True Colors (22 page)

Eventually, they gave up on snagging a table
and worked their way over to the bar. They waited while a couple of
guys wearing Hurley Plumbing Supplies shirts ordered Mojito’s, then
took their turn at the bar. “Champagne? Gus asked.

“No. Champagne
didn’t work out so well,” the red-haired woman said with a
smile.
Emma
, Gus
recalled, the woman’s name suddenly popping into her brain. She
recalled the woman introducing herself when she’d approached Nick
Fiore a few days back, when he’d been standing at the bar.
Emma.
“I’m sticking with
beer tonight.”

“You still get your bubbles that way,” Gus
joked, then eyed the man.

“Two Sam Adams lagers,” he ordered. “I guess
we’ll go with bottles.”

Gus nodded, pulled two beers from the
refrigerator under the counter, snapped off the tops and reached
for a couple of chilled glasses. When she turned back to the
couple, Emma said, “We’re in love.”

“That’s definitely worth some bubbles,” Gus
said.

“It’s because of the song,” Emma told her.
“From the jukebox.”

“I’m not sure I believe that,” the man
said.

Well, Gus thought, this isn’t their first
argument. They’d been at odds yesterday. And they’d obviously
survived yesterday’s argument, if they were announcing their love
today.

“He’s a scientist,” Emma explained. “He’d like
to pretend he doesn’t believe in magic. But deep in his heart, he
does.”

“Deep in his heart is all that matters,” Gus
murmured.

“The song was ‘True Colors,’ by Cyndi
Lauper.”

Gus nodded. So many people came and went, but
when a song from the jukebox exerted its magic, she had a way of
remembering.

“Can we play it again?” Emma asked, waving
toward the jukebox at the far end of the room.

Gus shook her head. “You can put in a quarter,
but the jukebox will play whatever it wants to play. You can’t
control it.”

“That’s crazy,” the man said.

“No, it’s not. It’s magic.” Emma rose on tiptoe
and kissed his cheek.

The man asked Gus to start a tab for them,
which meant they planned to stay a while. Maybe they’d get lucky,
and “True Colors” would pour out of the jukebox for them. Even if
it didn’t, they were already lucky. They’d found each
other.

So some other song would play. And some other
couple would be touched by it, enchanted by it. Maybe
tonight.

###

 
Judith Arnold is the
award-winning, bestselling author of more than eighty-five
published novels. A New York native, she currently lives in New
England, where she indulges in her passions for jogging, dark
chocolate, good music, good wine and good books. She is married and
the mother of two sons.

For more information about
Judith, or to contact her, please visit her
website
. Feel free to check
out her
other
books
and sign up for her
newsletter
.

If you
enjoyed
True Colors,
I hope you will consider posting a review of it online. Thank
you!

Here’s a peek at
Wild Thing
, the third book
in the Magic Jukebox series:

Chapter One

Monica had no idea how many straws a camel
could carry on its back. She only knew that if she was a camel,
she’d reached her limit.

And really, it was not a big thing in and of
itself. Just one last straw. Just Jimmy being Jimmy.

But enough. Her back had broken. She was
done, done, done.

She sat at a table at the Faulk Street
Tavern, nursing a glass of wine. Maybe she should have ordered
something stronger, but she wanted to remain clear-headed while she
contemplated that single, final straw and waited for her best
friend to join her. Emma was teaching an art class at the Brogan’s
Point Community Center, but she’d promised to come to the pub as
soon as her final student departed. Monica calculated that Emma’s
trip from the community center to the bar would take about ten
minutes. Emma didn’t own a car, although her gajillionaire
boyfriend could buy her a fleet of Lamborghinis if she asked him
to. Of course, one reason he was so crazy about her was that she
would never ask. His wealth meant nothing to her.

She
had
acquired a bicycle, however—used
but in excellent shape—which enabled her to scoot around town a
little more rapidly than traveling by foot. Monica glanced at her
watch and hoped Emma would arrive soon. If she finished her glass
of wine before Emma showed up, she might order another, and that
would be the end of her clear-headedness.

