Meet Me at the Lake

Downtown Huntsville is choked with cottagers and tourists from May until the trees give up the last of their fall color. Luckily, I find a parking spot large enough to maneuver the Cadillac that Whitney’s uncle has loaned me. The thing handles like a cruise ship and smells like dusty potpourri, but I need a car—the resort is twenty minutes outside town—and I don’t own one.

When Mom died six weeks ago, Whitney brought me back. By the time Peter called to tell me about the accident, she was already on her way south, baby Owen in tow. In all the years I’ve lived in Toronto, it’s the only time she’s braved driving there. She packed my suitcase and took me home, white-knuckling the steering wheel until we were an hour north of the city.

I ring the doorbell of a powder blue house, and Reginald Oswald greets me. He’s well past retirement age, wearing suspenders, as always, and a wrinkled checked shirt. Reggie’s been the resort’s accountant since my grandparents bought the place in the late sixties.

“Rosemary’s at church, but she said to give you a big hug.” Reggie does not share his wife’s commitment to Sunday service. “How are your grandparents faring? I’ve been meaning to check in with them.”

The flight from Victoria was too much for Grandma Izzy, so Grandpa Gerry came on his own for the funeral. He’d seemed so much older. Small and frail and so unlike the bombastic man I’d known growing up.

“They say they’re holding up, but I think they’re trying to make me feel better.”

The last I spoke with Grandma Izzy, she broke down midway through our conversation. “You just sound so much like her,” she’d said.

My grandparents lived on the other side of the country, but Mom was on a first-name basis with the staff members at their retirement community. She knew their events calendar better than they did. She befriended their neighbors’ adult children who lived nearby so she had someone with eyes on the ground to check in. She gave Grandma and Grandpa regular reports on everything happening at the resort.

“I expect you to do the same for me when I retire,” she used to tell me, and I’d roll my eyes. “Mom, we both know that will never happen.”

“I’ll call them this afternoon,” Reggie says as he leads me down the hallway to his office, the smell of a bacon and eggs breakfast lingering in the air.

Reggie extends his hand at one of the guest chairs. “You a coffee drinker? You might need some for this.”

Reggie fixes me a cup and then delivers the news. It isn’t good.

“I’ll be honest with you, Fern,” he says, peering out at me over his wire frames. I’m playing with the hole in my jeans, but my fingers still at Reggie’s expression. “Maggie was a smart businesswoman, really turned things around when she took over from your grandparents. But with the tourism business being what it has over the last couple of years, finances are break-even. Your mother stopped taking a salary.”

I rub at the spot between my eyebrows. This is so much worse than I could have guessed.

Reggie blows his gin-blossomed nose into a polka-dotted hanky and continues. “Hopefully, this year will be stronger than the last two. Do you know how bookings are heading into fall and winter?”

I shake my head. Jamie said room reservations are flat for July and August, but I don’t know what the rest of the year looks like. I don’t even know our current percent occupancy. The resort has two conference spaces—the dermatologists are using one of them this week, but have we had any other groups since I’ve been home? I’ve been back for more than a month. I should know these things. Even if I end up selling the resort, I need to know the numbers.

My alarm must be clear across my face, because Reggie’s expression softens. “Don’t be hard on yourself,” he says. “You’ve suffered a terrible loss, and those are some big shoes Maggie left you to fill. I’m here to help in any way I can, when you’re ready.”

When I finally told Mom I didn’t want to work at the resort all those years ago, she stopped talking to me about the business altogether. But Brookbanks was her first love, and over time, she let me back in—asking my opinion about the band she was thinking of hiring for the end-of-summer dance, or a dish she wanted to take off the menu. Would the guests revolt if we lost the fish and chips? (Yes.) Knowing Mom kept the resort’s problems from me is sobering. I thought we were closer.

I used to resent how much she worked when I was a kid. I hated every dinner I ate alone, every emergency phone call that pulled her away when we were supposed to have a girls’ night. I never wanted to tie myself to work the way she did, but I’ve been putting in fifty-hour weeks at Filtr. I know what it takes to run a business. I know how much Mom cared about this business. Stressed wouldn’t begin to describe how she must have felt. The worry would have been constant, gnawing at her from the inside out. My guilt is a lead jacket. While I’ve helped Philippe make Filtr a success, Brookbanks has floundered. For the first time since my mom died, it really hits me—Brookbanks is mine. Actually mine. Not my mother’s.

