A Measure of Happiness (31 page)

She made sure to look Matt in the eye. “When I woke up, you raped me.”

Her pulse battered between her ribs. Her skin fired with the need to run. Her eyes refused to blink.

Matt's gaze skittered to the side. When he looked back in her direction, his leg was bouncing, same as the morning she'd awoken to confusion, sunlight seeping around the blinds, and Matt sitting in the desk chair. He'd been waiting for her to wake up. Had he been worried that she wouldn't?

She needed to stop trying to figure out what douche bags were thinking.

“We were practically doing it,” Matt said.

She wanted Matt to see what she saw. She wanted him to see his real self.

“I said no. I told you to stop. But you wouldn't. You shoved your disgusting—” Her breath clattered through her teeth. “No matter what you tell yourself, that's the definition of rape. I could barely breathe, and you were crushing me. You were hurting me. And all the while you were having your great, good time, like I was some piece of shit. Like I wasn't even there. Like I didn't even exist.” What he did to her affected not just her body but also her soul. “You almost killed me.”

Matt blinked at her. “I was just messing around, buddy.”

“Exactly what a rapist would say.”

Matt made a sound, a cross between an exhalation and an annoyed chuckle. He squeezed his lips together and shook his head. “I feel sorry for you, Celeste.” He pointed to his ear and made the universal sign of a crazy person.

“I hope you never hurt another girl. I pray to God you never get the chance. You're a lousy baker, a terrible friend, and a rapist.
I
feel sorry for
you.
” Celeste turned and took hold of the doorknob.

Matt stood up. “Celeste, wait.”

For the first time this morning, his eyes looked different. Turned down with sadness rather than widened in fear. For the first time this morning, his stance looked more aw-shucks embarrassed than what-the-fuck angry. For the first time, he looked as though he might turn into the old Matt and try to apologize.

Celeste kept her hand on the doorknob. “What is it?”

“You, um. You're not going to the police, are you?”

Was a lie still wrong if you lied for all the right reasons, even if one of those reasons was revenge?

She was a good girl, but she wasn't that good. “I'm not going to the police,” she said. “I already went.”

Matt's body went rigid, his expression tight and pained. For a second, she was back in that bed with Matt above her, having his great, good time. For a second, her vision clouded. For a second, she was everywhere and nowhere. Then she pulled herself together. “In fact,” Celeste said, “they're on their way to arrest you right now. If I were you, I'd grab a few things and take off. If I were you, I'd run.”

“Thank you for warning me.”

For the first time this morning, Matt sounded sincere.

That, she figured, was as close as she'd ever get to an apology.

Celeste slipped out of Matt's room and closed the door behind her. The rush of a flushing toilet echoed from the bathroom at the end of the hall. Somewhere nearby, music filtered through a student's closed door. She race-walked down the center of the hallway. Then she yanked open the door to the stairway, pounded down the stairs, flew out the wedged-open doorway and into the freedom of the new day. Beneath achingly blue skies, old faithful Old Yeller sat steady and true.

She'd let every Celeste-is-crap lie in her head seep into what she'd thought had happened with Matt, and then she'd let that infested mixture grow into its own big, fat lie.

She needed to stop spreading lies about herself.

Hidden inside Old Yeller's glove box, behind the folder with her insurance, registration, and service records, was Katherine's. 22, the gun she could've used to blow Matt's brains out. Lincoln would've been proud she hadn't lowered herself to Matt's level. She was proud she hadn't lowered herself to Matt's level.

Instead of shooting first and asking questions later, she'd taken Zach's advice, kicked ass, and gotten answers.

Celeste held her hands up to her mouth like a megaphone and let out a whoop. The echo bounced off the redbrick buildings and roared back to her, the sound of her own strong voice. She stomped her feet and raised her arms up in triumph.

Just because she had the power didn't mean she needed, or wanted, to use it.

She felt more than a little smug about her ability to resist temptation. She felt freaking superior.

She felt like a freaking superhero.

