Retreat to Love Read online

  “I know, but look at the way Lizzy has the posture,” he said, turning back a page to indicate the lax muscles. “She’s just flopped up there on top of Health, it’s not like she’s so sick she can’t even sit up a little and look around and enjoy the ride.”

  “Co-dependency goes deeper than that,” Angelica told him. “Both partners become so tied to their roles they can’t help but adopt them when they’re together. Isn’t that your message, Lizzy, at least a little?”

  “That’s what I see,” said Theo.

  She smiled at the two of them. “That is how I put them together, yeah. So you know what I mean about her face, right? Not too ill but believing she is?”

  I turned back to her sketches. “So here, maybe, along these lines?” I pointed to a face with sad eyes and drooping mouth, but a slightly raised brow. “She’s feeling down and yet enjoying the vantage point, maybe just a little bored, too.”

  “I don’t know,” Wren chimed in. “It’s close, but maybe a little too, calculating, I guess. Can you work from here and maybe add more furrows, more pain?”

  Lizzy considered it. “I think ... you mean along here?” she asked.

  Wren nodded.

  “And if I thin out the hair a bit, let her grasp a handful of it with her left hand?”

  “But leave her body like it is,” Wren told her, “so we know it’s coming from her mind, not so much physical.”

  “That’s great,” Caleb said to Wren. “You’ve got a fantastic eye.”

  “You’re telling me,” Lizzy said, kissing Wren’s cheek. “Thanks. Thanks a million.”

  Wren blushed. “Aw, go on.”

  “No, really,” I added. “That was inspired. Let’s skip doing you tomorrow so you can come tell me how I’m doing.”

  “Now you all have to get out of here so I can work on this before dinner,” Lizzy said, grabbing pencils from her desk. “Brandon, I’ll be late for k.p., you get it going and I’ll set the table and wash up.”

  I laughed. He’d spent the whole time at Lizzy’s silent, even less of a presence than Rafael. It seemed he was afraid of his food partner.

  Caleb headed for the door. “Let’s go, people, the artist is at work. Nothing more to see here.”

  Another volley of pebbles woke me the next morning. Wren half-waved when I sat up to squint at her. She threw herself down on my still-warm, still-comfortable bed while I shut myself in the bathroom.

  “You’re up before Caleb.”

  “I’m sorry, I know you wanted to rest.”

  “Uh-huh.” Wetting my hand in the warming shower spray, I rubbed at my eyelids and forehead.

  “I tried Lizzy but she had her curtains drawn and wouldn’t stir.”

  “Lucky Lizzy.” I brushed my teeth while leaning against the tub.

  “My showing is this afternoon.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Maybe you’ve noticed I haven’t been talking about the houses much lately.”

  Sighing, I wrapped a towel around myself and stepped out to kiss the top of her head. “I know, sweetie, but some people are just like that. Give me a minute to get clean, okay?”

  She nodded and I went back to my shower. The peppermint castile soap slowly but sweetly opened my senses to the day, and just to bring myself wholly awake I exfoliated my face. Wren had a cup of coffee sitting on my dresser when I opened the bathroom door, and she’d made my bed.

  “Thanks,” I smiled. “Caleb knocked yet?”

  She shook her head. “It’s not late.”

  “So why are you nervous? It’s just us.”

  “Doesn’t matter. I hate showing my stuff even when it’s done.”

  “Everyone does.”

  “No, not … Not for approval.” She flopped on the bed again. “Well, yes, for approval, but more for my own sense of purpose. I can talk about it in advance, because I’m just telling you what I intend the finished product to be, but half the time even when I think I’m done I realize there’s another angle I haven’t explored yet, another way to re-examine and re-focus—I don’t know if I’m saying it right. It’s like, I think I know what I’m doing, I put a lot into development, but the second I show it to someone, they say something that isn’t even necessarily what I’m trying to accomplish, but it suddenly points up some major flaw in execution which means I have to almost go back to square one.”

  “You don’t have to listen to us. You can even tell us not to talk.”

