Retreat to Love Read online

  “What were you saying earlier about the house thing in Connecticut?”

  “Oh,” she shrugged. “It’s kinda strange, I guess. But I’ve been living in the same duplex for eight years. The landlord told me when I moved in he was wanting to remodel and sell the thing one day, so that ax has been over my head the whole time. But all this long, nothing, not a word from him about it. Or if there was word, it was ‘we’ve just lost in the market and can’t fix it up now’ or ‘interest rates are too high, no one’s buying’ or something. Then, three months ago, out of nowhere, a decorator shows up on my doorstep to take room photos and measurements. I mean, the place is like a second skin to me now!” She dabbed at her eyes, then rolled them self-deprecatingly. “So I called him up, the landlord, to see what was going on. Seems his wife’s parents just left them some major cash, and housing in the area has gone through the roof, and he gave me two months to get out. The same day—I was taking a house-hunting break to surf some art boards—I ran across the FireWind info, and something just, I don’t know, made me apply. Isn’t it strange? There I was, devastated about losing my home, having to move—which I hate, of course—and this new sanctuary threw itself in my lap. That’s why my cabin is one of the important first pieces of my series.”

  “Awesome.” It seemed more like well-aligned events than destiny, but I got that the move here moved her. And the emotion would drive her art. “Sounds like they’ll be great, your houses.”

  She snorted. “If I ever manage to make them.”

  “You don’t have anything sculpted yet? Just the sketches?”

  “And the concept. It took me ages to figure out what I wanted to do with all these houses we’ve had. Like, make them into tree ornaments so I could give them roots, or nesting in each other like one of those Russian dolls, kind of interactive, you know?”

  I nodded.

  “But clay’s no good for interactive, and I didn’t want to go with anything more delicate, less structural. So this is where we’re at. If I can just get my mind off you-know-what I’ll be able to focus.” She scratched her nails along her scalp. “But besides all that, I have about three minutes to find Rafael and place the order for dinner. He’s not at his cabin, down any obvious trails, or around here.”

  “Get Margie to find him.”

  “She’s on her way to San Marcos to pick up the groceries I haven’t ordered.”

  “I haven’t seen him all day. Suppose he’s bailed?”

  She double-clicked on the supermarket program. “Either way, I guess the menu’s up to me. You have any favorites? If I’m cooking for eight solo it’d better be pretty damn simple. Like, hot dogs and potato chips simple.”

  “Do they have tofu dogs?”

  “Oh, God, you’re one of the veg-heads.” She crossed her eyes at me. “Pizza it is, then. Let’s see—frozen cheese pizza, with some added flourish. Green peppers, tomatoes, corn, ground beef for the normal ones here. Salad on the side. What else?”

  “Up to you, Team Three. I’m off to soak up inspiration from the hills around me.” I stood up and squeezed her narrow shoulder on the way past.

  By Tuesday dinner, Rafael had been declared among the missing. Margie claimed he was still on the grounds, and merely nocturnal. The trail of dirty dishes in the rec room and porch Theo discovered every morning supported her claims. Over pasta, Wren declared war.

  “Look, you’ve all been nice about helping to clean up and stuff, but no more. No more saving leftovers for him. No more washing dishes for him. If Margie can’t bother to make him follow her precious rules, I’m figuring out a way on my own.”

  “Guerrilla training at the base camp at dawn?” asked Lizzy.

  “If it comes to it. I’m no sergeant’s kid for nothing. But I think we’ll start with Operation: Palmolive. Stack the sink so high he can’t get his midnight snack without clearing it, and leave a nice little note pinned to the rubber gloves.”

  Angelica and Theo started in at the same time, but he deferred to her. “And what about when he’s ignored them and we need to make breakfast and there’s dried primavera sauce on the bowls?”

  “Drag me out and I’ll do them. But if that happens, tomorrow I’m lugging the dishes to his porch. And if that doesn’t work, I’m ordering paper plates and you’re all eating frozen food the rest of the week. Just so you all know.”

  I took my plate to the sink and returned with a cup of chamomile tea.