 

Katherine wasn't certain how this was going to end, only that it would.

Outside of her apartment, the sun was setting, the sky pulling down the shades on another Wednesday. Any minute now, Barry would arrive at her door. Once again, she sat waiting on the sofa, the support solid beneath her legs, the velvet soft beneath her hand. Yet half of her mind was stuck on yesterday's events.

A mere thirty-five hours ago, she stood on the westbound side of the Mass Pike, with her hip thrust toward oncoming traffic and her thumb protruding, and rediscovered her decades-ago affinity for hitchhiking. Only this time, instead of twentysomething guys with long hair and oily voices pulling over to give her a lift, a forty-something woman in a silver Corolla had pulled into the breakdown lane and donated a tire. The woman—who could've been Katherine's sister, Lexi, if Lexi had also been African American—had purchased the tire the previous week, after having dreamed she'd blown out a tire on the Mass Pike. The dream, she'd told Katherine and Zach, must've been about Katherine.

Synergy? Flow? The universe paying Katherine back for years of events not lining up in her favor? At that point, Katherine would've agreed to plain old dumb luck.

Thirty-two hours ago, Katherine and Zach had arrived on the campus of Culinary America and gone straight to the dean of students to find their friend Celeste Barnes's dorm room. The dean told them Celeste had left school unexpectedly weeks ago and that they should alert him if they found her. Then, in a move that solidified Katherine's impression of Zach as a terrific detective, he admitted Celeste was his girlfriend and claimed he was afraid she'd come back to rekindle a romance with another student, a certain Matt Something. The dean, clearly flustered, admitted that a certain Matt Something had stopped by his office earlier that morning to withdraw from school.

Something had happened between Celeste and Matt. But no guns blazed. Neither a SWAT team nor the local police careened onto the campus with their sirens blaring to apprehend a woman hell-bent on revenge. After twenty minutes of debate, Zach and Katherine had decided to trust Celeste's note, promising her return, and they headed back to Maine. At three o'clock this morning, they found Celeste back at her apartment, safe and sound and munching out on a plate of toast and eggs big enough to satisfy Zach's bottomless pit. Celeste had quite a tale to tell herself.

Katherine was about to add another tale to her cache of life stories.

The overhead and table lights blazed. No candles sat on her mantel to set or accent a mood. Neither appetizers nor dinner covered the tables to distract from the necessary conversation.

She'd secured the tarot decks in their drawers.

She wore jeans and a plain white T-shirt, and she'd pulled her hair from her face with a ponytail holder found rattling around in the bottom of her purse. Her feet were bare. She'd left the black boots in the closet.

Barry would appreciate the absence of filters.

Even sex was a distraction, a pleasant way to avoid challenging emotions. She and Barry had made love on Sunday, breaking down a physical barrier and giving them the semblance of progress but changing little.

Barry still hated secrets. She hated keeping secrets. But letting go? Who knew what the truth would ultimately unleash?

She was about to find out.

When Katherine stood to get the door, her sight grayed, like pixels of a photograph, and she remembered that she'd forgotten about lunch. For the first time in her life, she'd been too anxious to eat. She held on to the door for balance.

“What's wrong?” Barry asked.

When he'd come into the bakery this morning, she'd shared an abbreviated version of the road trip—why she and Zach had gone and how they'd eventually returned and found Celeste. Katherine had promised to tell Barry a longer version of the story tonight. She'd promised to tell him all he deserved to know. She owed him . . . so much love.

“What if nothing at all is wrong?” Katherine asked. “What if everything is finally right?”

Barry placed a hand at the small of her back. The other hand took hold of her upper arm. “Sweetheart, sit down.”

Katherine's legs wavered beneath her, like timeworn, sea-weakened dock stanchions, but she refused to sit. If she sat down, she'd collapse. If she sat, she'd lose her nerve. Barry's gaze held so much love for her. If she sat, she'd never know whether his love depended on a false image of her he'd created from her lies.