Jimmy. The asshole.

Last night was the tenth anniversary of their
first date: the junior prom in high school. Monica hadn’t even been
aware that Jimmy Creighton knew who she was back then. They’d
traveled in different circles. She’d been an A student, diligent
and disciplined, working at her parents’ inn when she wasn’t doing
homework or pursuing other moderately egg-headed activities. Jimmy
had been a cut-up, a funny, handsome guy who took nothing too
seriously. Yet for some reason—maybe on a dare—he’d invited her to
be his date for the prom. And for some reason—maybe because he was
the cutest guy who had ever asked her out—she’d said yes.

They’d had their ups and downs over the past
ten years, but Monica had thought they were mostly on an up right
now. They both had jobs, he selling cars and she moving up into
management at the inn. The sex was good. They hadn’t had a fight in
more than a month.

“For our anniversary,” she’d told him, “I
want to make a special dinner for you. Okay?”

“Sure, of course,” he’d said. “I love when
you cook for me. If it wasn’t for you, I’d be living on buffalo
wings and beer.”

She’d scheduled a day off
for herself yesterday, although she’d shown up at the inn before
dawn that morning so she could accompany one of the chefs from the
inn to the docks to pick up lobsters fresh off a boat. From there,
she’d journeyed to the green-grocer for organic vegetables, and
from there to the butcher, and from there to the wine store for a
thirty-eight dollar bottle of Bordeaux. Then she’d let herself into
Jimmy’s apartment, donned an apron, and gotten to work. She’d made
lobster bisque. She’d made Veal Oscar, garnishing the veal with
lobster meat and asparagus spears and topping it with a
béarnaise
sauce. She’d
warmed a loaf of bread. She’d prepared a tossed salad and scalloped
potatoes. She’d spread a white linen cloth over the café table that
stood in one corner of his living room, and lit a tapered white
candle. And waited for him to show up.

The Ford dealership where he worked closed at
six. Even allowing for traffic, he should have reached his
apartment before seven. At eight-thirty, she phoned his cell. “Oh,
hey,” he’d said cheerfully. “I’m over at Dave’s place. A group of
us decided to pop some beers and catch the Sox game on TV. I’ll be
home by midnight, okay?”

Not okay. Final straw. Monica had blown out
the candle, tucked the wine bottle under her arm, and walked out of
his apartment, leaving behind her key to the place.

That was yesterday. Today she’d gotten
through the day, keeping her grumpiness in check until she realized
she wasn’t terribly grumpy, after all. After previous break-ups
with Jimmy, she’d felt angry or depressed, lost or confused. This
time, not really. This time she was ready to shed all those straws
Jimmy had been heaping onto her back for the past ten years. She
was ready to move on. A little mournful, a little anxious, but
ready.

The Faulk Street Tavern was rarely crowded on
a weekday afternoon, and today was no exception. Gus Naukonen, who
had owned the place since before Monica was born, occupied her
usual station behind the bar, wiping surfaces, filling bowls with
munchies, arranging bottles. None of the wait staff had arrived
yet, but anyone who wanted a drink could walk up to the bar and ask
for one, which was what Monica had done. Presumably, so had the
young guys in polo shirts and khakis seated around one of the big
tables with a couple of pitchers of beer and heaping bowls of
popcorn. They were too clean-cut and rich-looking to be a fishing
crew. Monica guessed they were college kids, their spring term over
and their wealthy families settling into the rambling summer homes
that dotted the northern end of town, where the upper-class folks
owned what they euphemistically called “cottages” but which Monica
called mansions.

She wasn’t much older than
those boys, but she felt older. No—she felt
mature.
Jimmy was a baby. She’d
outgrown him.

A few other tables were occupied, and a man
the far side of middle age sat at the bar, slumped over an empty
glass. From where Monica sat, she could see Gus shooting occasional
glances at the man, as if to make sure he didn’t lean too far in
any direction and topple off his stool.

