Romeow and Juliet (10 page)

“Have you ever thought of settling here?”

“Actually, the thought has crossed my mind.”

“I heard you’re just filling in temporarily at the bank.”

Cam looked surprised that I knew that. “Everyone really does know everyone else’s business on the island.”

“It’s a byproduct of living in such an isolated social situation,” I confirmed.

“And you heard about my brother-in-law as well?”

“I have. It’s really nice what you’re doing for him.”

Cam shrugged. “I’m a nice guy. Besides, I love my sister. I’d do anything for her, and my brother-in-law really needs this job.”

“How much longer do you think you’ll be needed at the bank?”

“Not long. If everything works out as planned, my last day should be June 30, which happens to be my birthday. I think birthdays are a perfect time for new beginnings.”

“And then?”

Cam frowned. “I’m not sure. I’d been doing some traveling, but to be honest, by the time the accident occurred I was pretty much ready to come back to the States and find a new career. I hadn’t decided what exactly that might entail, but I find that I’d really like to try something new. I guess once I’m no longer needed at the bank I’ll have to give it some thought.”

I realized that the fact that Cam had made a lot of money early in his career explained his superexpensive car. If he could afford to take two years off he must have made a lot of money. I tried to remember if I knew the previous district manager for the bank because that must be Cam’s brother-in-law. I’d never had to borrow money until last winter, so it was doubtful I’d ever met the man.

“Oh, look,” I whispered. Romeo and Juliet were both in Mr. Parsons’s garden, as I’d suspected they would be. Juliet was sitting up on a bench and Romeo was sitting on the ground next to her, reaching his paw toward her.

“Aren’t they adorable?” I added. “It seems a shame to interrupt.”

“Yeah, it does, but Francine will kill us if Juliet ends up pregnant with a tomcat’s babies. We’d better break them up before it’s too late.”

“I guess we should,” I reluctantly agreed.

Luckily, both cats stayed put as we approached. I picked up Romeo and Cam picked up Juliet and we headed back down the beach.

When I returned home Cody was sitting on my front deck. As much as I hoped we could avoid each other for the duration of his stay, deep down I knew it most likely wouldn’t be so.

“What are you doing here?” I asked.

“I thought we should chat.”

“So chat.” I opened the front door and motioned for Cody to precede Romeo and me inside.

Cody sat down on the sofa while I tossed another log on the fire. Although spring had arrived, it was still cool in the evenings.

“Who’s the guy?” Cody asked. He must have seen me walking down the beach with Cam. We’d each been carrying a cat. I’m sure it looked very romantic.

“My boyfriend,” I lied. “So why are you here?”

“I could tell by your complete avoidance of eye contact when we ran into each other on Danny’s boat that you’re less than thrilled that I’m spending time on the island. We’ve always been friends. What happened was unfortunate, but I hate to see it ruin our friendship.”

“What friendship? You took my virginity and then you left.”

“I know. It was a mistake. A huge mistake. I never meant for things to progress that far. I really have no excuse for what happened except to say that I’d been attracted to you for a long time, and you seemed so willing. It was a bad decision that I’ve regretted every day since.”

“You were attracted to me?” I couldn’t quite believe that.

“I was.”

“Yet you left.”

“What was I supposed to do?” Cody asked. “I’d already enlisted in the Navy. I had plane tickets for the next day. I had to go.”

I guess Cody had a point. Sixteen-year-old Caitlin had been so wrapped up in irrational teenage emotions that she couldn’t see that she was as much if not more to blame for the situation than Cody was. If the same thing happened today I would have handled it differently.

“I sent you a letter as soon as I got settled,” he pointed out.

“A letter of apology. Do you know how it made me feel that you considered the most amazing night of my life to be some huge mistake?”

“The most amazing night of your life?” Cody grinned.

“Don’t flatter yourself. I had no means of comparison at that point. At best it was passable.”

I hoped my nose wouldn’t grow with all the lies I was telling. I still considered my night with Cody, in spite of everything that happened after, to be the best I’d ever had.

“I’m sorry,” Cody said, his voice sincere. “I handled it badly. That night was amazing, but the fact that I had to leave made it so much harder.”

“Yeah, I guess I can see that. So why did you stay away so long? It’s been ten years.”

