As Waters Gone By Read online

  Emmalyn could almost see their rented bikes propped up against the tree’s trunk those years ago as she and Max explored the widened shoulder where footprints in the velvet sand told them other visitors like them had stopped to take in the view. Miles of north woods forest around them, then an opening where passersby could see Lake Superior splashing pebbles that eventually became sand. Intoxicating.

  “I want to live here someday,” she’d said, more whim than wish.

  “It’s a sign,” Max had answered.

  “Of what?”

  He’d tilted his head and smiled that crooked, charming smile. “It’s . . . a . . . sign. A For Sale sign.”

  He’d been leaning against it, blocking what it said, but stepped away to reveal a weathered For Sale sign with a phone number inked across the bottom.

  They’d picnicked on the sandiest and driest part of the shore that day, taking turns imagining what they’d do if they could own a scene like that. Max brought up the issue of taxes several times. “Lakefront property? Babe, impossible.”

  “I know. I wasn’t really serious.”

  In the end, they’d called the number of the realtor. Just to talk. Ask a few questions. The realtor drove out and showed them the property, including the small cottage somewhere in the trees beyond where Emmalyn parked the Prius. Right around this curve of shoreline. Right up this embankment—a science classroom’s dream example of erosion.

  She crested the embankment now, as they had then. What romantic notions had clouded their thinking that day? The sight that greeted her nearly stopped her heart, and in a wholly unromantic way.

  If she counted only the sweet waves tickling the shore, or the bleached late-season sea grass responding to the breeze, the birches and pines and maple tapestry, she would have been charmed. But the cottage that had seemed adorable so few years ago had grown as pale as Emmalyn felt, as disappointed by life.

  Windows shuttered, it looked comatose. She stepped tentatively onto the front porch, patting the wooden banister as if to say, “You poor thing.” Emmalyn needed time to absorb the challenge ahead of her before Cora the Roofer arrived. She extracted her phone from her shoulder bag and opened the notes app. She wondered how many more days the temps would linger above fifty degrees so she could do exterior painting. It wasn’t bad, really. All things considered. Mostly the trim work. Noted.

  When had the cottage been built? The 40s? When she and Max first saw it, they were taken with its quaint concept. It was a word they’d turned to each other and said as if mirroring each other’s thoughts. How long had it been since their thoughts were in the same library, much less on the same page?

  But Max wasn’t the issue today. Making a new home for herself, for them, loomed as the crisis du jour. And what she had to work with was the vacant quaintness with the wide many-paned windows on either side of double many-paned doors . . . shuttered to keep light from getting in or out.

  She slid the key into the lock and braced herself for what she’d find inside.

  “Why didn’t I bring a flashlight?”

  “I have two.”

  The rich voice from high above jammed her heart into overdrive. Her heel caught on the raised threshold in her retreat, but she caught herself. “Cora?”

  “It’s me. Up here.”

  As Emmalyn’s eyes adjusted to the dusty half-light, she could see Cora’s shadow through the eerie blue tarp where the kitchen ceiling should be at the rear of the cottage.

  “My massage canceled on me. Just getting a feel for what we’ve got structurally up here. It doesn’t look that bad. You didn’t happen to call to have the electricity hooked up, did you?”

  By the glow from her phone, Emmalyn made another note. “Didn’t think of it.”

  “I won’t be able to use any power tools until we get that taken care of. Or, I could bring my generator.”

  “I’ll call right away. You said you had an extra flashlight?”

  “In my truck. Wayne’s truck. Out back.”

  Emmalyn Googled Madeline Island Electric Company on her way around the exterior of the cottage. No search matches. Bayfield County Electric Company. Ashland County Electric Company. A squirrel dashed through the crisp leaves at her feet. Time to pay attention to where she was walking.