  “… Sunday night,” Caleb was saying. “I’m sure they’ll be happy if you join us. Right, Ashlyn?”

  “Right what?”

  “I told Wren she should come with us Sunday, since she seems to need a break already.”

  “Come where?” I asked, as Lizzy nudged me under the table.

  “Hasn’t Zach told you? He emailed me he’s coming in to see you and suggested we all go into Wimberley for a meal. I told him it had to be Sunday night because of the cooking and everything.”

  “Oh. Well, fine with me, I guess. I told him to come back and see me sometime, but I didn’t think Austin would be boring him already.”

  “I guess Wimberley has its attractions,” Caleb said, crinkly brown eyes tracking from me to Wren.

  Zach’s message mostly complained about his spring allergies kicking, but reported he’d accomplished my mission and Sunday was good for him. When I got back to my cabin the lights were on.

  “I knew I shouldn’t have told y’all my door code,” I said to Wren as I joined Lizzy on the sofa. “What did you think of that, then?”

  She grinned the first true face-splitting grin I’d ever seen. “I’m pleased.”

  “Don’t let her lack of euphoria fool you,” Lizzy deadpanned. “I forced her to stop asking me after the eighth time if he really said what she thought he said and did it seem to me too he was saying what he might be saying. I mean, obviously he is smitten and my hopes of taking her on the rebound are forever crushed.”

  “So next time poor Zach and I are going to be left all alone?”

  “Let’s toast to that,” Wren said, handing us mugs of the cocoa she’d remembered to order for me from San Marcos.

  The next morning I ignored the tapping at my window, figuring setting Wren up with the hottest guy at FireWind was my good deed for the week and she could get Lizzy to wash up the mess Rafael had obviously left. After sleeping late I took my long-awaited bubble bath then lounged in my robe as I watched the deer from the studio window and pretended not to look at the sketches on the drafting board. Once it was bound to be quiet at the Main House, I gathered my notebook and headed for the computer center.

  It was empty, and I chose the CPU connected to the plotter printer, which was a luxury on my artistic wish list. A few times I had taken designs to a copy center to print out full-scale patterns, but for most of my quilts I tiled the pattern pieces to a page each and used the old-fashioned cut-and-paste method. It took most of the morning, accompanied by illicit slices of coffeecake, to create the Gran Chain (or whatever I would call it). When it came off the plotter I made a few adjustments and corrections on paper, then on screen, and sent a line drawing to print.

  Brandon came in. “Can I see?” he asked, approaching.

  “Nope.”

  He pulled his hair back. “Oh. ‘Kay. I get it.” Turning his back to me, he switched on another terminal.

  “It’s the way I work.”

  “Yeah. It’s cool. Some people are insecure about things until they’re done. They don’t think anyone else can see the big picture but them.”

  “Some people don’t want the flow of their ideas interrupted by the comments of others, actually,” I said, and rolled the final print outs to take back to my cabin.

  Threading my machine is my mantra. Before each project, I start by cleaning the feed dog, shuttle race body and hook to remove any lint, then I oil the moving parts of the take-up lever, needle shaft, winder, and bobbin casing. And then I make my bobbins. I like a full one for each thread color ready to drop in the cas
ing as soon as I need it. But it’s when I tighten the stop motion knob and take the thread from the spool pin through the upper guides, down around the tension dial and up again to snap into the check spring that I begin to focus on what’s ahead for the day.

  Snaking the thread through the take-up eyelet and dropping it past the thread guard, weaving it through the lower guides, I anticipate the dry taste of the frayed end. I moisten it to a sharp point before I finally thread the needle. My drops of saliva won’t make it into the actual project, but in my gut I know the process of licking the thread that will appliqué, embroider, or quilt together my creation solidifies the connection between me and my artwork.

