A Peculiar Grace (51 page)

Stalled in traffic, hikers in shorts and fancy boots flocking across the street, Hewitt recalled Timothy’s initial riddle about the strongest part of a chain. Then the road opened up and the traffic thinned, somewhere he’d lost the log truck, and he passed a sign welcoming him to Maine.

He’d forgotten the riddle until the spring after everything had fallen apart with Emily and he was finishing building his own forge and had gone to see Timothy’s uncle Albert in Bethel, to visit and gently learn if the offer of the tools was still in place. They’d sat most of an afternoon and drank a bottle of hard cider when Albert had leaned forward in his padded chair and asked Hewitt the very same question his nephew had and Hewitt paused—Timothy had never answered. Albert smiled and said, “Ya damned young fool, ya’d better learn it once and not forget. The strongest part of a chain is the weakest link. Now, hand me that cane and let’s hobble out and see if the rust’s ate all that stuff up or if there’s any good to it yet.”

The landscape was changing again, leveling out, rolling, scrub pines and some nut trees, oaks and hickories back from the roadside, houses coming closer together, the shoulders now not only sandy white but glimmering with sunlight reflected from bits of crystal; quartz sand.

He’d talked to Emily several days ago. Calling intentionally late in the evening and wanting to be the one to do it—to give her time after the episode with Elsa but not so much she’d feel awkward calling him. She’d clearly been happy to hear from him, only asking him to wait a moment and then coming back on and saying, “You can hang up now, Nora. Nora? Hang up. I mean it.” There came a mewl of a sigh and the faint click.

“So everybody’s returned safe and sound?”

“I’m not sure how sound but yes. To my surprise John tried to tiptoe in about two hours after I talked with you. He and I sat up talking much of the night. Far from any resolution but a step along the way. Nora still hasn’t talked to me about it, brushing me off with her stone face but I know she and Mom talked or maybe Nora just listened but they had a serious discussion. She’ll talk to me when she’s ready. I think she’s figured out it wasn’t my fault. I’m not so sure about John yet.”

“Elsa?”

“Oh, she’s still alive, as far as I know. Maybe it’ll change and I do hope it’ll be years and years but right now I don’t want to hear a word about her.”

“What about you, Em?”

“Well, I did sneak off to Rochester a few times to talk with a therapist. He asked the usual questions about our personal life and how we balanced the kids and work and all that stuff that I’d already done myself and I was as honest as I could be. I’m not a perfect person Hewitt but I was a pretty good partner. Anyway, the third time I was talking with him, he told me everybody’s got a stone jar deep inside them only they know the contents of. Some people just leave it be. Others have to peek now and then. Some get snared by it. I sat back and thought about it a bit and stood up and thanked him and told him I didn’t need another appointment and came on home. Because I’d realized my stone jar’s not very important to me but obviously Martin’s was to him; if you poke around down in there too much you find ways to justify it and the ways only have to make sense to you, not to anyone else.”

“I like that idea.”

“Well, yeah. I’m moving forward, which is stupid because of course I am—it’s either that or be crushed by it all and—”

“That’s not the way you’ve ever been.”

“Thanks. I try.”

“You sound good, Emily.”

“Actually there’s some big news.”

“What’s that?”

“I’ve got a buyer for the clinic. Well, two buyers. A husband and wife team about five years out of medical school who’ve been working in Buffalo and saw the place was on the market. I like them and they’re crazy about the idea. I guess a few years in Buffalo took most of the idealism out of them, trying to balance between patients who resent being patients and dealing with all the paperwork for the state and the government. Little old Bluffport looks pretty good to them. They’ve rented a house and we’re supposed to sign papers this week, although it’ll be a couple of months before we can close.”

“What about you?”

“Professionally? They were sweet about it. I think they really hoped I’d keep my office there for some continuity and to make their transition easier but that’s what the receptionists and the two nurses are for. I’ll keep my practice but find a new office. A clean slate. I think it’d be best for me and my patients as well. It’s tough to unburden yourself when you’re sitting there wondering if your therapist is listening to you or thinking about her husband who used to be down the hall. But what about you, Hewitt? What’re you up to?”

