seen anybody up there yet? Or is the place pretty much cleared out for the season?”
“Cleared out,” I reply, and I take a sip of my own sweet tea. I made a whole pot right when I got here, since Gran had left supplies in the cupboard if they were things that would last through the winter. “The place is like a ghost town.”
“Have you seen Erik anywhere?” she asks, and she has a lilting, teasing sound to her voice.
I scratch my knee and knock a bug off my leg. “Who?”
“Mr. Jacobson Senior. The older gentleman with the firm backside and deprecating sense of humor.”
“Eww. I can’t believe you’re talking about the man’s backside.” I chuckle.
“Well, I happen to have explicit knowledge of his front side, too,” she replies.
“Gran!” I yell on top of a laugh. “Stop!” But I’m laughing so hard that I have to hold my sides.
“Oh, it’s not what you think,” she says, but I can hear the laughter in her voice. “I stumbled upon him skinny-dipping with his wife one night, back when we were all younger. I just happened to get a glimpse of his package. It was pretty impressive, I’m not going to lie.”
“So you and he never…” I let the words hang there in the air.
“Oh, God, no. He’s just a friend.”
“Is he the one you called when I said I was coming up here?” As the sun sets, lightning bugs begin to flicker on and off in the distance.
“Yes.”
I catch a flyaway piece of my hair that starts to tickle my nose and tuck it behind my ear. “Did you tell him what happened?”
“I reckon that’s your business,” she says, and she lets out an indelicate sniff. “But he was pretty interested in hearing the story. Always was a nosy old coot.”
“You could have told him,” I say. “It’s not like people knowing will change anything.”
“So, you’re not going back?” she asks.
My gran and I have always been tight. She has been my confidante when I couldn’t talk about things with my mother. When I was old enough, she’d taken me to get started on birth control. She has stood by me through more shit than anyone. “There’s nothing to go back to.” I play with a stray thread on the frayed hem of my shorts. “He moved me out, moved her in, and they’re probably planning a nursery right now.”
“Still a shitty thing to do,” she mutters. “He could have told you it was over and let you decide when you wanted to go.”
“That would have been way too civilized.”
“How long are you going to stay at the lake?”
“I figure a couple of weeks. Maybe more. Who knows.” I shrug even though I know she can’t see me. “As I said, there’s nothing to go back to. Except maybe finding another job.”
“You’ll have to start your paperwork soon.”
“What paperwork?” I ask. “Updating my resume?”
“Divorce paperwork, Abigail. You get half the equity in that house even if he did kick you out of it,” she reminds me. “Please tell me you took your grandpa’s keepsake box with you.” She sounds like she’s holding her breath all of a sudden.
I smile. “It’s the only thing I grabbed on the way out the door.” It was really the only thing that mattered.
“What I want to know is why you don’t sound like you’re broken up over the way things have gone.” She waits. Silent.
“I feel relieved, honestly,” I say after a moment. “I don’t know why I feel this way. But I’m not sad. I’m mad as hell about the cheating and the baby and everything, but I’m not sad.”
“Good,” she says firmly.
A roll of thunder shakes the sky just as we finish our talk. “How do you do that?” I whisper more to myself than to her.
“My old bones never lie,” she replies.
A flash of lightning streaks across the sky and it’s almost immediately followed by another clap of thunder that’s loud enough to shake the porch rail. “I’d better go,” I say.
“Love you, Abigail,” she says softly. And I know she’s not lying. “You’re going to get through this. You’re going to come out the other side and be happier for it.”
Tears sting my eyes and I blink hard to push them back. “Thanks, Gran. Love you too.”
She hangs up and I sit on the porch and watch as fat raindrops plunk around me.
I love the rain. I always have. I’ve never been bothered by thunder or lightning. I wouldn’t go stand