Give & Take (Redbeard Cove #2)

37. Lana

Chapter 37

Lana

“ R aph comes home to-niiight, Raph comes home toniiiight!”

The girls sing an echo of what’s been spinning through my brain ever since I woke up this morning. Is it bad I’m as giddy as the two of them?

“Okay, okay!” I say as we clamor out the front door. “I get it, we’re excited!” The girls practically skip down the front stairs, while I glance over at my porch ceiling, where Raph cleaned out the rot and replaced the boards a few weeks ago. I still feel guilty about him doing all that free manual labor, even though that’s the least of what he’s done since he’s been here. He’s trimmed the hedges (that made for several innuendos I had to try hard not to wheeze at over dinner that night), hauled out and driven away all the junk in the basement—broken furniture and baby gear, mostly—and every week, he sorts Mrs. Brown’s recycling.

Speaking of which, Mrs. Brown waves at the girls from her porch as they skip past her front yard. I promised I’d take the kids down to the Bean Scene for ice cream before Raph got back from whatever urgent university meeting he had to deal with back home.

I’m still on top of my stairs when she calls over to me, “Where’s that handsome babysitter of yours?” She’s shameless. I’ve seen her peeking out her blinds when Raph mows the front lawn. Debbie Mathers across the street, too.

“He’s out of town for a few days,” I tell her.

“He’s coming back tonight!” Aurora says, jumping up and down over on her path.

“Goodness, Lana, what are you going to do when he heads back to California?”

My eyebrows lift. “How?—”

Mrs. Brown waves a hand. “You know how it is in this town. Everyone knows everyone else’s business.”

I laugh, but it’s a little shaky. “I guess so.” No one’s been saying anything to me. But I don’t exactly engage in gossip.

It was foolish of me to think we might have escaped notice. In the past couple of weeks, Raph’s been spending less time at the coffee shop and home working on his paper after hours and more with us.

With me.

Suddenly I wonder if that’s what the emergency meeting was about at his university. Is he behind? Has being with me jeopardized his degree?

“Well? What are you going to do?”

My stomach, already twisting, tightens. I want to leave my porch and end this conversation. But Mrs. Brown is a kind woman. She’s often offered to look after the girls before, and has once or twice, though I never lean on her, given her age and frailty. I paste on a smile. “The girls will be back in school. They’ll miss him. But we’ll manage.”

Mrs. Brown takes a sip of her lemonade, her eyes crinkled in a smile as she watches Nova and Aurora do cartwheels on her lawn. “I’m not talking about your girls, sweetheart.”

I blanch. What does she know? Sometimes I think Mrs. Brown misses everything. Other times, she surprises me.

I’ve gotten sloppy.

“He’s been wonderful,” I say tightly. “I’ll certainly miss him. I really should get going, I promised the girls ice cream.”

“Sweetheart,” Mrs. Brown says. “I say if you’re enjoying yourself, don’t listen to what anyone else has to say about it. Did you know Mr. Brown liked to wear women’s underwear?”

I nearly choke on my next breath. “Um…no I…” there is zero reason I would know this fact.

“Well he did. It was a harmless thing, strange at first for me, but when I was assured that was his only kink, and it made him happy, well I didn’t get in his way. I just told him he couldn’t wear mine. Stretched out my favorite girdle, see. That was the end of that.”

I’m truly at a loss for words. My octogenarian neighbor just said the word ‘kink’.

“Anyhoo, that hussy Mabel Johnson down at the Sears put two and two together when he started buying things for husky ladies. The fool man put them on in the restroom and—well she spread it round the whole town. Poor Mr. Brown was humiliated, lost some good friends. Luckily he worked in the Mayor’s office, and the Mayor, bless him, was the kindest man known to this town. Next to his son.”

Our town’s beloved ex-mayor is Mac’s father.

“Mom!” Nova calls from the yard.

“Well,” Mrs. Brown says. “All I’m saying is we thought that business with my husband was going to ruin us. But let me tell you, he had several people act very kindly toward him too, over the years. I think they had their own skeletons they felt a little better about bearing. So if you’re concerned stepping out with that fine boy is going to hurt you or your beautiful girls in some way—well don’t you worry. You’ll probably help loosen this town up. Worst case is some other scandal will come along soon enough.”

I stand there a moment longer, reeling from this unexpected, and frankly, shocking wisdom, from my neighbor. She gives me a broad smile, then returns to her book.

Which I could swear is the Bible.

