The Duet (26 page)

“Oh, I don’t know,” I said with fake cheerfulness. “I think there might be a thing or two in life worse than that.”

As usual, Gloria missed my sarcasm. She took her time ordering, asking me all sorts of questions about the ingredients in each of the baked items. Today she claimed to be allergic to gluten. Yesterday it was lactose intolerance (though she was quick to order an extra creamy latte with whipped topping), and I believe the day before that, she was a vegan and not able to eat anything with eggs.

I rolled my eyes when I turned around to make her coffee, but I smiled a little to myself. Avalon may not be a small town in the traditional sense, but sometimes this café made it feel similar to one. I loved these people, annoying and crazy as they were, and I wouldn’t trade any of them for the world.

“Mr. Baylor!” I said when I turned around and saw my very favorite customer. “How are you this fine day?”

I topped off Gloria’s coffee with a smiley face made of chocolate syrup and handed it to her with a wink. She scowled and found a seat in the corner, far away from everybody else.

“What looks good today, Mr. Baylor?”

Mr. Baylor stood a few feet away from the cash register, his eyes raised to the chalkboard menu up high on the wall. He had a routine, and it could not be hurried. First, he would peruse the menu as if he hadn’t looked at it every day for the past two years.

“You changed some things,” he stated. We hadn’t changed a darn thing.

“We have a lovely Kona blend today on special, Mr. Baylor. Are you in the mood for a nice dark roast, or would you prefer something on the lighter side?”

“Lighter side? Young lady, in my day, there was only one kind of coffee; dark and strong. And we didn’t fluff it up with any of that syrup or froth or whatever you young people ruin a perfectly good cuppa joe with these days.”

I pressed my lips together. This was the same speech he gave – verbatim – every single morning at six.

“I think I know just the thing for you,” I said as if I’d just had an epiphany. “Wait right here.” I fixed him a mug of steaming Kona blend – the same one he drank every day – and added a dash of cinnamon and a squirt of chocolate syrup, careful to keep my back to him so he didn’t see. I selected a generous-sized lemon bar from the bakery case and put it on a matching plate, then carried them over to his favorite table near the window.

He gave me a dollar. “Keep the change,” he winked at me. I smiled at him warmly and tucked the dollar in my pocket. Mr. Baylor was ninety-six years old, and sometimes he wandered on back to 1940. I didn’t care. When he was having one of his more lucid days, he would tell me the most wonderful stories about his life, and those were worth way more than the simple coffee and treats he got from me every morning. The way I saw it, I owed him.

The morning continued at much the same pace, and I was grateful to be busy. The less time I had to think, the better.

Miranda left around one for a lunch date with a friend, and I took advantage of the lull in business and stepped outside for some fresh air. It had warmed up a little since earlier, but the clouds hung low and dark, casting an eerie shadow on everything. I leaned in my open doorway, watching my fellow shop owners as they busied themselves getting ready for the weekend. Windows were being washed – some even painted with fresh logos and slogans. Sidewalks were being swept, displays were perfected, and signs and banners were hung. I loved this time of the year.

“Izzy.” I turned with a start at the sound of my name. My name in that voice. God, I was so angry with him, and yet his voice still did things to my insides.

“Jay.” I nodded formally, not moving from my spot. I may have looked calm and collected, but I was anything but.

“I came to say that I…” He ran his hand down the side of his face, and I had a flashback of the two of us standing in the kitchen when he was telling me about Cooper’s drug habit. I swallowed back the painful memory.

“You what, Jay? What did you come to say?” I had to force myself to sound cold, but the truth was, if he apologized for the performance the other night, I would forgive him in a New York minute. But he had to say the words. I wasn’t feeding them to him. And I wasn’t going to make this easy.

“I’m heading back home. I think it’s better that way. At least for now.”

“Uh huh,” I nodded, trying not to show any kind of emotion. That was not at all what I expected, but if I had thought of the words I least wanted to hear, it would have been those. “So what you’re saying is that I did the right thing by keeping Sydney a secret from you. Because you are checking out – just like I thought you would. Congratulations, Jay. You’ve lived up to all of my expectations.”

This time, he pulled both of his hands through his hair in frustration. I could see his jaw working. “Okay Izzy. You know what? You win. You were right not to tell me. From now on, you can go about your life, guilt free, knowing that you saved your daughter – our daughter – from the ill fate of having me for a daddy. Are you happy now?”

I straightened from where I was leaning in the doorway and took a tiny step closer. We were still several feet apart, but even at that distance, I felt that pull he had over me. What I didn’t feel were the right words. I had no idea what to say; no biting comment, vicious remark, sarcastic jibe. I had nothing.

We stood face to face, glaring at each other, the only sound in my ears was my erratic breathing. I was vaguely aware of Abe and Grumpy Gloria watching us from the corner where they had just been chatting.

“No,” I finally said, my voice barely a whisper. “No, I’m not happy.”

Jay searched my face, and for just a split second, I thought maybe he would just say ‘to hell with it’, pull me close, and put all this ugliness to bed – literally.

“Well that makes two of us.” He spun on his heel and walked away, leaving me standing there like a complete dumbass, wondering why we both felt it necessary to keep hurting each other like we did.

I pressed my hand against my chest, which felt way too tight all of a sudden, and glanced up to see Abe starting toward me, a look of concern on his face. I forced a smile and gave him a wave, then went back inside to the comfort of my café.

43

Jay still hadn’t booked his flight. He had no idea why he was hesitating. There was nothing left to be done here. He would go home, calm down a little, then call Izzy and ask if it was okay that he write to Sydney once in a while. He had thought he could just walk away, but he was fooling himself. Izzy may have made it clear she wanted no more to do with him, but he would never abandon his daughter, even if he thought it best if he kept a bit of a distance.

