Love and Death in Blue Lake (7 page)

Eddie thought about Xander. The guy was crazy to let Ruby and Courtney out of his sight for one second, let alone an entire summer. Eddie had a million questions, but Ruby was a kid. It wasn’t fair to ask her, so he swallowed the words stuck in his throat.

“I always wanted to meet you—even before I found out my sperm donor dad had like four hundred kids.” Ruby the irrepressible. Said what she was thinking. So like her mom.

Eddie opened the fridge and poured sodas. The kind that were full of sugar and really bad for you. Ruby’s eyes lit like sparklers. He’d had a feeling they would.

“I’m not supposed to,” she admitted.

Eddie added a healthy shot of rum to his. He was not a drinker and contrary to rumor was not a former drunk. He just didn’t think it was good business sense to drink much when you owned a bar. But he needed this one. Ruby was still staring around, her head tilting every which way, when she took the soda he offered and sipped.

She was elegant. Like Court. Every thing she did, every gesture she made, that deep twinkle in her shining eyes, Courtney, Courtney, Courtney. So he listened to her sing, and he gave her some tips, easy stuff, stand up, don’t sway back and forth so fast, shoulders back, feel the music. Relax. Feel the music deeper. Keep the emotion genuine. She sang and sang, and he thought she had the sweetest voice and a nice way with the guitar. She wasn’t flashy, but her deceptive simplicity was endearing and should be nurtured.

She could be his daughter. She was easy to like, same as her musical style, she was bright, sweet with a slice of lime. He went off on an imaginary journey of her high school graduation, then college, of course she would go to Harvard or at least U of M, walking her down the aisle for her wedding, holding his first grandchild, swaddled in a baby blanket. Was it pink or blue? His imagination failed him there.

“The thing with Xander is, she doesn’t love him.” It was like Ruby read his mind. “Not like she loves you. Or used to.” This must be more gleanings from the diaries. “She doesn’t know, and you better not tell. I think you won’t. I trust you because I know all about you, plus I get that vibe.” She came up for air, sipping her soda.

“Xander blew his stack when he found out she never divorced you. Even though he’s still married! Mom never asked him to move in. They never had a thing when she was in L.A. He just showed up looking like a lost puppy dog, and she let him in. And he stayed. She didn’t even ask me because I would have voted
no
. He doesn’t even like me.”

She set her empty glass on the counter and sat on a stool, propping an elbow on the island and cupping her face in her hand. “So now this wedding. It’s ridiculous. She wants one more baby before it’s too late. Hello? They are both married to other people. He’ll never divorce his wife. The wife gets half of his everything, which is not much. She’s one of those stay-at-home types who can’t cross the street without him holding her hand. He still spends time at her place, fixing faucets and whatnot. To see the boys. And he brings them to
my
house. I don’t like it. But do I get a say? No. Xander’s giving Mom the life she always wanted, except it’s too late, and anyway she’s doing it with the wrong person. I mean, Xander is harmless, but he’s pedantic. That grates on my nerves just a little bit. Okay, a lot. Sure, we’re a family in a California way, but in another way, I know my real family is here. With Gram and Gramps and Aunt Gwennie and the twins and Uncle Kyle.” She took a breath and looked at him, and Eddie saw something vulnerable there behind the bravado. “And you.”

“Pedantic. Now that’s a twenty-dollar word.” Eddie stalled, wished he didn’t have to drink all that soda to get to the rum. This is what he did at the bar all day. Listened, nodded, poured drinks. The bar…Angry Angels…the party.

“Your mom is going to wonder where I am.”

“Well, good. Maybe it will make her take a breath and think.”

Eddie realized they’d been at this a while. A long while. “Don’t your grandparents expect you for dinner?” He guessed he’d expected Courtney’s mom would come over here and pick Ruby up, but he should have offered to drive her home before now. Time got away when music was the theme.

“I can hear the river,” she said instead of answering. “The river was your special place until you got the apartment.”

She had apparently memorized those teenage diaries her mother had written so long ago.

She had tears in her eyes. “I feel like I need to write a song. Something’s too big inside, too heavy. It’s gonna sink or swim.” Her tears remained in her eyes, all shiny and unshed. His heart pierced. An arrow. “I don’t blame you for not wanting a kid back then. You were right. The timing was off. She’d tell you that herself now.” Ruby tilted her head toward the skylights.

