The Space Between Sisters (18 page)

She looked around now, surprised that night had fallen outside the windows of Birch Tree Bait. It was time to be closing up. She got up off the stepladder and moved around the room. She was still intensely preoccupied by her thoughts, so much so that everything she did—closing the shutters, turning off the fans and the few remaining lights—had an almost dream-like quality to it. But when she shut the front door behind her, absentmindedly, and turned the key in the lock, she thought,
It's okay. I'll figure this out. I'll see Sam tomorrow. We can talk some more then.
And then she headed down the steps to Win's car, the last one left in the parking lot.

L
ess than twelve hours later, Poppy was pulling back into that same parking lot. She felt completely different, though, than she had the night before. If she'd gone to sleep weighed down by her new self-knowledge, she'd woken up feeling freer and lighter than she had in a long time. Everything suddenly seemed clear to her. It was as if, while she was sleeping, her priorities—or, more aptly—her
lack
of priorities—had magically rearranged themselves. It wasn't going to be that easy, she knew. People didn't change overnight, did they?

But as she was thinking about this, she noticed a police car parked, haphazardly, as if whoever was in it had gotten out in a hurry. She felt a tightening in her stomach, which she tried to ignore.
So what?
she told herself, getting out of her car. So a policeman is getting a cup of coffee here, or just stopping in to talk to Sam. It wasn't a big deal. She'd seen cops here before. It wasn't like it was off limits to them.

Still, her uneasiness persisted, especially since, when she went inside, Sam was nowhere to be seen, and Linc and Justine, who'd
always been friendly to her in the past, now seemed reluctant to meet her eyes. Her stomach tightened a little more.

“Where's Sam?” she asked Justine, who was working the register.

“He's in his office with Roy,” Justine said, not looking at her.

“Roy?”

“Roy's a cop,” Justine said, and because it was obvious to Poppy that no more information would be forthcoming, she went to get a cup of coffee.

“'Morning Byron,” she said, as she filled her cup. He was, as usual, sitting on a stool at the coffee counter, reading the
Minneapolis Star Tribune
.

“'Morning,” he said, keeping his eyes trained on the paper. Poppy stared at him, uncomprehendingly. Under ordinary circumstances, Byron was courteous to the point of being chivalrous. Now he was bordering on rudeness. As Poppy poured half-and-half in her coffee, her face burned with indignation. What had she done? And why was everyone giving her the cold shoulder? Did they . . . did they know about her and Sam? And even if they did, why would they all be so angry with her? It wasn't as if Sam was giving her special treatment at work. After work, of course, it was a different story.

She'd just made up her mind to ask Byron what was going on when the door to Sam's office opened and he and a policemen came out. Sam glanced at Poppy, then glanced away. This time her stomach twisted, almost painfully. “Thanks for getting here so fast, Roy,” Sam was saying to the cop as he shook his hand.

“'Course. I'll be in touch. But don't, uh, don't get your hopes up.”

“No, I'm not going to,” Sam said. He walked Roy to the door, opened it for him, and waited until he'd cleared the porch. Then,
with another quick glance in her direction, he said, “Poppy, can I see you in my office?”

She nodded, wordlessly, and hurried over. Linc and Justine and Byron, who'd been so unwilling to look at her before, were all looking at her now. She knew they were because she could practically feel their eyes boring into her back.

“Is something wrong?” she asked, trying, and failing, to read Sam's expression. He didn't answer her, though. Once they were in his office with the door closed, he sat down at his desk and gestured for her to sit down, too.

The office was so small that her knees touched his desk. He hated this room, she knew. He only came in here during the busy season when it was absolutely necessary. She waited for him to say something, but instead he leaned back in his swivel chair, sighed, and massaged his eyes.

“Sam, what's going on?” she blurted out. “Why was that policeman here?”

He paused, then answered her question with another question. “Do you remember what you did with the keys I gave you last night?”

“The keys?” she said, reaching instinctively for her handbag, which was sitting on her lap. She opened it and rummaged through it. They weren't in there. Had they fallen out onto the car floor? Had she taken them out last night and left them on her dresser? “I . . . I don't have them,” she said, looking helplessly at Sam.

“You don't have them,” he said, patiently, “because you left them in the door when you locked up last night.”

“How . . .”

