“How have you been managing all this on top of the restaurant and work?” I ask, turning to face him and waving my hand at the house. “It’s a huge property for one person to maintain.” God, how did Sue do it? And raise two kids and run the Tavern?
Sam runs a hand over his smooth cheek. Shaving only made his cheekbones more prominent, his jaw more angled. “I guess I don’t sleep much,” he says. “Don’t look so horrified. I got used to staying up for long stretches when I was a resident. Anyway, I’m grateful I’ve had something to do. I would have gone crazy sitting around the past year.”
Guilt curls around my heart. I hate that he did this alone. Without me.
“Does Charlie help much?”
“Nah. He offered to come back, but he’s busy in Toronto.” I cock my head, not following. “He works in finance, on Bay Street,” Sam explains. “He was up for a big promotion—I told him to stay in the city.”
“I had no idea,” I murmur. “I guess his boss has better luck getting him to wear a shirt than your mom did.”
Sam chuckles. “Pretty sure he wears a suit and everything.”
I clear my throat and ask the question I’ve been wondering all morning, “And Taylor? She lives in Kingston?”
“Yeah, her firm is there. She’s not exactly a Barry’s Bay girl.”
“Didn’t notice,” I mutter, looking out the window. I can see Sam smile from the corner of my eye before he gets out of the truck and walks around to my side. Opening the door, he offers me a hand to hop down.
“I know how to get out of a truck, you know?” I say, taking his hand anyway.
“Well, you’ve been gone a long time, city slicker.” He grins while I get out. He’s got one arm on the door of the truck and the other on the side, caging me with his body. His face turns serious. “Charlie should be home later,” he says, eyeing me closely. “He went into the restaurant this morning to help Julien with a few last-minute things for tomorrow.”
“It’ll be great to see him again,” I say with a smile, but my mouth has gone dry. “And Julien. He’s still there, huh?” Julien Chen was the long-suffering chef at the Tavern. He was terse and funny and kind of like a big brother to Sam and Charlie.
“Julien’s still there. He’s been a big help to me and Mom. He took her to chemo when I had shifts at the hospital, and when she was in there for the last few months, he stayed with her almost as much as I did. He’s taking it pretty hard.”
“I can imagine,” I say. “Do you ever think he and your mom . . . you know?” The idea hadn’t crossed my mind as a teen, but as I got older, I thought it might explain why a young, single man whose cooking skills far surpassed boiling pierogies and cooking sausages would live in a small town for so long.
“I don’t know.” He runs his hand through his hair. “I always wondered why he stuck around for so long. He didn’t plan on spending his life up here—it was just a summer job for him. I think he had big dreams of opening his own place in the city. Mom said he stayed for me and Charlie. The last couple of years, though, I wondered if it was for her.”
He looks back down to me with a sad smile, and without saying a word, we both walk around the side of the house and head to the water. It feels instinctive, like I had walked down this hill only days ago rather than more than a decade earlier. The old rowboat is tied to one side of the dock, a new motor attached to the stern, and the raft floats out from the dock just as it used to. My throat is thick, but my whole body relaxes at the view. I close my eyes when we get to the dock and breathe.
“We haven’t put the Banana Boat in this year,” Sam says, and my eyes pop open.
“You still have it?” I marvel.
“In the garage.” Sam smiles, a flash of white teeth and soft lips. We walk out to the end of the dock and I steady myself before looking down the shore. There’s a white speedboat attached to a new, larger dock where ours used to be.
“Your cottage looks pretty much the same from the water,” Sam says. “But they’ve put another room on the back. It’s a family of four—the kids are probably eight and ten by now. We let them swim over and use the raft.”
I have an odd sensation looking out over the water and the raft and the far shore—it’s all so familiar, like I’m watching an old family video except the people have been scrubbed out so I can only make out faint silhouettes where they once were. I long for those people—and the girl I used to be.