CAN’T BELIEVE that out of all the places in Port Hamilton, you actually chose this,” Rose said when she dropped by to see the apartment. She stood in the middle of the tiny living room, gazing out through the window. “Nice view, though.”
“Isn’t it?” Sarah stood beside her mother. Windows on this side looked out over the Straits of Juan de Fuca to the distant coast of British Columbia. From the bedroom, she could see the soaring Olympic Mountains, still covered with snow as they would be for much of the year. “Last night I watched the ferry until it disappeared out of sight.” She glanced at Rose. “Want some coffee?”
“Sounds good,” Rose said. “I’m going to check out the rest of the place.”
“Actually you could do it from where you’re standing,” Sarah said. “But go ahead.”
She filled the coffeepot with water, took a package of muffins from a basket on top of the refrigerator, and stuck two of them in the toaster oven. On the battered three-burner stove was a blue enamel kettle. Above it, on a shelf she’d tacked up that morning, she’d filled a yellow jug with wooden spoons and whisks, a couple of candles and a wicker basket. Just looking at the arrangement pleased her. Amazing how much better she felt than this time yesterday. Hearing from Matthew was another part of it.
She’d felt so terrific after talking to him that she’d thrown caution to the wind and gone on a shopping trip of sorts. At the Goodwill store, she’d found the coffeemaker, some floor pillows, a couple of rugs. Tomorrow, she would bring over the last boxes from Rose’s basement. Home. I’m home again, she thought. I have a home, she amended.
“I see you’ve erected your tent,” Rose called from the bedroom. A moment later, she was back in the tiny kitchen. “I remember you making tents in your room when you were a child. You’d crawl inside, close the flaps and shut out the cruel, nasty world.”
Sarah grinned. Her purchases had also included yards of pale gauzy fabric that she’d pinned on the walls and ceiling around her bed. It did feel rather tentlike, very cozy. Lying in bed last night, covered with quilts, she’d felt completely at peace.
“Long-term lease?” Rose regarded Sarah over the top of her wire-rimmed glasses, strands of steel-gray hair already escaping from the knot at the back of her neck.
“Just six months. I’d like it to have been longer, but apparently the building is up for sale. Actually, I’d like to buy it.”
“Why not just enjoy it while you have it,” Rose said. “Enjoy it for what it is. A place to stay for now.”
“Because I want…” To feel secure, she thought. She poured coffee into two mugs and spread the muffins with butter. In the fridge, she found the marmalade and blackberry jam she’d picked up from the farmer’s market.
“I still don’t understand paying rent for a place when I’m rattling around in a house that’s far too big for me.” Rose spooned sugar into her coffee.
Sarah said nothing. It was pointless to argue with Rose, cruel to voice what they both knew: living together would drive Sarah nuts because Rose was an exacting, demanding perfectionist given to dark, morose moods when things didn’t go her way. Sarah reluctantly conceded she’d inherited the trait herself and, so, found it doubly irritating to deal with in her mother. Ted had once suggested that everything she did was an attempt to prove she wasn’t like Rose. She’d fought him on that, told him he didn’t really know Rose. Later, she wondered if he really knew her.
“Have you spoken to Matthew yet?” Rose asked.
“He was in surgery. But I called him. Actually,” she tried for a casual tone, “we’re going out for a Frugals tonight.”
Rose smiled.
“What?”
“Nothing.” She drank some coffee, set her mug down. “You should look at your face. You look like Queen of the Hop.”
Sarah laughed. “You need to update your terminoogy, Mom.” Through the window behind Rose, she watched a flock of seagulls circle, their cries faintly audible above the sound of traffic going down Front Street. “It was funny talking to him. All these years and it was as if we’d just seen each other the day before.”
JUST AFTER MIDNIGHT, Matthew woke to the sound of his beeper. Fumbling in the dark, he picked up the phone from the bedside table. “I’m not the one on call tonight,” he told the page operator. “I changed with Dr. Adams. You need to call him.”
“Then there’s been some kind of mix-up,” the operator said. “I have you down, Dr. Cameron.”
“Call Dr. Adams,” Matthew said. “I’ll come in if I have to, but try him first.” He hung up the phone, rolled over and closed his eyes. Just as he drifted off, the phone rang again. Adams couldn’t be reached. He sat up, switched on the light. The operator put him through to the E.R. The patient was a child with intestinal problems.
“Give me ten minutes,” Matthew said. He dressed then, shoes in hand, padded silently across the hall.
From his room, he heard his pager go again. He sprinted downstairs, scribbled a note to Lucy and went out in the dark cool night.
Something had to give, he thought, as he drove through the deserted streets. As stubborn as he knew himself to be—and as Elizabeth was always quick to confirm—he understood the mess the system was in. If it was a business other than Compassionate Medical Systems coming to the rescue, he could go along with it, but Olympic Memorial, like a desperate spinster, attracted few suitors.
Sure, he could rhapsodize about the joys of a smalltown practice, the majesty of the Olympic Mountains, the achingly beautiful coastal trails. But none of the major players he’d hoped would offer their hand had shown much interest in what was also a debt-ridden, rural, blue-collar town with an aging population.
The truth was, you had to know Port Hamilton to love it. He did. And Sarah did. Sarah. Who he used to think he knew better than anyone in the world and then realized he didn’t really know her at all. Still, it made him feel good to think of Sarah being back. If you were lucky, you had one, maybe two friendships that lasted a lifetime. Like a plant. A few leaves might fall off through lack of nurturing, but the roots never died. That was how it was with Sarah.
He pulled into the parking lot and switched off the ignition. Through the glass doors of the E.R., he watched a nurse in blue scrubs. His beeper went off again.
“Hey, Debbi.” The mother looked young enough to have been the patient. “What’s up with Alli tonight?”
“She’s been throwing up and pooping all day.” Her face pale in the harsh overhead lighting, Debbi soothed the child lying on the examining table.
“Well, let’s take a look at her.” The toddler, listless and pale, eyed Matthew as he examined her but didn’t make a sound: That didn’t reassure him. Healthier children tended not to submit so easily to being poked and prodded. “Haven’t seen you around for a while.”
She bit her lip. “We moved out to the end of the peninsula. I met this guy and we bought some property together. He’s into a naturopathy, which worked pretty good on my asthma. Really good, in fact. But nothing was working with Alli and I got scared. He went to Olympia to some workshop and I decided I’d bring her in, just in case.”
Matthew