“I’m ready,” I tell Reggie. “Do you have time to get me up to speed now?”

I ask him for a pen and paper, and he digs out a fresh yellow legal pad from his desk. He points out areas where we could cut back and some costly updates Mom delayed to help offset the slowdown. I think of the golf cart covers, and the ice machine that broke down the night of the accident. Jamie said it had been on the fritz for a while.

When we finish hours later, my head is spinning and my hand is cramped from taking pages of notes. I’m supposed to meet Mr. and Mrs. Rose for cocktails at their cabin this evening, but I could use a martini now.

It’s clear the restaurant’s food costs are too high, but otherwise Mom kept expenditures low and staff hours modest. I’ll have to dig into scheduling and our supply orders to see if we can tighten any more. But it’s obvious what we really need are more bodies through the door. I’m overwhelmed, but underneath there’s a spark of excitement.

I’ve always been competitive. Before I got kicked off my high school soccer team, I lived for the rush of winning. Brookbanks, I realize, is something I want to win at. Mom may not have asked me for help, but I want to prove to her I can do it.

“Did Mom ever mention hiring a consultant?” I ask Reggie before I duck out to the garden to say hello to Rosemary. She returned from church a while ago.

Reggie takes his glasses off, rubbing the lenses on his shirt. “She did. Couldn’t believe the deal he gave her, but Maggie could charm the knickers off a nun.” It’s true. Mom had a vibrant energy and sense of showmanship that drew people to her. She was naturally chatty, but at home, when she didn’t have to be “on,” she softened a little.

Reggie chuckles to himself. “Why do you ask? Did he get in touch?”

“He showed up yesterday.”

“Well, that’s a piece of good luck. I hope you don’t take offense to me saying you need reinforcements,” Reggie says. “I know you’ve got a business degree, and Maggie said you were running an impressive operation down there in Toronto.”

“Really?”

“Don’t look so surprised. She was proud of you. Maggie wouldn’t have left the resort in your care unless she believed you could do it.”

My throat goes tight. I thank Reggie for his help, blinking away the stinging in my eyes, and escape to the backyard.

I find Rosemary tying tomato vines. She’s wearing a yellow sundress and a straw hat, and as she takes me around her vegetable patch, explaining her trick for keeping the slugs off the leaf lettuce, I notice I’m more casually dressed than she is for mucking around in the dirt. Torn jeans and Birkenstocks were probably not appropriate for a business meeting, even if it was with someone I’ve known my whole life.

If I’m going to get more involved in Brookbanks, then I’m going to need something to wear. My mother’s bright shift dresses aren’t me, and while ripped denim and cotton tees fit Filtr’s minimalist sensibility, they’re not right for working at the resort. As I walk to the boutiques on Main Street, I realize that’s what I want to do. Work. Not follow Jamie around aimlessly like I have been, but actually work. It doesn’t mean I’m not going to sell, I tell myself. It doesn’t mean I’m staying.

I manage to find more than a few things I don’t hate—simple pieces that don’t make me feel squirmy about the weight I’ve collected on my mom’s couch. I’ve never been a clotheshorse. Jeans, I’m good with. I know I can rock a camisole. Pushing too far beyond that tends to stretch my already limited fashion patience. I used to dig for treasures in secondhand stores, but I have no time for that anymore.

As I’m heading back to the car, I notice there’s a slick record shop that never used to be here and a guitar store that also serves food. I’ve always wanted to learn how to play. I pause in front of the Splattered Apron, a cute kitchenware shop, and duck inside. I leave thirty-five bucks poorer. Mom may have been content to sip watered-down sludge every morning, but I’m not.

Once I get back to the house, I pack up the pod coffee maker and put my new French press on the counter. It feels monumental. Even if I’m only here for a short time, I don’t have to drink my coffee like Mom did, and I don’t have to run the resort like her, either.

Then I pick up my phone and call Philippe.

—

I arrive at Cabin 15 already buzzed. It felt good to quit. Philippe didn’t think I’d ever do it, even though he knew I wanted to open my own place. But Philippe has always been arrogant in the extreme. From the cotton of his T-shirts (exclusively pima, always white) to the temperature of the oat milk in his flat white (135 degrees), he’s also picky in the extreme. For a long time, that’s what I liked about him. That someone so particular was attracted to me was an ego boost, and mine was dented for years after Will.

