A Perfect Love Read online

  Winslow lifted a hand. “Hasn’t Dana always made you feel like an equal partner?”

  “Ayuh, sure. She’s never said anything bad, you know, and she does appreciate all the work I did to get the house in shape.” He felt himself flushing again. “I don’t mean to brag, Pastor, ’cause Yakov helps a lot, too. He seems to know where everything should be, even where the pipes are hidden in the walls. But Dana runs the school, and that’s what our house is—the Kennebunk Kid Kare Center. So, in a way, I feel like we are all about her money, her business—”

  “But you’re her husband, her partner.”

  “Ayuh, pastor, but a man is what he does, and until recently I’ve never found any work I really enjoyed. But now I’m an official Internet merchant . . . and Dana doesn’t seem to care.”

  Winslow silently stroked his chin between his thumb and index finger. Finally he said, “This Internet business of yours—you doing any of it in Ogunquit?”

  Mike blinked. “Ogunquit? No. I mean, yes. I sell on the World Wide Web, which means I ship to all kinds of places, but yeah, I have been going to Ogunquit a few times a week. Captain Stroble’s granddaughter has a high-speed cable modem, and I use it while she’s at work. It shaves a couple of hours off every workday . . . hours I had hoped to spend with Dana.”

  Winslow closed his eyes and nodded, a knowing smile crossing his face. “Mike, I am quite certain this situation is not as desperate as it seems. What you and Dana need is a good heart-to-heart talk. It sounds like you’ve both been too wrapped up in your own little worlds to connect with each other.”

  “But she—”

  “Listen to me, son. The Bible says we shouldn’t let the sun go down on our wrath. That’s another way of saying you shouldn’t let the day end without clearing the lines of communication. You need to talk to your wife openly and honestly; the sooner, the better.”

  “But she’s expecting a houseful of company today! The entire town’s coming for lunch, so when am I supposed to—”

  “You’re the man of the house, Mike. You make time for your wife.”

  Roaming the island in search of enough driftwood to see him through another night, Buddy climbed over the rocks near Puffin Cove and tried to keep his thoughts centered on his task. Overhead, the sun was as weak as yesterday’s dreams, and the rising wind chafed at his cheeks. But he couldn’t turn back yet.

  Fact: Roxy needed warmth. Fact: Roxy was his pet, and he loved her. Fact: In the coldest month of the year, he had purchased a desert animal to live in one of the coldest places in America, so he’d have to become extremely creative before spring blew in and warmed up the island. This meant he might have to confess what he’d done, pay for some extra firewood, and endure a week or so of Dana rolling her eyes at his stupidity.

  But he wasn’t the only person on Heavenly Daze who’d flirted with folly. Why, he’d just passed Pastor Wickam’s house, and everybody was still yakking about how silly he’d been when he went through the toupee phase last October. And the entire island was laughing about his recent bathroom debacle. And Charles Graham, who fancied himself the Great American Novelist, had learned the hard way that sometimes dreams were best reserved for sleeping. And Annie Cuvier, that brainy girl, why, there wasn’t a soul on the island now willing to come within a mile of a sandwich made with her miracle tomatoes. In every house on this island, someone had done something silly, so why did he feel like the only one with an albatross around his neck?

  Standing at the top of a black granite boulder, he looked across the island’s sand dunes and saw the boarded-up Lobster Pot. That was another dream, a far-flung one at best, and he had about as much chance of buying the restaurant as he had at winning Miss America. Success didn’t come easily to the Buddy Franklins of this world, and sometimes it didn’t come at all.

  Why were some people born winners and others losers? Why were some people fast and others slow? Why were some people born beautiful and others so homely people averted their eyes rather than look them in the face? Did God decree who got what? If so, why was the Lord so ticked off at the losers and outcasts?

  Tilting his head back, Buddy lifted his gaze to the overcast sky. “What have I ever done to you?” he called, his voice ringing across the empty rocks. “How could you hate me before I was even born?”

  From where he stood beside the church steeple, Gavriel heard the cry of a soul in distress. His supernatural eyes fixed on the source, and instantly his heart leaped at the opportunity to minister.

