Second Chances (4 page)

Jackie and I both turned to look over our shoulders to see Tish framed in the door, holding it open with one shoulder, the porch light bathing her in a yellow-orange glow. He called back, “Who is it? I have my phone right here—” he reached for his pocket and then added, “Guess I don't.”

“Caller ID said Chicago,” Tish informed.

“Better get that,” Jackie said low, rising to move around me.

I didn't bother to respond, instead reaching for the zillionth time to touch my own cell phone, imagining how close I was to hearing Blythe's voice, if I dared to dial that number. My heart pounded hard, sending anxious blood and concentrated longing through my body; I missed him so much it hurt.
Soon, soon, soon. Soon I'll see him
. I rose and followed in Jackson's wake, but headed around to the far side of the porch to see if Mom was free; we had to discuss a few things too.

It was
10:30 and Ellen had locked up the café, leaving Jilly and me on the porch. Mom and Gran were already home, along with Ruthie and Camille, who could barely keep her eyes open an hour ago. Tish, Clint and Clint's friend Liam were sitting around the fire pit with the dogs, roasting marshmallows. Their conversation, punctuated by an occasional laugh, was a pleasant murmur in the background. The air was yet motionless, save for the constant hum of mosquitoes buzzing near our ears; I sat with my feet propped on an adjacent chair while Jilly leaned her hips against the railing, blowing lazy smoke rings at the lake.

“Justin's coming over in a bit,” she said after we'd enjoyed the night in relative silence for a while.

“I'm glad, Jills, so glad for you guys.”

She smiled around her cigarette and then roughed up her spiky blond hair. Her eyes were blue as sapphires, clear as crystals. I'd always been jealous of those eyes, fringed in naturally thick, dark lashes. Eyes I knew as well as my own. She blew a long trail of smoke and said, her voice sweetly sincere, “I never thought I'd feel like this again.”

Christopher Henriksen, Clint's father, had been Jilly's husband for just a few short years before he died in a snowmobile accident the winter Clint was three. I'd been living in Chicago then, but Jilly's grief had been palpable, reaching me even across the miles separating us physically. She'd vowed never to love again, and for a long time I was sure she meant to keep that promise.

“I'm so happy for you,” I whispered. “God, Jilly, you deserve to be happy.”

“So do you,” she returned and looked back over her right shoulder at me. “I saw you out there talking to Jackie earlier.”

I paused for a beat, at last said, “Yeah, we were talking about the kids a little.” I wasn't sure why I was suddenly hesitant. Jilly's gaze sharpened instantly and I added, speaking too quickly, “He seemed weird. Reflective. He said…he told me he wished I would have shown him I was angry that he was cheating. It's like he was hurt that I didn't do anything about it.”

Jillian ground out her smoke in the ashtray and then sat near me, her eyes intent. She didn't seem inclined to speak and so I went on, “He told me that he was actually relieved when I caught him last Christmas. He didn't have to keep up the charade anymore.”

“He
was
the limping horse,” Jilly said finally, as though to herself, and tapped the index finger of her right hand on her lips.

“What the fuck does that mean?” I asked, but my tone was curious rather than scathing, despite my choice of words. Even though I knew it was about a dream. Jillian and her precognitive flashes; I had learned to take them with a grain of salt, though Great-Aunt Minnie had also been possessed of the gift, and no one had been skeptical of her. Not even Mom.

Jilly rolled her eyes. “Last night after the fight, I dreamed about a horse limping across a field. A dark brown horse, limping like it was favoring a leg. I woke up speculating it was Blythe, but now I know it was Jackson.”

“Shouldn't the horse have been missing a tooth?” I asked, sounding bitter. I swallowed that away and then said, for no real reason other than to irritate her, “Did you know that Jackie's parents named him after the Johnny Cash song?”

Jilly shot me the annoyed look I'd been expecting, her eyes crinkling at the corners and lips looking as though she was trying to bite through an apple seed with her incisors.

“Yeah, I guess so,” I said, listening to Tish and the boys goofing off in the background. “That used to be our favorite song. Jackie would sing it in the shower.”

“He's limping to make you feel sorry for him.”

