Love and Peaches

  Remembering NewYork made her realize she’d momentarily forgotten it. Leeda dug into her pocket, pulled out her cell phone, and hit two on the speed dial. Eric answered on the first ring.

  “Hey stranger.”

  “Hey.” Leeda picked at the fence of the pen. “I’m sorry I haven’t called. It’s crazy busy here.”

  “I figured.”

  They were quiet for a second, missing each other. Leeda could hear street noise in the background on Eric’s end, and she longed for the dreamlike excitement of the city. “Hey, can I ask you something?” Leeda said.

  “Sure.”

  “Do you think I’m vapid?”

  “What?”

  “I don’t know. I just…Do you ever feel like you don’t know who you are?”

  “Leeda, I know who you are. You are not vapid. You’re wonderful. You’re smart. You’re beautiful. You’ve got so much going for you; trust me.”

  Leeda took it in, just listening in silence. It wasn’t quite what she needed to know. But she didn’t know how to ask for what she did.

  They talked about the last couple of days, and about plans, and about Leeda’s estimated date for her return to New York, which was getting fuzzier and fuzzier all the time. “I don’t know, maybe the first week in July,” she said. She couldn’t believe they were already even talking about July.

  Eric was disappointed but supportive. “Hey, I love you, Lee,” he said when she’d been quiet for a few moments.

  “I love you too,” she said into the phone. She met Sneezy’s eyes as they said their good-byes, and she hung up.

  She smiled at the pony, like a peace offering, as if the animal could understand smiling. The pony just stared at her and, embarrassed, Leeda glanced away. Looking into the booth next to her, she noticed a display of baby chicks hatching in a big, clear plastic incubator. It was an agonizingly slow process—tiny little pecks, the occasional hairline crack, the eventual collapsing of a small piece of shell. And some of the chicks didn’t make it. A few of them died right there, before they made it all the way out. But the ones that did were fuzzy and cute, stumbling about, snuggling together.

  When she turned back, Sneezy was still staring at her expectantly with her big brown eyes. Leeda reached out and gently touched Sneezy on the tip of the nose. The pony let out a warm breath that tickled her hand. Leeda let her hand fall and turned to watch the crowds again.

  A couple of people took the business cards she’d had printed up at Kinko’s. But no one seemed seriously excited about Sneezy or The Baron.

  Eventually Grey reappeared. They silently watched the dusk descend and the lights of the rides and the vendors go on in bright whites and pinks. From somewhere across the grounds, the night’s entertainment boomed in faraway notes and indecipherable words, reverberating through the dusty field. At around 8 p.m., when no one had stopped by the booth for an hour, they started to pack up.

  It was late when Leeda and Grey pulled into the driveway of Primrose Cottage, the sound of the tires on the white paving stones interrupting the sound of the crickets. It had been a long, quiet ride, and Leeda was sleepy as she slid out of the truck and climbed the porch stairs into the house, leaving Grey to unload the ponies and bring them to the barn. She didn’t feel like getting back in her car and driving to the orchard.

  To the left of the parlor, a door opened into one of the spare bedrooms where Grey had been sleeping. Leeda walked to the doorway and peered in. Grey’s belongings were few: a big duffel bag with a pile of dirty clothes inside, a canvas painting of bicyclists racing, a tiny bag with his toothbrush and razor. It smelled like boy’s deodorant, sweet and masculine. Leeda turned back to the parlor and listened to the clock tick. She imagined that, on many nights, Grandmom Eugenie must have had only this sound to listen to.

  Leeda walked upstairs to the bedroom and changed into one of her grandmom’s old nightgowns, which felt a little spooky. She sat on the bed dangling her feet, feeling sleepy and restless simultaneously.