“How do I know that?” he asked, his tone still patient. “I know
that because they were still in the door when I got to work this morning.”

“Oh, thank God,” she said, relief welling up in her. “So nobody stole them?”

“No, they didn't need to steal them,” he said, and now, in addition to patience, she thought she detected weariness in his tone. “They only needed to borrow them.”

“Borrow them?” she repeated, not understanding.

“That's right. They let themselves in with them, and then they cleaned out the cash register.”

Poppy sucked in a little breath of surprise.
“You were robbed?”

“Burglarized. Roy—the police officer who was just here—said it was a crime of opportunity. Someone came by after the store had closed, saw the keys in the door and . . .” He shrugged.

“Does . . . does Roy have any leads?”

He shook his head. “No. He'll keep his ear to the ground, though. If it was a young person, or young people, they might tell their friends about it and word might get out.”

“Oh, Sam, I'm so sorry,” Poppy said, and she was stunned to feel tears burning in her eyes. She was
not
a crier. “I don't know what happened last night,” she said, trying to piece it together. “After you left, I was thinking . . . and I was so preoccupied I didn't realize . . . Oh, God, I feel terrible.”

He tipped his chair back again, but otherwise said nothing.

Poppy blinked. A tear ran down her cheek. She was mortified. Beyond mortified, really. And she was something else, too. She was disoriented. She felt like . . . she felt like she didn't know this Sam. He was so different from the man she'd been with yesterday evening. That man had been affectionate, and flirtatious, and funny. He'd always maintained a sense of professionalism during
the workday, of course, but still, he'd never been like
this
before. He'd never been so detached, and so, so
impersonal
.

She was seized with a sense of panic. She needed to put things right. She needed to put things back to the way they'd been before. “I'll reimburse you,” she said, suddenly. Decisively. “For all of the money you lost.”

“Poppy, you can't. It's too much,” he said, rubbing his eyes again.

“How much?” she asked, impatiently, as she wiped away a tear with the back of her hand.

“It's doesn't matter,” he said.

“It does.”

He sighed. “It was around seven hundred and fifty dollars, more than we usually have in cash.” She sagged a little in her chair. She didn't have that much money. She didn't have even
close
to that much money. She knew it, and he knew it, too.

“What about insurance?” she asked. “You're covered for this kind of thing, aren't you?”

“No. Not if the theft is due to . . . negligence,” he said, and she got the impression that he was somehow trying to soften the sound of that word. It didn't work. It still cut her to the quick. It was such an ugly word, though to her it should at least have been a familiar word. After all, this wasn't the first time in her life she'd been negligent.

A silent sob shook her now, and Sam, looking mildly alarmed, opened one of his desk drawers, looked around in it, and took out a packet of tissue. He handed it to her across the desk. “Look, I don't want you to cry, okay? It could have been worse, it could have been a lot worse,” he said, his concern for her registering in his voice. “As far as I can tell, all they took was what was in the till. They could have cleaned this whole place out.”

Poppy swallowed back another sob, and ripped into the tissue
packet. It was hard to imagine it being any worse than it already was. She extracted a tissue now and mopped her eyes with it.

“Hey, take it easy,” he said, and his voice was gentle again. “In the general scheme of things, it's not that big a deal. It was a day's cash earnings. That's it. If we're lucky, we'll make it back today.”

She forced herself to take a deep breath and tried to smile. “I guess my quitting last night at least saves you from having to fire me now.”

Sam didn't answer. He reached back into his top desk drawer, took out an envelope, and handed it to her. It was her paycheck. He tipped forward in his chair. “Well, yes,” he said. “Under the circumstance, I think your leaving is for the best. Don't you?”

She brushed away those words with the sweep of her hand. She didn't
care
about this job. She
cared,
very much, about him.
About them. Together
. She waited for him to say something about this, but when he didn't, she said, uncertainly, “Sam, what about us?”

He hesitated. “Honestly, Poppy, I'm not sure about us right now.”

It was so quiet in the small room then that she could hear the clock on Sam's desk ticking. Outside his office, someone called out to someone else, a screen door slammed, a car engine started up. Inside the office, the seconds ticked by.

“Are you saying . . . you don't want to see me anymore?” Poppy asked, in an almost whisper, and she felt as if she had put whatever remained of her pride on the desk between them. It didn't matter, though. Her pride didn't seem important right now.