Would her admission convince him he'd never really known her at all? That the woman he'd loved was nothing more than a figment of his imagination?

She'd never know unless she risked another loss.

“What if, nearly twenty-four years ago, I gave birth to a son, and gave him away for adoption?” Katherine asked.

Barry's expression flicked from concern to confusion. His hand fell away from her back. “What are you saying?” he asked. And his eyes, those loving eyes, blinked at her, as though breaking up her image might bring the meaning of her words into sharper focus.

What had she done?

She felt light, as if she were somehow floating above herself. She forced herself to stay in her body, where the fibers of the Oriental rug pricked the soles of her feet, Barry's hand squeezed her arm, and his gaze tumbled her heart. She forced herself to just say it. “Zach is my son.”

Barry's jaw slackened, and his expression went blank. A professional side effect, no doubt, from years of listening to horrors and revelations while remaining sympathetic yet objective.

He released her arm and, days after Halloween, seemed to summon the energy of a low-level spirit. For the first time, Barry reminded Katherine of her father, his eyes dark with disappointment, his face contorted with anger. “How could you have kept this from me? A—a son? How could you have lied to me?”

Katherine's pulse pounded in her belly, hollow sounding as a spoon against a stainless steel mixing bowl. But even though she'd wronged Barry, even though every bit of his anger was justified, she refused to absorb it. She took a deep breath and, in return, offered him love. “I'm so sorry. I was afraid if I told you I'd given away a child, you'd question whether I deserved to be a mother.”

“Uh-uh,” Barry said. “Don't you dare put this on me. You're the one who thought you didn't deserve to be a mother. I never would've entertained such a thought. You're one of the most nurturing women I've ever known,” he said, and her eyes watered. Barry shook his head, sighed. “Zach's father?” The tightness in Barry's jaw and the slight widening of his eyes betrayed a hint of jealousy.

Katherine forced herself to hold Barry's gaze. “No one I knew especially well,” she said. When Barry didn't blink, she answered his next logical question. Barry she did know especially well. “No one I knew how to contact.”

Barry nodded. “This explains so much.” He sat down on the sofa, hung his head, and pinched the bridge of his nose.

Katherine sat far enough away to give him space but near enough that he could choose to reach for her. She folded her hands in her lap.

When Barry looked up, his eyes were wet. “I'm so angry at you.”

“I know,” she said, and a tear slid down her cheek.

“I don't think you do. In fact, I don't think you have a clue why I'm angry.”

Katherine squeezed her hands together and rattled off her long list of faults. “I lied about never having a child. After years of suffering the stress and disappointment of IVF and driving each other up the wall, I insisted upon a divorce because even though I didn't have the guts to tell you about the son I'd given up for adoption, I wanted to give you a chance for a family.”

Barry's chin dimpled, as though he might sob. “That's not the worst part.”

“You're kidding. I missed something?”

“I know you're not as tough as you seem. I know how much keeping that secret must've cost you. I know how much you've suffered.
I know you.
” Barry took her hand, and her hand trembled in his warmth. “The worst part,” he said, “is that you didn't trust I'd love you no matter what. That's what hurts the most.”

“Do you still love me?”

“I never stopped loving you.” Barry gave her a tight smile and squeezed her hand. “But I'm still angry at you.”

Katherine issued a laugh-cry and covered her mouth. She ran a shaky hand over his curly hair. As if forgetting their conversation, Barry held her hand to his lips. They made quite a pair. “Do you remember the question you asked me Sunday night?” she asked.

“Whether you still served coffee in bed?”

“Earlier Sunday night. The question I didn't answer.”

Barry grinned, like a boy about to get everything he'd ever wanted. Like a man who deserved everything she owed him. Like a man capable of forgiveness.

“Yes,” she told him. “I'm ready to come home.”

C
HAPTER
20

T
he end of the world came with a sound track.

