Sea Glass Inn (6 page)

“He’ll be in college soon,” Mel said, her voice stilted. “And when he comes back to visit, Richard will have a new house, a new family.

I would have been the displaced one. On my own. With nothing to offer.”

Pam glanced back at the house when Mel did. It was barely visible from their seated position. “I thought if I could make a home of my own, someplace I had helped to create, he might be proud to come here. Proud of me. Not sorry for me. I wanted to have something to offer.”

“A legacy,” Pam said.

Mel gave a half shrug, half nod. Pam gave in to the urge to reach over and give Mel’s hand a brief squeeze before she let go and hugged her knees to her chest. Mel seemed to have locked herself away in her memories and worries, and Pam was relieved to sit in silence, struggling to ignore her sudden craving for a cigarette. She understood what it meant to love a son so much you would do anything for him.

Mel had gone from hiding her identity to stepping out on her own, all for her son. At a time in her son’s life when most parents were resisting change, trying to hold on to the past, Mel was looking forward. And daring to
move
forward, leaving behind everything she knew in the process. Pam believed that a mother who was proud and independent was a much greater gift than one who was hiding her sexuality and her potential. She only hoped Danny would be able to appreciate what Mel was doing. Pam sighed. There was no way she could back out of the commission now. She had no choice but to help Mel in the only way she could. By painting for her.

Pam stared at the painfully white canvas and tried to summon the nerve to make the first brushstroke. The initial touch of color was the hardest. It stained the perfectly blank linen, started a process while her mind screamed that it was all meaningless and not worth the effort. She looked around for something to distract her, to give her an excuse to abandon the image simmering in her head, but nothing offered itself. The small A-frame was clean, the laundry done, the bed made. Even her springer spaniel, Piper, wouldn’t oblige her by begging to play or go for a walk. The brown-and-white dog dozed in the weak autumn sunlight, oblivious to her owner’s inner turmoil.

If it hadn’t been for the memory of Mel’s handshake when she accepted the commission for more paintings, Pam would have shrugged off the rare urge to capture the scene she noticed that morning. She and Piper had gone for a walk at low tide, just after sunrise, to a large basalt formation about a half mile down the beach.

One of Pam’s favorite spots, the tide pools created by the cluster of rocks captured such interesting sea life. Usually she brought a nature guide with her to force her mind to concentrate on identifying one thing at a time. This morning, however, she had forgotten her book at home. Instead of looking at each piece of the little ecosystem—naming and breaking down the characteristics of each creature in the shallow water—she had started to notice the interplay of elements, of light and shadow, in the microcosm in front of her.

Before she knew it, she was framing sections of the scene that could work as paintings. She’d walked around the formation until she found the right perspective, where the rising sun caught the seven-foot-tall hunk of basalt with a deep pool at its base. A cluster of starfish clung to the edge of the pool, illuminated as if by a spotlight as they seemed to reach for a wave that receded into the shadows and left them stranded. Pam’s hands had clenched as she’d tried to ignore her rush of desire to paint, but then she’d remembered Mel’s hand firmly gripping her own. She had returned home to take care of some suddenly pressing chores before she finally gave in and hauled out a canvas and her paints.

Pam had labored under the unexpected weight of the easel and the lightweight frame of her canvas. She’d had to move them three times before she was satisfied with the way the light hit the rough cloth. She’d pulled the kitchen table close so she had a place to set her brushes and paints. The effort of moving everything into place had been exhausting, and she hadn’t even started to paint. She’d wanted to scrap the project and sit down with a drink, but she had come too far to stop. The image of the rock had pounded too insistently in her head, trying to get out.

Resigned, she dropped her box of brushes on the table with a bang loud enough to make Piper raise her head. She settled down again as Pam quieted her movements, opening the box and taking her brushes out one by one. She feathered each against her hand, the bristles pliable and soft on her palm. She must have cleaned them thoroughly after her last bout of painting—the seascape Mel bought—but the act was so ingrained, so automatic, she couldn’t remember doing it. She took her time arranging the brushes in rows, their ends perfectly even, before she started to unpack her paints.

