The Lake Season (21 page)

Cooper threw up his hands. “Are
you
?”

“Yes. No. I don't know. God, I almost killed you, didn't I?”

“Jesus, Iris. What are you doing?”

It was no use. “I didn't mean to stop. I mean, I wanted to say a quick hello, but I've got to get back to the house. Right away.” She snuck a look at him, an intense heat rising in her cheeks. “I'm busy today. Crazy busy.” Just plain crazy was what she was.

“Okay,” Cooper said warily.

“So,” she said, stepping awkwardly toward her car. “I guess I'd better go.”

Cooper ducked playfully to the side. “Wait, let me take cover first.”

“Ha-ha . . .” She opened the door. But she couldn't get in. Not yet.

“You are something,” Cooper said, which suddenly made her smile.

“What?”

He shook his head in amusement. “Nothing. Just that you sure keep a guy on his toes.”

Iris liked the way it came out. The way his mouth curved up in one corner as he said it. It wasn't just the way he was looking at her. It was the way he saw her.

“Whatever's so important, can it wait for a swim?” he asked.

Iris looked back at her car, still running. She looked down at the house, where she could not see Millie's look of consternation. Or Bill's befuddlement. And back at Cooper, who was dusty and tan, and still smiling at her in the middle of their driveway.

Trish's words echoed loudly in her head,
Stop it, Iris. Stop it. Now!

“Why not?” she said breathlessly.

•    •    •

They'd descended the hill below the barn, bypassing the house and cutting left across the lawns to the same spot where Stephen and Leah had passionately argued what seemed like years before. A handful of willows lined the shore, and the grasses were taller here, a spot where mallards nested and where Iris had scouted for eggs and ducklings when she was a child.

“Do you think they can hear us?” Cooper asked, glancing sideways at the house in the distance. Tiki torches on the patio flickered, signaling the dinner hour.

Iris shook her head. “They're all too busy talking over one another.”

Cooper laughed. “Stephen's parents are a little high maintenance, huh?”

“Makes my mother look like a pussycat,” Iris agreed. “And that's no small feat.”

“And what does that make you?”

Iris stopped at the water's edge and kicked off her sandals. “I don't know. A dog?”

Cooper made a face. “Are you kidding? Something fiercer.”

Fiercer? “A tiger, maybe?”

“I wouldn't go that far.”

She splashed him, and Cooper darted away laughing.

“What then?” she demanded.

Cooper sat on the rocky shore and began unlacing his work boots. “An egret.”

“A bird? I remind you of some gangly bird?”

He nodded, his voice growing serious. “The best kind of bird. You've seen them growing up around here. Egrets are graceful.” He glanced over at her. “Independent. Loyal to their nest.”

Iris tilted her head, contemplating this. She'd observed the quiet shorebird all her life. But it was the attributes Cooper listed that caught in her throat. It was perhaps the nicest thing he could've said, and the thought of her own distant nest filled her with a quiet sadness. And, right on its tail, a small flutter of happiness, too. Cooper thought her independent.

He stood, then pulled his T-shirt over his head, and Iris averted her gaze. She could hear him unzip his work pants, and a moment later he stood behind her, in just his navy-blue boxers.

“Come on,” he whispered, touching her shoulder.

Iris watched as he waded in, the shadows of the branches overhead falling across his bare back. Cooper's legs flexed as he navigated the rocky shallows, the water rising up to his waist, and he turned to look back at her.

“You all right?”

She nodded, filled with sudden awareness of her clothed self. She'd have to strip down at least to her underwear, which she desperately tried to recall from when she got dressed that morning. An image of tattered grandma underpants flashed in her mind; God, she hoped she wasn't wearing
those
.

The shade of the willows combined with fading sun enveloped them in a golden hue. It wasn't getting any darker. She dropped her pants quickly, kicking them aside with her foot.

Cringing, she closed her eyes. Which was absurd. Cooper's own eyes were not closed, and she could feel the warmth of his gaze traveling across the pebbly shallows as she tugged her T-shirt off and stood in her white bra and panties before him. At least they weren't the ones with holes in them, she thought, stepping gingerly onto the damp sand.

