Luke
“Ma, we gotta talk.” I find her in the kitchen slicing tomatoes.
“Is it about that review?” She doesn’t look up from the cutting board, just grabs another handful of grape tomatoes and continues slicing. I’m not entirely surprised she knows already. I am surprised she seems so unbothered by it though.
“Yeah… Look, I?—”
“Honey, sit down.” The knife slices through the tomato once more before she wipes it on her apron and sets it on the butcher block in front of her.
“Ma—”
“Sit.”
I pull the stool out and prop my elbows on the white marble kitchen island, knee bouncing under the ledge. Ma pours water into the teakettle and places it on the stove, pulling two mugs and two tea bags from the cabinet. My heart rate spikes, my knee bouncing faster.
When I was a little boy, Ma made herself some tea and sat me here at this counter. That was the day she told me, with tears in her eyes, my cousin was going to live with us. I sat at this counterwhen Dad told me he had cancer. Ma had three mugs of tea set before us as he told me his prognosis.
The day I told her Samantha had left and she wasn’t coming back, Ma said, “Some things simply aren’t meant to be,” as she slid the steaming cup of herbal tea across the counter.
Tea was Ma’s way of bringing comfort to a tough conversation.
The kettle whistles from the stovetop. Ma takes the stool beside me, placing the mug in front of me.
“I told you how your father and I met, didn’t I?” she asks, blowing on the steam swirling above her mug.
“Yeah. You met on the lake, fell in love, and here we are.”
“Ah yes, you got the abbreviated version, but there’s more to it.” She reaches for the honey and dribbles some into her tea, then passes it to me.
“I was on my way overseas when I came to Maple Cove. I was supposed to go to one of the most prestigious culinary schools in France, but I wanted to spend the summer with my best friend, so I came here and waited tables with Joanie at her dad’s tavern.”
Joanie and Ma were college roommates for two years until Ma changed her major. She switched to a different school that specialized in the culinary arts but kept in touch with Joanie. She always said when your heart finds its person, it knows. Whether that person is a lifelong best friend or a great love doesn’t matter. In her case, it turned out Joanie was her lifelong friend.
I don’t think I knew about France, though.
“I remember the first time your dad walked through those tavern doors. Thought my heart would leap right out of my chest. He walked in like he knew the world would stop and stare, and loved every minute of it.” She smiles at the memory and lifts her tea to her lips. I try to imagine my dad as a young man, but all I can see anymore are those last days.
“We were three peas in a pod—Joanie, your dad, and me. All summer. He helped his father with his construction business. We waited tables at the tavern. On our days off, we’d swim in thelake, take the boat out, or ride our bikes to the next town over for a night out. Your dad and I began to steal some time to be alone together. We’d look at the stars, take long walks. Over time, the affection we felt for each other turned into love, though neither of us wanted to admit that.”
Liv finds her way into my mind again, the way she has more often than I care to admit these last few days. Ma stares into her tea, her fingers rubbing mindlessly across the glazed ceramic mug.
“By the end of the summer, I wasn’t sure I wanted to go to France anymore. My heart wasn’t in it the way it had been before. I kept waiting for your father to ask me to stay, but he never did.” She shakes her head as if still in disbelief over how things played out back then.
“Listen, I came to talk to you about that review. It’s serious.” I angle my body to face hers, knee propped up on the leg of the stool.
“I’d bet money that girl would have stayed if you'd just told her you wanted her to.”
“What?” I jerk back.
“Oh please. I suspected you were sneaking around with Miss Weston. Boy, you’ve never spent so much time in this house. Not to mention that window over there shows me everything and anything I need to know about what’s happening. I saw the two of you. There’s something there, and you let it go.”
My hand involuntarily pushes through my hair. I should have known. Nothing gets past Mae Huffman.
“I’m sorry for sneaking around.”
“I know why you did it. Not much good that did, though, huh?” The corner of her mouth lifts, one hand coming down on my knee, patting it gently.
“Listen, son. I know you feel burned by Samantha, and I know you feel you need to behere,and I never want you to think I don’t want you here.” Her words are coming out rushed.