Her words seemed to galvanize Sam into action, though. He got up, came around to the other side of the desk, and sat on its edge. They were so close now they were almost touching, but what he said now didn't close what little space remained between them.

“Look, Poppy, don't get me wrong,” he said. “I'm incredibly attracted to you, and I've really liked getting to know you better this last week. But we're at completely different places in our lives. You're free to come and go as you please. When the summer is over . . . you'll move on. In fact, part of me is surprised you haven't already.” She shook her head wordlessly; leaving here was the last thing she wanted to do. “I, on the other hand,” Sam continued, “I'm tied to this place. I have three children, a business, a mortgage,
two
mortgages, actually—one on the cabin and one on the store—and a whole lot of other responsibilities I won't bore you with now.” Again, she shook her head in protest. She knew what he was doing. He was saying, in the nicest way possible
, You're not like me, you're not a grown-up, and we're done here
.

He looked away from her now. They'd reached an impasse. But it didn't matter. It was still over. Poppy couldn't force him to be in a relationship with her. But he wasn't the only one she was going to miss, she realized, and she was surprised at how much this new knowledge hurt.

“Sam, what about Cassie?” she asked. She was still tutoring her on the front porch of Birch Tree Bait whenever they both had a free afternoon. “Her twirling has improved so much. But we're still working on her routine and her performance is next week.”

Sam looked uncomfortable. “I think, right now, it might be better if you gave Cassie some space.”

She nodded, miserably. So that would be gone, too. Those pleasant afternoons sitting on the porch swing, watching Cassie twirl, a little, and listening to her talk, a lot.

“I'm sorry,” Sam said. “I want you to know how much I appreciate the time you've spent with her. She's loved it. She talks
about you all the time. But . . . she's confused about you, too. She's confused about
us
.”

Poppy looked at him questioningly.

Sam sighed. “She talked to Alicia about you this last week. And she told her . . . she told her she wants you to move in with us. I'm not clear exactly what she thinks your role would be. I don't know whether she thinks you'd be a sister to her or whether you and me would . . . give her a sister.” He looked suddenly embarrassed.

That sounds good,
Poppy thought. And it did. The part about giving Cassie a sister.

“Can you understand the position I'm in here, Poppy?” Sam asked her now. And all the humor was gone from his eyes. “I don't want Cassie to hope for something that's not going to happen. She'll be disappointed when you two stop spending time together, but hopefully, it will save her from more disappointment down the road.”

“But . . . I promised her I'd go to her performance,” she said softly.

“I know you did. She wants you to sit in the front row with her mom and me. I think you can see, though, that that would be . . . inappropriate.”

Inappropriate
. There was another word Poppy hated. It belonged to the province of guidance counselors, school principals, and people who taught workplace seminars. And now, apparently, it belonged to the idea of her coming to Cassie's twirling performance. She'd already been negligent, God forbid she add inappropriate to the list. Sam stood up. This was her cue to stand up, too. She did.

“Are you okay?” he asked. She nodded. He watched as she
tried to wipe the last traces of tears off her face. He felt bad, she saw. And she was sorry for him now.

He opened the door to his office and she saw him hesitate, wondering how to say good-bye to her. Should he shake her hand? Give her a hug? Kiss her on the cheek? In the end, he settled for a kiss on the cheek. It was a nice guy's kiss, she decided. A nice guy's way of saying,
I don't hate you. I just don't want you in my life anymore.
And in the end, it was that kiss that hurt the most of all.

T
he following week, Poppy drove down Butternut's Main Street. The charm of its striped awnings, brightly painted wooden benches, and window boxes filled with flowers was lost on her. She was a woman on a mission. She checked her watch as she turned into the Butternut Community Center parking lot. Today, timing was everything. And, as planned, she was exactly five minutes late for the baton twirling performance. If she'd timed it right, and she thought she had, she could slip into a seat in back, unseen, before Cassie went on stage. This was important, because while Cassie had invited her, Sam had
un
invited her during the meeting in his office. But she'd be damned if she was going to miss her star pupil's—her only pupil's—performance. She parked and hurried over to the building, but as she pushed open the lobby doors, she saw a woman sitting at a card table locking up a cash box.