In one slip, she moved into the lake, passing Cooper underwater, and surfaced just beyond him. Behind them a throaty chorus of peepers had started along the shore.

“Feeling better after the other night?” Cooper asked.

Iris smoothed her wet hair back. “I'm working on it.” She leaned back into the water, floating. She did not want to talk about Leah or her family right now. “If I could just stay like this . . .” she said, her voice trailing.

“I know. This is why I came back here,” Cooper said, sinking into the water.

Down the beach, voices carried and they both turned, watching as distant figures emerged from the house and onto the patio.

“They'll be wondering where I am,” Iris whispered, grateful to be where she was instead. She laughed out loud, suddenly giddy, as if they were a couple of kids hiding from the grown-ups and might be discovered at any moment.

“You're a big girl,” Cooper allowed.

“Sometimes.” Iris laughed again. “Sometimes I just do a really good impression of one.”

“Well, you've got me fooled.”

Iris turned to him. “Can I ask you something?”

“Why do people always do that?” Cooper mused. “Ask if they can ask you something, instead of just asking the question.”

“Probably because they're uncomfortable about the very thing they want to ask you.”

“Are you?”

“Well, now I am,” Iris said, smiling.

Cooper swam closer. “Ask me anything.”

“All right.” Iris glanced back at the house. “What was I like in high school?”

Cooper frowned. “Don't you already know the answer to that?”

“No. I mean, everyone has a vague idea of how other people saw them in high school. But it doesn't always match up with how they felt. Or who they were.”

“Exactly. So, why would you care what I thought about you in high school?”

“Forgive me, but only you could answer like that.”

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“You were popular. And athletic. Everyone knew who you were. I'm sure it never occurred to you to feel anything less than awesome.”

Now it was Cooper's turn to splash her. “That's not fair. I was just as self-conscious as anyone else in high school.”

Iris scoffed. “Sure. Says the lacrosse team captain.” She rolled over onto her stomach. “Wait, weren't you also homecoming king one year?”

Cooper winced.

“Oh, please. Of course you were!”

“Iris, that was so long ago. Who cares about that stuff now?”

“I know, I know. But seriously, this is important to me.”

Cooper rolled his eyes. “I can't imagine why. But if you want to play this game, I will.” He paused. “Let's see; in high school I remember you as being kind of serious. And smart. Weren't you in all the honors and AP classes?”

“Yeah, but that's not what I mean. How did I
seem
to you?”

He gave her a pleading look. “Tell me again why you're asking me all this?”

“Because you're right—high school
was
so long ago. We've all grown up and turned into such different people. But now that I'm back home, I don't feel different at all. Suddenly I'm unsure of everything. I'm driven by this ridiculous need to please my parents. And I'm completely overshadowed by my sister's life. It's just like high school all over again.”

“Iris, it's nothing like high school. As for Leah, you're just looking out for your sister. It may feel overwhelming, but it certainly can't overshadow you.”

“But it is!” Iris insisted. “I came back here to sort things out for myself. And yet I'm so afraid to take the next step,
any
next step, really, because what if it's the wrong one? What if I screw up and can't go back and fix it?” She was rambling now, and she could see that Cooper was trying to keep up. “And I'm listening to everyone else: my parents, Trish, you! Why is that? I'm educated, I've got a family and a career, and I'm forty, for God's sake. Haven't I learned anything?”

Cooper swam closer. “Well, haven't you?”

“This isn't funny.”

“I don't think it is. You're struggling, Iris. Welcome to the trenches. All I can say is that you've got to take a step, even if it's in the wrong direction. Because you can always circle back.”

“Can I really?”

Cooper's voice was soft, and his eyes full of concern. Iris could feel her heart slowing in the water. “Iris, you can do anything you want to. You're still the smart kid from school.” He furrowed his brow. “And definitely the serious one.”

Iris flicked him.

“But you're so much more than that. Stop analyzing everything so intensely. Go with your instinct.”

