The Guest Book (4 page)

“Are they letting you out?” she asked Max, finger combing her hair as she spoke, her fingers catching in the snarls created by Chase’s hands and her too-brief bit of sleep.

“Yeah. Just need a ride. And money. You know the pin number.” One of the more depressing parts of their arrangement was that Macy had her own copy of Max’s bank card and was adept at making midnight withdrawals to retrieve the money he needed to get out. She always told Emma it was for the donuts they were buying. Max was one of the only people
she’d ever heard of who actually earmarked money for what he called “legal matters.” Macy had told him he should just call it what it was: bail money.

She sighed. “Okay. I’m on my way.”

“Is what’s-his-face there or are you going to bring Little Bit?”

“He’s here, so I don’t have to wake her. She’s got school in the morning, you know.”

“Didn’t you learn anything the first time?” he chided.

She started to inform him that Chase was sleeping on the couch, but decided to go the indignant route instead. “That’s a funny question to ask me, Max. You’re not exactly in a position to judge.”

“Nope. Guess I’m not.”

When the dial tone buzzed in her ear, she told herself that it was because the call had timed out, not that he had hung up on the one person he was counting on to rescue him.

S
he made her way through the darkened streets, her headlights shining on the empty road ahead of her, thinking of the other times she’d gone to get Max in the dead of night. There were the numerous times he’d called because he was too drunk to drive. The time he’d been picked up in a sting at a drug house where —thankfully —he’d been one of the few people on the premises who was not involved with illegal drugs (give the man a medal), but he’d still needed a ride back to the drug house to retrieve his car. Then there was the especially scary time one of his girlfriends —stellar human being that she was —had flipped out and pulled a knife on him. That time he’d called Macy from behind a locked door. She could hear the woman screaming outside the door, threatening to kill him. “Why aren’t you calling the police, Max?” she’d asked,
wondering what in the world he expected her to do to subdue the woman.

“Well, I don’t exactly want the police coming here,” he’d replied. Macy hadn’t asked any more questions, just driven as fast as she could to the address he’d spit out. By the time she got there, he’d somehow gotten away from the crazy girlfriend and was sitting on the curb waiting for her like everything was fine. Later, in her kitchen, he’d made coffee for them and laughed as if nothing had happened. He’d told Emma stories about their shared childhood, never once mentioning their dad in any of the stories, as if he’d never existed.

As she drove to pick up Max, Macy thought about the summer she’d drawn the first picture in the guest book at the beach house, choosing to think about something happy rather than the sad situation her brother was in. Macy’s dad had bought her special pastel pencils — the first of many sets — so she could draw a picture in the guest book of the butterfly shells she’d found. She had been pouting about losing the shell contest to Max, so he’d suggested she draw something in the guest book to cheer her up.

“A real artist needs real supplies,” he’d told her as they drove to the store.

And that had been the beginning.

She thought about the artist with whom she had exchanged pictures all those years ago. The images of their annual offerings spun through her head: the seascapes and landscapes and — later — more personal pictures of the things that mattered to them. Though other eyes surely saw the pictures in
the guest book, none of those eyes ever mattered. It was always about the artist and Macy, the pictures in the guest book existing just for the two of them.

Looking back, she had her dad to thank for it, and — in a strange way —Max. Had her feelings not been hurt over that shell contest, she wouldn’t have been pouting, and her dad never would’ve suggested she draw pictures of her shells in the book. She rolled her eyes, knowing Max would think that was rich — that their sibling rivalry had inadvertently led her to an exchange that would last far beyond the fifth summer of her life, had stayed with her to this day, still filling her thoughts and her heart. Especially now that their mother was taking them back to Sunset Beach, back to the house where maybe— just maybe — the guest book waited.

She guided the car into the surprisingly full parking lot of the police station and parked next to a pickup truck with rolled-down windows. She yawned loudly and opened her car door. One last thought crossed her mind as she got out of her car, a thought that made her heart quicken: she might finally see the last picture he ever drew for her. She hoped he had left it, in spite of everything.

T
he clock that hung over the door of Ward’s Grocery seemed to have stopped, the hand barely moving past where it had been the last time Macy checked. She shook her head and looked at the watch on her wrist. It bore the same time as the clock on the wall. She scratched her forehead, leaving a smudge of red paint. She could feel it there and reached for a rag to wipe it off. Then she re-focused on the window she was painting.

