The nickname just flew right off the tip of my tongue and surprisingly, she doesn’t give me a dirty look for saying it. I do notice her face fall a little when I mention that I’ll keep my hands to myself and it makes me want to puff my chest out with pride. Lucy likes me and she wants me to touch her. Suddenly, nothing else matters outside of learning what makes this girl tick. She quickly agrees to the tour and we pack up our books and head outside to my truck.
Fifteen minutes later, we’re climbing up some rocks at the opposite end of town. The view from the top is breathtaking, just like it always is.
“Welcome to Fisher’s Lighthouse,” I announce, holding my arms out from my body and spinning in a circle. “It’s overindulgent and disgusting that I have to share a name with almost everything in this fucking town, but this is the one place I don’t mind sharing it with.”
Shielding my eyes from the sun, I stare up at the huge red and white striped structure that overlooks the ocean and Lucy does the same while I give her a little history lesson.
“There used to be a lighthouse keeper who lived inside and manned the light for the fishing boats back in the day when oil lamps and clockwork mechanisms were used. Could you imagine that? Living all alone in this lighthouse, day after day, year after year, with no one judging you, telling you what to do or getting into your business? Your only job was to make sure the boats stayed safe and got home to their families,” I say wistfully as I slide my hands into the front pockets of my jeans and stare off into the distance, watching the waves crest a few miles from shore.
“Now, computers run it all and no one ever really has a need to come out here unless something breaks. So that means it’s just me or my grandfather who get to walk around inside this beauty and stare out at the ocean, pretending like we’re the only two people in the world. It’s the best at night, when it’s pitch black and it looks like you’re standing on the edge of the world. You feel like if you take one step off the rocks, you’ll just drop down into nothing and disappear forever. Sometimes, disappearing sounds like the best idea in the world.”
I stare out at the endless ocean, wondering why I don’t feel embarrassed that I just said more to Lucy about how I feel than I’ve ever said to anyone else. The sun shines on my face and I feel at peace. Being at this spot, with Lucy by my side, makes that possible. She doesn’t ask a thousand questions or feel the need to fill the silence with useless talk. She’s content to listen to me and enjoy the quiet moment. I know what she sees when she looks at me – a cocky, popular guy that everyone wants to be around because of my money and not because of who I am. Around town, I’m the son of the richest man on the island and I have to hold myself with a little more poise and polish, but out here, on the corner of the island where no one can see me, I can just be myself. With Lucy, I can be myself – a small-town boy who really, truly loves the place he lives, but dreams of bigger and better things.
I hear her step across the gravel on top of the rocks and suddenly, her small, warm hand is sliding into my own. She entwines her fingers with mine and squeezes my hand while we both stare silently out at the water.
I’m realizing, right in this moment, that meeting Lucy is my bigger and better thing.
Chapter 22
Lucy
Present Day
It’s been a week since I went to Trip’s house and Fisher kissed me in the basement. Okay, fine, I was an equal participant in that kiss, but I’m trying to block that part out of my mind, especially since Stanford and I have had a really great week together. I even managed to convince him to avoid downtown and stay here at the inn, not wanting to chance running into Fisher. The plan was to put some distance between us and get him out of my mind so I could concentrate on Stanford.
Too bad it’s not working.
Absence is not only making the heart grow fonder, it’s forcing the libido into overdrive and the guilt is driving me insane. Sticking my tongue down my ex-husband’s throat one day and kissing the man I’m dating the very next makes me feel like the trashy whore Fisher’s father accused me of being. I’m kissing Stanford when I still have the taste of another man on my lips, one who gets my blood pumping and makes me crazy, in more ways than one.
“What’s bothering you?”
On my hands and knees in one of the guest bathrooms, I glance over my shoulder to see Ellie leaning against the doorway.
“Nothing’s bothering me,” I lie, going back to what I was doing.
“You only scrub toilets when you’re pissed off or upset about something, so spill the beans, sugar plum.”
I continue scrubbing, putting a little more elbow grease into it and blowing a strand of hair out of my eyes that has fallen out of my ponytail.
“Nothing to spill. These toilets were disgusting and since the guests are all down at the beach, I figured I’d get a head start on the cleaning so you wouldn’t have to do it when you were done making lunch.”
She laughs, stepping further into the room, and grabs the rag from my hand, shaking it out and holding it up in front of her.
“Right, so you just decided on a whim to use one of Fisher’s old t-shirts to clean the toilets. A t-shirt I know damn well you were still wearing to bed up until a week ago,” she muses.
Reaching up, I snatch the shirt out of her hands angrily and go back to work. Dammit, I really loved this shirt, too. It was one of Fisher’s from boot camp, grey with the word Marines written across the front in black. The letters were so faded after years of washing that you could barely read them and the material was so soft I was afraid one more trip through the spin cycle would make it fall to pieces, but I still loved it. It hung down to middle of my thighs and made the best nightshirt. It also made it easier to think about Fisher and dream about Fisher and that had to stop.
I hear a retching sound followed by a little cough, and I turn around to see Ellie turned partially away from me with her hand over her mouth.
