Into the Darkest Day
“That is, if you can get away? I know you must be busy with everything.”
“It’s okay.” Tina was covering the shop, and balancing the books could wait. Again. “I’d love to come,” she said, and she heard the smile in Simon’s voice as he responded.
“Brilliant. I’ll give y
ou the address for your phone. Bring Bailey, if you like.”
An hour later, Abby was driving towards Lake Geneva, a thermos of fresh lemonade in the backseat, along with some homemade chocolate chip cookies she’d baked the day before, and the medal wrapped in the old silk handkerchief. She’d left Bailey at home, sprawled by the stove, looking like all she wanted was a nice, long snooze.
The sun was shining and the day was baking hot, and nerves jangled in her stomach, along with an undeniable sense of excitement. This almost felt like a date. Maybe it was one. Maybe she could be crazy enough to consider it one, to act like it. Shannon would want her to. She imagined her friend’s exaggerated mic-drop moment. He invited you for a picnic? And you brought lemonade? When are you sending out the wedding announcements?
Abby was still smiling as she spotted the sign for Holmwood Farm and turned up the dirt road, then parked the car by an old, weathered barn. The place had been easy to find, right off Route 12, between Big Foot Beach State Park and the town of Lake Geneva—a prime piece of property that developers would no doubt love to get their hands on, if the dairy farmer ever decided to sell up.
She got her things out of the back and then headed across the grass to the small cabin, little more than a glorified shed with a tacked-on porch, that was only a dozen or so feet from the edge of the lake.
She paused as she gazed at the lake shimmering beneath a cloudless sky, blue glinting under blue. In the distance, a motorboat skimmed along the water, and if she swam out past this little inlet, she knew she’d be able to see the large floats and cordoned-off areas of the town’s Riviera Beach, where her mom used to take her when she was little. Her and Luke, splashing, playing Marco Polo, lying on the little beach, their legs dusted with sand…
Abby clamped down on that thought before she could let it take root, even though she knew that, of course, it already had. All the old memories were there in her mind already, burrowed deep. She just couldn’t let them spring up. Take over. Because she was afraid of what might happen if she did.
“You made it.” Simon came out onto the little porch of his cabin, resting his hands on the railing as he smiled his welcome. “What do you think of my palace?”
“It’s amazing. Prime real estate, right here.”
“I know, right? Though somehow I don’t think Andrew Holmwood is going to sell to Wisconsin’s next water park.”
“No?” Abby met Simon’s dancing gaze, her mouth tugging upwards as it always seemed to do in his presence. His happiness, his joy, felt infectious. Easy. “His family’s probably been here for a hundred years.”
“A hundred and fifty.”
She laughed, and he nodded towards the thermos and Tupperware in her arms. “What have you brought me?”
“Cookies and lemonade.”
“You angel.” Grinning, he liberated her parcels from her, taking them inside.
The medal was in her shoulder bag, still wrapped in its handkerchief.
Abby followed him inside—the cabin was simplicity itself, a corner carved off as a kitchen, a folding table with two chairs, and a double bed in the corner. The best thing about it was the large window overlooking the lake.
“It’s rather basic, but it does the job,” Simon said. “Are you hungry? I’ve made chicken salad sandwiches.”
“That sounds perfect.”
“Why don’t we go outside? It seems criminal to stay a second in here with a day like this one.” Simon gathered up all their provisions and they headed back out.
The shoreline of the lake was a strip of scrubby sand and not much more, the water shallow and clear, looking almost golden in the sunlight, the colors of everything—the sky, the lake, the trees—so bright and pure it hurt Abby’s eyes, even as it made her want to stare and stare, take it all in.
“How do you cope with these summers?” Simon asked as he spread out a blanket for them to sit on. “I mean, day after day of the most gorgeous weather. How do you not talk about it all the time, just exclaiming over how amazing it is?”
“Isn’t that what you Brits do? Talk about the weather?”
“Only because it’s so miserable.” He sat down, then patted the space next to him. “Now show me this medal.”
Shyly, as if she were offering him a treasure—and perhaps she was—Abby took the wrapped medal from her bag and handed it over as she sat down. Simon unwrapped it with the reverence it seemed to deserve, studying it carefully, holding the heft of it in his hand.
“Wow,” he said quietly.
“I have no idea why my grandfather had it.”