“Ready to get out of here?”

She glanced back to find Avis, arms crossed, checking out the scene she was painting.

“Every time I think your scenes can’t get any better, I’m proved wrong,” Avis said. “Your pictures tell stories, Macy. They capture people’s imaginations, draw them in. Which is
why all that mess about letting you go if you don’t come back at his bidding is just Hank blowing steam. You know that, right?”

“Don’t be so sure, Avis. Hank makes it clear every chance he gets that he didn’t hire me to paint windows. That he lets me do them as a creative outlet. For me.”

According to Hank, he could take or leave her artwork. Macy had come to believe most people felt that way about it.

“Hank’s full of it,” Avis snorted. “Don’t listen to that fool.”

Macy sometimes wondered about this life of hers, how at twenty-six years old she had ended up with a woman twenty years older than her as a best friend. And yet, she would never trade Avis for a friend her own age. Avis’s perspective and wisecracks had gotten Macy through many challenges.

Avis had been the one to train Macy her first day on the job, when Macy was still in a state of shock over being left by Chase. Even before she had spoken, Avis’s wide, kind smile had told Macy that this was a person who saw the best in people. It was Avis who discovered Macy’s artistic bent and begged her to start painting signs and, eventually, the large front window of the store. Sometimes when Macy was painting or when a customer stopped to remark on her work, she wanted to hug Avis for making her paint again. She’d all but stopped painting after that last vacation, that last picture she’d left in the guest book.

“One of these days,” Avis said, “you’re going to waltz in here and tell me you’re quitting because you’ve finally decided to go to art school.” She cracked her illegal bubble gum. “And no one’s going to be happier for you than me.”

“Don’t I wish.” Macy rolled her eyes like she always did,
dismissing the idea of pursuing a dream that seemed to get further away with each passing year. There was Emma to think about and keeping a roof over their heads to worry about and other realities of being a single parent that concerned Macy. More and more, she knew her pipe dream of being a “real” artist was about as likely as Chase sticking around long term. She had resigned herself to the fact that painting the windows of the grocery store and making fancy signs to delight customers was going to be as close as she came to that dream. Instead of her own show in a gallery, she would have the unveiling of the seasonal windows she painted. Instead of reviews from art critics, she would have kind comments from the regulars.

She put the finishing touches on the beach umbrella she was painting. In the painting, a little girl was digging in the sand by the ocean while two parents rested under the umbrella. She found herself painting what she wished were true. In Macy’s art, her life was perfect. She could draw what she wanted, and there it would stay until the picture got changed because Hank grew tired of it.

Macy glanced at the clock again. She had been at work for hours, but the time hadn’t flown like she’d hoped.

Avis sidled up to her. “You leaving in the morning?”

“Yep. Mom and Max and Emma are packing the car today, getting all the last-minute stuff done. By the time I get home, they’re supposed to have the car ready to pull out of the drive first thing in the morning.”

Avis smiled at her. “I hope you guys have a blast.” The older woman rested her hand on Macy’s back and looked over
her own shoulder for Hank. “Lord knows you’ve got it coming to you.” Avis paused before speaking again. “
He’s
not going to be there, right?”

“Are you kidding?” Macy said. “My mom and Max wouldn’t stand for it.”

“Good. I just didn’t want you caving. I know how persuasive he can be,” Avis said, rising up to her full stature of five feet two inches and putting up her fists like a prize fighter. “Remember —you’ll answer to me if you do.” She winked at Macy. “Just don’t waste this time obsessing about
him
.”

Avis wouldn’t say Chase’s name, but she could say the pronouns referring to him with enough venom that they sounded like curse words. She remembered all too well those early days after he’d left, the days Macy moved through a fog trying to balance a baby and a new job. Sometimes Macy thought Avis considered it her job to remember for her, standing sentry at the door to Macy’s heart. And Avis had been none too happy when Chase showed back up. None too pleased when she realized he’d basically moved back in, despite Macy’s continued justification that he was still relegated to the couch.

“Will you promise me something?” Avis asked.

Macy rolled her eyes at her friend. “Wow, if that’s not a loaded question.”

“This one’s an easy one.”