  “I know. But nothing’s going to stop you thinking, and I’ll be trying to read your minds and second-guessing myself anyway.”

  “Well, then, if you know you’re going to be re-thinking the project when we’re done today, just accept it and give yourself the space you need to dwell on everything.”

  Wren laughed, dropping the hair she’d been idly braiding. “Sounds simple, doesn’t it? But I’m not sure I want anyone else causing me to re-think this. I’ve been dwelling on these dwellings for months, and now I think I have the key to the right execution, and the second you squint to take in a detail, I’ll be convinced I’ve done even this all wrong.”

  “I know what your problem is.”

  “Oh, good.” She sat up a little.

  “Your internal critic is far too astute. You did it to Lizzy, and you’ve done it to me, too—swept in and in thirty seconds seen what we’ve been completely blind about, and told us exactly how to fix it without taking anything away from our own ideas. It seems like no big deal to you when you do it to us—and believe me, I’ve appreciated it—but when you do it to yourself it’s complicated by the ideas the artist side of you has about the work, so the critic side of you ends up giving you grief.”

  She raised an eyebrow at me. “So the fact I’m multifaceted makes it hard for me to be an artist?”

  “In a nutshell.”

  “I’m not sure I feel any better.”

  “Well, come to breakfast with me; you can moon at Caleb to take your mind off it all, and I’ll try to get him to bend over a lot with his backside towards you.”

  She linked her bony arm through mine. “What a pal.”

  Rafael, oddly enough, showed up at Wren’s studio with a handful of wildflowers—the bluebonnets were just beginning to bloom and he’d mixed them with some incredibly vivid Indian paintbrush, very startling and cheerful. I decided not to mention it was illegal to pick our state flower. Wren stuck them in a glass of water while we looked at her houses.

  They were small-scale ceramics, none taller than five inches and an almost random mixture of crude construction and minute detail. The walls of her San Antonio barracks house didn’t meet at ninety degrees, but the mission architecture style was richly formed at the windows and doors.

  “It’s baby blue because it’s where my brother was born. I was eight, and my mother drifted into this post-partum depression which kinda changed her forever. Anyway, it was a very disjointed time in my life.”

  She also had finished the ranch house where they lived when she was twelve and got her first period. It was glazed in blood red, streaked with iron. The vines climbing up the side wall looked enough like the shed uterine lining to make me shiver.

  Rafael loved it. At least, I can only assume he did, since he discoursed so long about it. “It’s, like, so sensual—almost inviting but thorny at the same time,” he said.

  “Um, thanks,” answered Wren, glancing nervously at Lizzy and I.

  “Thanks for sharing,” he added as he turned to go.

  “Bye, man,” Caleb called after him.

  “He spoke, like, a dozen words!” I turned to Wren. “Wow. I wonder what Margie said to him.”

  “Whatever it was, it seemed to spark the spirit of togetherness in him,” Angelica sneered. “Wonders will never cease.”

  Wren had four more houses planned in her Military Brat series. As she told us about them, outlining the general trend of monochromatic structures and their personal significance, I wrestled with my own fears about the creation of a very personal art.
She’s said she was trying to define ‘home’ with this series, but the dwellings didn’t meet my definition of ‘homey.’ They were houses, distinct in style but the impact grew from the chronology of Wren’s life. Even the way we determined she should name them—descriptively (12th year—menstruation) rather than geographically (Ft. St. Helen)—pointed towards their being more about autobiography than about a global sense of home.

  Of course, I had never been moved from place to place like her; perhaps to another military kid her work would feel more naturally familiar. But why should she be forced to universalize it if it felt right to her?

  Looking at the basically finished Chains of Love, I had to admit it was about nothing more cosmic than my relationship with my mother’s mother. Would anyone other than Gran and I ‘get’ it? Zach or Bernadette, maybe, at least for the artistic merit—I knew it had that—and the few hints about them it contained. Caleb and Wren and Lizzy and the rest, instead of discussing the meaning, might only comment on the stitchery, the combination of elements, other externals.