“Are you okay?” I ask, getting up from the floor and stepping to her side.
She holds up her free hand and shoos me away.
“I’m fine, I’m fine. That shirt just really smells right now. Like toilet water and….uuugghhh, toilet water. I shook that thing out and now the smell is everywhere.”
I have no idea what she’s talking about. I can’t smell anything but the bleach I was using. She rushes out of the bathroom and into the hall, taking a few deep breaths once she’s out there.
“You know, you’ve been acting kind of weird yourself lately. What the hell is going on with you?” I ask suspiciously as she bends over and puts her hands on her knees while she breathes.
I feel a little guilty that we haven’t had time to talk recently. I’ve been busy with the inn and Stanford and trying to avoid Fisher and she’s been busy with… What the hell HAS she been busy with? I know she’s been here working; the clean rooms and fresh food constantly coming out of the kitchen is proof of that, but what else has she been doing that this is the first time I’ve seen her in a week? Ellie and I see each other every day, even when we’re both busy.
She finally stands back up and shakes her head at me. “Nope, we’re not talking about me. There is nothing going on with me worth talking about when there is PLENTY going on with you. Lucy, your ex-husband and the love of your life has been back on the island for a little over three weeks and I can’t help but notice that you’ve been a lot more attentive to Stanford since that happened. You’ve been going out of your way to show everyone that the two of you are perfectly happy together, but I know you. I know this must be hard on you, seeing him again after all this time. You don’t have to put up a front for me. You know you can tell me anything.”
Leaning my back against the wall in the hallway, I close my eyes and let my head thump against the wall.
“This sucks. This really, really sucks,” I whisper.
I hear her feet shuffle and she moves to stand next to me, her arm pressing against mine as we both lean into the wall.
“I don’t know what is going on with me. I said good-bye to him in my mind and my heart. I let my anger take over where the love used to be and I’ve been fine. I’ve learned how to live without him. Forget three weeks, three MINUTES with him and suddenly I’m questioning everything,” I tell her as I lean my head to the side and rest it on her shoulder.
“Do you know what he did last week?” I ask, pulling the journal pages out of my back pocket that I’ve read so many times the papers are almost starting to fall apart. I hand them to Ellie and she unfolds them and starts to scan the pages.
“Those are some pages out of a journal he kept in high school. It was from the year I moved here and we first met and then when I tutored him in Chemistry. Everything he felt, everything in his heart, was poured out on those pages and it killed me, Ellie. The way he saw me and the way he opened up to me like he’d never done with anyone else before. I remembered every moment of that time with him and it hurt so much.”
I pause and squeeze my eyes closed even tighter, ashamed of the hundreds of times I’ve read those pages in the last week, alone in bed at night, after Stanford has kissed me good-bye and we’ve made plans for the following day.
“Wow,” Ellie says softly as she gets to the last page and hands them back to me.
“I know,” I tell her with a sigh as I refold them and shove them back into my back pocket.
“I know you’re going to hate me for saying this,” Ellie says softly, “But maybe it’s a good thing that you remember it. Your head has been so filled with the bad stuff and he’s just trying to get you to remember that there were good times, too. You two grew up together and you built a life together. It wasn’t all bad, and he’s trying to get you to realize that. He’s a different person now, Lucy. Everyone can see it. I think he just wants you to see it, too.”
“That’s the problem. I DO see it. I see so much of the old Fisher that I fell in love with and it’s tearing me apart.”
“I think what you need is a break,” Ellie suddenly announces as she slides away from the wall and stands in front of me. “Get your ass cleaned up and get out of this place. Go into town and get some fudge from Ruby’s. I think some double chocolate peanut butter swirl is just what the doctor ordered.”
She’s right, I’ve been cooped up in the inn for a week and all it’s done is given me more time to dwell on things. With a quick hug, I race over to my living quarters and take a quick shower, throwing on an old pair of jean shorts and a Butler House t-shirt, fastening my wet hair up on top of my head in a messy bun.
Pulling my golf cart into an open parking space a few spots down from Ruby’s, I immediately see the one person I’d hoped to avoid when I came to town. I should have known better. Standing here on the sidewalk, I can’t help but stare at him and I’m glad I threw on a pair of sunglasses so it’s not so obvious I’m checking him out. Today, Fisher’s paired his usual khaki cargo shorts with a red USMC t-shirt that hugs his upper body in too many right places. On his head is a backwards Butler House baseball cap that is ratty, dirty and incredibly faded. The sight of that hat does all sorts of things to me and I have to press my hand over my heart to try and get it to stop beating so fast. I gave him that hat right before he left for basic training. He took it with him on every deployment and told me he wore it more often than the uncomfortable helmets they were given. It’s been across the world and back countless times and I can’t believe he still has it.
I stop ogling him long enough to realize his black, F150 truck is backed up right in front of Ruby’s and I’m guessing he just got here and no one has noticed that he’s breaking one of the main summer laws on the island: no motor vehicles on Main Street. It sticks out like a sore thumb in the sea of white golf carts and bicycles parked along the street. I see him struggling to pull something out of the back end of the truck and I realize why he broke the law and drove into town. He’s delivering the sign he was working on when I stopped by Trip’s place last week. It takes up half of the bed of the truck and there’s no way he could have brought it into town on a cart.