  She stared at her grandmother’s bureau. She thought about the letter she’d found. And then she popped up from the bed and walked across the carpet. Slowly, she pulled the first drawer open. But when that turned up empty of anything but old control-top panty hose and underwear, she got bolder, opening drawer after drawer, losing her compunction. Next she turned to the closet, searching the shoe boxes on the shelf at the top, and then turning to the boxes down below. On the third box, she hit it. She slid the box out of the closet and put it on the bed, opening it up. There had to be forty letters, tied together with a white ribbon and all addressed to Eugenie in the same hand with no return address. Leeda opened the first few—some were simply letters that planned out meeting times. Oak tree, 7 p.m. Swimming tonight. Others were longer, telling small stories about things that had happened in the course of a few days, and some were just full of sweetness, teasing Eugenie for her quirky, eccentric little ways or expressing longing and tenderness.

  One, Leeda kept coming back to. It wasn’t dated. But it was toward the end of the pile, and the things it said seemed to be a culmination of all the things before.

  Genie,

  I’m sorry for the other night. I know by now that trying to push you into anything makes you get farther away from it. I don’t know why I think trying to reason with you will work. Sometimes I just hope you’ll be open, and human, and hear me, just because it’s important to me and for no other reason.

  I know there’s too much in the way between you and me. But I also know that when I’m with you, it’s like something more than being in my body. It’s like a piece of my soul isn’t inside me anymore, but it’s all wrapped up wherever you are. It’s one of the things in this world that makes me believe people are more than just skin and bones. That when I’m with you, I feel like someone and something bigger than what I thought.

  Genie, I’m gonna ask you one more time. Please don’t do what you’re planning to do. Do the impossible thing instead. Be with me. Be brave and be with me.

  Your M.

  Leeda lingered over the words, touching them with her fingers, and then dug at the bottom of the box for anything left over. It was as if she didn’t know how the whole thing had ended. It was like she hoped it would end differently. There was one final note, the folds worn, as if it had been opened and folded many times. It was brief.

  Genie,

  I’ll wait for you tonight, you know where. And I know it’s spoiling the surprise, but I bought you a ring. Isn’t that the silliest thing? It cost me every last drop of my savings. And I know you would never wear it. And nobody would ever understand it. But the thing is, I have a life ahead of me that doesn’t involve watching you marry somebody else. So I’m going to leave tomorrow, either way. Tonight you need to decide. Are you coming?

  M.

  Leeda folded up the letter like it had been and carefully replaced all of them in their box. She felt heavy and exhausted. She hadn’t read one word written by her grandmother, but the weight of her suffering had come through on every page. Leeda felt, most of all, her grandmom’s fear in the face of her lover’s courage. He had been begging her to do the brave thing. And apparently, marrying Leeda’s grandfather had been the easier choice, though Leeda didn’t know why.

  Leeda wondered whether her grandmom had thought about someone finding her letters in the closet after she died. Surely she knew that if she kept them, they would be found eventually. It wasn’t like she had died a spring chicken.

  But she had left the house to Leeda for as long as she had the ponies. Had she thought Leeda would find them? Did she want her to? And did she want Lucretia to know? Did she want everyone to know? Did she care?

  It seemed that, after years of keeping secrets, Eugenie would have had some plan for the evidence she had left behind. But Leeda had never known her well enough to guess what her intentions could have been.

  She stood and slid the box back into the closet. Then she shuffled into the bathroom to brush her teeth. Back
in the bedroom, she pulled back the covers and crawled underneath, turning off the lamp beside the bed. The light coming through the window illuminated the room, reminding her there was a full moon.

  Leeda laid her head back on the pillow, and her mind drifted rapidly but aimlessly to the baby chicks that never got a chance, and to Grey being alone once he turned eighteen, and to the poor doomed love of her grandmother. It was a long time before she came back to herself and remembered that no one but her was in the room, and much of what she was thinking of was now in the past. She was only a girl lying in a quiet house with the moonlight on her bed.

  Fifteen

  The Bridgewater Courthouse was lit up in the summer sun; the reflection off it was so bright that Murphy shielded her eyes as she climbed out of the truck she’d borrowed from the Darlingtons. The air smelled like hot tar and melted grape Blow Pop. Murphy squinted at the large wooden front doors, and then at the clock hanging above them. Quarter to three.