  “Show me, Father,” he prayed, keeping his eyes on Buddy Franklin. “Show me what to do.”

  Then the answer came. This job would not fall to Yakov, for the sight of a familiar face would only silence Buddy’s cry. This was not the time for a supernatural vision, for Buddy would not be able to accept it. This was a time for speaking in the way Buddy understood.

  Moving at the speed of light, in invisible supernatural form Gavriel swooped from the rooftop and planted his feet on the rocks beside Buddy. Without using audible words, Gavriel bent down and whispered in Buddy’s ear: “Your cry has been heard. Pull out the paper and pencil in your pocket.”

  For a moment Buddy hesitated, then he obeyed. As his eyes watered in the stinging wind, he reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a stubby pencil from the Pitch and Putt golf course in Wells and a long grocery receipt from the mercantile.

  “Now sit,” Gavriel whispered again, “and write the words I will speak to you.”

  After settling onto the rock, Buddy pressed the pencil to the paper and began to write.

  Dana stopped drumming her nails on the mantel long enough to check her watch. Twelve-fifteen, and no Buddy. Basil and his crew would arrive at any moment, and she’d told her neighbors to be at her house by twelve-thirty. She had planned to serve punch and cookies while people mingled until one, then they’d hold the ceremony and surprise the entire town with Buddy’s brilliance.

  But where was the boy?

  She moved to the stairs and tilted her face upward. “Yakov!” Something in her cringed at the whiny sound of her voice, but she couldn’t help it. Mike’s trusty assistant had been upstairs in his room all morning, not lifting a finger to assist. She had baked three cakes, tossed a fruit salad, baked two loaves of shredded wheat bread, and put a huge pot of hot cider on the stove to simmer—and she’d done everything herself.

  A moment later Yakov appeared at the head of the stairs. “Ayuh?”

  “What are you doing up there? I need your help.”

  The slender man nodded as he jogged down the steps. “Sorry, Dana. I was praying for your event this afternoon.”

  Dana looked away, her face growing hot as guilt smote her. How could she be irritated with a man who’d been praying for her? But right now she needed help with feet on it, not wings.

  Yakov touched her shoulder and gave her an open and eager smile. “How can I help?”

  She raked a hand through her hair. “I need Buddy. I don’t know where he is, and it’s really important that he be here when Basil Caldwell arrives.”

  A shadow of concern flitted through Yakov’s dark eyes. “Buddy is not here?”

  “No. I went to the carriage house and knocked on his door, but he didn’t answer and the door was locked. He wasn’t in the workroom, either.”

  “Has Mike seen him?”

  “Mike has made himself scarce, too.” Dana bit her lip, trying to curb her desperation. “If you find either one of them, you can wring their necks for me—after the ceremony. I’m so frustrated with both of them I could scream. I wanted Mike to rearrange the furniture so there’s an open space in the front of the classroom.”

  Without even stopping to grab his coat, Yakov moved toward the front door. “I’ll send someone to help, then I will find Buddy. Don’t you worry.”

  Before she could say another word, he left the house. Through the window, she saw him moving across the front porch, his tread so light he barely creaked the old floorboards.

  Dana
had one cogent thought before she hurried back to the kitchen: All the men in her life had proved utterly undependable on the day she needed them most.

  Sitting on the rocks with his head resting on his bent knees, Buddy opened his eyes when he heard the soft scrunch of shoes against the scree on the rocks. Yakov stood beside him wearing only a sweatshirt and jeans, yet the man didn’t even shiver.

  “Your sister is quite concerned about you.” A smile hovered in Yakov’s eyes. “She is a little frantic about this afternoon’s hoo-ha.”

  The sun seemed suddenly bright; Buddy shaded his eyes with his hand as he looked up to meet the other man’s gaze. “Whatever.”

  “You are not concerned about your sister?”

  “Dana’s always a little frantic.”

  Yakov shrugged. “She will be OK now. I summoned Caleb, Zuriel, Elezar, Micah, and Abner to help her. But you, boychik, are my responsibility.”

  Laughing, Buddy turned his gaze out to sea. “I’m nobody’s responsibility, Yakov-my-man. Nobody wants me hanging around their neck, especially not Dana.”

  “You are wrong. She loves you very much.”