“Easy for you to say. Mr. Popularity himself.”

“For the record, being the captain of the lacrosse team was great. But being popular wasn't. You know how stressful that was? Everyone's always got one eye on you. You're constantly thinking about what you say or do, or who you're with. I should've focused a lot more on the important stuff. Like you did.”

Iris scoffed. “Yeah, look where that got me.”

Cooper waited a beat before reminding her, “Right here, with me.”

Iris glances over, but he'd closed his eyes and was floating on his back. Watching Cooper out of the corner of her eye, she could sense how relaxed he was. Stretched out in the water, a look of contentment on his face. If only she could channel some of that for herself. If only she could summon some of that confidence he'd had back in high school. He could say whatever he wanted about popularity; there was no denying he was still more sure of himself than she was.

Above them the first twinkling stars had shown themselves. Staring up at them, Iris floated beside Cooper. Wondering what the kids were doing under those same stars, back at home. “It's beautiful at this time of night,” she said finally.

“You're beautiful,” Cooper replied. He was looking at her.

Iris righted herself, planting her feet firmly in the sand. How long had he been watching her like that?

Cooper moved closer. Reaching underwater, he found one of her hands and drew it to him, pressing it to his mouth. Iris watched, trembling. As though it were someone else's fingers pressed to his lips.

“What are you afraid of, Iris Standish?” he asked her softly.

“Everything.”

Iris knew what was about to happen, but she closed her eyes anyway. Forcing aside her fears, and Trish's voice, and all the hundreds of reasons she should turn away, climb out of the lake, and race back toward the house.

But she did not. As the voices of her family carried across the water, rising in laughter and falling away in hushes, Iris let Cooper Woods press his wet mouth against her own. She did not pull away as he kissed her assiduously, encircling her waist with his arms. She did not flinch as he ran his hands over her slick, wet head. Nor did she cry out when he drew her toward the shore and lay down against her in the shallow waters, their bodies moving with a gentle rhythm as the lake lapped softly at every inch of their skin.

Twenty-One

T
he wedding planners had landed. With the big day looming, Tika, Leah's coordinator, arrived to confirm the wedding's “launch and design tactics,” something that sounded to Iris like a NASA rocket dispatch.

Tika roared up the drive in a tiny silver Audi TT, top down and her long, red hair jetting behind her. Followed by another car, filled with people whom Iris assumed were her assistants. Polished young women with sleek ponytails and portfolios tucked under their arms, and a twiggy young man in salmon-colored pants, who sprang from the passenger seat of the Audi and shielded his eyes as he took in the house.

“It's an army,” Millie murmured, watching them through the kitchen window.

“An underfed, manicured army,” Iris corrected.

Leah swept down the porch stairs and greeted Tika with ­European-style kisses.

“Welcome!” she said, gesturing to the porch, where Millie and Iris stood watching the congregation. The young man in salmon pants issued a perfunctory pageant-style wave.

“This is Devon,” Tika said, “our visionary.”

“I've heard so much about you,” Leah gushed.

“Uh-huh.” Devon snapped his head left and right, scrutinizing the property as he chewed one end of his aviator sunglasses impatiently. “So this is it?”

Tika pressed a small clutch to her chest. “No, no, don't worry. The reception site is up that way.” She pointed toward the barn, behind the house.

Devon furrowed his pale brow. “I'm not feeling it.”

Which apparently was not a good sign. Behind them the minions began to fidget, and Tika whisked open a portfolio of photos that one of the minions nervously had produced, as if on cue. “These are the shots I took last month. Remember the sloping meadow? The oak trees bordering the hill? You'll see the site is perfect.”

Devon, swatting at a stray fly, did not look convinced.

“Guess this doesn't involve me,” Iris said quickly, already making a getaway for the door.

“Oh, no you don't,” Millie said, placing a firm arm around her daughter's waist and drawing her to the porch steps. “Come meet the team. They're very talented.”

“You mean affected,” Iris whispered.