Trisha was staying in New Jersey for a couple more weeks. He hadn’t seen much of her since they first got there, and he felt a little bad about it. She was much easier to hang out with than he remembered. When he’d run into her at the O’Donnell’s a few weeks back, he’d been wary at first, especially when she called him the next day asking him to go to New Jersey with her. But he found that he actually enjoyed her company. She wasn’t so full of drama, and she didn’t feel the need to fill every silence with chatter. In fact, she’d been quite introspective the whole trip. He wondered if there was more to this visit than just reconnecting with some old friends. Maybe she had fences she was trying to mend too.

He only hoped her plan was working out better than his.

Tired of watching the world from his second story balcony at The Breakers, Jay decided to take advantage of the mild October day and walk a while on the beach.

It was nearly sixty degrees, with promises of warmer temperatures over the next three days. The town was having some kind of festival, and everyone seemed to be busy preparing for the crowds. In fact, the desk clerk at the hotel had been none too pleased when Jay was unable to give him a definitive check-out date. They needed every room.

Kicking off his shoes beside the pile of flip-flops and sneakers at the entrance to the beach path, Jay came up over the dune and got his first view of the Atlantic up close. He started walking in the direction of Izzy’s house, not for any real reason other than there seemed to be less people on the beach. He was passing an older gentleman, probably in his late fifties, who was smoking a cigar and sitting in a faded beach chair, his fishing pole stuck in the sand beside him.

“You’re Sydney’s father, aren’t you?”

It took Jay a minute to place the familiar face. He didn’t get a chance to answer or even nod. “Fred Delaney. We met at the shelter during that last storm.”

Jay shook Fred’s outstretched hand. The two men stood there sizing each other up for a moment, until Jay started to feel uncomfortable.

“Nice to see you again,” he said, anxious to move on. He made a move to keep walking, but Fred stopped him.

“Why don’t you sit a while? Beautiful day.” Fred motioned to the sand beside him, and Jay, not able to think of a good reason not to, took a seat.

“Beer?” Fred asked, reaching into the cooler beside him. Jay shook his head. “So I figured I could maybe shed a little light on what’s going on with Izzy.”

Jay looked up, shielding his eyes from the sun. “What do you mean?”

Fred puffed on his cigar, pulled it out of his mouth and inspected it thoughtfully. “The thing about guys like us, Jay, is that we’re keen to observe. And I’ve been observing these Delaney women for almost thirty years. Did Izzy ever tell you about her dad?”

Jay shrugged. “Not too much. I know she didn’t think too much of him.”

“Smart girl.” Fred took a long pull of his beer. “My brother was a real, first class asshole. I could tell you stories…” He shook his head in disgust.

Jay turned more toward Fred so he wouldn’t miss a single word. Izzy’s dad had died when she was a little kid, so he wasn’t a huge part of her life, but he still felt like knowing more about the man might make him feel closer to Izzy somehow.

Stupid, he knew.

“I actually met Miranda first,” Fred began. “Took me weeks to work up the nerve to talk to her, but by the time I did, my brother Frank had already cast a spell on her. By the time I knew they were together, she was pregnant with Izzy already.” Fred stared out at the water, lost in the memory.

“Frank was never happy about the pregnancy. I know he felt trapped; surely a wife and child would put a damper on his rock n’ roll image. This was back in the days when the Stone Pony was the place to be, when Bruce Springsteen was showing up unannounced to play a set here and there, and when a little unknown band called Bon Jovi was just getting discovered. Frank thought he had what it took to make it big, and I admit – he probably did, talent-wise. But damn if he wasn’t the cockiest son of a bitch you ever met.” A sour look crossed his face for only a brief moment, and then he relaxed again. He could’ve been talking about his last dental appointment, for all the emotion he was exerting.

“I know it wasn’t exactly noble of me, given my feelings for Miranda, but I could see the writing on the wall and I wanted to be sure she was looked after, so I offered to marry her instead, leaving him free to sow his wild oats or whatever. To give you an idea of my brother’s spitefulness, do you know what he did when I made the offer? Well, first he laughed for about three straight days, and then he packed up his guitar and his pregnant girlfriend and moved them all the way to California – as far away from here as he could get.”

“Where’d they move to? LA?”

Fred shook his head, then lit up his cigar again. “Nah, that would have made a little more sense at least. He could have claimed he was chasing his dream or whatever. But no, he moved them out to some remote random town with literally no chance of being discovered. As soon as Izzy was born, he’d leave for weeks at a time, and drive all the way back to Asbury Park, hanging around like he was a groupie or something, hoping for some scraps. That’s about the time he met Amy.”

“Frank had an affair?”

Fred laughed. “An affair would have been forgivable. No, Frank Delaney had himself a whole ‘nother family. One for each coast. Each complete with one doting wife and one baby daughter.”

Jay tried to let that sink in for a minute. “Does Izzy know?”

“Not yet.”

“What about Miranda?”

“Miranda knows.”

Jay was quiet. He wasn’t sure if he should prompt with more questions, or just let Fred talk if he felt the need.

The two men sat in silence, watching the waves and lost in their own thoughts. Finally Fred spoke again. “I tell you this because I feel like maybe Izzy has transferred some of her feelings about her dad onto you. She doubts you – and it may or may not be based on something you did to deserve her doubt – but she knows what it feels like to be unwanted by a parent, and she’s thinking of Sydney.”

“I did plenty of things to shatter her trust.”

Fred didn’t seem to hear him. “I also thought you should know that Izzy’s about to get a bombshell dropped on her.”

“Miranda’s gonna tell her about that other family?”

Fred nodded.

“Why now?”

“Because Izzy’s half-sister has decided a family reunion is in order.”

Jay blew out a sharp breath through his teeth. “I don’t really see how that can be good for anybody.”