“You look good, girlie. You’ve got a bit more color than you did last week,” Mrs. Rose says, holding me at arm’s length for inspection.

Mr. and Mrs. Rose have hosted Sunday cocktail hour at Cabin 15 since before I was born. First, it was my grandparents who joined them, then my mother, and now me. Sometimes there’s a larger crowd, an assortment of longtime Brookbanks visitors and newbies they’ve befriended at the horseshoes pit, but otherwise, the ritual is the same: ice-cold gin martinis and plain Ruffles chips on the porch at five p.m.

They never had children, and I’m not sure whether that was by design or just how things worked out, but either way, they give off major kooky grandparent vibes. Mrs. Rose’s neck is always draped with so many strands of wooden beads, you’d suspect them of causing her hunched back. Mr. Rose was a theater critic “back when the theater was worth critiquing.” I don’t think either has eaten a vegetable in their lives, save for the pickled onions in their cocktails.

I was bitter about the guests when I was young, how their needs came before my own, but the Roses were as good as family. Before I left for university, they threw a rowdy wine and cheese party that spilled from their cabin into several others, Mrs. Rose slipping me plastic glasses of chardonnay when my mom wasn’t looking. Since I’ve been home, they’ve insisted on hosting me for cocktails every week. I think they’re checking up on me.

“I’ve been swimming down at the family dock and taking the kayak out in the morning before the lake gets busy,” I tell them. “I did a few hikes. I was becoming inert.” Initially I needed to leave the house and get my blood moving, but I’m enjoying my treks around the property and time at the lake. I didn’t appreciate how stunning it is here when I was growing up.

“Glad to hear it,” Mr. Rose says. He’s standing behind the bar cart, stirring an awfully large pitcher of gin. Grandma Izzy had the cart delivered back in the eighties before the Roses arrived for their annual summer vacation. It’s brass with large swooping handles and in no way matches the quaint cottage decor. We all know it as Izzy’s Cart, even though Mr. Rose doesn’t share bartender privileges.

“I’m relieved to see that you’re no longer dressing as a street urchin,” says Mrs. Rose.

I’ve put on a pair of capris and a new cream silk blouse—it’s sleeveless with a high halter neckline and open in the back. Cocktail hour is something the Roses dress for, although I’ve never seen them in anything remotely shabby. It’s always natty suits for Mr. Rose and swaths of loose-fitting silk for Mrs. Rose. Tonight he’s in butter yellow and she’s in a turquoise caftan with gold embroidery on the bust and sleeves. I’ve been showing up in shorts and tanks, and neither has said a word about it until now.

“I went shopping in town today,” I tell her, taking my place on the wicker love seat, same as the one at the house, while Mrs. Rose settles into a bamboo rocker. On the coffee table, in addition to the regular paper-towel-lined bowl of chips, is a cheese ball—an honest-to-god, rolled-in-parsley-and-walnuts, old-fashioned cheese ball—surrounded by a ring of Ritz crackers.

I gesture at it. “What’s the occasion?”

“We’ve got company, dear,” Mrs. Rose says as Mr. Rose fills a fourth martini glass. He garnishes two of the cocktails with pickled onions and mine with a trio of plump green olives.

“We thought we’d invite your friend,” Mr. Rose adds.

“My friend?” I look around the porch. There’s no one else here.

“I sent him inside to see if he could repair our TV,” says Mrs. Rose. “I don’t know what we’ve done—can’t seem to get any picture on the thing.”

“Hoy, there he is,” Mr. Rose calls as Will appears in the doorway, remote in hand. He’s dressed in a navy suit with a crisp white shirt, the top button undone, his hair slicked back like it was last night. My lungs compress.

“Hello,” he says with an unreadable glance my way. Actually, it’s more than a glance. His eyes catch on mine and then they grow darker, but then he blinks and brings the remote to Mrs. Rose. “All fixed. You just have to press the input button a few times.” He shows her on the remote.

“How do you know the Roses?”

“We met last summer, and I bumped into them again this afternoon.”

“Take a seat, William.” Mr. Rose points at the small slice of cushion next to me, then brings Mrs. Rose and me our drinks. They are full to the brim. “Remind me how you take your martini,” he says to Will. “Let me guess. Are you a twist man?”

“I am,” he says, sitting beside me.