“I know,” I said, quietly, lacing my fingers and fitting my thumbnails together.

“He'll keep limping.”

“What are you saying?” I asked, sounding more accusatory than I'd intended. But Jillian was silent, putting on her enigmatic face.

“Jillian Rae, I would never fall for a lame horse,” I said. God, did she think I was that pathetic?

At last she sighed and then reached over with one hand to hook her fingers through mine. She said, “I know, Jo, but I had a shiver for a moment there.”

“Then put on a sweatshirt,” I suggested. I wasn't sure if I meant that to be bitchy or not; fortunately Justin's truck suddenly beamed its headlights across the parking lot and Jilly chose to ignore my comment. She sat up straight, fussing with her hair once again.

Uncharacteristically, she wondered aloud, “Do I look all right?”

“You look amazing, like usual,” I said, then teased, “What does it matter what you look like just to go have sex?”

Jillian whapped my shoulder as she rose to her feet, slipped on her sandals, and called good-bye to the kids. Clint called back, “See you, Mom!” in his usual cheery fashion.

“Have fun,” I chirped.

“See you in the morning,” she added, over her shoulder. “I'll get up to say bye.”

“Thanks, Jilly Bean,” I said, utterly sincere.

Justin leaned out of his window to wave, and I waved back, then helped myself to the pack of smokes that Jillian had left abandoned on the table. I lit one as the truck pulled out of the lot, just in time to hear my middle daughter's voice calling over, “I see that, Mom!”

“Dammit, go to bed!” I called back, only half-kidding.

But, heartless teens that they were, all three just laughed.

I ambled
back to the house, but found I wasn't ready yet for bed. I stood for a time in the wedge of light from the fridge before finally closing it without finding anything worth eating, my thoughts flowing back to the night less than a month ago when Blythe and I had crept back to the house during our annual Fourth of July Eve event to make love in the kitchen. I leaned on the same countertop now, at last tipping my forehead against it, thinking of him.

What if he tells you it won't work? What if he tells you to go back to Minnesota and forget about him for good?

My heart scattered panicky blood around my body at the thought. I lifted my head and felt woozy for a moment. If I tried to go to sleep now I would just lie awake for hours worrying. At last I fumbled in the dark kitchen for the old gray hooded sweatshirt that Mom kept hanging on the hook by the back door. Slipping into its ratty warmth, I decided that I'd sit and stargaze until I felt ready to face my bed.

I met Tish, Clint and Liam coming towards the house on my return trip to the café.

“Jeez, Mom, aren't you going to bed?” Tish asked.

“I'm just going to sit for a little bit longer,” I told her. The boys were trying to put one another in a headlock, Clint with his unmistakable hee-hawing laugh. He sounded just like his dad, and in the darkness he could have been Chris. I refocused on Tish and said, “I'll come up and say good-night.”

“K, Mom,” she agreed, and then embraced me for just a second, but tightly. I kissed her hair.

“G'night, Aunt Joey,” Clint added, breaking free of his friend to kiss my cheek.

“Aw, ‘night Clinty,” I returned, and then they all took off at a gallop.

And I continued on through the stillness of the night.

Some time
later I came awake with a jolt, realizing I'd dozed off on one of the porch chairs. A mosquito tickling my left temple with its bite woke me and I slapped at it in irritation, glad I was at least wearing jeans and the hooded sweatshirt. Shit, I was probably bitten in two dozen new places anyway though. I stretched, noticing the moon was in a new position on the black backdrop of the sky, hearing the high-pitched trill of the gray tree frogs, the grunting bass of the bullfrogs, and the fiddling crickets harmonizing in a grand cacophony of night sounds. Their noise always seemed to escalate after midnight; likewise, a breeze had blown in over the lake, cooling the air but not strong enough to chase away the mosquitoes. I knew sleep would come if I went back to the house now, but decided to have one last smoke before heading that way. I was standing against the porch rail, exhaling slowly, watching the lake as it lay cloaked in the muted shades of night when someone just behind me asked, “When did you start smoking again?”