  “In” the truck could mean anything. The back of the overgrown pickup held a wide array of ladders, sawhorses, a massive toolbox, ropes, looped extension cords. Emmalyn wondered if the truck was this tidy when Wayne used it. After perusing the bed of the vehicle, she skirted around to the passenger side of the cab. A massive flashlight suitable for search and rescue or dark crawl spaces lay on the seat. She clicked it on and off to check its power. Strong enough to light the whole cottage. At least the first floor.

  The flashlight was almost unnecessary by the time Emmalyn reentered the building. The blue haze was gone, the tarp removed. A jagged edged, branch-shaped open skylight let in the sun at the back of the cottage. She clicked on the flashlight anyway and set it on its heavy base on a table near the door with its beam aimed up to reflect off the lower ceiling in the living area. The two small bedrooms upstairs stood between Emmalyn and the rest of the roof.

  “What do you know!” Cora called from her rooftop perch.

  “What is it?”

  “The clock in the kitchen is still keeping time.” She stuck an arm down through the hole in the roof and pointed east. “Oh, wait a minute. I don’t see the second hand moving. Must have stopped years ago at just this spot. Kind of freaky, huh?”

  Emmalyn dodged shadowed furniture, most of which she catalogued as unsalvageable on her way toward the back of the cottage.

  “Don’t get too close,” Cora warned. “I’m on a solid spot here, but I can’t guarantee something isn’t going to come crashing down.”

  “Is the damage confined to the kitchen?”

  “The roof over the front half looks good.”

  “What do you suggest?”

  “Skylight. If it were me, I’d take this opportunity to install a skylight. You’ll never find shingles to match these. And I don’t imagine you’re willing to replace the whole roof at this point.”

  Emmalyn peered at the hole. “It isn’t as bad as I imagined. But it went straight through the ceiling, too?” That explained the drifts of insulation on the floor of the kitchen.

  “Good thing no one was cooking supper in there. Looks like the branch shot straight down. Too bad the guys removed it. Could have made a conversation piece.”

  She was kidding, wasn’t she? Had to be.

  “I like the skylight idea, Cora. How long do you think it would take me to get one out here?”

  Cora stuck an arm down through the hole and pointed west. “If you like the one I have in the truck, we can make a deal. We got stuck with it when a previous client decided it was too large for her bathroom, but it was an ‘as is.’ No returns.”

  “Damaged?”

  “Scratch and dent. Still in the box though.”

  Emmalyn remembered seeing a big box in the back of the truck. “Do I want a dented skylight?”

  “Meet me out there and you can take a look. I’m pretty particular, and I’d put it in my own house if Wayne would let me. Would your husband have a problem with a skylight?”

  Courage and truth. “He’s been living in a prison cell for four years. He’d probably appreciate the extra light, providing we’re still together when he’s released. It’s not . . . a given . . . from his side, anyway.”

  No response from the rooftop.

  “Too much information?” Far more than she’d intended to share. Emmalyn’s awkward chuckle landed somewhere near the pile of loose insulation.

  “We have more in common than you’d think.” Cora’s voice had lost its business tone. “For one thing, we’re both trying to figure out how to hold a marriage together when our men are missing in action.”

  * * *

  “Nobody on the island knows about Max’s incarceration.”

  �
��I won’t be the one to tell them. That’s up to you.”

  “Thank you.” Emmalyn positioned herself to help slide the skylight box out of the truck.

  “On the one hand, it’s nobody’s business.” The woman used her knees to scoot the box toward the opened tailgate. A foot at a time.

  “And on the other hand?”

  “Keeping information like that to yourself means you’re carrying”—another heave with her knee—“the whole load”—another final heave—“by yourself.”

  Emmalyn balanced the end of the box while Cora jumped down so they could lower the box to the ground together. Cora grabbed a box cutter from her tool belt and sliced the tape on one end.

  The picture on the outside of the box had Emmalyn convinced this was far better than simply covering the hole in her roof, if it passed her own set of inspection standards. If Cora was “pretty particular,” she might be shell-shocked by Emmalyn’s level of particular.

