At Last (The Idle Point, Maine Stories)(28)

Gracie laughed softly as another seagull tried to steal the bounty but was scared away in a flurry of squawking and ruffled feathers. "Gramma Del used to take me down to the beach when I was little. We'd walk along the shore and she'd teach me the names of the birds and the different shellfish."

"She taught me the phases of the moon," Noah said, "and all about the tides. The house isn't the same without Del."

"She doesn't think we should be friends." She regretted the words the second she uttered them.

"I thought she liked me." He sounded hurt and Gracie couldn't stop herself from placing her hand on his forearm.

"She used to," Gracie said. "She thinks you might be trouble."

"She might be right."

"And she might be wrong."

"Don't bet on it."

He looked so sad when he said those words that Gracie felt compelled to explain. "Gramma Del worries. She just doesn't want me to spend time with any guy."

"Neither do I."

His words hung in the air between them. He looked down to where her fingers rested lightly against his skin. She thought about moving her hand away but didn't. The breeze off the ocean was sweet and soft against her bare arms and legs. They stayed locked in position for what seemed like forever and then Noah leaned closer to Gracie and Gracie moved nearer to Noah and the lemonades and lobster rolls and lighthouses were all forgotten.

He kissed her the way she had dreamed of being kissed, with strength and tenderness and a yearning that matched her own. Her lips parted slightly. He touched his tongue to hers, sweetly... so sweetly that she felt herself melt against him even though she hadn't moved an inch.

The kiss lasted only a few seconds but those seconds changed their lives forever.





Chapter Six





Gracie had never lied to Gramma Del before in her life but there was no other choice. She couldn't possibly tell Gramma that she was seeing Ruth Chase's son. The merest mention of the Chases upset her grandmother so much that Gracie worried about her heart. Besides, she was seventeen now and entitled to a life that belonged to her alone. The days of sharing everything were gone and Gracie's happiness was laced with a bittersweet sense of regret.

Noah's plan to work at the animal hospital went by the boards when Simon stepped in and made it clear that Noah's summer would be spent learning the newspaper business from the ground up. In a way Gracie was glad. She couldn't think when Noah was around. Something happened inside her brain every time she saw him or spoke with him or even knew he was somewhere in the vicinity. Her heart beat faster. Her hands trembled. Her concentration flew out the window like Old Man Horvath's runaway budgie. She fit all the other bits and pieces of her life into the spaces between Noah's kisses.

There was a lot of talk about Noah around town. Everyone had a story to tell. He'd been spied in the back seat of Laquita Adams's Toyota. Somebody else claimed to have seen him with the principal's daughter out near the football field. Partying on Hidden Island, sneaking down to Portland, getting wasted at work when his father wasn't looking. They could talk all they wanted to because it didn't matter to Gracie. She knew the real Noah.

"Sit down, missy," Gramma Del said one evening in mid-July when Gracie was particularly eager to run to Noah's arms. "You eat so fast you'll make yourself sick."

"Sorry," Gracie said, chastened. She tried not to glance over at the anniversary clock on the credenza. "I'm starving!"

Gracie ate dinner every night with Gramma Del unless Doctor Jim kept her late at the animal hospital. Gramma Del was in frail health but her spirit was as strong as ever. She kept busy knitting scarves and mittens for the church's winter carnival and playing cards with her friends, women she'd grown up with right there in Idle Point more than eighty years ago. Del's friends took good care of her. They even kept a close eye on Gracie, much to her chagrin. Suddenly Gracie's blameless life had become a crazy quilt of white lies and half-truths. She hated sneaking around but if that was the only way she could be with Noah, then that was what she'd do.

At least she didn't have to worry about what Ben thought. Her father and his wife du jour were working for a shipbuilding firm up near Calais on the Canadian border. He'd been good about sending home money each month, which meant he wasn't drinking at the moment. Gracie was learning not to expect too much of her father. Gone were the days when she would bring home bouquets of A's and academic awards and wait, almost dancing with excitement, for her father to suddenly realize what a gem of a daughter he had. Of course that never happened. Ben remained as remote from Gracie as he ever had, but at least now it didn't hurt quite as much as it used to.