She opened the first tube and closed her eyes as the viscous, smudgy smell of the oils hit her nose. No turning back now. Even stronger than any visual cue, the scent of her art connected her to the first drawings she had made as a child. Waxy crayons, chalky pastels, cheap sets of watercolors. Sometimes she could ignore the landscapes, the faces, the images that inspired her. But once snared by the smell of the paint, she couldn’t stop the rest of the painting from pouring out.

Pam took a deep breath and smeared a line of black paint on the canvas, outlining the jagged silhouette of the back side of the large rock. She was surprised her hand didn’t shake as she sketched the dark outline since her willingness to return to painting for this woman was so frightening.

Of course she found Mel beautiful—there was nothing unusual about that. She could admire beautiful women. Sleep with them.

Even take care of chores or projects for them, often against her better judgment. But draw for them? Not even a sketch on a bar napkin. Agreeing to paint for Mel, opening herself to friendship and connection, was dangerous. For years, she had survived by avoiding close relationships, ignoring any attraction that might lead to something deeper than a one-night stand. Tourists and itinerant visitors to her small seaside town were fine, offering sex with no strings or commitment, but Mel seemed determined to stay.

Even though Pam would normally bet her life savings that a new entrepreneur hoping to open and run a successful bed-and-breakfast would fail as so many had before, there was something about Mel that made her hesitate. If anyone had a chance to fulfill her dream and build an inn that would be a haven to tourists, it would be Mel. She seemed to represent family and permanence, sanctuary and home—myths that Pam had foolishly fallen for long ago.

The memory of what she had lost, the very things Mel was fighting to create, hit her with such force. In the belly, in the heart, in her mind, everywhere she was most vulnerable and most susceptible to the pain. She wanted to smash her canvas, snap the brushes in half, throw her tubes of paint against the wall. Destroy, not create. She had trusted in forever only to have it torn away. She couldn’t allow it to happen again, regardless of how tempting Mel could be. All Pam had to do was deliver her promised paintings—no matter how painful it was to finish them—and get Mel out of her life.

The colors Pam slashed across the canvas were dark and shadowy.

Black for the basalt, with a hint of red flame from its volcanic past.

Deep purples, blues, and greens for the anemones that remained in place and mocked the starfish as they strove to save themselves. Stark blue-black mussels and white barnacles that clung to the rock. The textures were thick as she layered coats of paint on the canvas. But when she moved to the ocean’s waves, her colors softened, her paint lightened into teal and aqua, with a whitish foam that marked the edge of the surf. She added a glint of sunlight on the water and allowed it to illuminate several tiny fish in the tide pool, some fronds of seaweed that softened the harsh edges of the rocks, and a tiny waterfall where the ocean’s waves still drained into the pool.

Once she started to paint, her brain and hands seemed to move automatically, translating the image in her mind into a series of strokes and hues until the first stage of the painting was finished. She didn’t even stop to consult the hastily made sketch she had drawn when she returned from her walk—on her kitchen counter since no paper had been available. It seemed as if she blinked three hours after that first brushstroke, waking out of a trance, and stepped back from the almost-complete picture. She had captured the scene, caught the starfish in their dying moment. Nothing left to do but add the fractured, polished mosaic of sea glass. Her first thought was that she had somehow painted more optimism into the image than she had expected. Where she had seen only hopeless, helpless starfish, there was somehow a sense of reaching, striving for a salvation that seemed possible.

But as the hypnotic effect of creation gradually evaporated, the image that was never far from her mind returned full force. She somehow transposed a vision of the child she had loved—the boy her partner had taken from her—onto the painting. She suddenly could see her son, who had been lost to her for so many years, kneeling next to the pool and reaching toward the starfish. The brief respite from despair was over, the glorious amnesia brought on by concentration and immersion was gone. Finishing a painting was even more painful than beginning as Pam’s mind returned to the present, and a rush of grief, held at bay for a brief time, returned in force.