  Murphy had no romantic notions about finding her father. She wasn’t looking for a hug, or any Oprah-type crying, or hours spent reconnecting. She didn’t want him in her life, and she respected that he had chosen freedom over her. Most girls would have been angry or angst-ridden that their dads had skipped out when they were babies. But when Murphy had thought of her dad at all, she had always hoped he was off somewhere living exactly the life he wanted. She understood his desire to be unfettered. She had been sure that, if nothing else, that was something she had inherited from him.

  The discovery that he existed in some real, connected way had just made her want to see him; that was all. She knew Jodee was meeting him here. She just wanted to lay eyes on him.

  She had gone with Birdie to her mom’s for lunch and had left Birdie there. Now Murphy sat at a spindly picnic table on the grass at the side of the lot, playing nickel basketball with herself in the sun. It was no easy task, and between failed shots she glanced up at the courthouse. She was out of the way enough to be unseen, but close enough to see everyone coming and going.

  One of her friends in New York worked at a Starbucks. He’d said that during training, they were told to try to make Starbucks a customer’s “third place.” Home. Work. Starbucks. In response, Murphy had turned her fingers into devil horns and told the guy that Starbucks was the devil. But if Murphy had a “third place,” it was here at the courthouse. She knew the schedules of the two receptionists who worked there. She could have written the biography of Judge Abbott—how, though he was probably only her mom’s age, he was graying at the temples, jowly, and serious-faced. How he wore shiny Payless loafers, was an upstanding citizen, and liked to tap his feet to the beat of “Row, Row, RowYour Boat” when he was listening to testimony from Murphy’s various accusers—Bob’s Big Boy for stealing their mascot, Kmart for stealing underwear, the town council for replacing all the framed pictures of the legislators in their hallway with pictures of players from the Orlando Magic.

  Now a rumble drew her eyes to the road, where her mom’s Pontiac was just pulling into the parking lot. Murphy slunk closer to the picnic table even though she didn’t need to. As Jodee got out of her car, she barely looked where she was walking as she made her way into the courthouse.

  A few moments later, another car followed—a green Chrysler LeBaron. Murphy leaned forward. A moment ago she had been perfectly relaxed, still not quite believing this would actually happen. Now her heart fluttered in her chest. She leaned rigidly into the picnic table.

  A man got out of the car. He was wearing jeans and a burgundy-colored T-shirt. He was tall, with dark brown hair and green eyes. Murphy took in everything about him—his skin, his shoes, whether or not there were bumper stickers on his car. (There was one. It said, nonsensically, MY OTHER CAR IS A BROOM.) She sent up a silent prayer that he wouldn’t have one of those “peeing Calvins” of Calvin and Hobbes stickers on his back windshield. Thankfully, she didn’t see one.

  Murphy knew she should feel emotional, but she didn’t. She didn’t feel connected to the man crossing the lot. She just felt eager to know. And eager to keep a safe distance.

  He walked casually, as if he didn’t have a care in the world, as if he wasn’t on the way to a paternity hearing. In another moment, he was gone, disappearing through the double doors.

  Murphy pulled away from the table and walked over to her truck. She got in and waited, sinking low in the seat but keeping her eyes on the door.

  Half an hour later, the man reemerged with Judge Abbott and Murphy’s mom. They all separated, Judge Abbott walking in the direction of town and Jodee and Murphy’s dad heading to their respective cars.

  He walked to his car and got in, pulling out of his parking spot and pausing at the exit. Murphy started the engine.

  She hadn’t planned on doing it. But when the LeBaron pulled onto Main Street, Murphy pulled out behind him.

  They had been on I-95 North for about twenty miles when he finally pulled off at a familiar exit. But instead of heading into the residential area of the town, he turned left, finally parking at a bar called Buckets.

  Murphy looked at the clock. Four-thirty p.m. That’s my dad, all right, she thought.

  She watched him walk inside.