I simultaneously gasped and started so hard I dropped the butt, whirling around to confront Jackson as he appeared unexpectedly for the second time this evening. He was standing with one foot on the bottom step, watching me. He was slightly more disheveled than he'd been earlier and he was also drunk. A slow-burn kind of drunk; obviously he'd been imbibing for hours. I pressed a hand to my chest in an instinctive reaction to calm my startled heart.

“Where's your car?” I asked him then, scanning the parking lot, not wanting to think about why he was here at this time of night. Goddamn limping horse.

“Walked,” he explained, still watching me. His eyelids were hooded and his voice just this side of slurry.

“All the way from your uncle's?” I snapped at him.

“From Eddie's,” he clarified. “Left the car there.”

I stared at him for a long moment before deciding abruptly that action was the best thing here. I spun around to unearth the hidden key; my hand was oddly shaky and I had to try two times before I inserted it correctly into the lock. Once within the dark interior of Shore Leave I ignored my jumping innards, my unease at dealing with my sodden husband on a night when I shouldn't have been seeing his face at all. Damn him, he was doing this on purpose to torture me. I fumbled in my purse, which was stuffed under the counter, finally locating my car keys. From across the café the screen door creaked open and Jackson was coming through it. I hadn't bothered to click on any lights, and he called, low, “Jo?”

“Over here,” I told him. “Getting the keys to get your drunk ass home.”

“Not yet,” he said, now headed my way, though rather slowly. I was struck again with discomforting familiarity; how many times in our past had we met in this very same place on hot summer nights, under cover of darkness, finding any excuse to make love? He'd bent me over the counter on more than one occasion.

Jackson leaned over that same counter on his elbows and grinned wickedly at me, looking too much like the teenage boy I'd just been trying to banish from my mind. I gripped the keys tight in my right hand and ordered, “Let's go.”

“Let's not,” he whispered. He reached and closed his fingers around my wrist, loosely, but when I tugged impatiently he kept hold.

I hissed, “Stop it, Jackson, I mean it.”

“Come here,” he said, and I yanked hard then, freeing my arm. He cajoled, “Jo, come on.”

“No,” I told him, my voice firm. I was so angry that he was behaving this way that I could have decked him. I moved around the counter but he followed, cornering me and this time slipping his arms around my waist, cupping my hips and drawing me flush against him. Before I could react he bent his head, sending the sharp scent of bourbon rolling over my face.

“Jackson!” I yelped, and shoved him hard in the chest. “Stop it! What in the hell are you trying to do?”

He stumbled back and regarded me as though through a haze, his eyes unfocused even in the darkness. He was more shitfaced than I'd realized, and I relented, shifting position and hooking his arm over my shoulders. He leaned heavily against me, reeking of booze, and I ordered, “Come on, you can crash on the couch.”

“Can't,” he murmured, and suddenly his knees seemed to liquefy. With alarm, I realized he had passed out.

I grunted with the effort of keeping him upright, but then gave up and just sank to the floor, bringing him with. He was like a cooked noodle, flat on his back before I could help it. From a kneeling position I studied his familiar profile in the dimness with something close to stun, trying to make sense of what he was doing here. What it meant.

“Shit, shit, shit,” I muttered. Now what? I couldn't possibly haul him across the lake path to the house. Nor could I wake Mom or Ellen to help me.

At that moment headlights beamed across the windows, flashing over me like a lighthouse beacon. Justin and Jilly, thank God. I darted out the screen door and waved at them. Jilly bounded out of the truck as soon as they parked and called, “Jo, what are you still doing up?”

“I need your help,” I informed them. “I killed Jackson and need to dispose of his body.”

Justin laughed heartily from behind my sister. Moments later they had joined me on the porch and I insisted, “Come and see for yourselves if you don't believe me.”

Inside Shore Leave Jilly clicked on the lights, making us all abruptly squint, and said, “Well shit. It's true.”

Jackson was horizontal on the floor beside the row of stools along the counter, his chin pointed at the ceiling, feet flopped outward. He might have been dead but for the rip-sawing snores that were making his chest tremble at intervals. I shook my head, suddenly exhausted, as Justin asked, “What in the hell?”

“He showed up here drunk just before you guys got back,” I explained. “Drunk as shit.”