  I walked throughout dinner, up the road away from town and circling back through the woods as it got darker and I worried about the cars. Not many passed, but those that did drove the country road as if it were an enclosed track, and I didn’t trust their headlights and their common sense to catch me in time.

  Hunger finally drove me to the Main House, where I ate in the computer room after making sure there were no signs of life from early-to-bed Margie. Email from Zach alluded to some hot news from him, but I knew it was pointless to try and drag it out of him ahead of schedule. Hopefully he’d met someone.

  Caleb was dishing himself some ice cream when I went in to wash up. “Join me?” he asked, scoop halfway into the chocolate chunk.

  “Why not,” I agreed, and put the kettle on. Nothing like ice cream and green tea.

  “Why weren’t you at dinner?”

  “Oh, I was just walking around, thinking. I grabbed a late sandwich instead. I miss anything?”

  “Not food-wise. Pork chops and canned green beans. Margie stopped by to beam approval at us while we told her about our workshops. Wren ...”

  We traded places as I moved to the pantry. “What?”

  “Nothing, I guess. Did you see her earlier?”

  “No. Did something happen?”

  He was quiet for a moment. “No. She just seemed to be kinda down. I’ve never seen her depressed like that, and I thought things went well today, you know?”

  I nodded, getting out spoons. “No one was mean or anything. Do you think we offended her?”

  Caleb leaned through the pass-through to identify a passing noise. He was wearing jeans, a very nice pair of black jeans. “Just Brandon going to the computer,” he reported. “Anyway, I was just thinking, you know, her house thing is just so, well, private. Maybe we didn’t give her the kind of reaction she was hoping for, we weren’t as intensely drawn in as we should have been.”

  Opening the freezer covered my little shiver. “Uh-huh.”

  “So you think we upset her? She was kinda, I dunno, quiet at dinner, hardly even laughed at Margie.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Ash?” I just glanced at him. “Hey, Ashlyn, what’s wrong?”

  I blinked. “Huh? Nothing. Thinking.”

  He shook his head. “No, really, what’s wrong? You tired?”

  I smiled. “Oh, hush, Caleb. I’m just preoccupied. My mind’s on Sunday.”

  He furrowed, then released, his brow. “Oh, your big day under the spotlight. You shouldn’t worry, it’ll be great. We’ll love it.”

  “You’ve never seen it.”

  “Doesn’t matter. I can tell just from knowing you.” He gave me a bear hug and stepped back without taking his hands from my shoulders, which he began kneading. “Look, Ash, I know it’ll be fine. And I promise to love it myself, no matter what.” He grinned.

  I shrugged my shoulders. Did he think I was a piece of dough? “Caleb, you idiot, you can hate it or love it or think it’s nothing more than child’s play. Just be honest. No one can say anything about my work I haven’t heard before, probably from myself.”

  When I’d called him an idiot he’d let go of me. Now he reached down and took my left palm with his right fingers. “Guess I am being stupid. Sorry, I shouldn’t have said anything so asinine.” He kissed the back of my hand and smiled. “Come sit outside with me, okay?” There went those crinkly eyes, the ones forcing me to smile back. I took my mug and followed him out the door.

  “So, are you ready for your exhibition?” I joined him on the swing.

  “I think so,” he said, putting his bowl down on the porch. “I like what I’ve done so far, anyway, I’m just going to work on mounting it tomorrow while you’re playing roots.”

  “Be nice.”

  He grinned and pushed the swing back swiftly, which had the net result of my tilting into his side as I tried to hold my mug up and away from my body.

  “Thanks.”

  His arm wrapped around my shoulders. “Sorry,” he said with a squeeze. “Did you spill?”

  His fascination with my shoulders was beginning to worry me. “No, it’s almost empty anyway.”

  “You need more? I’ll make it.”

  I shook my head. “I’m good. No more caffeine tonight, anyway, I need my beauty sleep.”

  “Hardly.”

  “Huh?” I looked at him.

  He winked. “Nothing.” His arm was still around me. I hoped Wren wasn’t feeling restless tonight.

  “I should turn in, too. Let’s leave these until morning,” Caleb said, nudging his bowl with his toe.

