Summer Island

Not true. Every letter shed attempted began the same: Dear readers.

Sometimes she came up with a sad, pathetic beginning-Im more sorry than you can know . . . . or How can I begin to say whats in my heart. . . . or By now you all know who I really am.

But there was never a second sentence. And if all that wasnt bad enough, she was worried about Ruby.

Her gaze landed on the note shed found sitting on the kitchen table. Dear Nora-Gone to see Dad.

It looked innocuous enough, but appearances were often deceiving. Ruby wasnt coming back.

It was Noras own fault. Shed pushed her daughter too hard in the past few days, and that was dangerous. Ruby always shoved back; she had from infancy. Unlike Caroline, who smiled coolly and he your hand and stepped aside when reality got too cl

ose.

Nora had recognized her mistake the second she saw the good-bye note. Her daughter had had enough.

She slumped forward, dropping her head onto her crossed arms. A good cry would probably help, but she couldnt find even that easy road to relief. She was wrung dry.

Then she heard a car drive up . . . footsteps on the porch . . .

The door opened, and Rand stepped into the kitchen.

Nora understood instantly: Ruby had sent her father to deliver the bad news.

“Hey, Randall,” she said, pulling her casted leg off the second chair. “Have a seat. ”

He glanced around. “Ive got a better idea. ”

Before hed even finished the sentence, hed crossed the room and scooped her into his arms. She made a garbled, whooping sound of surprise and put her arms around his neck, hanging on. “What the-”

“Just hang on. ”

She clung to him as he carried her over the threshold and out onto the porch. There, he pulled an old mohair blanket off of the rocker and wedged it under his arm. He walked down the steps, across the shaggy lawn, out to the edge of the bank.

Beneath a huge madrona tree, he laid the blanket over the rocky ground, then gingerly set her down. Her bare toes stuck out from the end of her cast, and he leaned over and tucked the fringed end of the blanket around her foot.

He sat down beside her, propped up on his elbows, and stretched out his long legs.

“Still cant stand to be inside on a sunny day?” she said.

“Some things never change. ” He turned to her, his face solemn. “Im sorry, Nora. ”

“About what?”

His gaze shifted to a point just beyond her left shoulder. “I should have said it a long time ago. ”

She drew in a breath. Time seemed to hang suspended between them. She felt the hot summer sunlight on her face, smelled the familiar fragrance of the sea at low tide.

He looked at her finally, and in his eyes, she saw the sad reflection of their life together. “Im sorry,” he said again, knowing that this time she understood.

“Oh,” was all she could say.

He leaned closer, touched her face with a gentleness that sapped her strength. “It was my fault. All mine. We both know that. I was young and stupid and cocky. I didnt know how special we were. ”

Nora was surprised by how easy it was suddenly for her to smile. Shed spent twenty years loving this man, eleven more vaguely missing him, and yet now, with him beside her on an old blanket that held their youth in its rough weave, she finally felt at peace. Maybe that was all shed needed, all these years. Just those few, simple words.

She laid her hand against his, and a peacefulness settled around her, as if everything in their lives had led to this moment. He was her youth, she realized sadly, a youth that was neither well spent nor quite misspent. Just . . . spent. In his eyes, and his alone, was the woman shed once been. “We were both at fault, Rand. We tried. We justdidnt make it. ”

He leaned closer. She thought for a breathless moment that he was going to kiss her. He wanted to-she could see the desire in his eyes. But at the last second, he drew back, gave her a smile so soft and tender it was better than a kiss. “When I look back-and believe me, I try not to--you know what I remember?”