Macy shook her head and grinned.
Avis
and
easy
were never synonymous, but she went along with it. “Shoot.”

“Will you try to be open to whatever comes along while
you’re there? Take a risk, let someone in? You know —easy stuff like that.”

Macy laughed. “I knew it wouldn’t be simple coming from you.”

“No, I’m serious. I have a feeling — and you know me and my feelings. They’re usually right on. These two weeks are going to be about change for you. Good change. Necessary change. But you’re going to have to open yourself up to it. And I know that’s not your style.”

Macy shook her head. “I open myself up every day. To you and my mom and Max and Emma. And now Chase. I mean, talk about taking a risk.”

“You’re not risking with Chase. You’re biding your time.”

Macy started to argue but Avis held up her hand. “Stop. Just stop. You can argue ‘til you’re blue in the face, but I know better. You’re waiting for the right one to come along, and you’re keeping Chase on reserve just in case he doesn’t. You can’t fool me.” She eyed her. “True love is rarely found on the path of least resistance.”

Avis leaned against a table displaying all-natural cleansing products, and Macy knew her hip was bothering her. A lifetime of standing at a cash register had taken its toll.

“But to find the right one, you’ve got to open yourself up to whoever he is,” Avis added.

“I’m not sure I can do that,” Macy admitted, her voice softening. She turned back to her painting so she didn’t have to look Avis in the eye. She thought about the parts of her past
that waited for her at the house called Time in a Bottle. She thought about how part of who she used to be still waited there for her. The innocent part of her that used to throw her heart’s door open to people, that didn’t know people could take parts of you and walk away forever.

What Avis was asking was a tall order indeed. But if there was anywhere to attempt it, Macy had a feeling that Sunset Beach was just the place. She looked up at the clock again, willing the hands to go faster around the circle, like the wheels that would carry her to Sunset Beach tomorrow. She pushed down the anxious feelings and let only happy ones bubble up, believing that Avis was right and that something wonderful waited for her in the days ahead.

M
acy paused before walking out the door. Bright light shone through the windows, yet inside, the house felt gloomy, as if it were raining. The feeling made her want to run outside and feel the sun on her skin. And yet Chase’s gaze held her in place.

“What?” she asked him.

He crossed his arms over his chest, his look changing from angry to merely sad, the fight sucked right out of him. “I wish you weren’t going.”

She lifted one corner of her mouth. “I think the timing’s good. I think we can both use this time to figure out what’s happening, to figure out if this is even what we want.”

“I don’t think it’s what
you
want.” He turned to the faucet and flipped the water on and off, on and off, passing his other
hand under the stream and staring at it in idle curiosity, water down the drain.

Macy knew he was waiting for her to respond. In the back of the house, she could hear Emma humming to herself as she gathered the last of her things. Listening to Emma, Macy thought about how every decision she’d made up to that moment had been about Emma, for Emma. A new thought occurred to Macy: What if she took Emma out of the equation? She looked back at Chase and wondered if what she felt for him was affection … or obligation. She thought of what Avis had said about true love and the path of least resistance, the reference to her relationship with Chase.

She busied herself with checking the grocery bags she had lining the counter. “Once upon a time, I thought you were never coming back. And I got used to that idea. And then you showed up after all that time and—”

“You don’t want me back,” he finished for her. The water went on and off again.

She exhaled in a long, steady breath. “What if we say I just don’t know what I want?”

He walked over to her and gripped her upper arms, his wet hands leaving damp handprints. “Don’t fool yourself, Macy. You’re not fooling me.”

She frowned. “Why do you have to be so maudlin right now? When I’m leaving? Why can’t you just wish me well and let me go?” She had hoped to make a clean getaway, to avoid all of this.

He dropped his hands, letting her go just as she’d asked.
He pointed to the door, his hand barely raised. “So go.” His shoulders slumped like a man defeated.

“Emma!” he called before Macy could stop him.

“Yes, Daddy?” Emma sang, skipping into the room, her bag over her shoulder.

“Your mommy’s ready to go.” His words seemed to carry a deeper meaning. He left the kitchen and sat on the loveseat in the den, the one that barely held two people. They had bought it together at Goodwill when she’d been pregnant with Emma, laughing at the ugly print, delighted they could afford it. She should’ve gotten rid of it long ago.