  I’d spent the afternoon crouching on the floor rearranging fabric, and was ready to develop a backache based on hunching over a machine. After a few shoulder rolls I selected a yellow spool and stretched a scrap of bright green fabric onto a small oval embroidery hoop. My first step was always to monogram ‘Ashlyn May’ with the date and title of the piece, if I knew it. I could embroider my name on the reverse side of the fabric freehand now, but had to trace the title in a dark pen on the front—I’d named this piece Chains of Love. The yellow thread gleamed golden against the green; perfect. A nice bright mood, energetic. Before the final stage, I would appliqué the title patch to the backing in the lower right corner. Meanwhile, it would be pinned to the wall near the machine.

  Just as I finished cutting the upper thread to tie it up, Lizzy knocked on the front door.

  “Dinner’s in about a minute. You coming? Wren sent me to ask.”

  I popped my spine and turned to get my shoes. “I just lost track. Ignore the mess.” We headed out. “Wren mad? I told her I’d help set the table and stuff.”

  “No, I did it. She figured you were working. Which is not to say she’s fine and all; Rafael is still among the missing and Margie never went over there today.”

  I sighed. “Tomorrow get me early if he’s not around and you are, I’ll help her cook.”

  “I wish I could, but it would blow my cover with Brandon.”

  “Have I told you the latest Brandon-as-ass story?” I asked. We had already compiled quite a few, but that didn’t stop me from relating what he’d said in the computer room.

  Caleb was on the porch. “What are you laughing about this time?”

  “An annoying photographer we know,” I replied, winking at him.

  “Geez, be more subtle, will you? I’ll back off already.”

  Lizzy walked up the steps to look him in the eye. “We’ll let it go this time, boy, but just remember you’ve been warned. None of your macho man stuff from now on, eh?”

  Caleb literally did back off. “No contest, Lizzy, you are way tougher than I am. I’ll keep away, I promise.”

  “Poor Caleb,” I said, holding the door for them both.

  “Poor nothing,” Lizzy replied. “He’s had a little too much of being the dominant paradigm in my opinion. Time to spread the wealth.”

  “Wren, can I sit next to you?” he asked, taking the bowls of sour cream and guacamole from her as she held open the kitchen door with her foot. “These two are too domineering for my sensitive soul.”

  “From what I’ve heard, Wren is into domination herself,” Liz said, grinning as Wren stumbled on her way to fetch the platter of spinach quesadillas.

  The banter slowed down once the others came in. Most of talk revolved around Angelica’s photos of her latest sculpture, a life size baby. It was a pure pink marble, and the infant was clenched in the palms of a woman’s hands; the tendons between her knuckles standing out, the smooth nails pressed into the baby’s ribs. The baby was curled upon himself, listless and pursed-mouthed.

  “It’s modeled on my nephew Tommy. I wanted to express the strength my sister in labor and the fragility of his little preemie body.”

  Theo’s eyes sparkled a little when he looked from the photos to her. “It’s amazing. You’ve really got something here.”

  Wren and I glanced at each other. Her side-eye suggested she shared some of my doubts.

  “That’s a gorgeous piece of marble,” Lizzy said, peering at the close-up of the infant’s clenched hands.

  “I just looked for beauty, and this spoke to me. I knew it was right from when I started.”

  We passed back the photos and moved on to general criticisms of Margie, who had kicked Theo out of the TV room in the middle of a documentary on Picasso. Caleb volunteered to help Wren haul the night’s dirty dishes to Rafael’s porch, but insisted she leave a note about their rebellion tacked to the newel post of Margie’s staircase. Lizzy winked at me and I had to pretend to be choking on the salsa to cover my laughter.

  The week went on in the same vein. Theo and Angelica were never seen apart. Rafael was never seen, although the dishes did show up clean after the porch dump. I dyed three yards of percale with indigo and spruce swirls, and ordered more cut glass beads from my favorite online supplier. By Saturday morning the fabric was ready to rinse and set, and I strung a clothesline between two trees in the deer clearing to hang it out. One of Gran’s quilting legacies was a predilection towards working with sun-drenched cloth carefully ironed.

  “Hey, that’s gonna scare away my subject,” Caleb said, coming out of the path towards the cabin. When I turned towards him, startled, he snapped three or four quick shots of me spilling the rest of the kernels on the ground. “Well, one doe is as good as another,” he shrugged.