  Slowly, Buddy shook his head. “I don’t think so. She’s only trying to be responsible. She and Mike probably wish I’d clear out and let them get on with their lives. Truth is, Dana’s been covering for me ever since grade school. She kept the other kids from picking on me when we rode the bus home from Wells; she helped me finish the math papers I never could finish. And now she’s tired. I see it in her eyes.”

  The silence between them stretched for a moment, then Yakov slipped his hands in his pockets and nodded toward the slip of paper tucked beneath Buddy’s boot. “What is that you have there?”

  “This? It’s junk. Just a cash-register receipt.”

  “Somehow I think it is something more.”

  Shrugging, Buddy pulled the paper free. “Ayuh, maybe it’s something. Maybe it’s nothing. It’s just some stuff that came to me a few minutes ago. Sometimes I have thoughts, you know, and I like to write them down. But they never amount to anything.”

  He lifted his hand until the paper caught the breeze and fluttered toward the ocean like the tail of a kite. He released the paper, watched it do a loop-de-loop in a sudden updraft and disappear into a white mist hovering above the water.

  “I have not seen your little pet today,” Yakov said, his eyes crinkling with concern. “How is the little creature?”

  “Roxy’s fine.” Reminded of his former task, Buddy stood and brushed sand from the back of his jeans. “I was out here trying to get some wood, but I think I’ve picked this part of the beach clean. I had to clean out her cage this morning, so I built the fire up nice and high so the cold air from the door wouldn’t bother her—”

  He stopped suddenly. The breeze carried a scent from the south end of the island, the definite aroma of roasting meat.

  “Buddy,” Yakov’s eyes narrowed in concentration, “where did you leave Roxy?”

  Buddy’s stomach dropped as he met Yakov’s gaze. Hoarsely he whispered, “On top of the woodstove. Where a hot fire was burning.”

  “Hot enough to bake—”

  Buddy didn’t wait to hear the end of the sentence. He took off at a sprint, running for home.

  Dana was on her way to the carriage house when Buddy tore around the corner, followed an instant later by Yakov.

  “No!” Buddy roared, digging in his pocket for his key. He fumbled with the lock, then thrust his head into his apartment. He turned an instant later, his long face flushed. “Not here!” He stared at Yakov. “Not roasted. Gone!”

  Yakov seemed to find meaning in this gibberish. “Then where?”

  “Don’t know! But Butch—”

  Yakov shook his head. “Surely he would not.”

  “How do we know? He likes to catch squirrels!”

  Dana propped her hands on her hips. “Yakov,” she injected a note of steel into her voice. “Tell me, this instant, who you are talking about. Who’s gone?”

  “My pet,” Buddy interrupted, lifting his hands in a don’t-shoot pose. “I have a pet. It’s a sugar glider, a little animal that looks something like a squirrel. But she has to stay warm, and I needed wood, so I put her on the wood-stove, and I was afraid she was roasting, but now she’s gone—”

  Dana pressed her hand to her forehead. “I don’t care about a runaway squirrel. I have some very important people on their way from the ferry right now. I need you to make yourself presentable and come into the schoolroom for the ceremony. It’ll only take a few minutes, then we’ll have a late lunch. OK?”

  Buddy grimaced as though she had struck him across the face. “But Roxy could freeze! She has to stay warm!”

  “Animals have a sixth sense about these things; she’s probably curled up in a warm place somewhere. After the party, we’ll help you look for her, OK?” Softening her tone, she walked forward and placed a hand against her brother’s chest. “I don’t mean to sound insensitive. I guess it’s OK for you to have a pet as long as I don’t have to take care of it. But I don’t have time right now to stop and look for a rodent.”

  “A marsupial,” Buddy answered, his voice flat. “She would carry her babies in a pouch, like a kangaroo.”

  “And possums,” Yakov added. “Possums come from the same family.”

  Dana resisted the urge to roll her eyes. “Whatever. Just get yourselves cleaned up and come inside, will you? Don’t disappoint me, either of you, or I’ll make sure you never forget it.”

  Buddy opened his mouth as if he’d protest again, but something in her eyes must have convinced him she meant business. He clamped his mouth shut, went back into his apartment, and slammed the door.