At the Bean Scene, Dolly, the part-owner of the shop, is so delighted to see the girls, she comes around the counter and gives them each a hug, and a handful of stickers she’s been saving for them. Dolly’s one of my favorite people in Redbeard Cove. She looks exactly like her namesake—petite, voluptuous, and bottle blonde, and is as smart and kind as she is too. Plus she always remembers my coffee order, and treats my girls like little adults, in the best way.

“This one instantly made me think of you, honey,” she says to Nova, holding up a sticker of a cow skull wrapped in a snake.

“Coooool!” Nova exclaims, enraptured.

With anyone else I might be insulted they thought something so dark made them think of my eight-year-old, but not Dolly. She knows Nova. And she knows me and what I’m okay with. After going through the other stickers she got for my eldest, she gushes over Aurora next, handing her a stack of butterflies and rainbows while they talk about how pretty that real life rainbow was the other day.

“You going to actually serve the customers sometime tonight?” comes a grumbly voice from the door to the back.

I look up to see Miles, the other owner of the shop.

“It’s fine,” I say, instantly defensive. “We’re not in any hurry.”

Dolly stands up. “Thank you, Lana. The only thing scaring off customers is you,” she tosses at her business partner.

Miles grumbles, but seeing no other customers requiring attention, retreats to the back.

Dolly rolls her eyes. “I swear one day there’ll be only one of us running this shop,” she says. She leans in and whispers to me, “And that’s because I’ll be in jail for attempted murder!”

I laugh out loud at this and we place our order .

The two shop owners get along so poorly the whole town’s been waiting for the day our lone coffee shop closes up when their relationship finally falls completely apart. But somehow, in the three years since Miles’ brother—and Dolly’s husband—tragically passed, transferring ownership to her, they’ve managed to keep the place going.

Maybe when the shop finally shutters and the two sue each other—or something—that’ll be the scandal that distracts from me and Raph?

The thought makes me almost laugh. I admonish myself. Because Redbeard Cove is not going to find out about me and Raph. Me and Raph are nothing more than a secret, lovely fling.

A heart-wrenching, perfect fling with two people that are a decade and a half out of sync.

I’ve done my best not to think of what happens at the end of the summer, taking Raph’s advice that there’s no need to borrow pain from tomorrow when we’ve got today to enjoy.

But in the days since he’s been gone, it’s been impossible to avoid.

Outside, we’ve got the patio to ourselves. The girls and I eat our respective ice creams and talk about my birthday tomorrow. They always get upset with me for not wanting to make a big deal about it, but this time they’re surprisingly laying off. I suspect Raphael has had a hand in that. They still want me to guess what they got me. Another thing Raph has had a hand in I’m sure.

“Duck slippers?” I guess, remembering the pair we saw in the store a few weeks ago .

“Nope,” says Aurora, her face covered in bubblegum ice cream.

“Bubble bath?”

“Mom, please,” Nova says. “You have so much bubble bath already.” Her disdain is pure teen, but the little boop of ice cream on her nose is still my little girl.

We keep playing as we watch the evening traffic go by. It’s nothing compared to the traffic jams back in Vancouver I used to sit in coming home from work. Here, there’s the odd car, plus a pedestrian or two, most of whom we know and some who stop and chat with the girls.

And when we’re at the ends of our cones, a flashy motorcycle I recognize as Cal Howard’s. It roars obnoxiously as he comes to a stop at the red light next to us.

Predictably, Cal’s got a woman on the back of his bike. I’d roll my eyes, except I know for a fact that if you’re going to have a quick fling, Cal’s an excellent choice. He’s a gentleman through and through, even though he’s a bachelor for life. Chris—who tried dating him once and said it was like kissing a brother—says he ends every relationship in a way where he’s actually remained friends with several of the women he’s dated. “I have no idea how he does that when technically he just goes around breaking hearts.”

Cal hasn’t seen me. He’s tipped his helmet in the opposite direction, towards his passenger as he presumably says something to her. But as the motorcycle idles, I can’t help focus on his shoes. Cal’s tall, but not out of the range of normal tall. He’s not size thirteen shoes tall, like Raph .

He also doesn’t have those very recognizable green sneakers I know Raph likes to wear.

The ones on the motorcyclist’s feet right now. Next to that cord on his left ankle…

I barely notice my ice cream cone dropping on the ground. My stomach falls, just like the lump of vanilla. Blood rushes in my ears, my heart thundering as I try to tell myself I’m not seeing what I’m seeing.

“Mom!” Nova says.