  “I’ll just carry them in,” I stood. The back of my neck felt chilly.

  When I came out, he was standing looking out towards the lake. His t-shirt was tight across his upper back. He fell into step beside me as I started down the porch steps.

  “I’m going to miss your cheerful morning smile after tomorrow,” he said.

  “Don’t worry, only three more weeks until we flip pancakes together again.”

  We were at the footbridge. Caleb turned towards me dramatically and grasped my hand between his two, drawing it to his chest. “Promise me you won’t flip pancakes with any other man until then.”

  I couldn’t resist giving him a sultry voice. “I didn’t realize my spatula was so important to you.”

  “Oh, but it is. It truly is.”

  “In that case, I promise.”

  He kissed my fingertips gallantly. “You have made my month, madam.” And when we started walking again, he forgot to unlink our hands. I figured it would be rude to do it myself, so I left my hand in his until I needed it to enter my door code.

  We just looked at each other for a minute while I stood in the half-opened door. Somehow, even though he wasn’t smiling, the wrinkles around Caleb’s dark eyes were still there.

  “Good night, then,” I finally said.

  “Sweet dreams, Ashlyn.”

  “Visions of maple syrup will dance in my head,” I assured him, and before he had quite started the motion to turn and walk away, I put my hand on his shoulder and leaned in to kiss his cheek. His hand grazed my hair when he kissed mine in return.

  “Sweet dreams, Caleb,” I said quietly, and went slowly in to bed.

  Chapter 7

  A volley of pebbles woke me. They fell skipping off the roof, window, and wood of my cabin, and I let out a little scream when I saw Lizzy’s face at the pane.

  “If you’d just set an alarm we wouldn’t have to resort to this,” she said, throwing herself onto her favorite spot in the corner.

  “Every one of you people is far too bothered by my dislike of clocks.” I turned to shower. “At least Caleb has the decency to knock loudly on the door and leave. I’m too much of a city gal to like seeing faces at my window.”

  “Grump.”

  I shut the bathroom door on her. Here I was devoting my day to her and she was criticizing.

  Wh
en I came out—fortuitously towel-wrapped—she and Caleb were sitting on my bed. “Make yourselves at home.”

  He started to stammer a reply, then stopped. She didn’t. “We were comparing this quilt to your stuff.”

  “Well, do it outside. I’m not in the mood for an audience.”

  They rose and Lizzy handed me my wet-hair comb. “I sure hope you get nicer before my parents arrive. They’re hardly going to be charmed by this sort of thing.”

  “Go away.” Again, I shut the door on her. Some retreat.

  They pretty much left me alone to make the coffee and juice once we got to the kitchen. He started to grate the carrots and she showed him her method of separating eggs. She launched into a rant about poppy seeds and he opted instead to add walnuts to the muffins. They both eyed the way I was slicing oranges for the juice until I glared them off. I almost didn’t remind her to wipe the flour off her forehead before Brandon came in for his early cuppa.

  After breakfast, as I washed the dishes and Lizzy taught Caleb how to dress up a lime marinade, a car came crunching and honking up the oyster shell road to the Main House. “God almighty, they’re early. They’re never early,” Lizzy said, wiping her hands on an apron.

  I looked out. A large silver sedan with more than its share of mud streaks at the wheel wells was rolling to a stop. The driver was not as short as she looked slumped back against the headrest, but the passenger was every bit as tall as his hair brushing against the roof led me to believe.

  “Elizabeth!” he called, unfolding from the seat. She walked off the porch and into his arms. “Say hello to your mother.”

  “I’m on my way.” She wrapped one arm around her mother’s softly framed body. As hard-wired as Lizzy was, they still looked alike. Images of Lizzy with fuzzy dove-colored hair and a cardigan didn’t come easily to mind, but it was suddenly easier to predict her features mellowing with age, her muscles plumping and her gold rims framing bifocals.

  She led them back up to the dining room, which I was clearing while pretending not to watch the reunion scene. Caleb picked up the drying towel and busied himself with passing in front of the kitchen door as often as possible.