Iris tried not to roll her eyes as she followed “the team” up the grassy rise behind the house, as the girls puffed and wobbled in their ridiculous heels. Devon led the small band, his stride brisk and impatient. Iris spotted Cooper's truck at the barn ahead of them, and she felt even more silly following this pastel-clad band up the hill.

“This is it?” Devon asked again. They'd paused at the main barn. He put a finger to his mouth and tapped it, clearly baffled by the scenery. He looked to Tika. “You said we were going for
Out of Africa
. Honey, this is decidedly more
Grapes of Wrath
.”

“Africa?” Millie piped up.

“Patience,” Tika said coolly to Devon. Though she, too, began tapping her clutch.

“It's this way,” Leah told them with an accommodating smile. She stepped in front of the planning party to lead the way, looking cool and unruffled in her seersucker tennis skirt and crisp blouse. “Not much farther.”

Devon assessed Leah briefly, then, seeming to decide on something, slipped his arm into hers. “Love the sandals,” he said. “Just don't lose me in a cornfield, okay? I've got a treatment at noon.”

Iris snorted.

Millie, who did not find any of this funny, exchanged worried looks with Tika. “He'll be fine,” Tika assured her. “He's a genius. And look, he adores Leah.”

As the planning party forged uncertainly ahead, Iris stole away and ducked into the barn.

“What's all that about?” Cooper met her in the doorway and gestured curiously toward the departing group.

“It's Leah's wedding posse. They're scouting the joint.”

“Sounds insidious.”

“You've got that right.” Their eyes met and held, but despite the shared laugh, Iris felt uncertainty creeping in. One moment she wanted to reach out and touch his cheek; the next she wanted to run.

“I'd better catch up with them,” she said reluctantly.

“What for?”

“Moral support. Millie's about due for a heart attack,” she added. “There's talk of Africa . . .”

Cooper reached for Iris's hand, ignoring her nervous chatter. “C'mere.”

It was all the invitation she needed. In the cool shadows of the barn, Iris wrapped her arm around Cooper's neck and kissed him on the mouth. A rise of yearning rose up inside her, and she pressed her nose into the curve of his neck, already moist with the heat of the morning. Iris inhaled his smell. A scent already familiar and comforting. Something she ached to lose herself in.

•    •    •

For the next several days, Iris did just that. As the Willetses took off for a quick pre-wedding visit to Maine, and as Leah and the planners hovered around the kitchen island with charts, Iris trusted herself to get lost. She stole away to the barn. And to the lake. And once to the shaded bed of his truck, parked in the far fields by the woods—wherever Cooper was. The rafter work in the large barn was finally complete, and with the new supply of Vermont lumber, he had moved on to the old smokehouse.

Cooper issued Iris a special invitation to work with him. She'd risen early and headed to the lake for her usual swim one morning when she noticed something glimmering on the rock wall by the dock. It was a tool belt, with her name stitched in red across the nylon. She lifted it, appreciating the weight of the tools within. Her very own hammer. Wrench. Shears. Each sleek instrument she pulled from its pocket felt right in her hand. A small note was tucked in the largest pocket, alongside a box of nails. “
For Iris, to rebuild. Love, Cooper
.” It was the best gift she could ever remember being given.

But Cooper wasn't her only distraction. The cookbook had taken shape and it was time to put out some feelers in the publishing world. Iris put in another call to Joan Myer. Joan was not just one of her favorite editors at Wordsmith Press in Manhattan. Joan was
the
publisher in cookbooks. Even before the Food Network channel had besieged the publishing industry with celebrity cookbooks, Joan had predicted the wave and made her own mark with distinguished lesser-known chefs. She was also game to take on a new author, something not every editor was willing to jump at. The question was, what if that author was Iris?

Iris put in the call to Joan's assistant and was surprised when Joan picked up on the first ring. “Yes, it's Joan.”

“Hi there, Joan. This is Iris Standish.”

“Iris, hello. Whatever happened to your author's piece on family farm cuisine? Did she ever find a chef to collaborate with?”