I watch as Mr. Rose takes a paring knife to the citrus rind, and I can suddenly taste the lemon drop candy in my mouth and feel Will’s body, hard muscle and damp skin, pressed to me.

“I hope it’s okay I’m here,” Will says quietly as Mr. Rose settles into his rocker.

“Of course,” I say, trying not to think about the smoky-sweet smell of him and his thigh wedged against mine or the fact that goose bumps have risen on my arms.

Will’s eyes expand at the size of the drink Mr. Rose passes over, spilling a little on the table. He doesn’t notice, and Will dabs it up with a paper napkin while Mr. Rose isn’t looking.

After everything that Reggie told me, I’m almost certain I need Will’s help, but could I really work with him? I’ve been turning the idea over in my mind like puzzle pieces dumped from the box.

We clink our glasses together, and I take a big sip. From the corner of my eye, I see Will inspecting me, his gaze lingering on my shoulder.

“You look nice,” he says.

I tuck my hair behind my ears, saying a quiet thanks.

“I was given a strict dress code, too,” Will says. “No shorts or sandals allowed.”

“There’s nothing less appetizing than a man’s bare foot,” Mrs. Rose pipes up.

“So tell us how you two know each other,” Mr. Rose says. My stomach flops, and I raise my glass to my lips.

“Fern and I met ten years ago. I painted a mural at the coffee shop where she worked.” I feel Will looking at me, but I keep my sights on the cheese ball as he tells the Roses about our day.

What he doesn’t know is how our time together altered the city for me. It’s like we left behind an imprint on the places we visited, and now twenty-two-year-old Will and Fern wander around downtown Toronto on a permanent loop in my memory.

“How nice that you kept in touch all this time,” Mrs. Rose says, and neither of us corrects her.

“A mural, eh? You don’t strike me as an artist,” says Mr. Rose, and my eyes dart to Will, an odd protective feeling whirring in my chest.

“I’m not one anymore,” he says, his voice flat. “I was never very good. Fern can attest to that.”

The Roses look at me. I have so many conflicting emotions about the man sitting beside me, but the most confusing is my need to defend the Will I once knew. He feels separate from this Will. This Will is the one who hurt me; that Will is the one whose drawing still hangs in a frame in my bedroom. That Will is the one I stand up for.

“I thought Will would be a famous illustrator one day. He was very good.”

I ignore Will’s gaze, boring into the side of my face. I supply myself with another dose of gin. His thigh presses against mine, a purposeful nudge, and I splutter into my drink, my cheeks heating.

“At my age, I should know people aren’t always who they seem on the surface,” says Mr. Rose. “Look at Fern. You wouldn’t guess it now, but she gave her mother quite a bit of trouble when she was a teenager. A real mutineer. Got brought home by the police once. Maggie was beside herself—all the guests around to see.”

I tense, and Will shifts beside me.

“That wasn’t even the worst of it,” Mrs. Rose says, oblivious to my discomfort. Just as she’s about to go on, Will claps his hands loudly and we all look at him.

“I’ve already heard this one,” he says in a tone that makes it clear he doesn’t want to hear it again.

I stare at him, and for a second time, he bumps his leg against mine.

“What about you, William? Get up to any mischief when you were a lad?” Mr. Rose asks.

“The regular—parties, beer, maybe a bit of pot,” he says. “I was a pretty boring kid.”

“You were not,” I contradict. Apparently, I’m Young Will Baxter’s most vocal advocate. I don’t appreciate this stoic, self-deprecating version, even though he looks like a sex dream. I spread a cracker with an orangey wedge of cheese ball, hoping the conversation moves on, but nope. There are three sets of eyes on me. “You were . . . unique.” A blush settles on my cheeks.

Will studies me for a second, the skin around his eyes crinkling. There’s something reassuring about this hint of a grin. I find myself smiling back.

“I think that day with Fern was the most exciting thing that happened to me.” Will looks right at me when he says this, and my mouth falls open.

“Well, if traipsing around Toronto is the most riveting experience of your youth, I hope you’ve gotten up to more trouble as an adult,” Mrs. Rose says, breaking the silence.

“Far less, I’m afraid,” Will says, taking a sip of his martini, his expression turned impenetrable. He doesn’t sound sad exactly. Maybe a bit wistful? I want to know why. I want to know why this Will Baxter is so different from my Will Baxter. He’s still the most fascinating person I’ve ever met, only now he’s a complete mystery.

