* * *
I stop to pick up Maisie on the way home, and Avery answers the front door wearing pajamas. Her skin is pale, and she has dark circles under her eyes.
“Maisie isn’t here,” she says, talking to me through the screen door. “Not long after you left, Leo started complaining that he didn’t feel good. He threw up and his temperature was high, and I didn’t want Maisie catching it, so Mason came and picked her up.”
“Oh no. Why didn’t you call me? I would have come back.”
“It wasn’t dire,” Avery says. “And Mason didn’t mind.”
“Are you okay? You don’t look so great.”
“I think Leo and I caught the crud together.”
“Anything I can do to help?”
“We’ll be fine,” she says. “Thanks, though. Now, I’m going back to bed before I pass out on the living room floor.”
I drive straight home, where I find Mason and Maisie so engrossed in The Fox and the Hound that neither even registers my presence. She’s snuggled up against his side and he has his arm around her. When Maisie notices me, she scrambles off the couch and flings herself at my legs.
“Mama! I made beer!” The apples of her cheeks are a little pinker than they were when I left, but she doesn’t seem sick. She looks happy. “And we went kayaking.”
“I let her push the button to start the mash tun,” Mason explains, hitting pause on the remote as he gets up from the couch. “After that, I rented a kayak up at the state park and we paddled around the north bay until it was time for a nap.”
“That sounds like a lot.”
He kisses me. “It was. And it wasn’t. We had fun.”
“I appreciate you doing it. Thank you,” I say, heading toward the kitchen. “By the way, I brought soup base from your mom, and she sent along some chashu and shoyu tamago for ramen.”
Mason follows me. “Can I tell you that hearing you talk about ramen is making me kind of hot?”
“Not right now.” I tilt my head toward Maisie. “But maybe around eight thirty you could give me all the details.”
His laugh is slightly wicked as he opens the containers I brought from his mom’s house. I sit at the island, showing him the photos while he makes dinner. Like his mom, he uses chopsticks while cooking. I don’t tell him I ate ramen for lunch, because watching him cook makes me kind of hot.
CHAPTER 21
Nepakartojama
Lithuanian
“a never-to-be-repeated perfect situation”
I’m in the sixth cabin, hanging another William Holbrook Beard print—this one with goats marching in a kind of bacchanalian parade—when Mason comes in from picking up Maisie. Except he’s alone.
“Hi,” I say as he leans down to kiss me. His signature move is touching his fingertips to the back of my neck in the hollow just below my hairline. It sends a sweet little thrill down my spine. Every. Single. Time. “Where’s Maisie?”
“Avery and Daniel are keeping her for the night. I figured we should do something for your birthday. Maybe go to Sandusky to grab some dinner and see a movie, maybe spend the night in a hotel with a pool.”
“I told you we didn’t have to do anything special.”
“Yeah, but”—he slings his arm around my neck and pulls me over to kiss my temple—“you only turn twenty-nine for the first time once.”
I laugh, shoving him playfully away. “You dork.”
Mason locks the cabin door behind us. He takes my hand, and we walk together in the most perfect silence. Sparrows and robins twitter in the trees, and somewhere a cardinal is singing birdie-birdie-birdie. I’ve never known this kind of peace. And I’ve definitely never known this kind of love.
“Hey, I just realized I left my phone in the office,” Mason says as we approach the brewhouse. “Let me grab it real quick, then we’ll head to the ferry.”
He opens the door for me, and when I step into the taproom, I’m met with a chorus of “Surprise!” and a building full of people. Avery and Daniel. Vivian and Lucy. Laurel and Mike. Owen and Didie. Mason’s parents. The book clubbers. All the people from yoga class—even Walt. My mom is here.
Multicolored pennant garlands festoon the airspace above our heads, a birthday cake with brown frosting sits on one table, along with some wrapped gifts, and another table is filled with warming dishes. Overwhelmed, I shuffle back a step and Mason is there, like a wall. He wraps his arms around me from behind, his mouth by my ear. “Happy birthday.”
I open my mouth to speak. Instead I burst into tears.
“Hey,” he says softly. “It’s okay.”
“No one has ever thrown a surprise party for me.” I give a wet sniffle, and Avery immediately whips a tissue from her purse. “And I’ve never had so many people in my life who care about me.”
“I’m just here for the cake,” Walt deadpans, making everyone laugh and turning me into a blubbering mess of laughter and tears.
Mason rubs my back and Vivian brings me a glass of white wine. I blow my snotty nose. “Thank you, all. Your execution was flawless. I had no idea, and … where did everyone park?”
Mason laughs. “This was a well-oiled machine.”
“So you’re saying Avery coordinated it.”
He gently swats my backside, then pushes me into the crowd so I can hug my friends. I make brief small talk with everyone, asking Rosemary how her hip is feeling, telling Lucy about an old Chinese checkerboard I scored on eBay, and complimenting Pat’s new haircut. Finally I reach my mom.
“I can’t believe you came all this way,” I say as her arms encircle me.
“Mason booked my flight,” she says. “And his parents picked me up from the airport. I spent last night at their house.”
“Oh, to be a fly on that wall.”
“Yōko and I have some things in common, so we talked a long time,” she says. “They think you’re good for their son, and it looks like he’s good for you, too.”
I search the room for Mason and find him holding a glass of beer as he listens intently to something his mother is telling Vivian. Whether by coincidence or the sheer will of my wanting it to happen, he looks at me and grins. He gives me a quick wink before turning back to the conversation.
“Yeah,” I say. “He is.”
My phone rings in my pocket and my mom says, “Yōko and I spent the afternoon making jaegerschnitzel for the party, so I need to go get it from the house. I’ll talk to you more in a little bit.”
My stomach growls at the thought of my mom’s schnitzel. She makes it every year for my birthday. I wonder if she also had a hand in choosing my birthday cake. If so, it’s a Black Forest cake layered with whipped cream and cherries, and I can’t wait to eat that, too.
I answer the phone, a video call from Anna and Keane.
“Happy birthday, Rachel!” they shout, and Keane launches into an off-key rendition of the birthday song until Anna clamps her hand over his mouth.
“We wish we could be there,” she says. “But we’re in Bermuda, getting ready to make the transatlantic crossing to Ireland.”
“That’s so exciting. Are you scared?”