“Well, unfortunately, it was just a little too far out of her area of expertise.”

Joan clicked her tongue. “Too bad. So, what else have you got for me?”

“Well, it's interesting you ask, actually.” Iris paused, gathering herself. “I have this friend who is an amazing cook. Top-notch, really. And she lives here, in New Hampshire, where she runs her own bakery and café.”

“You're summering in New Hampshire? Lucky dog. The city is positively sweltering. Disgusting, really.” Joan sighed audibly.

“Yes, it is nice up here,” Iris answered, trying to stay on course. “So, my friend, Trish, really knows New England fare. I mean, she is New England fare.”

“Uh-huh.”

Iris could imagine Joan glancing at her watch or checking her email. Editors were always buried. Iris had to make her pitch fast and strong.

“So what I thought was, why not collaborate with her? I mean, she's perfect. She's got the experience, and we work well together. And her food—well, it's just to die for.”

“Right. So you teamed her up with your struggling author?”

“No, no, not my author.” She took a deep breath. “I teamed her up with me.”

There was a beat of silence on the other end of the line. “I'm afraid I don't follow.”

Iris sank onto the bed. “I've been toying with the book idea for a while. So, I thought, why not? I could do this. I mean, I am doing this.” Iris swallowed hard. “I'm writing the book. And we've got sample pages, if you'd be willing to take a look.”

Joan did not answer right away.

What was Iris doing? Poor Joan probably dealt with wannabe authors all the time. It was no different from the parents who timidly approached Iris at PTA meetings clutching hand-scrawled pages with “
Just the cutest little idea for a picture book! Would you mind?
” Usually about some ordinary fur-ball animal, like a squirrel. Who lived in their attic. Or some equally mundane idea, like the time her sweet elderly neighbor, Mrs. Dooley, flagged her down at the bus stop with a typewritten story about her schnauzer, Otis, who loved to chase his tail. “
Oh, if you could just see him. Once he even caught it!
” And the look on Mrs. Dooley's face: bursting with hope and canine pride. They did not understand that Iris was a nonfiction agent, who could barely connect her own writers with editors in this tough market, and who did not specialize in children's literature or squirrels, and certainly not tail-chasing schnauzers. These painful incidents happened all too often, each time leaving Iris nodding politely, sometimes even feigning false enthusiasm, as she fought the knowledge that if she did not escape quickly she would be forced to stomp this person's dream dead like a bug. And yet here she was, doing the same thing to Joan. Only this time, Iris was Mrs. Dooley.

As the silence stretched painfully between them, Iris decided to grab the bull by the horns. Might as well get trampled trying. “Look, Joan, I know I'm not an actual author. But I know the parent this book is intended for. And Trish knows food. We've been working on these recipes all summer, and they're special. Seasonal, local, healthy fare. And all kid-friendly. It's what every parent I know is craving. No more microwave macaroni. No more hot dogs from the freezer. We're talking fresh, sustainable family dinners where everyone dines and unwinds together. The way we grew up, in our own family kitchens.” Finished, Iris collapsed on the bed.

“I see,” Joan said slowly, turning the ideas over on her tongue. “Healthy but quick. Getting the family back to the table. Sustainable ingredients.”
Please
, Iris thought.
Please ask to see some pages.

After a pause, Joan spoke. “Tell you what. I'm heading to Long Island next weekend. If you can get me some sample chapters before that, I'll try and take a look.”

“Really? Oh, Joan, thank you! This means a lot.”

“Just be patient,” Joan cautioned. “Most of the team is away right now, and I'm about to take my own two-week hiatus. It's been god-awful here in New York. And I just wrapped a deal with
National Geographic
that about killed me.”

“Congratulations,” Iris said. “Sounds like you need a break.”

“You've no idea,” Joan groaned. “Okay, so let's say you get this to me by Friday. I can't promise I'll get to it before I leave town, but I'll try.”

Iris bit her lip. Friday? She had Joan's attention now. And she didn't have much time left in New Hampshire with Trish. “Friday it is,” she promised.