Cody shrugged. “I don’t know. That first tour was hard, but it gave me a sense of purpose. I was doing something important. Making a difference. And then I was accepted into the Seal program and my life trajectory seemed set. I’m not even sure why I’m hesitating to re-up now, except that I’m starting to consider everything I’m missing.”

“Missing?” I asked.

“A wife. A family. Friends with whom I share a history.”

I just looked at this man I did
not
want to love. Deep inside, I knew that in the end he’d leave again. If I opened my heart to him I’d get hurt, and this time I wasn’t sure there was any coming back.

“I’d like us to be friends again,” Cody added. “I want to have people in my life who know about the intimate details of my past.”

“Intimate details?” I asked.

“Okay, maybe intimate isn’t the right word. But, other than my family, the people living on this island are the only people I share childhood memories with. They’re the only ones who know that I was the shortest kid in my class until the ninth grade, and that I threw the winning touchdown at the state championship when I was a junior, and that I dressed as Superman for Halloween three years in a row.”

“And that those three years happened to be when you were in high school,” I reminded him with a laugh.

“See.” Cody grinned. “I can’t share that embarrassing fact with a single person outside of the residents of Madrona Island and not come off as some huge geek.”

“You are a huge geek.”

Cody shrugged. “Maybe. But I’m a geek who knows all of your most embarrassing memories as well. I guess that puts us on equal ground. So how about it?”

“I don’t know. I’ll have to think about it.”

Cody stood up. “Fair enough. I’ll see you around.”

There are some things you should never agree to do even for your favorite brother. Going on a blind date with someone neither of you has ever met, it turns out, is one of them. By the time Saturday evening rolled around I was pretty much regretting my decision to spend the evening with Danny, his date, and her cousin. When the pair of men showed up at my door, I found that I regretted the decision even more.

How can I describe Melanie’s cousin Walter? The word nerd comes to mind, but that would be too kind. Nerd with a superiority complex and deep emotional issues would be a bit closer. Don’t get me wrong; I’m not a snob and every guy I date doesn’t need to be a perfect 10, but Walter was . . . well, Walter was a truly unique individual.

“You’re slouching,” Mom reminded me as I stood in front of her refrigerator in my bare feet the day after the disastrous date.

I stood up straight. My mom was a wonderful woman, but she was a stickler for proper posture.

“Is the salami I saw in here earlier gone?” I asked.

“It’s in the deli drawer, but it’s much too late to be having a snack. Dinner will be ready in an hour.”

“But I’m hungry now,” I argued. Why is it that anytime I visit my childhood home I turn back into a petulant child?

“You can snack on a carrot while you shred the lettuce for the salad.”

I grabbed the bag of carrots as well as the head of lettuce from the crisper and headed toward the cutting board, which was already set out on the kitchen counter. If I’d been at my own home I would have stuffed my mouth with cookies just to prove I could.

“Have you given any more thought to helping out with the children’s choir?” Mom asked.

The woman who had led the choir for the past twenty years had left the island and the church was looking for a replacement. Unfortunately, I had a passable voice, and Mom had suggested to Father Kilian that I might make an acceptable replacement.

“I don’t know. It seems like a big commitment.”

“You’d just have Wednesday night practice and Sunday morning services. Sister Mary really needs you to do this.”

I sincerely doubted that, since Sister Mary seemed quite adept at recruiting volunteers to help out with the children’s programs she was in charge of, but spending time with the kids would be fun, and I really wasn’t busy on Wednesday evenings.

“Okay, I’ll give it a try,” I agreed.

“Wonderful.” Mom smiled. “I thought today’s sermon might have made an impact. It was a perfect time for Father Kilian to discuss service to the community,” Mom continued to drone on. “It seems like he has a knack for knowing just what message to share at the most appropriate time. Don’t you think?”

“Um,” I answered as I let my mind drift to last night’s date. If I knew my mom, and I did, she’d spend the next twenty minutes providing examples of Father Kilian’s knack for delivering the perfect message at the perfect time.

The evening had started out okay. Danny had made reservations at the best restaurant on the island, which helped to make the situation palatable. The Sea Grotto, an oceanfront restaurant best known for serving seafood that had been caught the same day it was served, is perched high on a bluff that overlooks a rocky seashore. On a clear night the lights from both the Canadian mainland and Vancouver Island can be seen from the windows that look out over the Pacific Ocean. It really is the perfect choice for a romantic evening.