Emma crawled into his lap and wrapped her pint-sized arms around his neck. Emma’s love came without conditions or qualifications.

“I wish you could go!” she wailed, adding just the right amount of quintessential Emma drama. The child was precocious and too smart for her own good.

Chase met Macy’s eyes over their daughter’s shoulder. “Have a good time,” he managed. He didn’t rise from his place on the loveseat. Macy wondered if they’d find him there when they returned, still staring into space with that lost-little-boy look on his face.

With a shrug, Macy gathered their bags and headed for the door, knowing better than to ask Chase for help. “Come on, Emma. Let’s go.”

Macy had one bag over each shoulder and one in each hand when she turned back one last time. Emma ran out ahead of them, her attention and intensity already focused on the trip.

“Maybe I’ll figure things out at Sunset,” Macy offered.

He pressed his lips into a thin line, his gaze hovering at the top of her head, avoiding her eyes. Without the history between them, she might’ve found him attractive. But she didn’t anymore, not really. Not like she should if they were going to try to build a life together.

“Hope so,” he said.

She shifted her weight under the grocery bags, the pink suitcase of Emma’s that said “Going To Grandma’s,” and the large, brightly patterned duffel she’d gotten for high school graduation, back when she thought she’d need such a thing because she was going to see the world. The truth was she’d only used the duffel a handful of times. Single moms didn’t travel much.

“I used to be a fun person,” she said. “When I was at Sunset Beach all those years ago, I used to be the kind of girl who believed in dreams.”

Chase shook his head. “Well, you just couldn’t bring yourself to believe in this one.”

She sucked in her breath. “You’re conveniently forgetting you’re the one who left.”

“I’m not forgetting that at all. I just hoped we could move forward somehow. Forget the past.”

She thought of sitting on her father’s shoulders, dreaming of the day she’d learn to ride the waves like the surfers she saw farther out in the water. She’d wanted to learn to conquer the waves instead of get sucked under by them.

She looked toward the open door, the sunlight shining through. She could almost believe the beach was just outside
the door instead of a three-hour drive away. As she looked out at Emma waiting by the car, she felt her heart fill with the kind of excitement usually relegated to giddy little girls.

“I wish you could’ve known her,” she said. “I think that would’ve made all the difference.”

“Known who?” he asked. He crossed his arms and shifted his weight, growing bored with a conversation that had nothing in it for him.

“The little girl I used to be.”

“Then I hope you find her when you get there,” he said.

She turned away and took a step toward the door. Then she looked back and said, “Me too.”

She left him sitting on the ugly loveseat and headed out the door.

Max turned up the radio, jarring her from sleep as she opened her eyes and looked around. She scanned the highway for a road sign that would tell her where they were.

“Nice nap?” he asked from the passenger seat. She started to tell him what she’d been dreaming about, but he’d already turned his attention back to Emma, who was trying to teach him the words to some teeny-bopper’s latest hit. The child was a walking Top Forty countdown.

Macy scooted closer to the window and leaned her head against the glass with a dramatic sigh for effect. Not that anyone heard her over Emma’s relentless chatter and the radio playing.

She watched the desolate parts of the North Carolina countryside slip by, stalks burned by the heat of summer catching her eye: corn, cotton, soy, tobacco. The green overcome by brown. She tried to visualize the ocean that waited at the end of the journey, but all she could see was the cracked ground, the washed-out landscape. It was hard to believe something beautiful waited on the other side of this.

“Mace? Where’d you go?” she heard Max ask.

As she looked up and caught his profile, she almost believed he was her dad sitting there. Could he really be approaching the age her dad had been when she’d sat atop his shoulders and pretended she owned the ocean, when she’d pretended her daddy could give it to her if it was what she wanted?

“Just thinking how depressing this part of the state is,” she replied. “Nothing but farmland, broken-down tractors, and old men in overalls. I need a mall and a Starbucks no more than fifteen minutes away.”

“I think you need a break from the city life,” he said. “You used to be such a tomboy, couldn’t wait to be outdoors.”

When he mentioned the outdoors, she thought of Emma’s demand to sleep under the stars with Chase. And where that had gotten her. The outdoors were not her friend, but there was no sense in going into that.