I think I’m going to be sick.

“Mom, what’s wrong?”

“Shoes,” I say. My eyes are on the bike. On the man I’m trying very hard not to fall in love with on a motorcycle with a woman wrapped around his back.

“Hey, that’s Raph!” Nova says. “Raph!” she yells.

The light turns green.

“ Raph!” The girls yell in unison.

“No,” I croak, my voice too quiet for them to hear.

It’s too late, anyway. Both heads on the bike swivel in our direction.

Raph’s head drops slightly.

That fucker.

But the woman—the woman climbs right off the bike and comes running over here.

Horror clenches my stomach. What the fuck is going on?

Vaguely I notice Raph’s done a quick U-turn, parking right in front of the curb.

But mostly I’m focused on the woman, who’s screaming inside her helmet. I pull Nova and Aurora back, my hackles all the way up. Is she going to attack me?

“Stay away!” I yell.

There’s a crash inside the restaurant. “Lana?”

Dolly’s calling my name.

But the woman’s paused on the other side of the fence, seeming to realize she needs to take her helmet off.

“Lana, what’s going on?”

I’m wild-eyed, I know. “Take the girls!” I cry. If this woman wants to fight, is that what I’m going to do? I’ve gotten into altercations before, but they’ve always been verbal. And controlled. In a courtroom, or when Mike and I were falling apart, in hushed tones in our bedroom.

“What?” Dolly’s alarmed, but Raph’s got his helmet off now, his thick hair tousled above his head. “No!” he cries. “Lana, it’s fine, I?—”

There’s more muffled sounds coming from the woman. She’s stuck.

I’d laugh if any of this were funny. Except Raph helps her. Helps her. Rage and jealousy course through me at the gentle way he leans over and untangles her straps.

That is, until he pops the helmet off the woman’s head.

And I see my mother.

My jaw unhinges from my head as I reel with this rapid turn of events.

The girls, who I’m still hanging onto, squeal, wrestling from my grasp. “Grandma! Raph!” They yell, tripping over themselves trying to get to the two of them on the other side of the little iron chain .

Aurora throws herself at Raph, Nova at Mom.

Then they switch, and my mom is reaching out her arms to me. “Oh honey. Don’t look so shocked.”

“Mom?” I say, my voice half-broken. I can barely move as she pulls me into a tight squeeze. “I thought…you weren’t supposed to be back yet, I?—”

“How could I miss my little girl’s birthday?” she asks, hands on my shoulders.

I’m so shaken, I still can barely register what’s going on.

“Surprise,” Raph says, looking sheepish.

“Mom, you should hug Raph,” Aurora says. “You missed him.”

My chest seems to fold in on itself then. All the panic I just felt, the jealousy, the betrayal—it was completely misplaced. Not just because Raph didn’t do anything wrong, but because it wouldn’t be wrong if he had. We’re not together, I remind myself.

I don’t realize I’ve said it out loud until Raphael’s jaw clicks, and he glances at my mother.

Mom looks between us, realization dawning.

I can see the pieces drop into place in her expression. The way he had to have been planning this for a while. A little unusual for the nanny. The outsized reaction I just had to seeing Raphael with another woman.

The way Aurora revealed how close we are—that hugging is something not unusual between us.

The way he’s looking at me now.

“Okay girls,” Mom says slowly. “What about if you and I walk home together? I think your Mom needs a turn on this bike. ”

“What?” I say, finally clicking back into reality. “No, I don’t—that’s fine. We can all go home.”

“No, really,” Mom says. “It seems you two have a few things to talk about.”

“I want a ride on the bike!” Nova says.

“No,” All three adults say at once. Four, actually. I turn to see Miles, standing behind Dolly, a grim look on his face. Dolly’s expression is pale.

Guilt jumps into the fray in my stomach. “I’m sorry,” I say. I must have scared the crap out of the coffee shop owners.

“We good here?” Miles asks. His voice is steely, but not unkind. It’s just the way he is.

When I apologize again, he just shakes his head. Then, to my surprise, he rests his hands on Dolly’s shoulders and guides her away with shocking gentleness.

“Come on, sweethearts,” Mom tells my kids. “I want to hear all about your summer.”

Before I really understand what’s happening, I’m alone with Raph. He’s got two helmets in his hands.

I want to shove him. To tell him he scared the shit out of me.

I want to fall into his arms.

I want to scream and cry and fall apart just so he can put me together again.

Instead, I reach out for a helmet, and say, “Well? Let’s go.”