Unfortunately, the date disintegrated the moment we sat down. Walter was as rude as any man I’d ever met. I spent a lot of time looking out those windows as I tried to ignore the condescending way the jerk spoke to the wait staff. It totally amazed me that Danny’s date, Melanie, put up with his nonsense. Melanie is a cocktail waitress at a local bar, yet she seemed to encourage rather than discourage Walter’s abuse of the perfectly nice men and women who served our fifty-dollar-a-plate meals.

“Cait?” my mom asked.

I looked up at the slightly plump woman who was still dressed in the knee-length dress she’d worn to Mass. If you ask me, trying to cook a big family dinner while still dressed in your Sunday finest was ridiculous, but Mom insisted that all the Hart women wear dresses or skirts on Sunday.

“I think the lettuce is small enough,” Mom added.

I looked down to see that I had shredded the leafy greens into microscopic pieces while I indulged on my rant down memory lane.

“Sorry.” I pushed the bowl aside and started dicing tomatoes.

“Is there something on your mind?”

My first instinct was to shrug. I had grown up sitting at this very counter helping Mom with the cooking and it had become firmly engrained in my psyche that the teenage code of conduct required that you never volunteered information to a parent even if you secretly wanted to share it with them. I’m not really sure how this particular rule came into being, but I can say that I’d become a master at making my poor mother pry every little bit of information out of me. Of course, now I was twenty-six, not sixteen, so perhaps it was time to grow up and learn the art of adult conversation.

“I went on a double date with Danny last night,” I began.

“And?” Mom prodded.

“And the guy was a real douche.”

“Caitlin Hart, we do not say ‘douche’ in this household. Now you go into the bedroom and say five Hail Marys.”

So much for adult conversation.

I shoved the tomatoes aside and did as I was instructed. The Hart family had not only been Catholic for dozens of generations but we were very conservative Irish Catholic. Don’t get me wrong; I’m proud of my heritage and my religion, but at times strict adherence to the old ways can become tiring.

As an adult, I live in a world made up of boxes. There’s the Sunday box, which I think of as my Harthaven box. It includes the village of Harthaven, my mother, the church, and the mandatory Sunday dinner every Hart on the island is required to attend. While I’d had a wonderful childhood filled with love and fond memories, there’s a part of me that longs for something more than can be experienced in this blue collar environment, where hard work, family, church, and tradition, are the cornerstones of everyday life.

During the other six days of the week I live in Pelican Bay, a modern town with eclectic residents that was built on the idea of personal enrichment, spiritual freedom, and economic prosperity. In Pelican Bay I share my life with wonderfully free-spirited souls, including two witches, hippie neighbors, and a cat who apparently has some sort of magical powers.

Aunt Maggie is my role model. Of all the people I know, she seems most adept at straddling the line between these two very different worlds. Sure, she’s politically opinionated and tends to ruffle feathers along the way, but she has a unique understanding of what it means not only to live in, but fully embrace, each of these very different cultures.

“So what did you get busted for?” My sixteen-year-old sister Cassidy asked when she joined me in the bedroom.

“Saying douche.”

Cassidy laughed. “Did it get you out of making dinner?”

“Actually, it did.” I smiled.

“It seems sort of pointless to even make a big dinner today.” Cassie plopped down on the bed. “Aunt Maggie is still at Siobhan’s, Aiden is in Alaska getting the boat ready for the season, and Danny called to say he was sick.”

“More like hung over. I wish I’d thought of calling in sick.”

“If you had, maybe Mom would have let me go hang out with my friends.”

“You know that Sunday is family day.”

“What family? At least when you were my age the aunts and uncles and cousins used to come over. Now it’s just us and so, so boring.” Cassie groaned and covered her eyes with her forearm. “No one has known pain like I have.”

Did I mention that Cassie tends to be somewhat melodramatic? Yet she did have a point. Things had changed quite a lot since I was sixteen. Dad was still alive then, and Aiden and Siobhan were always around. The island was still home to most of my dad’s siblings and their families. Sunday dinner meant dozens of people who shared a bloodline and would come together to share a meal. The boys would throw a ball around in the yard, while the men drank beer and the women gossiped about who needed to make a trip to the confessional right away and who could probably get by with waiting another week.