Max smiled at her over his shoulder before turning his gaze back to the two-lane highway ahead of them. “I think being near the ocean is going to be good for all of us,” he said. Macy was glad he had changed his tune.

“That’s what I’m talking about!” Emma exclaimed, pumping
her fist in the air with a broad grin on her face. She had Chase’s eyes and dimples.

Macy smiled at her daughter and pulled her into a hug, kissing the top of her head as quickly as a butterfly lighting and flying away again. Max reached his fist behind him, and Emma bumped her knuckles against his, her smile unfading.

If nothing else,
Macy thought,
this trip is good for Emma. If nothing else, I can give her some time at the ocean. And maybe I can stop wondering what to do about Chase for five whole minutes.
She would be a good mother to her daughter, the way Brenda had been a good mother to Macy.

She looked over at Brenda at the wheel. Brenda’s sunglasses were slipping low on her nose as she concentrated on the road. Macy resisted the urge to lean forward and push the glasses back to the bridge of her nose. Sensing Macy’s eyes upon her, Brenda glanced over her shoulder and gave her a smile. She thought of the younger version of her mom, the one who used to ride in the passenger seat as her dad drove, in charge of selecting the music the family listened to.

As soon as Max got old enough, he shut them all out with headphones that piped in his own music selections, loud and angry. But Macy liked her mom’s music —beach music, soft rock, songs about love lost and found. Sometimes Brenda sang along, prompting Macy and Darren to join her in singing the familiar, if overplayed, lyrics. Sometimes, instead of singing along, Macy just listened to Brenda’s voice, which was sweet and clear and blended well with Darren’s deep and resonating baritone. Even at a young age, Macy imagined finding the
person her voice would one day mingle with. Her parents had been an example of what love could be. An example Macy had fallen short of.

Macy wondered if her mom remembered the guest book. They certainly had never mentioned it after they left Sunset Beach. They hadn’t mentioned their past vacations at all, pretending they’d never happened. Macy was still a bit surprised that they were headed back to Sunset Beach at all, that Sunset had been important to other members of her family as well.

She took out a pad of paper from the little bag of interesting things she had packed to keep Emma busy in the car during the three-hour drive. Then she pulled out the box of brand-new, expensive colored pencils she had purchased with a 50 percent-off coupon in a splurge the week before the trip. Removing a blue pencil from the box, she began filling the top of the paper with what would be a sky.

“What are you doing, Mommy?” Emma asked, leaning over, her brown eyes narrowing as she peered at the paper.

Macy gave her a half smile. “Guess.”

It was a game she had played with her daughter since she was barely old enough to talk. She would start drawing, and Emma would try to guess what it was before it became obvious. Sometimes the little girl surprised her with her ability to intuit what Macy was drawing.

Macy pulled out a black pencil and began drawing a curved line against the blue background.

“It’s a bird, flying in the sky!” Emma said excitedly, bouncing up and down with energy only a child could have during
a long car ride. She leaned closer as she watched Macy’s every move intently.

“What kind of bird?” Macy asked, trying to enjoy the moment instead of focusing on Emma’s suffocating closeness in the small backseat. They whizzed by a green sign that indicated Sunset Beach was a mere thirty miles away. Her heart quickened with that same burst of giddiness she’d felt talking about the trip with her mom. With any luck, they’d arrive at the same time she finished the picture. She pulled a gray pencil from the package and began to shade the wings of the bird that appeared to be taking flight across the blue. The ocean below would have to be a different blue, with just the right amount of green blended in to match the color of the Atlantic.

“It’s a beach bird!” Emma said, as she recognized the markings of the bird. “What do you call them, Mommy?”

“Seagulls,” she answered, thinking of the last time she was at the beach, the last picture she had drawn and left behind. A smile crossed her face as her hand froze with the memory.

She looked out the window again and let herself remember— and hope, as ridiculous as it seemed to do so. She thought of a verse her dad taught her years ago. He was always getting her to memorize verses, rewarding her with scoops of ice cream from Baskin-Robbins every time she got one right. Even now she could taste mint chocolate chip as the last few words of a verse she hadn’t thought of in years crossed her mind: “Hope does not disappoint.” Maybe this trip that verse would prove true. She quit drawing and closed her eyes for a moment, daydreaming as the road carried her closer to Sunset.