  Half an hour later, Dana sat on the front row of her classroom, staring at the blackboard and Basil Caldwell’s imposing figure. The other chairs, most of them kid-sized, had been filled by the citizens of Heavenly Daze, for Basil had not been able to find any members of the media willing to brave the ferry ride across the frigid feather white waters. Instead of a photographer, Basil had brought a camera, which Vernie Bidderman now held, her lips flattened in a frown as she peered through the viewfinder.

  “If I take the picture,” she was asking Basil in a none-too-subtle stage whisper, “will they put my name in the magazine? I always did want to get my name in Northeastern Living. Since I sell it at the mercantile, seems only fair.”

  Ignoring Vernie, Basil stood with his hands folded and his head lowered, an almost reverent posture, but Dana knew he was only killing time. Mike had finally arrived— and taken a seat on the far side of the room—and so had Yakov. They were waiting for Buddy, but Yakov assured Dana her brother was on his way.

  While they waited, Dana scanned the room. Barbara Higgs was still in the hospital, and Russell was with her, but Bea, Vernie, Olympia, Charles, Babette, Dr. Marc, and Cleta occupied kiddie chairs in the front row while Salt, Floyd, Stanley, Yakov and Mike lounged on two of the kid-sized tables behind the chairs. Birdie, who wore a pretty wool dress with a low-cut lace collar, sat primly beside Salt, now her official beau. The Smith men, with the exception of Yakov, had stationed themselves in the doorway between the schoolroom and the bountiful buffet spread on the kitchen table. (Dana had mentally cursed the computer a hundred times as she set out the food—the buffet would have looked a hundred times better in her formal dining room, but nooooooooo, Mike had to put his beloved computer on her grandmother’s antique dining table.)

  Bobby, Brittany, and Georgie were occupying themselves by coloring puffin pictures at the table right behind Dana’s seat, while Winslow and Edith Wickam oversaw their efforts from another kiddie table. Winslow had winked at Dana when he came in, and while she wasn’t sure what the wink meant, she took comfort from it. Perhaps something good would yet come out of this disastrous day.

  Her heart settled to a more normal rhythm when the clunk of heavy boots announced Buddy’s presence in the classroom. From the disheveled look of his clothes
and hair, and the streak of soot across his cheek, she knew he hadn’t taken time to clean up, but had kept looking for that creature. By the defeated look on his face, she surmised that he hadn’t found it.

  Maybe her surprise would take the sting out of his loss.

  Sighing in relief, she nodded to Basil, who had agreed to wait for Buddy only when she explained that the ceremony would mean nothing without her entire family present.

  “If we may begin,” Basil said, lifting a brow in Dana’s direction, “we are gathered here today on behalf of Northeastern Living to recognize a superb new talent. A talent that has been long buried, long ignored—”

  He grimaced as Vernie flashed the camera in his face.

  “Um,” Basil widened his eyes in an apparent effort to focus, “as I was saying, we are here to recognize a new talent. A few weeks ago, you see, Northeastern Living decided to run a poetry contest. Poetry, as you know, is the language of the gods—”

  “Really?”

  Dana lowered her head onto her hand when she recognized the voice. Why was Yakov interrupting?

  “There is only one God and one mediator who can reconcile God and people,” Yakov said, looking around the room. “He is the man Christ Jesus.”

  Winslow Wickam and several of the Smith men applauded.

  Dana looked at Basil and made a little hurry-up motion with her hand.

  Basil tipped his chin back and studied Yakov through lowered lids. “May I continue?”

  “Please do.” Yakov resumed his seat.

  “As I was saying,” Basil said, pressing his hand to his chest, “imagine my surprise when one entry proved to be not only from Heavenly Daze, but from a woman of my previous acquaintance, Dana Franklin Klackenbush.”

  Dana felt her cheeks burn as her neighbors, in unison, applauded lightly.

  Vernie advanced with her weapon. “Say cheese, Dana!”

  The camera flashed.

  Blinding spots clouded Dana’s vision as Basil continued. “I’d like to read the poem Dana sent us, but before I do, let me assure you that we found it deserving of our highest honor. We have declared it the first prize winner!”