  Cora found a way to peel back the box sides so Emmalyn could get a good look.

  “Here. This spot here on the edge.”

  “That’s the dent?”

  “That’s it. I’ve gone over the whole unit. This is its flaw.”

  “Who would see that?”

  “Angels and low-flying eagles.”

  Emmalyn rubbed her hand along the edge. “Wouldn’t this part be facing the peak of the roof? Not visible from the ground?”

  “True.”

  “Would it affect sealing it adequately? Would it leak?”

  “I’d have to guarantee that for you. I’m confident it won’t. But if it did, it would be on me to remove it and replace it. I’m not worried. If it were here”—she pointed—“that would be a different story. But this won’t affect its structural or functional integrity.”

  Something that felt like a wave of excitement stirred. Excitement. “I like it. I really like the idea. How much for the whole project? Labor and everything?”

  “Let me check inside on the second floor to make sure I didn’t miss anything, no collateral water damage. Then we’ll talk about price.”

  “Good thought.”

  “And you might want to consider having Joe work his exterminator magic. I’m sure you’ve noticed that mice have been leaving you little presents.”

  She had noticed. Mousetraps were already on her list. “Joe’s an exterminator?”

  “Not professionally. But he’s got the touch. He’s who we all call when the little critters decide they’d rather live inside than out. Now, there’s a man with a story to tell. Funny how life does that to us. Drags us through something that turns into a story.”

  The two women took the narrow, twisting stairs from the living area to the slope-ceilinged second floor, flashlights well in hand. Talk of critters made Emmalyn see movement where there wasn’t any.

  When Max and friends used the cottage for hunting, they brought cots and sleeping bags. The larger of the bedrooms held a double bed. The smaller was empty. The master bedroom had a bed. The children’s bedroom would never need one.

  Never.

  Max’s sentence had seen to that. Not that there’d been more than a whiff of hope left.

  “It’s plenty warm up here,” Cora said. “Considering the current natural air conditioning. This the bathroom? Petite. You planning on . . . ?”

  “Replacing that toilet? Yes.”

  “Don’t blame you. Might want to take pictures the day your new toilet comes riding across the lake on the ferry. Something to tell your grandkids.”

  That familiar hollowness settled in Emmalyn’s middle. “No grandkids.”

  “Not yet. You’re not old enough. Young people these days. Two extremes. Either they have their babies before they’re out of high school or they wait until their 401Ks are healthy and their energy’s gone.” She backed out of the bathroom—one-way traffic—and shined her flashlight on the ceiling in the narrow hallway. “Are your kids in middle school yet? Now, there’s a challenge.”

  This courage-and-truth thing was getting annoying. “Max and I don’t have any children.”

  “Oh. Sorry. I mean, if that’s your choice . . . ”

  “New subject, please.”

  Cora turned her flash-lit face toward Emmalyn. “Do you know what I’d do if I were you?”

  Here it came. Try what my nephew and his wife did. Seems odd, but it works. There’s this new herbal supplement guaranteed to increase fertility. I know where I can get some cheap. Quit thinking about it. It always happens when you’re not thinking about it. If you adopt, you’re sure to get pregnant. Happened to a cousin of mine. Which version of the above would Cora use on her? She sighed. “What would you do?”

  “I’d have a painter spray-paint the entire place white, ceilings and walls. All this dark wood on the walls makes it like a tomb in here. And it’s not as if it’s high-quality wood. I realize we don’t have the shutters off yet, but even with the windows letting in light, don’t you think these dark walls will make it claustrophobic? Paint the whole thing white. Then you can tackle one room at a time with fancy colors, if you want. That’s what I’d do.”

  She’d asked Cora to drop the subject and she had. Wonder of wonders.

  “You don’t want it to stay looking like a hunting cabin, do you?” Cora said.