  Now was her chance. She could follow him in. Say hi. Introduce herself. Ask him a thing or two. What was his favorite drink? Was he as free as he wanted to be? What places had he been to? What did she have that came from him? Or she could drive away. Put it behind her. Possibly never see him again.

  Murphy wasn’t ready to talk to him. But she wasn’t ready to give him up forever either. She idled for several minutes, debating with herself. And then she turned the truck around toward Bridgewater.

  On the way back, the whole event got bigger in her mind. She regretted not going in. She worried he was gone for good. And she needed to know. She needed to know if being unfettered had been worth it for him.

  Bridgewater looked small as Murphy turned off the exit ramp. She felt no attachment to the town itself. But it did look pretty while driving in—beyond the fast-food joints that greeted her at first, downtown was small and quaint.

  Instead of heading toward the orchard, she turned toward home. She would confront her mom with what she’d seen. Murphy wouldn’t let her deny it.

  Her headlights, as she turned in, swept the lot of Anthill Acres Trailer Park and her own front stairs. Two figures were standing outside her mother’s trailer, talking. Murphy stopped the car, frozen in place.

  The man reached out for Jodee, and Jodee gave him a tight hug and thanked him loudly. They said good-bye, and Jodee disappeared into the house. The man continued down the stairs toward his truck, got in, and started the engine.

  Murphy only could gape at him as he pulled out onto the street. Not before he looked both ways, of course.

  Rex always was a careful driver.

  Sixteen

  “He’s staying at the Homewood Suites,” Murphy said. She was standing in the doorway of the cider shed, looking incredulous, her arms hanging at her sides. Birdie, a crate of peaches midair and ready to pour into the press, squinted at her.

  “Rex?”

  “Yep.” Murphy nodded. “The guy at Circle K told me.”

  It was a misty, cool day, and even though it was noon, it was still dim and felt early. The mist had infiltrated Murphy’s hair and had made it twice as puffy as usual. It felt like they were somewhere remote and alone.

  Overcast days were always blessings at the orchard. As long as the picking wasn’t interrupted, they were a pleasant escape from the relentless sun and heat. And if rain began, picking ended for the day, and the workers retreated to the dorms to relax, play cards, talk, watch TV, and hang out. Everything slowed down.

  “That’s crazy. Why hasn’t he come to see you?” Murphy had told Birdie what she’d seen the other night and that she’d planned to sleuth it all out. Murphy had taken on an air of cool determination that, Birdie knew, never boded well.

  “Why’s he going to see m
y mom?” Murphy asked.

  A weird, awkward thought hung between both of them. Jodee McGowen had always been crazy about Rex. And she was single. And she had dated younger guys before. But Birdie quickly dismissed the thought as ludicrous and hoped that Murphy had done the same.

  The sound of damp footsteps and voices announced someone approaching, and Murphy turned as Emma and Raeka appeared beside her in the doorway with crates of peaches.

  “I’m gonna go up to the tree house,” Murphy said to Birdie. “I’ll see you up there in a bit.” She waved to the two women and left.

  Emma and Raeka sidled up beside Birdie and began dumping their peaches into the press. Birdie watched Raeka’s strong hands.

  “Hey, I wanted to ask you guys something,” Birdie said in English. Some things were too important to her to communicate in a foreign language. And now that she had them alone, she felt it was a rare opportunity. Her gut throbbed a little. “How was Enrico when you left?”

  Emma and Raeka came from Enrico’s town in Mexico. They knew him well.

  Raeka ran a wrist across her forehead to wipe back her damp hair and smiled at Birdie knowingly and sympathetically.

  “He was okay.”

  “Do you hear anything about him?” Birdie swallowed. “Does he have a new girlfriend or anything?”

  Emma grinned sadly. “You don’t want him to move on, Birdie?”

  But Raeka was shaking her head. “It’s not that easy, Birdie. Nobody is allowed to talk about you,” Raeka said. “He just locks himself up with his chicken and listens to music, and he doesn’t want to hear your name.” Emma nodded along, her eyes wide for emphasis.