“I have always loved the stars up here,” she said, a few tears escaping down her cheeks. “I think we could have a good life here, and I think it’s what she wants. What I don’t know is what you want. Edward.”

She pinned him with a look and struck an open C chord, loud.

I want Courtney. I want the three of us to be family, he thought. No. Four. Ah, shit, no. Too complicated. He stuffed his thoughts back down in the vault. He had a well of feelings and maybe writing a song wasn’t such a bad idea. He wrote with his bands. He could write with Ruby.

“Okay. Let’s write a song,” he said.

The sweet relief on her face was reward enough for missing the first hour or so of his host duties. They wrote lyrics, nothing really stuck, but they had fun. They both loved Andrew Bird and he helped her work out “Lusitania.” She could play by ear and sang the female part just right. She could whistle, too.

Hours passed until finally she said, “You know it’s midnight?”

He hadn’t known. Damn. He would be a horrible father. Or no, if he was her father, she was exactly in the right place. But he wasn’t her father. So he sucked. Courtney must be so worried.

“My grandparents think my mom got special permission to bring me to the bar. Like I have to have a stamp or a wristband or something. I love music, duh. I might love it because of you. Let’s go catch the last set. Want to?”

“Let’s go.” Like her mom, Ruby was a force of nature, and Eddie had lived long enough to know you just had to ride their wind.

****

Courtney loathed gossip. It was difficult to form a polite response to the second hundredth question
So do you have dinner with the Kardasians?
But she gave it a shot. “I don’t live in L.A. anymore, and when I did those girls were in diapers.”

“But didn’t you help decorate that commercial for Paris Hilton?”

“I don’t work in that field anymore. I’m a therapist now.”

“Oh, too bad.”

Once people got the idea that her life was not an endless A-list party, they started sharpening their knives. It was the same girls from school, women now, who just didn’t know how to be nice.

“You waited a long time to go to college.”

“Yes, but I wouldn’t change a thing. I had my fun, lived some dreams, and now I’m helping other people live theirs.”

“Huh. So a shrink. I heard you bought Doc’s old house. Nobody here needs a shrink. Well, Spence had issues, but he’s from downstate. That one is strange too.” Someone pointed out Lily behind her camera.

“I can’t believe you’re leaving California for here. Is it because of Eddie? Are you two getting back together?”

Good question. She shook her head to clear the tumbled thoughts. Her mind felt like scrambled eggs. What had she done today? And where was Edward? The party, actually the pre-party, was at his bar, but he was nowhere to be seen. She hadn’t seen him since she’d told him about buying the house. And he’d walked away. She wondered if she could live in a town with him and not be his wife. Would he divorce her now, when she finally admitted she loved him? She couldn’t blame him. He’d never wanted kids. Except for maybe twenty or thirty seconds very early this morning when they’d both been sleep deprived and on high arousal.

“Is you daughter his?”

“She’s fourteen. I left eighteen years ago. You do the math.” Courtney felt immediately sorry she’d snapped, but people could be so rude.

“Yeah, but you came home a lot.”

“I never saw Edward when Ruby and I came home.” That was true. She’d stayed away on purpose.

“So who is her dad?”

“He’s not in the picture.”

“A rock star? From one of your video shoots?”

“She looks a little like Jimi Santori.”

Courtney didn’t respond. She couldn’t stop thinking about Edward, about the fact that they both knew how they felt for that brief time and could hardly admit it to each other, forget about other people in this small town full of big mouths. She sipped her tea, the color of wine, in a wine glass, so nobody would question her not drinking. She hated all the questions, and that was just another one she was not ready to deal with. Soon enough, everyone would know.

Edward. Where was he? She’s always been a self-diagnosed social misfit. She tended to panic in crowds of strange people. But Edward was a man she could talk to. They’d find a quiet corner away from all the small talk and cutting gossip about this one’s weight gain and that one’s wrinkles. She suddenly wanted to flee, but to where? Back to her family? She wanted to see Edward more than she needed to be alone. Would he ever admit he loved her? The playlist said he loved her with every single song. But she could be making that up. They were all from the year they graduated. 1992. But he’d slipped a few in from 1994. Her favorites. The band was good. She let the music take her and let the conversations around her float away. She heard someone say, “Courtney’s drunk,” and she hid a smile. People believed what they wanted to believe.