Piper had left her bed to sit by the back door, and she whined softly, asking to be let outside. Pam grabbed a box off the kitchen table and followed her dog into the small backyard. She sat in a weathered Adirondack chair and sifted through the box’s contents while Piper wandered around the tiny patch of lawn. She hadn’t been lying when she’d told Mel that sea glass was getting harder to find, but she hadn’t let on how much she had collected over the years since she had started coming to the ocean with her grandparents. She sorted through the glass until she had a good-sized pile of red tones, from pale pinks to rich burgundies, to use on the starfish bodies. She added some lavender-colored glass as an accent and then called Piper inside for dinner. She poured some kibble in a bowl for her dog and a few fingers of tequila in a glass for herself. She hesitated and then poured a little more. Pam sat on the couch with her drink and turned on the television, ignoring the painting she had turned to face the wall so she wouldn’t have to see it.

❖

Pam called Mel a few days later to tell her the starfish painting, the first of her commissioned pieces, was completed. She felt a stab of disappointment when the call went to voice mail. She hung up without leaving a message. Even though the process had been difficult, now that her mosaic was finished she wanted to share it with Mel. Because she was relieved to be finished with a painting. Exhausted and relieved and ready to have it out of her house. And maybe because she wanted to see the painting through Mel’s eyes, to replay the August afternoon when she had found Mel in her gallery, standing in front of the seascape. To use Mel as a buffer between her and her art, a filter so she could maybe bear to look at it.

She picked up the phone and dialed again, waiting through Mel’s businesslike message.

“Hey, Mel, this is Pam. From the gallery.” Brilliant. Like Mel knew at least six different Pams in Cannon Beach. Be cool. “I finished one of your mosaics.”

Was Mel on a date? Not an unreasonable explanation for her absence on a Friday night. And it wasn’t like Mel would have trouble finding someone…Pam’s silence had stretched a little too long. “So, um, give me a call when you want me to bring it over. Or you can come get it. Whatever.”

Pam gave her address and mercifully put the call out of its misery.

Yes, very cool. She had no reason to be so tongue-tied. Or to care what—or whom—Mel was doing on her weekend. Mel’s social life was none of her concern, and the only reason she called again a few hours later was because she wanted to get the painting off her hands and Mel’s check into her account. And that was the same reason she drove by Mel’s inn the next day, only to find the big house dark and empty, no blue Honda in the driveway.

Pam slowly drove home along the winding road that edged the ocean and collected Piper for a walk on the beach. The brief glimmer of satisfaction she had felt when she’d finished the starfish painting disappeared as she realized Mel might have given up on her business and left town. She had expected it to happen, but her disappointment caught her by surprise. No matter, she decided. Tia would be glad to have the painting in her upcoming art walk, and life in Cannon Beach would go on as usual, minus yet another hopeful entrepreneur. Pam pulled her jacket tighter as the wind increased. It was blowing from the south, pushing dark clouds across the sky. Pam whistled for Piper and turned back toward her house, hoping to get home before the approaching storm.

Mel jumped to her feet with the rest of the crowd as Danny rushed eight yards for a touchdown. She hadn’t seen him since she’d moved to Cannon Beach. She had initially been upset that she didn’t have a chance to talk to him the moment she got back to Salem, but now she was relieved to have the extra time to get herself together.

Even the sight of him in his helmet and uniform, barely recognizable as her son among his teammates, triggered an unanticipated range of emotions. Happiness, guilt, doubt. She had expected to feel them, just not all at once, clamoring for her attention and threatening to steal her self-control. Mel settled back onto the bleachers when Danny left the field with the offense. She moved as one with the other fans, blending in with the sea of green on the home team’s side of the stadium, but she felt like an outsider. At the game, in her former city, as she brushed against her old life. She felt out of sync, different, in the very place she had called home for so many years.

Although she hadn’t spoken to Danny yet, she had managed to run into Richard and his fiancée, Lesley, earlier at the concession stand. All very polite, very grown-up. Mel had walked away after the few minutes of casual chitchat with an irrational feeling of anger. And regret.