“You sure? I can stay if you want.”
“No, I think I’m just going to cry it out for a while.”
“Okay, kiddo. I’ll call you tomorrow.” He rose and kissed the top of my head, and that small kindness squeezed another sob out of me.
“You were really great tonight, Sam,” I whispered. Unsurprising, that.
“Take care, honey.”
I looked at him through watery eyes. “Thanks.”
He let the dog back in and then left.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
I HAD INVENTED the Joe Carpenter of my dreams. For sixteen years—more than half of my life!—I’d been in love with an imaginary man. All the effort, all the time, all the love I’d poured into Joe had been like shoveling the tide. There was no payoff, there was no happily-ever-after. There was just nothing. Just a sweet, not-too-bright guy whose looks I had used to construct an impossibly perfect man.
God, I was so stupid.
Self-loathing twisted through me, making me toss and turn in my bed. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Whom might I have met if I hadn’t been so hung up on my imaginary Joe? Would I be married to some imperfect but real man by now? Over the past six months, I’d turned myself inside out to get Joe…for what? For nothing, because there was no Joe, not the way I’d thought, anyway. I was like some poor adolescent girl who was in love with a movie star or singer, assigning all kinds of qualities to a pretty face. “And then, someday, our eyes will meet at a concert, and we’ll just know that we’re right for each other….”
And what about the real Joe? What would I say to him? “Oh, sorry, but I made you up. We’re not really breaking up, because the person I thought you are doesn’t exist outside of my head. Have a good day!”
When morning finally hauled itself to Cape Cod, I sat up. My head still hurt, my eyes were gritty from too many tears, my body ached as if I had the flu. The high heels I’d worn the night before caused my calves to cramp, and my hair was tacky from all the goop I’d slathered in it to make it behave.
I drank some orange juice, threw on my sweats and went for a run, needing to purge my mind of the recriminations screaming there. I turned my iPod up loud and trudged along in my trademark trot, Digger plodding beside me, his joy of the outdoors undimmed by my mood. My shoulders cramped, my stomach ached, my calves burned. I didn’t care. In fact, I welcomed the discomfort. It distracted me from the ache in my heart.
When I got home, I showered and brushed my teeth and sat on the porch for a while, feeling hollow and numb. Digger licked my face, but I barely noticed. After a while, the phone rang. Thinking it was Sam, I answered it.
“Millie, it’s Joe.”
My stomach thudded to my feet. “Oh, hi, Joe.”
“Are you okay?” He actually sounded a little scared.
“Yeah, sure.”
“Are you still mad at me?”
I sighed. “Maybe you should come over, Joe.”
“Now?”
“Now would be good.”
When Joe got to my house, I saw that he’d brought his dog. Tripod leaped out of the truck, and he and Digger went chasing each other merrily through my yard, just as I had always imagined they would. I winced. All my plans seemed so stupid and shallow now.
Joe stared down at my kitchen table and declined a glass of water or cup of coffee. When I sat down across from him, he looked at me directly.
“Can I just say something first?” he asked.
“Uh, sure,” I said.
“Okay, Millie. I know I screwed up last night, and I can see why you’re so mad at me. It was a really dumb thing to do. I was just thinking about when I was in high school and how sneaking a drink seemed like so much fun. I guess I wanted to seem kind of cool, you know? Because I’ve got to tell you, being back at Nauset High, being called Mr. Carpenter, it kind of freaked me out. All of a sudden, I felt wicked old. Do you know what I mean?”
I shook my head.
“Oh. Well, it was stupid, and I’m sorry. Please don’t be mad anymore, Millie.”
I swallowed. “Joe, it’s actually kind of more than just last night.”
“It is?” His eyes were wide and confused.
I traced the design of my tablecloth, grateful for somewhere to look other than at Joe.
“Well, the thing is, Joe,” I said, needing to whisper because my throat was so tight. He leaned forward to hear me better. “The thing is that I guess I’ve been thinking…I think maybe we’re just not right for each other.” I swallowed loudly.
“But Millie…” Joe said, taking my hands across the table.
“No, Joe, I’m sorry.” I pulled my hands free. “This is mostly on me, not you. Last night was just…just an example of what’s been going on.”
“What are you talking about?”
With effort, I raised my eyes. “I haven’t been honest with you, Joe,” I said. “The truth is, I’m one of those women who went after you, just because you’re so…gorgeous.”
“You didn’t go after me,” he countered. “You didn’t. That was one of the things I liked about you. You didn’t seem to be so…desperate.”
“Well, I was. I’ve had a crush on you since freshman year of high school, Joe. I’ve always wanted to go out with you. I even…” I swallowed again.
“What?”
“I kind of, well, stalked you. For a long time. To find out what you liked. I knew where you went and who you were with and stuff like that. And then when I moved back here, I tried to make myself into a person that you’d want.”
He ran his hands through his hair. “Millie, what are you talking about?”
“I wanted you to notice me. I lost weight. I made sure I bumped into you when I was at the senior center. I’d figure out when you went to the post office and go at the same time. I started running on roads I knew you drove on. I got a dog because you had a dog. There. Now you know.”