“Not much. Well, I’m finishing up a pair of hitching posts. Real ones. I mean for real horses, not something to stick in a yard. And I had fun with the design. It was a bit of a challenge. Well, something more than that—there was a bunch of personal horseshit symbolism wrapped up in the whole thing. It felt good. They go in tomorrow and that’s the real test but at the moment I’m tickled with them.”

“Horseshit symbolism for hitching posts. That’s kind of funny. Do I want to ask what that was?”

He was thoughtful. “I don’t think I could tell you. It’s a little like those stone jars you were talking about. Not weird shit just a lot of things entangled and interwoven that even if I could lay em all out would sound silly but kept inside make all the sense in the world.”

She was quiet a bit. Then said, “You sound good.”

“Yup. Mostly.”

She hesitated also and then said, “Despite being a damn fool, you’ve been a good friend, Hewitt. A good friend through all of this.”

He said, “Well, thanks. I hoped to. I might’ve learned a couple things myself.”

They were suddenly in a tight squeeze.

“It’s funny, isn’t it Hewitt? You get older and time wails on by but it’s also lost the urgency it had when you were young. The path’s not endless anymore and maybe that’s it—if you’re going to step forward you want to make sure where you’re stepping. Cause there isn’t a second chance.”

Then they were both quiet.

She said, “I meant—”

“I know what you meant, Em. I feel the same way.”

“Good,” she said and then her voice pitched down a little. “Of course you do.” There came another pause. She said, “Hey, Hewitt?”

“What’s that, Emily?” He was feeling gentle, tender, uplifted precisely.

“You heard from that girl? The one who was staying with you?”

“Jessica,” he said. “No.” And added, “Not yet.”

M
IDAFTERNOON HE
was sweating lightly, merging with traffic and following signs, both agitated and amused that the small urbanity of Portland would so throw him off but in fact it’d been years since he’d driven in any traffic to speak of, even his lightning trip to Bluffport and back had all been on roads he knew well, mostly interstates and thus hard to screw up. And it was not warm but hot, the heavy ocean air smelling of possibilities and he realized he hadn’t seen the ocean in years either and doubted he would this time beyond a possible glimpse. Then he was off and moving uphill into the Old Port section of town, the streets here just streets and manageable, at least until he very nearly pulled into what he thought was a street but was cobbled and blocked
off with metal posts—ordinary slightly ornamental cast objects he noted as he reversed in a three point turn, not letting the horns get to him, guessing, hoping if a cop was around they’d see his plates and realize the misunderstanding. Somehow this process calmed him and oriented him as well and he began to drive around the old downtown, swanked-up but nicely as far as those things went. He circled around and around, extending his range and going up and down hill streets before returning to the central plateau of downtown. Guessing there was a fair chance he’d passed up or down the fatal Volkswagen hill. He was looking for her hotel and when he finally saw it realized he’d passed it once already but drove by again. He’d expected a cheap rooming house sort of deal and only at the last second registered the name on the maroon canopy awning out above the sidewalk, the brass and plate revolving doors, the two cabs and a town car pulled along the curb and the liveried doorman. And drove by the hotel parking garage next to it, and went on to circle the block again and look for a place to park—he wasn’t about to pay five bucks an hour just to park Walter’s jeep.

Now that he knew where it was he parked a few blocks away. So he would have time to stretch and get used to the flow of people on the sidewalks. And when he walked into the lobby of the Eastman Park Hotel he’d simply be arriving at a destination. His jeans and T-shirt were clean enough and he left his sunglasses on—wanting the crucial sense of distance they provided. He walked along, taking in the shop windows but moving with a slowed deliberation, smacked a bit by the realization that the whole drive over he’d simply been coming to rescue Jessica because she’d asked but was now a little nervous about seeing her. And wondering what she’d been up to and how long she’d been staying at a fancy hotel and then stopped dead center in the sidewalk. He thought It’s not my business where she stays or what she does. And then just wanted to see her.