Then the band played the opening chords from a song from 1999. She’d done the video, one of her last. About the toxic chemicals between two people, she’d designed the entire shoot with Edward in mind, and that had been the song that had wiped the last vestiges of him from her life, wiped him away. Then Ruby came, and she was able to put him out of the picture, most of the time. He didn’t belong there. How did he know? Did he receive her message, all the little things she’d included in the video so private to them, but disguised? Did he sit here in Blue Lake and watch and know?

I mean, really, it was the only song he played that was not something that had been in their collection, had not been from ’92 or those few from ’94. Where was he?

She wandered the barn-like room, smiling, saying hi, staying in slow motion. She wanted her photo albums. She wanted her car. She wanted her clothes. Her office furniture. Her notes. She wanted her clients to all come out and still be her clients, but that would not happen unless she set up an online practice. Like on Skype. People in her profession were doing that more and more now. Well, life coaches, not licensed psychologists. Either way, she had to establish a presence here. She would have new challenges. Substance abuse. Sexual abuse. OCD. ADHD. Not “where’s my bliss?” She knew another therapist, a good friend, who would take some of her clients. She’d have to call each of them and tell a few of them that they were ready for life without a coach. And call her friend to ask if the referrals would be okay.

“Where’s Eddie tonight? He never leaves this bar.” A guy whose name she could not remember grabbed her arm, stopped her slow progress through the room.

“I have no idea.”

“Lookin’ good, Courtney.”

Now she remembered his name. Joey. He used to taunt her because she didn’t wear a bra. He used to make fun of her black nail polish and little dresses. He’d grown a beer belly. So many of them had. Yes, substance abuse. That would be her clientele, and they’d be hostile, coming on order from work or jail. Like this guy. It was enough to shake her to her bones. That was the social phobia. She’d be okay if she just took some deep breaths.

“You, too,” she smiled and used all her strength to wrest his hand from her arm. Just then a girl from their class came up, glaring at Courtney. “Joey. Honey. This is our song.” She shot Courtney one last look as she led a sheepish Joey away. “We’ve been married fifteen years. Hands off, bitch.”

Well, okay then. Courtney pretended the over-processed blonde with bad teeth was a hostile client, even though she’d had very few of those. Her people came to her for answers to life’s big questions. They wanted to know how to make things better. They had moved on from the flatline of high school. Some people never did.

Another guy. Captain of the football team. Still in reasonably good shape. A kind smile. He’d always been a nice guy. “Where’s Eddie?” At least he tapped her shoulder instead of grabbing her arm. He leaned in to her a bit, because the music was loud.

She wanted to scream. Who was she? Edward’s bodyguard? She shrugged and smiled. Lifted her empty glass of tea and went to the bar to refill.

She had brought a special bottle and stuck it in the cooler. People would talk about that, how she made herself so at home here. But it was for a reason. Mr. Football followed her. “You are lookin’ good, but then I always had a crush on you. Even with your wild style.”

Courtney didn’t believe him for a minute, but was glad she’d poured the tea into a wine bottle. Something to do with her hands to keep them steady. She took off the stopper and filled her glass. “Gee, thanks.” They smiled at each other. Checked for rings. He didn’t have one. Neither did she. “Divorced. Jeannie Halsworth. Two years. We got two kids, boy and girl. You’d of thunk that would make it stick but nope.”

Sounded like the divorce had been Jeannie’s idea. Sounded like he knew she was a therapist. Once people found out, the troubled, the terrible, the lonely hearts, came out of the woodwork. But he stopped there. “You and Ed aren’t still married? I heard a rumor.”

“Just like high school all over again.” She avoided the question. “Rumors all day and all night.” She laughed. Shrugged again. It was the first genuinely happy moment she’d had all night. Edward was her husband. At least as of today. Until he signed the papers.

She felt herself start to sicken and excused herself, escaping into the bathroom. Social anxiety. She hated that label. She hated “shy” too. She was a plain old introvert, and parties were not her thing. Especially when sober. Especially when Edward had decided to disappear. She needed their world of two to feel safe.