Katherine spent New Year's Eve at home with her family: her ex-husband she'd remarried, Barry; her biological son, Zach; and his live-in girlfriend, Katherine's sort of daughter, Celeste. Katherine and Barry cuddled on the grayish-blue velvet sofa she'd brought home from her apartment. Celeste and Zach took the French-blue wing chair, Celeste slung across Zach's lap. Zach ran his right hand up Celeste's tights, from her ankle to the hem of her miniskirt. The fingers of Zach's left hand sneaked beneath the bottom of a sweater Katherine saw as olive colored, even though Celeste insisted it was emerald green.

Katherine grinned and shook her head. Ever since Zach had gotten his cast off three weeks ago, he seemed determined to make up for lost time by not being able to keep
both
of his hands off Celeste. Yesterday at Lamontagne's, Katherine had threatened to spray Celeste and Zach with water, as if they were cats in heat. That had only encouraged them to slip into the stockroom and shut the door behind them.

Minutes before midnight, a bottle of Freixenet sparkling wine chilled in a silver ice bucket alongside the coffee table, four crystal flutes sat at the ready, and the warm fireplace air held the aromas from their lucky New Year's Eve dinner. Black-eyed peas for humility and good fortune. Collard greens, because who doesn't need a few more greenbacks? Long noodles to encourage longevity. And a pork roast to represent the richness of happiness.

Inside the refrigerator, a ring-shaped Dutch chocolate cake awaited Zach's birthday and symbolized coming full circle.

Across the living room, ABC and the perennially young Dick Clark broadcasted from Times Square. Crowds of revelers wore winter jackets and multi-colored hats and waved twisted balloons beneath electronic news tickers and Jumbotrons. Above the throng, the glittery white New Year's ball readied for its plunge into the new millennium.

In Hidden Harbor, the weather was clear and cold, the thermometer on the porch hovering below twenty degrees, but Zach insisted they leave the farmhouse's fireside warmth and venture outside to take in the last view of 1999.

The tidal river glowed faintly beneath the waning crescent moon. Barry snuggled up behind Katherine and wrapped his arms around her. She held on to Barry's hands and hugged the moment. Zach positioned himself behind Celeste and asked that they tilt their heads to the night sky.

Zach pointed to the Big Dipper, standing erect as a shepherd's hook, and the outer stars in the celestial bowl pointing a straight line to the North Star. “My dad taught me about the constellations when I was a kid,” Zach said. “And on Christmas Eve, we all went out to the yard to show Celeste how to stargaze like a Fitzgerald.”

By
all,
Zach meant his adoptive parents, Everett and Carol Fitzgerald, Zach's brothers, Donovan and Ryan, and Zach himself. Last week, Zach had brought Celeste to the Arlington home where he'd grown up to meet his family, but not before he'd let Celeste and Katherine know he considered Hidden Harbor his permanent home. He wasn't going anywhere.

Katherine and Barry's calendar was open to possible travel. Then, after exploring the world beyond Hidden Harbor, Katherine wanted to explore a job in social services, starting as a volunteer for CASA, Court Appointed Special Advocates. Blake had inspired her. The simple act of giving him a job and becoming his friend had improved his behavior, his grades, and his self-confidence. She wanted to help as many at-risk kids as possible.

Katherine and Celeste had drafted a plan. Next month Katherine would sell Lamontagne's to Celeste, but Katherine would stay on till the spring to help Celeste with the transition. Celeste had already selected a new name for her bakery: Sugarcoated, a fitting nod to Celeste's snarky and newly recovered voice. Thanks to weekly visits with a shrink Barry recommended, Celeste was making amazing progress dealing with her eating disorder and coming to terms with the assault.

Katherine and Celeste had both discovered the benefits of speaking out versus holding on to secrets and sugarcoating the truth.

“If you've got something to say, speak now,” Katherine said, “before we all freeze to death.”

“Actually, I've got a couple of somethings to say,” Zach said. “When I was little, my dad taught me, if I was away from home, I could always look up to the night sky to find the North Star and my way home.” Zach sighed, a heavy sound that came out as a great white cloud. “So . . . yeah . . . after I pass next week's physical fitness and mental fitness exams, and after I get into the academy . . .”