He walked on, easier now. He came to the intersection where the side street led down to the Eastman Park Hotel. He crossed over
and stopped again, now a little jittery. The hotel was downhill to the north and between it and the intersection where he stood was a small park. What he guessed was a park. The size of a city lot and all concrete except for a few young trees with tapered drooping leaves he couldn’t identify, the slender trunks rising from a circle of chipped mulch. He didn’t give the trees much hope. There was a bus stop of fogged Plexiglas out on the sidewalk and the rest of the space was on several levels, almost as if making a small amphitheater. People sat or stretched in the sun, reading newspapers or eating, small groups chatting. The far end of the park was the old brick side of the hotel, rising six or seven stories, fading paint with the name as a block-letter banner across the upper side between ranks of windows. He looked back at the park, mostly kids, some women in a cluster, a few men in ties with their sleeves rolled up. A woman sitting with her knees together, head down, reading.

He looked again. Red tennis shoes, black jeans, white T-shirt, black choppy hair. As he watched she lifted her head and looked about. Not toward him and not as if she were expecting or inviting anyone but a measured reconnaissance for close or approaching danger. Then turned back to her book. And that instant stunned him. The recognition was immediate and absolute: it was Jessica but not Jessica—a stranger no stranger at all but someone who knew him in ways no one else ever could or would, someone who’d allowed him in, who’d cracked the door and sat back watching and waiting and now was entering fully into him as his ribcage split and spread and broke apart and his body flushed hot then cold and hot again and he wondered if he was having a heart attack. He rocked gently in his boots. Here she was. She reached up to push that lock of hair from her eyes and turned a page. Her head bent down, he saw the oval of skin at the top of her back, her neck rising out of it, the tendons taut. And he’d thought her fragile. And then knew she was fragile but only truly to him, a delicate precious vessel of life that perhaps he might lift and encircle and in doing so crack open his own fragile vessel. All this and he thought
How could I have missed that, and at once wondered if he had. And now was fully Hewitt standing at the edge of a concrete gully with no choice but to walk the new old Hewitt over and see what happened.

He came up enough from the side so she didn’t see him until his shadow fell over her and as she looked up he said, “Whatcha reading?”

She blinked without smiling and closed the book so he could see the cover and it was the same book she’d left for him and for a moment he wondered if this was witchcraft or something greater and she grinned then and said, “Hey Hewitt,” and stood. She was a level up from him so they were face to face.

His mouth stretched around an irrepressible rubbery smile as he said, “Hey, yourself, you.”

She held up the book and said, “I got to missing it so I got myself a new copy. Damn, it’s good to see you.”

“It’s a great book,” he said and then reached for her and she came into his hug. Then she felt his hands moving deeply into the muscles of her back and his lips working her name into the skin of her neck and she pulled her head back and looked at him and he met those eyes with everything he had and said her name as benediction, plaint and prayer and she came back fully into him and now her hands worked his back and shoulders and her lips and teeth making their own chassé over his neck and face, and as if ten thousand years had led them their mouths came together and his hands dropped to the small of her back and hers came up tugging hard his hair, their tongues and mouths some fruit never tasted waiting hanging for them.

Somebody whistled and he heard but didn’t care but slowly as if taking flesh away with her she extracted just enough to look at him again.

“Be damn,” she said, face flushed. Near invisible freckles over her nose. Somehow, he’d missed those.

“Jessica.” His voice not quite right.

“Right here.” Her shaky smile.

“The question, the question …”

She cocked her head, a teased nervous smile.

“The question is do you want to spend the night in Portland?”

Her smile was gone but she was glowing and he realized her hands hadn’t stopped working on him. “No, baby,” she said.

“What do you want? Can you tell me what you want?”

“I want to go home.”

I
T WAS LATE
afternoon before they got out of town. After retrieving her duffel from behind the desk of the hotel they got directions and drove far up along the waterfront and found the yard where the Bug had been towed. Loaning the jeep, Walter suggested Hewitt check the VW carefully but with the engine pushed through into the backseat, the rear axle and transmission ripped free, there was no mistaking it was beyond resurrection. Jessica got her paperwork from the glovebox and then together they worked to liberate what was left of her stuff, clothing mostly, some books, a little box retrieved after great effort from the battery compartment beneath the rear floorboards—dope too good to be left behind. They found a clam shack and ate lobster rolls and she told him other than the oversized bath, the room service lobster had been the best thing about the hotel, also admitting if she hadn’t consumed platters of crayfish in her childhood she not only would’ve been stymied by the lobster but wouldn’t have known how to suck and squeeze to find the sweet morsels in the legs and along the belly. As they went along with all this one or the other would reach and they’d sweetly ferociously entangle again.