Pushing my sunglasses up on my head, I jog over to the back of his truck and grab onto the sign across from him. I’d seen the sign almost finished and I know how much work he put into it. Seeing how absolutely beautiful it is with paint and the final coating of varnish, I don’t want him to mess it up trying to lift it on his own or hurt is shoulder.
He looks up in surprise. “Hey, what are you doing here?
“It’s a double chocolate peanut butter swirl kind of day,” I tell him with a shrug as we work together to slide the sign out of the back.
He laughs and then pauses. “This thing is really heavy. You’re going to hurt yourself if you try to help me lift it.”
I glare at him before going back to work, pulling the sign out on my own before he quickly gets back to work helping.
“I’ve lifted things much heavier than this all on my own for years, thank you very much.”
We continue moving the sign without saying another word and I immediately feel bad for snapping at him. In one second, I managed to remind him of all the times he left me alone to do things by myself and that’s not what I intended.
Holding the long, rectangular sign between us, Fisher at one end and me at the other, we walk it up onto the sidewalk and a customer leaving Ruby’s holds the door open for us so we can tip it upright and get it through the door.
“Fisher! Oh, my goodness, what have you done?!”
Ruby’s excited shout fills the small fudge shop as she comes running out from behind the display case and over to us. Ruby is in her late sixties and she and her husband Butch opened the store when they moved to the island after he returned from Vietnam. Ruby and I talked often while Fisher was on one of his many deployments and she gave me some good advice during that time, but we haven’t spoken much other than in passing since everything happened last year. I was ashamed that she was able to make it work with her husband after he came home from the war and I wasn’t.
We set the sign down on the floor in front of the display case and Ruby wraps Fisher in a big hug.
“It’s so good to see you back home,” she tells him softly before moving back and patting both of his cheeks.
He smiles down at her and I watch him blush as he talks about the gift he made for her.
“I just wanted to do something to make up for what happened last year. I’m sorry I wasn’t here to fix the front window. I know the sign doesn’t erase what I did, but it was the only thing I could think of.”
Ruby takes a moment to study the sign and I watch from the side as tears fill her eyes. It really is quite beautiful. Made out of an old piece of oak, Fisher painted it in the pale yellow and pink colors of the shop and carved Ruby’s Fudge Shop in the middle in flowing, curly script and added wood-burned drawings of fudge, candy and other confections that are staples here in her store.
“Oh, Fisher, this is just beautiful.”
She runs her hands lovingly over the sign before turning back to face him.
“The only thing we really needed was for you to get better and come back to us, but I understand why you needed to do this and I thank you. It’s going to look just wonderful hanging in the front of the store.”
She turns her head and shouts to the back room. “BUTCH! GET OUT HERE AND SEE WHAT FISHER’S DONE!”
A few seconds later, Butch comes through the back doors and joins us, nodding at the sign in approval. Ruby grabs my hand and pulls me around the display case, putting together a box of all my favorite flavors of fudge while Fisher and Butch begin discussing the best way to hang the sign.
Ruby prattles on about this season’s vacationers and how business is going, but I tune her out after a few minutes when I hear Butch ask Fisher how he’s doing.
“War changes everyone, son, there’s no shame in that. If it doesn’t change you, you were already too fucked up to begin with. What’s important is that you did the right thing and you found your way home.”
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Fisher nods, sliding his hands in the front pockets of his shorts. “I got a little lost for a while, but it helped to have something back here, guiding me back home.
I swallow thickly and blink back tears, wondering if he’s talking about me or Trip or any other number of things that could have pulled him back to the island.
Butch pats him on the shoulder and nods. “Don’t lose sight of that. No one understands your need to do your duty to your country more than me, but sometimes you have to figure out on your own that there are more important things than fighting a battle we might never win. Sometimes there are more important things to fight for right here at home.”
Butch and Fisher both glance over at me and I look away guiltily, grabbing a piece of wax paper and helping Ruby fill the box she’s started for me.
The two men talk for a few more minutes and I stop eavesdropping. Ruby sends me on my way with my box of fudge and she and Butch both give Fisher a hug before we walk out the door. Fisher tells them to give him a call when they’re ready to hang the sign and he’ll stop by to help as we step onto the sidewalk and into the sunshine.
“Well, I guess I should be getting back to the inn,” I tell him with an awkward smile as I start to turn away.
“Lucy, wait,” he says, wrapping his hand around my upper arm and gently turning me back to face him. “Since you’re already here in town, how about lunch? There’s no point eating dessert when you haven’t had lunch, right?”
He eyes my box of fudge and I can practically see him start to drool. Ruby’s fudge has always been a weakness for Fisher and whenever I brought it home, I had to hide it from him or he’d eat all of it before I could get one piece.
“You just want me to share my fudge with you,” I laugh.
He shrugs. “Guilty. So, how about lunch?”
I pause, contemplating all the reasons why this is a really bad idea. I’m supposed to be avoiding Fisher, not spending more time with him to further muddle my already confused head and heart.