Anxious Hearts (5 page)

It’s been forever since I’ve seen you,” Louise says from behind her sunglasses. She picks at her black nail polish. I realize that I’ve never seen Louise with fresh nail polish. She must start picking at it as soon as it dries.
“Qu’est-ce qui se passe?”

“Shut up,” I say. “I see you every day.”

I lean against the slow, misty breeze oozing up Commercial Street from the sea. It was sunny today, mostly. Indian summer, everyone calls it, but Mr. Denis says we’re supposed to call it Second Summer to be culturally sensitive. Ada still calls it Summer of All Saints, which I guess is what the old-timers say.

“The sun feels good,” I say. “It hasn’t been sunny for a month.”

“Franktown sucks,” says Louise, pointing at a weathered row of town houses.
“Regardes.”

Louise is right. The sun is a mixed blessing around here. It just shows all of Franktown’s cracks. There isn’t a building around, house or store or gas station or barn, without peeling paint and weeds. Half the houses are for sale. The biggest thing in town is a propane tower with our zip code painted on it: 04647.

“Anyway, you know what I mean,” Louise says. “You’ve, like, disappeared. What’s your story?”

I don’t answer, even though I know what she wants to hear about. I’ve been pretty quiet the last few days. I’ve got a lot on my mind, I guess.

“Fine, I’ll do the talking,” says Louise. “I don’t get the Gabe thing. All he does is mope around and scribble in that stupid notebook. And why can’t he get a haircut? His father is the richest man in Washington County.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I say. Rough translation: Drop it.

“I just don’t get the appeal,” Louise says. “I mean, he’s so, I don’t know,
morose
. What’s he got to be so mopey about? I don’t even see how he’s related to the rest of his family.” She
picks off another chunk of polish. “He should take grooming lessons from his brother. Personality lessons,
aussi
.”

“Gabe’s not Paul,” I say.

“No kidding,” Louise says. “You could do so much better, Eva. John Baptiste has been all over you for months. And he is looking
très
hot lately.”

I roll my eyes. Louise can’t fathom how anyone could ever resist the gorgeous, wealthy John Baptiste. He’s supposedly Franktown’s most desirable catch. Which is exactly why I don’t like him.

“And he has a nice car,” she says. “And he doesn’t carry a stupid notebook around everywhere he goes.”

“That’s because he doesn’t know how to write,” I say.

“Seriously, Eva,” Louise says. “Do you really like this guy? Because this is going to take some getting used to.”

I don’t know how to answer without making her upset, and I really don’t want to talk about it, because Louise wouldn’t get it anyway—that Gabe understands me, sees me, that ever since my mother’s birthday, all I’ve thought about is the way his deep breaths and slow heartbeat sounded against my ears while I cried on the docks against his shoulder. I just say: “He’s different.”

“Understatement,” Louise says. She goes back to picking her nails.

“I’ll see you,” I say. “Let’s hang out, maybe this weekend?”

“Wait, don’t tell me. You’re blowing me off again,” Louise says, or more like scoffs.
“Quel choc.”
She pulls the hoodstrings of her sweatshirt straight down with a jerk and disappears into the hood. She heads up the hill toward the tiny Franktown library, where we used to go every day after school, supposedly to do homework but really to read magazines. “Hey, by the way, did Gabe tell you about Paul?”

“What about Paul?” I say.

“My father says Paul needs a bone marrow transplant. They’re looking for a donor.”

“I didn’t—”

“I thought Gabe would have talked to you about it. Brothers usually make good donors.”

I don’t say anything. Gabe hasn’t said a word about his brother to me. I’ve been wondering, but I haven’t asked.

“Anyway, bye,” Louise says. She turns and steps away.

“Bye,” I say. I watch her walk up the hill for a few minutes. And then I turn toward the harbor and walk toward the dock, where Gabe has promised to meet me.

Gabriel

T
HE POWERFUL ARMS OF
B
ASIL THE BLACKSMITH
rippled as he grasped the hammer with heavy, elbow-length leather gloves and slammed it onto the anvil with a tremendous
clang
.

“Do you hear me?” he said. “I don’t believe you.”
Clang.
Basil wore a black leather apron that glimmered in the glow of the fire under the great iron-and-cedar forge that sat in the center of the dirt floor. The forge lorded over the ember-lit shop, its radiant heat causing sweat to drain from Basil’s brow. Shadows cast in four directions took the shapes of anvils, clamps, rods, and Basil’s broad shoulders.

“But Father, I saw,” Gabriel protested from the doorway. “Four ships. I have no doubt.”

“Quiet!” Basil shouted. “There are no ships. You are wrong.” Basil slammed the hammer down again with a terrible
clank
that Gabriel felt in his teeth. “You’re supposed to be working out on the dikes, searching for breaches and protecting your village. The tide is unrelenting, Gabriel, and the threats, the real threats, are many.”

Gabriel muttered a curse.

“Father—”

“Enough!” Basil held up the horseshoe with his tongs, twisting it back and forth in the air to inspect it. “There. Another perfect shoe. Gabriel, bring the horse around to the …” He waved a gloved finger toward the back entrance.

Gabriel, silenced, walked toward the large doors on the back wall, past the boy operating the shoulder-high bellows used to fan the hell-hot fire that Basil had kept alive for four years running, burning coal harvested from the marshes. The fire was hot enough to melt metal, and the marbled, pocked skin that covered Basil’s forearms and neck proved it was hot enough to melt flesh, too. The boy, drenched and sinewy, looked up at Gabriel through dusty, tired eyes, slowing the bellows for a moment.

“Attend!” Basil shouted at the boy. “Fire!”