Behind Monica stood the jukebox. She had her
back to it, but she knew it was there, a magnificent antique
rumored to possess magical properties. With its arched wood frame
and its stained-glass inset of two peacocks nestling together, it
was beautiful enough to belong in a museum. Its contents were a
mystery: old songs that had been recorded back when vinyl records
were the only available technology. No one knew what songs were in
the jukebox, though. They weren’t listed on the machine. You
couldn’t choose a particular song. According to legend, the songs
would choose you.

Monica had grown up hearing
the myth of the jukebox’s reputed magic. She knew that if you put a
quarter into the machine, three songs would play, and no one knew
what those songs might be, other than that they’d be oldies, dating
to her parents’ era or even longer ago than that. Sometimes a
particular song would strike someone in the room a particular way,
bewitching that person, or transforming her, or…
something.
Monica hadn’t really
bought into the legend until her friend Emma and Max, the
gajillionaire, had both fallen under the jukebox’s spell and found
true love in each other’s arms.

Monica supposed that when it
came to the jukebox, she was currently an agnostic. She didn’t
quite believe it was magic, but she didn’t quite
not
believe it,
either.

The bar’s door opened, and Monica glanced
over the back of the banquette. At the sight of Emma’s wild red
hair, she smiled. She was not going to cry on Emma’s shoulder. She
was not going to fall apart, bemoan the death of her decade-long
relationship with Jimmy, turn the afternoon into a pity party.
Instead, they were going to hoist their glasses high and drink a
toast to Monica’s liberation.

“Hey,” Emma said, ambling over to Monica’s
table and sliding onto the banquette facing her. “I hope you didn’t
have to wait long.”

Monica burst into tears.

***

Some marinas had a rule stipulating that
sailboats had to approach their slips on their motors. Ty Cronin
preferred the marinas that didn’t have that rule. To him,
maneuvering a boat into a slip on wind power alone was a welcome
challenge. Gauging the coastal breezes, riding in on the jib,
tweaking the rudder an inch one way or the other until you eased
alongside a mooring or into a berth… Sweet. What was the point of
sailing if you had to rely on the motor?

The North Cove Marina at Brogan’s Point
didn’t have a motor-only rule, so Ty brought the Freedom into its
slip on wind power and technique. He’d had a good run up the coast
from Key Biscayne. Some nasty weather off the Carolina coast, but
nothing he couldn’t handle. The Freedom was a gorgeous vessel: tiny
but well-equipped galley, comfortable upholstered sleeping benches,
an inboard shower and state-of-the-art commode in the head, and big
sails that swelled and curved and maximized the wind’s power. He
hadn’t even bothered with the spinnaker. The boat moved fast enough
without it, and this trip wasn’t a race.

It was a job. Wayne MacArthur had offered him
a nice chunk of change to transport the boat from his winter home
in the Florida Keys to his summer home in this seaside town north
of Boston. Ordinarily, Wayne had explained, he would sail the
Freedom up the coast himself, but he had some business issues
detaining him in Florida, and he wanted the boat moored in Brogan’s
Point before Memorial Day. Ty was cool with that. The list of
adventures he’d prefer over spending a week doing a solo ocean run
was pretty short. Getting paid for the privilege was a bonus.

He’d never been to Brogan’s Point before—or,
for that matter, any part of New England. So what the hell. He’d
sail up, spend a few days, and fly back to Florida. He had nothing
going on there that couldn’t wait for a couple of weeks.

He navigated the Freedom into its assigned
slip and glided the boat into position with barely a tap against
the old tires cushioning the side of the dock. He leaped off the
boat and onto the smooth pine planks of the dock, lashed the boat
fore and aft, and stood for a moment, his feet planted on the
dock’s solid surface, his legs adjusting to the lack of roll and
pitch.

The May afternoon was mild, warm but nowhere
near as humid as the heavy air smothering southern Florida at this
time of year. A refreshing breeze lifted off the water, flinging a
lock of Ty’s hair across his nose. He’d washed his hair that
morning when he’d showered, but after a day that had started off
the coast of Rhode Island, carried him through the Cape Cod Canal,
and blown him into his destination on brisk, strong gusts, he could
use some freshening up.