Hitting the light switch, she blinked as her comfy/cozy was illuminated by soft yellow light. The furnishings were nothing like the Bradfords’. In her house, if something was antique, it was because it was useful and had been made by a Kentucky craftsman: an old wicker basket, a pair of faded, tissue-soft quilts that she’d mounted on the walls, a rocking chair, a pine bench under the windows, the heads of old hoes and spades that she’d found in her planting fields, framed herself, and hung up. She also had a collection of musical instruments, including several fiddles, many jugs, some washboards, and her treasure of treasures, her Price & Teeple upright piano from 1907. Made of quarter-sawn oakwood, and with incredible copper hinges, pedals, and hardware, she’d found the old girl in a barn rotting in the western part of the state and had her lovingly restored.
Her mother called the house a museum to folklore, and Lizzie supposed that was true. To her, there was great comfort in connecting with the generations of men and women who had worked the soil, carved out lives, and passed their survival knowledge on to next generations.
Now? Everything was about 3G, 4G, LTE, and smaller, faster computers, and smarter smartphones.
Yup, because that was a legacy of honor and perseverance to give to your kids: how you struggled to wait in line for the new iPhone for twenty-six minutes with only a Starbucks in your hand and an online blog about something pointless to pass the time.
Back in her forties-era kitchen—which was that style not because she’d gone to Ikea and Williams-Sonoma and bought lookalikes, but because that was what had been in the farmhouse when she’d bought the hundred-acre parcel seven years ago—she cracked the icebox and stared at the leftover chicken pot pie she’d made Monday night.
It was about as inspirational as the idea of eating paint chips heated in a sauce pan.
When her cell phone started to ring, she looked over her shoulder at where she’d put her bag down in the hall.
Let it go, she told herself. Just …
She waited until the ringer silenced and then waited longer to see if there was a call back—on the theory that if it were an emergency with her mother, there would be an immediate re-ringing. Or at least a chirp that she had a new voice mail.
When neither came, she walked over and fished through her purse. No message. The number was one she didn’t recognize, but she knew the area code: 917.
New York City. Cell phone.
She had friends up there who called her from that exchange.
Her hand shook as she went into the call log and hit dial.
The answer came before the first ring had even finished. “Lizzie?”
Her eyes closed as Lane’s voice went into her ear and through her whole body.
“Hello?” he said. “Lizzie?”
There were a lot of places to sit down in her living room or her kitchen—chairs, benches, sofas, even the sturdy coffee table. Instead of putting any of them to use, she leaned against the wall and let her butt slide down to the floor.
“Lizzie? You there?”
“Yes.” She put her forehead in her hand. “I’m here. Why are you calling?”
“I wanted to make sure you got home all right.”
For no good reason, tears came to her eyes. He’d always done this. Back when they’d been together, no matter when she’d left, he’d called her just as she was coming in the door. Like he’d put a timer on his phone.
“I don’t hear the party,” she said. “In the background.”
“I’m not at home.”
“Where are you?”
“At the Old Site. In the barrel room.” There was some rustling, as if he, too, were sitting down. “I haven’t been out here for a long time. It smells the same. Looks the same.”
“I’ve never gone there.”
“You’d like it. It’s your kind of place—everything simple and functional and handmade.”
She glanced over at her living room and then focused on the first spade she’d found out in those fields that she planted with corn every year. The thing was old and rusty, and to her, beautiful.
The period of silence that followed made her feel like he was in the room with her.
“I’m glad you haven’t hung up,” Lane said finally.
“I wish I could.”
“I know.”
She cleared her throat. “I thought about what you told me all the way home. I thought about the way you looked when you were talking to me. I thought … about the way things were.”
“And?”
“Lane, even if I could get past everything—and I’m not saying I can—what exactly do you want from me?”
“Anything you’ll give me.”
She laughed in a tense burst. “That’s honest.”
“Do I have a shot with you again? Because I’ll tell you this right now—if there’s any chance you’ll have me, I—”
“Stop,” she breathed. “Just … stop.”
When he did, she pulled at her hair, tugging, tugging, so hard it made her eyes water even harder. Or maybe that was happening for other reasons.
“I wish you hadn’t come home,” she heard herself say. “I wish … I was almost over you, Lane. I was getting my breath back, my life back. I was … and now here you are, saying things that I want to hear, and looking at me like you mean them. But I don’t want to go back. I can’t.”
“Then let’s go forward.”
“Like that’s so easy.”
“It’s not. But it’s better than nothing.”
As the quiet stretched out again, she felt the need to speak, to explain things further, to go into greater detail. But as words jammed in her head, she gave up the fight.
“There hasn’t been a night, a day, that I haven’t thought of you, Lizzie.”