“Monsieur,” said the boy. He inhaled deeply, rose to his toes, and extended the bellows-handle over his head, then
thrust downward to the floor, sending oxygen-rich air into the forge to feed the devilish heat.

Gabriel pushed open the back door. There were two horses in the courtyard, Eulalie and one of Notary Leblanc’s massive workhorses, Nog. He was a tall horse with colossal feet, bred to work in the hayfields. His back was speckled black and gray with a shorn mane and cropped tail. He whinnied and shook his massive head with a sputter. Gabriel grasped Nog’s rein and led him lumbering into the shop, where Basil stood with a freshly shaped shoe. Gabriel stroked Nog’s nose while Basil raised his back leg and held the shoe against his hoof. “Perfect,” he said, drawing a nail from the pocket of his apron.

“At least someone here knows what he’s doing,” came the voice from the doorway. There stood Jean-Baptiste Leblanc, the notary’s son, tall and expensively dressed, the glowing forge lengthening his cheekbones and his shadow. Jean-Baptiste was still unmarried, despite his good looks and his family’s wealth. With a dozen horses in their employ, the Leblancs were Basil’s best customers.

“Master Leblanc,” said Basil. “Welcome.” He motioned to a bench at the side of the shop, a motion that Jean-Baptiste ignored.

Gabriel was wary of Jean-Baptiste. He knew that Jean-Baptiste, like every man in Pré-du-sel, desired Evangeline.
Even now, just hours before their wedding, Gabriel knew that Jean-Baptiste coveted Evangeline, and he fixed his eyes on his rival. Tomorrow, he told himself. Tomorrow she will be mine, and there will be no more threats from him, or anyone.

“I’m sorry, Monsieur Lajeunesse,” said Jean-Baptiste, indulgently enunciating each sound in Basil’s name. “I’m afraid I have been eavesdropping unintentionally. Did I hear something about ships? My apologies, but what nonsense is this?”

“Just nonsense, as you say,” said Basil. “There are no ships. Today is not the day.”

Jean-Baptiste pulled his head back and squinted at Gabriel. “I see,” he said. He turned back to Basil.

Basil wiped his brow with his scarred forearm. “Come, Gabriel. Hold Nog’s bridle and steady him. We must shoe this horse for young Leblanc.”

eva

We’ve been driving up Boot Cove Road for fifteen minutes now, or maybe more, and we’re not really driving anyway, it’s more like speeding, heading east, listening to an old Led Zeppelin song. Gabe wants to get to Quoddy Head before sunset so we can watch the stars come up over Passamaquoddy Bay, even if it means doubling the speed limit the whole way.

“I’ve never seen a cop out here,” he says.

Gabe’s car isn’t fancy, just a secondhand sedan with a bench seat and electric windows. The baby-blue hood doesn’t match the rest of the body, which is chocolate brown.

Gabe looks different today, grown-up and serious, hair pushed back from his broad forehead, light whiskers sprouting
from his angled jawline. His eyes smile in unison with the corners of his mouth as he hits the gas again. Yesterday he qualified as cute. Today he’s handsome.

“I like your car,” I say, thinking how stupid I sound when I do. I look at his hands, clasped together with fingers locked, dangling over the top of the steering wheel. He drives with his wrists.

“It’ll be all right once I get the hood painted,” Gabe says. “I bought it last week from the want ads on the back page of the
Lubec Lighthouse
.” He pats the wheel and smiles, a sideways smile. “It’s a birthday present for myself.” He speeds up even more.

“You gave yourself a birthday present?” I ask. “Who does that?” I’m trying to flirt, but just as I smile we hit a pothole and he turns to look at the road and doesn’t see.

“I do,” he says, swerving into the oncoming lane to avoid a shredded tire on the roadside. “I always have. Every year.”

“OK,” I say. I want to say “That’s weird,” but I don’t, because he probably won’t think that’s flirting. Instead, I say, “Well, you made a great choice.” I roll down my window. “What else did you get for your birthday?”

Gabriel looks over at me, his blue eyes tender, hazy. He scrunches his brow and shakes his head. “Just this.”

“Come on,” I say. “Nothing else?”

Gabe shakes his head. I see his notebook on the dashboard, sliding back and forth as the road winds toward Quoddy. I watch it, hoping it slides off the dashboard and onto the seat, splitting open for just a moment so I can glimpse inside. “What about your brother?” I ask.

“He got a Mercedes,” he says.

“What?”

“My brother. For his last birthday. He got a Mercedes.”

I’m angry at whoever gave Paul a birthday Mercedes and gave Gabe nothing. Which, I’m guessing, would be their father, Mr. Basil Lejeune, Esq., the only lawyer in Franktown. He considers Paul, the big hockey star, his family’s only real success story, after himself, of course. Quiet, scribbling, second son Gabe doesn’t deserve a Mercedes. “No, I mean how is he doing?”

“What?”

“Louise told me he was sick or something. Is he going to be—”

I can’t even finish my question before Gabe turns up the Led Zeppelin song on the radio. Loud. “Many times I’ve lied …,” he sings. He rolls down his window and speeds up, the wind blowing his mop of hair back into his face, plastering it against his cheek. He disappears behind it. “Many times I’ve wondered …”

I just sit and look out the window at the ocean appearing and disappearing through the pine trees in flashes of infinity.

Quoddy Head appears in the distance. Gabe takes hold of the steering wheel with his left hand and slides his right hand over on top of mine. He feels warm on my skin. I turn my hand over and grasp his.

Gabe doesn’t talk to me, and somehow it’s OK. I don’t want this drive to end.

Gabriel