The Violets of March (6 page)

“What do you mean?”

She ignored my question in a way that only Bee could. “Well, is it twelve thirty already?” She sighed. “It’s time for my nap.”

She poured herself a demitasse of sherry. “My medicine,” she said with a wink. “I’ll see you later this afternoon, dear.”

It was clear that there was some kind of history between Bee and Jack. I could see it on his face, and I could hear it in her voice.

I leaned back on the couch and yawned. Enticed by the allure of a nap, I found my way to the guest bedroom and curled up in the big bed with its pink, ruffled comforter. I picked up the novel I’d bought at the airport, but after battling through two chapters, I tossed the book on the floor.

I freed my wrist from the constraints of my watch—I can’t sleep with any hardware on—and opened the drawer of the bedside table. But as I dropped the watch inside, I noticed something in the shadows.

It was a journal, a diary of some sort. I picked it up and ran my hand along the spine. It was old, and its intriguing red velvet cover looked worn and threadbare. I touched it, instantly feeling a pang of guilt. What if this was an old diary of Bee’s? I shuddered, setting it carefully back inside the drawer. A few moments passed, and I found myself with the diary in my hands again. It was too irresistible.
Just one look at the first page, that’s all.

The pages, yellowed and brittle, had a pristine feel that can only be cultivated by the passage of time. I scanned the first page for a clue, and found it in the bottom right corner, where the words
Manuscript Exercise Book
were typed in black ink, along with standard publisher’s jargon. I recalled a book I’d read long ago in which a character from the early twentieth century used such a notebook to write a novel.
Is this a draft of a novel, or a private diary?
Fascinated, I turned the page, extinguishing my feelings of guilt with ample amounts of curiosity.
Just one more page, then I’ll put it back.

The words on the next page, written in the most beautiful penmanship I’d ever seen, sent my heart racing. “The Story of What Happened in a Small Island Town in 1943.”

Bee had never written, at least not that I was aware. Uncle Bill? No, the lettering was clearly the work of a female. Why would it be here—in this
pink
room? And who would leave off their byline, and why?

I took a deep breath, and turned the page.
What would be the harm in simply reading a few lines?
When I took in the beginning paragraph, I could no longer resist.

I never intended on kissing Elliot. Married women don’t behave like that, at least not married women like me. It wasn’t proper. But the tide was high, and there was a cold breeze blowing, and Elliot’s arms were draped around my body like a warm shawl, caressing me in places where he shouldn’t have been, and I could scarcely think of much else. It was like how we used to be. And even though I was married now, even though circumstances had changed, my heart had managed to stay fixed in time—frozen, as if waiting for this very moment—the moment in which Elliot and I found our way back to this place. Bobby never held me like this. Or maybe he did, but if so, his touch didn’t provoke this kind of passion, this kind of fire.

And yes, I never intended on kissing Elliot on that cold March night, nor did I plan for the unspeakable things that happened next, the chain of events that would be my undoing, our undoing. But this was the chain of events that began in the month of March of 1943, events that would forever change my life and the lives of those around me. My name is Esther, and this is my story.

I looked up.
Esther? Who is Esther? A pen name, perhaps? A fictional character?
I heard a knock, and instinctively pulled up the comforter to hide the pages I was reading.

“Yes?” I said.

Bee opened the door. “I can’t sleep,” she said, rubbing her eyes. “How about we make a trip to the market instead?”

“Sure,” I said, even though I really wanted to stay and keep reading.

“I’ll meet you out front, when you’re ready,” she said, staring at me for a few seconds longer than was comfortable before breaking her gaze. I was starting to get the feeling that people on the island were all in on some big secret—one that no one had any intention of sharing with me.

Chapter 4

T
he Town and Country Market was just a half mile from Bee’s home. I used to walk there as a girl, with my sister or my cousins, or sometimes all by myself, picking purple clover flowers along the way until I had a big round bunch, which, when pressed up to your nose, smelled exactly of honey. Before the walk, we’d always beg the adults for twenty-five cents and return with pockets full of pink Bazooka bubble gum. If summer had a flavor, it was pink bubble gum.

Bee and I drove in silence along the winding road up into town. The beauty of an old Volkswagen is that if you don’t feel like talking, you don’t have to. The engine noise infuses uneasy stillness with a nice, comforting hum.

Bee handed me her shopping list. “I have to go talk to Leanne in the bakery. Can you get started on this list, dear?”

“Sure,” I said, smiling. I knew I could still find my way around the market, even if I was seventeen the last time I’d stepped foot in the place.

The Otter Pops were probably still on aisle three, and, of course, the cute guy in the produce department would be there, with the sleeves of his T-shirt rolled up high to show off his biceps.

I scanned Bee’s list—salmon, arborio rice, leeks, watercress, shallots, white wine, rhubarb, whipping cream—which hinted that dinner would be drool-worthy. I decided to start with wine, since it was closest.

The Town and Country Market’s wine department looked more like the cellar of an upscale restaurant than the limited selection typical of a regular grocery store. Nestled below a small flight of stairs was a dimly lit, cavernous room where dusty bottles seemed to cling perilously to the walls.

“Can I help you?”

I looked up, a little startled, and noticed a man about my age walking toward me. I backed up abruptly and almost knocked over a display of white wine. “Oh my gosh, sorry,” I said, steadying a bottle that was bobbing like a bowling pin.

“No worries,” he said. “Are you looking for a California white, or maybe something local?”

There were few lights in the room, so I couldn’t make out his face, not at first. “Well, I really was just . . .” And just then, as he approached me and reached for a bottle on the upper shelf, I saw his face, and my mouth fell open. “God, is that you,
Greg
?”

He looked down at me, shaking his head in disbelief. “Emily?”