  “Not funny.”

  “Point of view. Add your expression to the fact I’m taking some revenge for your ruining my morning’s shoot, and it’s enough to make me smile.”

  “She doesn’t even come around this late.”

  “I know; I’ve been stalking her. But I wanted some good daylight establishing shots, then this afternoon I was going to get her coming out. Which she won’t do if you’ve got some curtain thing flapping all over the place.”

  “Too bad you don’t have a right to dictate the world the way you want it, isn’t it?”

  “A haven for artists working side-by-side, isn’t it?”

  I shook my head. “Pulling a Margie line isn’t gonna make me take it down. It needs to dry, and this is the only good place to hang a line. Take your pictures tomorrow.”

  “I’ve got to set up downwind well before she shows, and your brother’s coming just past dusk. I sure don’t want to offend your and Wren’s delicate sensibilities by going to dinner in the sweaty work vest I spent hours crouching in.”

  Yeah, Goddess preserve us from Caleb smelling bad in front of Wren. He crossed the clearing towards me, presumably without considering if his work vest reeked. It didn’t, but I was counting thoughts, not reality. I admitted, “I forgot about the dinner thing. And the cooking. What are we going to make?”

  He pulled a spiral notebook out of a side pocket. “I made a little bit of a shopping list. Figured on eggs and pancakes or muffins in the mornings, maybe some soups like gazpacho for lunches. What do you think?”

  I took it from him. His handwriting was all block capitals. His pencil was blunt. “You actually planned all this? Raspberry-cream cheese blintzes? I was thinking more like cereal and raisin toast.”

  “It’s not hard. Some fresh fruit for smoothies, a few dairy products. There’s a food processor in there, we can make anything.” Oh, the confidence of a man who could cook. It knew no bounds.

  Handing back the notebook, I said, “I’m game, as long I don’t have the smell of bacon frying every morning to deal with.”

  “Wouldn’t have it any other way. Unlike your little project here, which I’d really like to get rid of now.”

  “Look. I know it’s thrown a kink in your works, and I'm sorry, Caleb. But I can't just not dry the cloth now, it has to set properly. Can't you take your shots in a couple of days?"

  He kind of growled, quietly. "Sure, it's okay for you to progress at your so-important pace, but my stuff just gets shelved. No problem."

  "Relax. Doe probably wouldn'
t have shown tonight anyway."

  "Yeah, she's so inconsistent."

  "You seriously want me to ruin my whole dye job for this one shot? There’s not other pictures you can take in the meantime?”

  "You're drying it, right? Like, same thing you could do in the laundry room?"

  "And waste all that electricity? I'm sure the founders wouldn't approve." I was flippant, but I’d calculated the overall look of the cloth based on a slow dry time, not the heat-set it would get with a tumble in the dryer.

  "Thanks a hell of a lot, Ashlyn, damn considerate of you," Caleb's Hershey kiss eyes went narrow on me before he turned sharply and strode out towards his cabin. Except, somehow, he didn't start exactly on the path, and a black willow branch snapped at him. "Fuck!" he yelped out.

  "Goddess, you okay? What happened?"

  He limped back towards me. "Fucking tree attacked me." His hand gripped his upper thigh.

  "Are you bleeding?"

  "Uh, crap, yeah, I think so."

  I reached him and pulled him back into the clearing. "Come on, let me help." The eyes judged me briefly, almond-round once more, and he leaned on me a bit as I helped him up my steps.

  We limped to the love seat. "Let me look." Reluctantly, he lifted his palm. "Wow. Good thing you're not a couple of inches shorter, you'd never have children."

  "Ha, ha, hardy ha."

  "You're going to have to take those off, you know, so we can clean it."

  "Are you enjoying this? I'm hurt here."

  "I know, I know. Poor Caleb. Aren’t you glad you don’t have to crouch on this thigh for hours later today?” Poor Caleb’s thigh. It looked bad. Well, not the thigh itself; the thigh was lean and solid under my hand. I wondered if Wren was into scars.