Katherine's teeth chattered, and Barry rubbed her shoulders. “For the sake of our dwindling circulation, while we're still middle-aged,” Barry said.This from the man who'd ridden his bike to work up until a week ago.

“My dad and I hashed it out,” Zach said, “and Katherine was right. He's cool with me not going to law school and applying to the Maine Criminal Justice Academy instead.”

“But how?” Katherine asked. “Your color blindness . . .” After she'd learned she'd passed her deficiency to Zach, she'd looked further into the ramifications. Certain careers were off-limits to those with color confusion. Law enforcement topped the list.

“Dad found out about a doc in Maryland who invented color-correcting contact lenses, and got me an appointment,” Zach said. “Yes, Katherine, Celeste's sweater really is emerald green.”

“I'm so proud of you!” Celeste turned in Zach's arms, and he lifted her off the ground to kiss her on the mouth.

Extrasensory perception, clairvoyance, or similarly minded women thinking the same good thought? Celeste said exactly what Katherine was thinking.

Katherine gave Zach a kiss on the cheek. Barry offered Zach his hand for a shake, but when Zach took it, Barry laughed and pulled him into a bear hug instead.

“Wait, what does this have to do with your Big Dipper speech?” Celeste asked.

“Oh, that.” Zach's hand went up to where his hair usually flopped over his brow. Last week, in the middle of Maine's deep freeze, he'd inexplicably decided upon a shorter than usual haircut. Now Katherine knew why. He was trying on the outer trappings of his future role as a police officer.

Zach chuckled. “The Criminal Justice Academy is an eighteen-week residential program.”

“Zach!” Celeste said.

“I get to come home on weekends. And during the week, if you miss me, all you have to do is look up to the night sky and know I'll be looking at the same bright stars.” Zach's voice went from sure to shy. “You know, so we're never, like, too far apart.”

“Beautifully said,” Katherine said.

Celeste held Zach's face between her hands. “That's the most romantic thing I've ever heard.”

Zach peeled Celeste's hands from his cheeks. “Give me a minute and you might change your mind,” he said. Then he got down on one knee.

Katherine held her hand to her chest, her heartbeat accelerating through the orange yarns of her sweater. Barry wrapped himself back around her, and she squeezed his hand.

“Celeste,” Zach began. “My density has brought me to you.”

Celeste giggled. “What in the world are you talking about?”

“That's not the right line,” Zach said. “Haven't you seen
Back to the Future
?”

“No.”

“Ah, heck. In that case.” Zach reached into his back pocket and produced a velvet box. He flipped open the lid to reveal a ring. Under the starlight Katherine couldn't make out the jewelry's details, but there was no mistaking where this was headed.

“I'm crazy in love with you,” Zach told Celeste. “Will you marry me and make me crazy for the rest of my life?”

So much for Zach winning any romance awards.

Celeste didn't seem to mind. She covered her face with her hands. Zach stood up, and Celeste peeked through her fingers. “Is that a yes?” Zach asked.

“Yes!” Celeste yelled, her voice choked with happiness. “Yes, yes, yes!”

Zach slid the ring onto Celeste's finger, and she jumped into his arms for a kiss, hooking her legs around his waist.

“Oh, good, we can go inside now,” Barry said.

“Barry!” Katherine popped him on the shoulder.

“Kidding! Congratulations, kids. And let's go inside.” Barry took Katherine by the hand. “Like we didn't see that one coming,” Barry said.

“One can't assume,” Katherine said, even though Celeste and Zach had recently moved to an unfurnished apartment in Ledgewood and they'd spoken of saving money for a Cape with a white picket fence, a shingle roof, and a blacktop driveway.

“Why not?” Barry asked. “I always assumed you'd come back to me.”

“Until you gave up,” she said.

“For all of five minutes.”

