A Season for Second Chances(15)

“You’ve found a place?” Max sounded surprised.

“Yes.”

“Already?”

“Yes.”

“Where is it? Is it close by?” he asked.

“You don’t need to know where it is,” said Annie. “It isn’t close by.”

“What if there’s an emergency?” said Max.

“You’ve got my phone number; if there’s an emergency I’m pretty sure you’ll call me rather than come around to my house! Have you spoken to the bank about the accounts?”

“I’m working on it.”

“Work harder.”

“It all feels so final,” said Max.

“Divorces usually are,” said Annie.

“Don’t say that word!” said Max. “Take the time you need, but don’t say it’s over. Please, Annie. I can make this right.”

“You can’t make this right, Max. Just . . . just please be out while I pack.”

Annie closed her eyes and rubbed her temples with her free hand. She didn’t feel like a romantic heroine anymore. She felt the full weight of her middle-aged life hanging from her shoulders like wet sandbags.

As she was paying at the bar, Emily came to stand beside her.

“You’re moving into Saltwater Nook,” she said.

“Yes, I am, on Sunday.”

“Are you friend or foe?”

“I’m sorry?”

Emily slid a flyer along the bar to Annie; SAVE SALTWATER NOOK AND RECLAIM YOUR HISTORY was printed at the top.

“It should belong to everyone,” said Emily. “No one person should get to decide what happens to our joint history. There are two choices: stand for what’s right or stand with John Granger.”

Emily’s focus on her was intense, and Annie could feel herself shrinking from her steady glare.

“Um, I don’t really have an opinion right now,” said Annie tactfully. “Until yesterday I didn’t know Willow Bay existed, let alone Saltwater Nook. I’m afraid you’ll have to do without my input for the time being.” She smiled, hoping to pacify Emily.

Emily seemed to accept this. She nodded toward the flyer. “Make sure you read it,” she said. “You’re involved now. There’s no room for sitting on the fence.”

Annie left, having promised to do her homework, and wondered what she had gotten herself into. Too late to back out now, she thought. And besides, where else was she going to find a place to live that didn’t require rent?





Chapter 11



As promised, Annie and Max’s house was empty when Annie let herself in on Saturday morning. The familiar smell of Max’s aftershave hung in the air and the foot towel in the bathroom was still damp, so he hadn’t been gone long. She hadn’t loved Max as a wife should for a long time, but in twenty-six years she had grown accustomed to him: to his little ways, his scent, his coughing in the mornings, his snoring gently reverberating through the bedroom wall.

After the second affair, they had taken separate bedrooms; Max’s need to wrap himself around her as they slept was no longer adorable, and his farting in bed had lost its charm. They’d still had sex occasionally, but Annie told herself that she was merely using him to satisfy her primal urges.

Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle stretched out on the bed while Annie packed.

“I’m sorry to leave you, Tiggs,” she said. “Let me get sorted, and I’ll come back for you. I think you’ll like your new home, there are plenty of places to explore. You’ll be a seaside cat instead of a town cat, how do you like that?”

Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle rolled onto her back and stretched before pulling herself back into a coil and going to sleep.

With the last box loaded into the car, Annie took one final look around the place. She heard the key turn in the lock and the front door close softly. Oh, shit! she thought. Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle, who had been padding along beside Annie on her farewell tour, retreated into the airing cupboard.

“Coward,” said Annie as Tiggs’s ginger tail disappeared between the louvered doors.

She heard Max’s footsteps walking from room to room downstairs and finally the creak of the tread on the stairs. He saw her and planted himself at the top of the stairs, one hand on the wall, the other gripping the newel post, casually blocking her exit.

“I couldn’t let you leave without saying something,” he said. “And now I don’t know what to say.”

“I think it’s all been said before,” she said.

“I guess I’d always hoped we’d find each other again,” said Max.

“Not in the places you’ve been looking,” said Annie.

Max looked at the carpet. “I don’t want to fight,” he said. “I came to tell you again that I’m not giving up on us. We’ve been through too much. You hate me now, and I don’t blame you. I hate me too. But I’m going to make it right.”

“I don’t hate you, Max,” said Annie. “Hate requires much bigger feelings than I have for you. And you can’t make this right. It’s too broken. Let’s just move on with our lives and stop pretending we shouldn’t have called time ten years ago.”

“Did you say good-bye to Tiggs?” asked Max.