It was eerie and exciting and uncomfortable, all at the same time. There, standing in front of me, wearing a grocery store apron, was my teenage crush. And even though it had been almost twenty years since I’d last seen him, his face was as familiar as it had been the day I let him remove the top of my Superwoman bikini and run his hands along my chest. I was sure it meant that he loved me and we’d get married one day. I was so sure of this, in fact, that I scratched “Emily + Greg = Love” with a paper clip on the back of the paper towel dispenser in the women’s restroom at the market. But then the summer ended, and I went home. I checked my mailbox every day for five months, but no letters. No calls. And then the next summer, at Bee’s, I walked along the beach to his house and knocked on his door. His younger sister, whom I never liked, informed me that he’d left for college and that he had a new girlfriend. Her name, she said, was Lisa.

Greg was still incredibly handsome—but he was older now, more weathered. I wondered if I looked
weathered
. I instinctively glanced at his left hand for a wedding ring. There was none.

“What are you doing here?” I said. It still hadn’t hit me that this was his place of employment. I’d always imagined Greg as an airline pilot or a forest ranger—something bolder, something bigger, something, well, more Greg. But a grocery store clerk? It didn’t fit.

“I work here,” he said, grinning proudly. He pointed to his name badge and then ran his hand through his bleached-blond hair. “Wow—it’s so good to see you,” he continued. “It’s been, like, what, fifteen years?”

“Yeah,” I said. “Wait, maybe even
longer
. That’s crazy.”

“You look great,” he said, which made me feel self-conscious.

“Thanks,” I replied, tugging at my collar. I looked down at my feet. Oh God. The rubber boots. Everyone fantasizes about running into old flames while wearing slimming cocktail dresses, and here I was in a balled-up wool sweater from the back of Bee’s closet. Oops.

Even so, Greg, with the same boyish good looks and gray-blue eyes exactly the color of the sound on a stormy day, was making me feel as good as he looked.

“So what brings you back to the island?” he said, smiling, propping his elbow against the wall. “I thought you were some fancy writer in New York.”

I grinned. “I’m visiting Bee for the month.”

“Oh really,” he said. “I see her here shopping every once in a while. I’ve always wanted to ask her how you were.” He paused. “But I guess I always chickened out.”

“Chickened out?”

He rubbed his hand along his forehead. “I don’t know,” he said. “I guess at our core, we’re all still sixteen, right? And didn’t you break up with me?”

I smiled. “No, you left for college.” He had a certain warmth, a certain energy that I liked.

“So why here, why now, after all these years?” he said.

I sighed. “
Well
, it’s a little complicated.”

“I can do complicated.”

I rubbed the finger where my wedding ring had once been. “I’m here because . . .” I paused and searched his face for approval, or disapproval, which was crazy because what did I care what my boyfriend from a million years ago would think of my marital status, and then I finally blurted it out: “I’m here because I just got divorced, and I needed to get the hell out of New York City.”

He put his hand on my shoulder. “I’m sorry.” He said it as if he meant it, which made me decide that I liked Grown-up Greg a lot more than Teenage Greg.

“I’m OK,” I said, praying that he wasn’t a mind reader.

He shook his head in disbelief. “You haven’t changed at all.”

I didn’t know what to say, so I said, “Thanks.” Greg was only saying what every person says to someone they were once romantically involved with, but it woke up my lethargic self-esteem like a dose of epinephrine. I nervously smoothed my hair, then remembered that I needed a haircut—three months ago.

“I could say the same about you,” I said. “You look great.” I paused. “How has life treated you? Any better luck in the marriage department than I’ve had?”

I don’t know why, but I had somehow pictured Greg blissfully married, living the good life on Bainbridge Island. A great house. A pretty wife. A half dozen kids buckled safely into car seats in a navy blue Suburban.

“Luck?” He shrugged. “No, none here. But I’m happy. I’m healthy. That counts for something, right?”

I nodded. “Of course it does.” I have to admit, it felt good to know that I wasn’t the only one with a life that hadn’t exactly worked out according to plan.

“So really, you’re doing all right? Because if you need to talk to anyone, I . . .” He grabbed a towel that hung from his apron and began dusting off a few bottles of red wine on a lower shelf.

Maybe it was the dim lights, or the presence of so much wine, but I felt oddly at ease there with Greg. “Yeah,” I said, “I’d be lying if I said this isn’t hard. But I’m taking things day by day. Today? Today I feel good.” I gulped. “Yesterday? Not so much.”

He nodded, then smiled again, looking at me affectionately, his face ablaze with memories. “Hey, do you remember the time I took you to Seattle to that concert?”

I nodded. It felt like one hundred years since I’d thought about that night. My mother had forbidden it, but Bee, ever the miracle worker, convinced her that letting Greg take me to the “symphony” was a grand idea.

“We almost didn’t make it home that night,” he said, his eyes like portals into the forgotten memories of my youth.

“Well, as I recall you wanted me to stay the night with you at your brother’s frat house at the university,” I said, rolling my eyes the way I might have when I was a teenager. “My mother would have killed me!”

He shrugged. “Well, can you blame a guy for trying?” He still had it, the spark that had attracted me from the beginning.

Greg quashed the awkward silence that followed by redirecting our attention to wine. “So you were looking for a bottle of wine?”

“Oh, yes,” I said. “Bee sent me down for something white. Which one of the pinots would that be?” When it comes to wine, I am one hundred percent idiot.

He smiled and ran his finger along the rack until it stopped midshelf, and he pulled out a bottle with the precision of a surgeon. “Try this,” he said. “It’s one of my favorites—a local pinot grigio made from grapes grown right here on the island. One sip, and you’ll be in love.”