In the span of the ten years between my sixteenth and my twenty-sixth year, my dad had died, the cannery had closed, Siobhan had moved to Seattle, and all of the Hart aunts and uncles, other than Maggie, had moved from the island. What was once a chorus of voices was now but an echo of what had once been.

“I thought Tara was coming for dinner,” Cassie added.

“She was, but she stayed to help Sister Mary with the plans for the program they’re offering to the children this summer. Maybe we should see if Mom wants to go out to dinner. My treat,” I offered.

“She’s already made the stew.”

“It’ll keep.”

“I guess it couldn’t hurt to ask.” Cassie smiled.

Luckily, Mom hadn’t started the bread or the potatoes, and even she had to agree that a big family dinner for the three of us was just short of depressing. Many of the businesses in Harthaven were closed on Sundays, but if you liked Italian food there was always an open table at Antonio’s, where parishioners of St. Patrick’s often congregated to share a meal and catch up with their neighbors.

We paused after walking in as Mom scanned the room, looking for an empty table. The crowded restaurant featured red-and-white-checked tablecloths, thick white candles that dripped over the side of repurposed wine bottles, and colorful baskets of red and white flowers. I took an appreciative breath as the scent of garlic and spicy tomato sauce transported me back to similar meals from my childhood.

“Oh, look, some of the members of my prayer group are sitting at the big table in the back,” Mom announced as we walked in through the front door. “Why don’t we join them?”

I could see Cassie was about to complain, but I squeezed her hand just in time to prevent an outburst.

“I think there are only two seats available,” I said. “Why don’t you go ahead, and Cassie and I will sit at the empty table in the corner.”

Mom frowned. “Are you sure?”

“Absolutely. That’s okay with you?” I looked at Cassie.

She smiled. “Yeah, that’s fine. I wanted to talk to Cait about the new computer software program I’m thinking of downloading.”

That was a smart move on Cassie’s part because Mom hated everything computer related.

“Okay, if you’re sure.” Mom looked back toward the table where her friends were congregated. I noticed her eyes had locked on the empty chair next to a man the family had known since before I was born who happened to be a recent widower. “Maybe I’ll join the two of you for dessert.”

“That would be nice,” I agreed.

The table Cassie and I headed to was just to the right of the red-brick fireplace that smoldered with red coals as the fire burned down.

“Is there anything going on between Mom and Mr. O’Donnell?” I asked as I sat across from Cassie.

“What? Ew! Why would you even ask that?”

“I noticed her noticing him when we walked in. It
has
been three years since Dad passed and two years since Mrs. O’Donnell passed. I just thought . . .”

“Well, unthink it. Mr. O’Donnell is too old for Mom. Besides, they’re both too old to be dating anyone.”

I sincerely doubted that either Mom or Mr. O’Donnell were too old to date but decided to let the subject drop. “So how about you? I think you mentioned a new guy. Justin?”

A dreamy look came over Cassie’s face. “Justin is awesome. He’s smart and athletic and a total babe. We aren’t actually boyfriend and girlfriend, but we’ve been out a few times, so unless Mom blows it for me, I’m hoping to take the next step.”

“Why do you think Mom would blow your chance with this guy?” I wondered.

“Justin is eighteen. He’s not used to dating girls with ten o’clock curfews. In fact, I’m pretty sure the other girls he dates don’t even have curfews. I’ve tried to get Mom to lighten up, but she refuses to be even a tiny bit reasonable.”

“To be honest, I’m surprised she’s letting you date someone who’s eighteen at all.”

“She doesn’t exactly know he’s eighteen,” Cassie admitted. “I told her that he was a junior, which he is, but she isn’t aware that he was held back a couple of times.”

“So next year when he’s a senior he’ll be nineteen?”

Cassie shrugged. “Justin’s thinking about dropping out after this year. He would have done it already, but his parents told him that if he dropped out he would need to move out of their house, so he’s hanging in until one of the jobs he’s applied for comes through. It’ll be so awesome if he can get his own place.”

I found myself in one of those moments when I wanted to pause the scene so I had time to think things through. There was no way I wanted my baby sister dating an adult with his own place, but I knew if I turned all parental on her, she’d simply shut me out. I wanted her to know she could come to me any time about anything and I would be there to listen and offer support. Siobhan had filled that role for me and I intended to fill it for Cassie.