, and cradled him to me, sobbing.  It was only a few weeks before the fateful prom night during which we'd ended up conceiving Camille. I had never confessed to anyone that I'd been secretly thrilled to be pregnant, beneath the fear and terror about telling everyone the news, because it meant that Jackie belonged to me, and me only, from then on; God, I'd been so stupid and naïve it was almost laughable.

“I've done that a time or two,” Blythe was saying, drawing me back to the present. “But I never did fall off.  My grandma Pam always said my guardian angel worked overtime.”

“From the stories I've heard Rich tell about you, she's right,” Jillian commented, and he grinned again, shrugging his shoulders and then draining the last of his soda. 

“Well, I'll let you two enjoy the rest of your night,” Blythe said then, rising to his feet and putting a couple of dollar bills onto the bar. He angled a quick look at Jilly and then his eyes came to rest on me. I leaned my right elbow on the bar and met his gaze, my chin tilted high; he was so tall.  He added, his tone light but his eyes intent on mine for a fraction of a second, “Call over to Rich's if you need a ride, all right?”

“Thanks, buddy,” Jilly said and I pulled myself together.

“We'll be good,” I told him, and the right side of his lips tipped up in a teasing grin.

“See you tomorrow then,” he said, and walked out the door with his shoulders shifting so amazingly beneath his t-shirt. Moments later I heard the sound of his truck firing to life and only then realized I was still staring after him.  I turned back to find Jillian studying me with her arms folded like an annoyed schoolteacher.

“What?” I muttered.

“Jo, Jo, Jo,” she said, sounding exactly like Gran.  And then, “Let's get home. Enough excitement for tonight, huh?”

It rained that night, a steady downpour through which thunder rumbled and lightning backlit the curtains at regular intervals.  I told myself this was why I couldn't sleep, not because of my thoughts that kept circling back around to Blythe sitting so close to me at the bar. Again I played over our conversation, whispering his name, his grandmother's maiden name that was now his. And then I would curl around my stomach and just drift into a restless sleep when thunder would grumble yet again and my eyes would flinch open.

***

A few days
later Landon's Trout Days, our official small-town celebration opened with a fish fry, parade, and street dance. And that was just Friday.

The girls were beside themselves with excitement Friday morning; Clint was going to drive them into town for the parade on the ancient golf cart that Dodge kept in the shed. The girls were wearing what had become their summer uniforms: jean shorts over their swimsuits, hair in high ponytails. Camille had on a bikini top, slightly on the skimpy side, and one that I had never before seen. I was sitting with Aunt Ellen and Gran, sipping coffee, and watching my girls make their way into the café, debating whether or not to say something about my eldest's mostly-bare torso. Gran, however, took the decision out of my hands, gesturing with her cane and wondering aloud, “Camille, what's that dental floss around your neck?”

Aunt Ellen hid a smile in her coffee; I watched, ready to do damage control if necessary.

Camille knelt near Gran's chair and hooked her wrist over the back of it, giving her great-granny a winning smile. For a second she looked exactly like her father. She said, “Gran, it's just my bathing suit.”

Gran harrumphed, not one to be easily charmed. “Well, one tug on those strings and you'll be bare naked from the waist up, girl.”

Ruthie came to give me a kiss, but Tish laughed, loving every moment of Gran scolding her big sister. Camille shot me a look that clearly asked for help. I sighed, torn between Gran's authority and my own. At long last I said, “Bring a t-shirt along, honey, just in case.”

“I was going to anyway,” she let me know, sounding the slightest bit defiant.

“Fabulous,” I replied, matching her tone with an edge of sarcasm.

The girls took off with Clint minutes later. I was mildly concerned that her older sisters wouldn't keep an eye on Ruthie, but then reminded myself that she was twelve, not a toddler, and was headed into Landon, not downtown Chicago. Jilly and I had run wild all around Landon, the lake, and Shore Leave since the summer we were seven and eight. Probably even earlier. Besides, I planned to join them after the lunch crowd was gone, nostalgic for the decorations that hadn't changed since I was a kid: the huge plaster replica of a rainbow trout, the nets, lures and poles strung between all the local businesses, the scent of fish and cheese curds frying. It would make a native Chicagoan cringe and run in the opposite direction; fortunately my girls had spent enough time here to refrain from being judgmental.

We watched as the four of them, Clint and Tish in the front, Camille and Ruthie in back, clung to the roll bars as Clint hightailed it down the gravel road. I could hear their laughter through the screen door, and sighed, depression momentarily almost crushing me as I contemplated how long it had been since I'd laughed that way. I mentally scolded myself in the next moment for being so morbid, when Aunt Ellen commented, “It seems like yesterday that was you and Jillian.”

“I know, it's scary how fast time flies,” I agreed, shoulders sagging a little. I bolstered myself with a sip of the strong coffee.

“Things will get better, Joey,” Gran said then, elbows braced on the tabletop, her own mug just inches below her chin as she studied me. It was uncharacteristic of her to be so optimistic. I waited too long to reply, feeling the familiar sting of unshed tears, and Gran went on, “I hear you crying at night, sweetie, just like that sad song on your radio that we hear again and again.”