Mrs. Rose clucks. “Young people don’t know how to have a good time anymore,” she says, then launches into a story about Christopher Plummer, a cast party, and a marriage proposal I’m almost positive never happened.

Soon talk turns to Will’s vacation. “What are you going to do to keep yourself busy for four whole weeks?” Mr. Rose wants to know.

“I’ll be working most of the time. It’s easy to do my job remotely.” He looks at me as if to ask permission, and I nod. I don’t mind if the Roses know why he’s here.

“I was going to do a bit of work with Maggie, help her with some ideas for the resort,” Will says. Hearing him call my mom Maggie is jarring. “I hadn’t heard the news before I arrived.”

“What do you mean, you were ‘going to’?” Mrs. Rose asks. Nothing gets by this woman. She lasers her eyes on me. “You need all the help you can get, my dear. And that’s not a slight against you.”

I know she’s right. Only I’m not sure I can keep it together for an entire month. Just sitting beside him makes me want to crawl out of my skin. Or onto his lap.

“And what about that young woman you had with you last summer?” Mr. Rose asks as he tops up our glasses. Will has a girlfriend? A familiar squeeze of envy cinches around my ribs. “What was her name?”

“Jessica,” Will tells him with a quick look in my direction.

This is good. This means any possibility of crawling onto his lap has been removed from the equation once and for all. This is great, I tell myself, even though it feels almost cruel that, when Will finally came here, it was with another woman. I take a long sip of my cocktail.

“Jessica, that’s right. A real looker, that one.” I can feel Will watching me as Mr. Rose makes a little whistling sound through his teeth. “We taught them how to play cribbage,” he tells me. I smile in reply, but it must look as false as it feels.

“And where is Jessica? Is she joining you later?” Mrs. Rose asks Will.

“No,” he says, and I’m sure I feel his elbow press into my arm, just a little. “We broke up.”

—

Dusk has fallen when the Roses kick us out. Will and I amble along the gravel walkway, and each cabin we pass has its own soundtrack—the slap of screen doors, the clatter of dinner dishes, a tumble of dice and a cheer of victory. The house and Cabin 20 are the farthest from the lodge, and as we walk, the woods grow denser. The path is lined with ferns and begonias planted in old logs. It’s hard to tell, but I think Will’s tipsy. I know I am.

“I think my blood is two parts gin,” he says, eyes glimmering in a way they haven’t since he arrived.

“That’s probably a conservative estimate.” I feel buoyant. It’s the booze, absolutely. But it’s more than that. It’s quitting my job and the beautiful summer night and the feeling of taking back some control for the first time since Mom died.

I blame the martinis for allowing me to reach out and touch his arm. “Hey, Will?”

He stops walking.

“Thanks for redirecting Mrs. Rose earlier. It’s not my favorite story.”

“I know it’s not.” We watch each other, the lamplight casting Will’s face in shadow.

“Did you mean what you said—about that day being the most exciting thing that happened to you?”

“I did,” he says. “I don’t spend much time in that part of the city, but when I’m downtown, I always think of it.”

I blink. “You live in Toronto?” I don’t know why I hadn’t guessed that before.

“I do,” he says slowly.

“For how long?” I ask, my pulse quickening.

Will’s eyes dart to the trees. He doesn’t want to answer.

“Just tell me.”

“A long time.”

I stare him down. That’s not good enough.

“Almost ten years,” he says quietly.

I nod once, but it’s mostly for the purpose of making sure my head is still attached to my neck. I didn’t think the great ghosting of Fern Brookbanks could get any worse.

“Wow.”

“Fern,” he says, and I wave my hands, hurt and disappointment rising up my throat.

“Don’t.”

“Fern.”

“Listen, I gotta go. I’m drunk. And you’re”—I study him—“too tall.”

I leave Will there, on the path, standing among the pines and poplars.

That night, the dream starts the same way. I can smell the pancakes before I go downstairs, but when I get to the kitchen, Will is at the stove instead of my mother. He’s wearing a dark blue suit, his back turned to me. His hair is past his ears, like it was when he was twenty-two, and when he looks over his shoulder, his face breaks into the most gorgeous smile I’ve ever seen. I pull him to the table and peel his jacket off slowly. His grin turns wolfish, his eyes hungry. I reduce my speed as I unbutton his shirt, watching him starve, then I press my teeth to the skin over his heart while the pancakes burn.