  “No. It needs to be a . . . a home.”

  “More like a beach cottage, since that’s what it is.” She drew a screwdriver from her tool belt and started removing the braces on the interior shutters in the smaller bedroom. “A little help, here?”

  Emmalyn no longer cared if her sweater was cobwebbed and the hems of her jeans cockleburred. It was time to roll up her sleeves and let in some light. She held the bottom of the makeshift, removable shutter while Cora worked her screwdriver. Together they removed first one, then another of the shutter panels.

  “And that’s why you bought this place,” Cora said.

  “Dead flies on the windowsills?”

  Cora frowned and stepped out of the way so Emmalyn could catch the full effect of the view. That endless expanse of fresh- water. Waves like an ocean. Without the salt. A corner of the largest freshwater lake in the world lay right in front of her, sparkling in the sun as if dressed for a gala. She unlatched the window lock and opened it.

  The breeze that blew in carried away bits of debris clinging to her soul. She closed her eyes and let the crisp October air reassure her she could have a future here, despite the hole in the roof, the mouse droppings, the bizarre collection of potential friends she’d met, the empty second bedroom, and the fact that her husband had changed their lives forever, not just for the five years of his sentence.

  5

  Before Cora headed out to round up a crew for the skylight installation, she and Emmalyn had removed all the shutters and stored them in the small, scruffy, unpainted shed behind the cottage. Emmalyn had gotten through to the electric company, who promised power would be reconnected “in a day or two.” Cora would use her portable generator for power tools until then. But it would be a while before the cottage was habitable.

  Emmalyn added to the list of cleaning supplies she’d need, kitchen supplies, the bare minimum furniture. Nothing in the storage unit back in Lexington seemed right for the cottage. Either too bulky, too much, or too memory-caked. She’d start fresh. That word again.

  The trunk of the Prius contained boxes of kitchen essentials, a favorite lamp, and a small microwave in addition to her single-cup coffeemaker. She’d brought a quarter of one closet of clothes. It appeared the only ones she’d need for a while were painting togs and anything she didn’t mind getting dirty.

  When the interior pulled her into shadowed thoughts, she forced her attention to the view through the windows that faced the water. It never failed to calm her—a liquid version of the effect she’d found when she’d opened her Bible and soaked in it in her late teens. Before college, before Max, before marriage, her career, their frantic pursuit of a child.

  She still
carried her Bible around. It was in the backseat somewhere. It just didn’t carry her anymore.

  A dangerous thought. Time to take the stubby broom to the porch floorboards.

  One thing. If she could get one thing about this place in order today . . .

  One thing. Each stroke of the broom underscored how many broom strokes, brush strokes, how many near-strokes it would take for her to pull this place together.

  But she wasn’t alone. Her EMT/librarian/roofer/masseuse had committed to help her massage life into old wood, breathe air into the tired lungs of the cottage.

  How had Max and his guy friends tolerated—? She knew the answer. They didn’t care about the building. They had each other and a common goal. The island’s whitetail deer.

  Each other and a common goal.

  Sweep. Sweep. Sweep.

  That’s what she thought she had with Max, too.

  She leaned the broom against the railing of the porch and sat on the freshly swept steps. The sound of the waves had already become more music than nature. This part would be easy to get used to.

  Whitewash the entire interior of the cottage? Not a bad idea.

  Ho. Leee. Ho-leee. Ho-leee. Ho-leee. The wave sound was deeper, rounder, as it rushed ashore, higher pitched and thinner as it retreated, taking small pebbles and sand with it. HO-leee. HO-leee. HO-leee.

  Holy. Holy. Holy.

  Coincidence. Pure coincidence.

  * * *

  A beautiful distraction. The mesmerizing waves. Habit tried to steer her thoughts to her losses, as it always did when life got too quiet. But the rustle of waves kept interrupting, as if pulling the thoughts out to deeper water, leaving her mind damp but empty.