Zach carried Celeste up the steps to the porch and then set her down so they could fit through the kitchen door. Celeste held on to Zach with her right hand. She extended her left hand beneath the stove's hood light, revealing a square gem that looked goldish to Katherine.

“What kind of stone is that?” Katherine asked.

“It's a peridot,” Zach said. “Celeste's birthstone, plus it matches her beautiful green eyes.”

Now
that
was romantic.

“It's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen in my life,” Celeste told Zach. Then, to Katherine, “You know what I want to do right now?”

“Call Abby?” Katherine asked.

Celeste nodded, her smile tight. “Do you think she'll be okay with this? I mean, because of her and Charlie?”

After Celeste had returned from New York a second time, she'd spent a few days with Abby, and their friendship had been going strong ever since. Abby and Charlie's on-again, off-again romance had recently experienced a downturn, and they were taking a break.

“I think Abby would be upset if you didn't call her. I know she'll be over the moon for you, because that's how I feel.” Her biological son and her sort of daughter would marry, making Celeste her sort of daughter-in-law. Katherine might
plotz
from joy. She looked away before Celeste could see tears pricking the corners of her eyes.

Barry was right. Katherine was Jewish by inoculation. She was a Jewish mother.

Celeste kissed Katherine on the cheek, letting her know she'd gotten away with exactly nothing.

“Your parents?” Katherine asked Zach.

“I'll call them tomorrow,” Zach said. “They already know I was planning on proposing.”

Katherine nodded. Of course. As an adult, Zach didn't require his parents' approval, but he still wanted it, still craved their acceptance.

Some things never changed.

Celeste dragged Zach to the phone. Katherine took Barry by the hand and they went through the dining room to the living room's fireside warmth and the TV's New Year's Eve broadcast.

Katherine started to sit down on the sofa, and Barry lifted her onto his lap. “Too far away,” he said, and Katherine nestled into his neck.

“Perfect timing,” Barry said, and for a second Katherine thought he was referring to the two of them getting back together and remarried, and Celeste and Zach's engagement. Then she turned her attention to the TV and the ball lowering over Times Square toward the glittering, numerical year 2000.

Barry slid a hand beneath her sweater and rubbed her back. Of course, he'd also meant
their
perfect timing.

The broadcast zoomed in on a young man in the crowd, waving madly at the camera. From the studio above the fray, Dick Clark told him to say hi to his mom, because she was watching him on TV.

True enough. The whole country was watching Dick Clark.

When Dick Clark told the viewers to get close to somebody they loved, Katherine held on to Barry a little tighter. She thought of Celeste and Zach in the kitchen. She couldn't hear them through the blare of the TV, but their love was as palpable as the sofa beneath her.

Were her mother and her sister, Lexi, sitting on sofas somewhere, chilling champagne and watching the ball drop into the new millennium?

Zach had decided he wasn't interested in finding his biological father, Adam Bell. But Katherine had yet to commit one way or the other to Zach's offer to search for her mother and Lexi. Did she really want to know what had become of them?

Celeste skipped into the room, pulling Zach behind her, proof that sometimes what you found was even better than what you could imagine. Zach sat down at the other end of the sofa and gathered Celeste into his lap.

Dick Clark told them to get ready, and they counted down the last seconds of the twentieth century. “. . . Five! Four! Three! Two! One! Happy New Year!”

“Wahoo!” Celeste yelled. “Best freaking New Year's Eve ever!”

Zach dug some kind of token from his pocket, kissed it, and slipped it back into his jeans. “Best birthday ever!”

The second time Katherine had spent Zach's birthday with her son.

“Happy birthday, sweet boy,” Katherine said, the same thing she'd told Zach on the day he was born. Katherine hugged Zach and then covered her eyes and burst into tears. Barry gathered her in his arms and she sobbed into his shirt. Over her head, Barry told Zach and Celeste she was
verklempt,
the Jewish word for “filled with emotion.” Katherine raised her head and wiped her eyes. “I'm fine,” she said, and then turned her face to the ongoing broadcast so she could catch her breath.