Book Lovers(78)

I look back into his honeycomb eyes, feeling like I’m sinking waist deep into them, like there’s no hope of getting away, in part because I lack any motivation while his hands are on me. “Anywhere?” I ask.

“Name it.”



* * *





Libby’s so immersed in Work Mode, she doesn’t insist on joining our Target run, and instead forks over the fundraiser’s shopping list. Sally agrees to run the register if anyone comes in, and we set out in the old beat-up Buick Charlie’s borrowing while he’s in town.

The air-conditioning doesn’t work, and the sun beats down on us hard, the blazing-hot, grass-scented wind ripping my hair free from its tie strand by strand. All of this just makes the cool blast of air and clean plasticky smell of Target more pleasant. I didn’t think we’d been spending an inordinate amount of time outside, but in the surveillance cameras at the self-checkout, my skin looks browned, Libby-esque freckles are dappled across my nose, and the humidity has given my hair a slight wave.

Charlie catches me studying myself and teases, “Thinking about how ‘hot and expensive’ you look?”

“Actually . . .” I grab the receipt. “I’m daydreaming about how hard I’m about to work you.”

His eyes spark. “I can take it.”

We drive straight to the cottage, and as soon as we step into the cool quiet, I’m keenly aware that this is, realistically, the most alone Charlie and I have ever been, but we don’t have long until Libby will be here, and there are, ostensibly, more important things to focus on than the places that sweat has his shirt clinging to him.

“You can get started out back,” I say, and head for the stairs to gather the rest of what we’ll need.

By the time I kick open the back door, arms loaded with bedding, Charlie’s already got the tent set up.

“Well,” I say. “You’ve done it. You’ve surprised me.”

“And here I thought that if you needed to stun a shark, you were supposed to just smack it between the eyes.”

“No,” I say. “Competency with portable shelters is the way to do it.”

He crouches inside the tent and starts unrolling the air mattress we bought at Target—because, sure, Libby and I are going to camp, but we’re still Stephens women. “How are you such a pro at this?” I ask.

“I camped a lot with my dad, growing up.” The intense daylight has every sharp line of his face shadowed to black, his eyes more molasses than honey.

“Have you gone since you’ve been back?” I ask.

Charlie shakes his head. After a few seconds, he says, “He doesn’t want me here.”

His tone, his brow, his mouth—everything about him has taken on that stony quality, like he’s just reciting facts, objective truths that don’t affect him. “They weren’t thrilled when I decided to stay in the city instead of coming back to work for one of them.”

I wonder if people fall for that. If, every time Charlie talks about the things that mean the most to him, the world sees a cold man with a clinical view of things, rather than someone grappling for understanding and control in a world where those rarely appear.

I swallow the aching knot in my throat. “I’m sure they want you here, Charlie. It sounds like that’s what they wanted from the beginning.”

He tips his chin toward the patio table, on which the extension cords we bought sit. “Mind plugging in the air pump?”

For the next couple of minutes, we’re silent as the pump howls. I set up the fans we pulled from the closet and plug them into the power strip. Charlie puts the bedding onto the mattress, and I hang the paper-lantern lights, arranging the mosquito-repelling candles at regular intervals.

We’re quiet until I can’t take it anymore. “Charlie,” I say, and he looks over his shoulder at me, then turns to sit on the edge of the air mattress.

“I’m sure he’s grateful you’re here,” I say. “They both must be.”

He uses the back of his hand to catch the sweat on his brow. “When I told him I was staying for a while, his exact words were, Son, just what do you think you can do? The emphasis on you was his, not mine.”

I sit on the deck in front of him, cross-legged. “But aren’t you two close?”

“We were,” he says. “We are. He’s the best person I know. And he’s right, there’s not a lot I can do to help him. I mean, Shepherd’s the one keeping the business going, keeping up with the work their house always needs. All I can do is run the bookstore.”

My heart stings. I remember that feeling, of not being enough. Of wanting so badly to be what Libby needed after we lost Mom and failing, over and over again. I couldn’t be tender for her. I couldn’t bring the magic back into our life. All I had on my side was brute force and desperation.

But I was trying to live up to a memory, the phantom of someone we’d both loved.

Now I see what I missed before. Not just that Charlie never felt like he fit, but that he saw what it would’ve looked like if he did. I didn’t make much of it at the time, but seeing Shepherd standing with Clint at the salon—it isn’t just that they are comparable heights and builds, or the same trope. They look alike. The green eyes, the blond hair, the beard.