Joe stared at me, then leaned forward and smiled. “Well, okay, I guess you definitely had a thing for me. So what? It doesn’t matter.”
“But—”
He cut me off. “I like lots of things about you. Like how funny you are, and smart. You always seem to be having a good time. And how you were with me…you don’t seem to care about what was outside. You like me, you know, just for me.”
I looked down. I had never felt so ashamed of myself in my life.
“Well,” I said very, very quietly, “I’m afraid you’re wrong. I mean, no, you’re not wrong, Joe. I have a lot of…affection for you. But I also just assumed a bunch of things about you, and I didn’t really bother to get to know the real you.”
Joe sat up straighter.
“And now that we have gotten to know each other a little more, I think that we’re just not right for each other.” The last sentence came out in the barest whisper.
“So what you’re saying is, now that you know the real me, you want to break up.”
The wind sliced through the yard, making the kitchen screens rattle, and the dogs yipped as they played. “Right,” I whispered.
“And this is not just about me screwing up last night.”
“No.”
We sat there another minute, then Joe closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Okay. I guess I should go, then.” His voice was husky. He pushed back his chair and got up to leave.
I looked up at him, this beautiful man, standing for the last time in my house. “Joe, I’m very, very sorry.”
He drew in a shaky breath. “I just want to say one more thing, Millie. I love you.”
Then he left, calling his dog more harshly that was necessary. Tripod clambered into the truck, and Joe drove away.
HOW COULD I HAVE BEEN so blind/stupid/foolish?
It became my theme song. I agonized over that question. How could I have done this? How could I have not seen? How could I have let it get so far?
I ached for Joe, knowing that I’d hurt him. I’d gone after him with a vengeance, manipulated him into thinking he loved the facade I’d constructed. Joe Carpenter was not a bad person. He had done a stupid thing, of course, but no one deserved to be told he wasn’t good enough, yet that’s just what I’d done.
Shame pressed down on me. I was drowning in shame. I was afraid to go for a run, in case Joe should drive by. I didn’t want to go to the Barnacle. I didn’t want to talk on the phone. I didn’t want to garden, ride my bike, see my friends or my parents. I told them, of course, though nobody seemed to be too surprised.
“I’m sorry, Millie,” Katie said about a week after the breakup. “But I’m sure it’s for the best.”
“Did you know about this?” I asked, reaching for a tissue. “Did you know that I was making him up as I went along?”
She sighed. “Well, kind of. I mean, I hoped that you were right, of course, but I never really saw all that wonderfulness that you did. I mean, Joe’s not a bad guy or anything, and yes, he’s gorgeous, but he always seemed like a big kid to me.”
Curtis and Mitch took me out to dinner at an expensive restaurant and ordered me to drown my sorrows. “He was just a pretty face,” Curtis consoled. “You’ll find someone else. Someone with a little more upstairs.”
“Absolutely,” Mitch echoed, finishing his martini.
Even my mom and dad weren’t that upset. “Well, honey, someone will come around who really is right for you,” my dad consoled. “Joe’s a nice guy and all, but…”
“But what?” I asked, needing the validation and hating myself for it.
“But he wasn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer, punkin.”
It didn’t help.
In addition to the self-recrimination that was running rampant through my veins, I simply missed Joe, too, his sweetness and his happy-go-lucky ways. I missed the thrill of seeing him, the sweet shock of his beauty, the physical closeness. And even more than that, I missed the days before I’d been involved with him, when thinking of Joe had sustained me. Let’s face it. I’d lost my lifelong hobby.
Once, I’d been so sure that Joe would be a huge part of my future. The truth was, I never really imagined myself with anyone else. My thirties suddenly yawned in front of me, and I pictured myself with only Digger and his irritable bowel syndrome to greet me each night, no person to interrupt the relentless quiet of my house.
Only when I was seeing patients was I remotely normal, but the clinic’s business was slowing down, and I had too much time on my hands even there. The new wing at the senior center was nearly finished, and I took to visiting patients twice a week, sometimes just dropping in for a visit. If Joe’s truck wasn’t in the parking lot, that was. The folks there all knew me by now, and it was comforting to be in my Dr. Barnes persona rather than full of self-beratement. I’d stay as long as possible in my patients’ rooms, reading to them, asking them questions about their lives before creeping through the halls, praying that I wouldn’t run into Joe.
SEPTEMBER BROUGHT IN EARLIER evenings and chillier days. The ocean seemed to have less green in it and more gray, and the wind was cool enough that I brought a hat when I went to the beach at night. The poison ivy was edged with red, the tourists left and the kids went back to school, and in the quiet of my home, I couldn’t avoid the thought that had started to ring the loudest in my head.
For years, I’d thought that Joe was a wonderful amalgamation of kindness, decency and dependability. But I only knew one man that terrific, and it wasn’t Joe.
Joe Carpenter was no Sam.
For the past several weekends, Sam and Danny had been visiting colleges throughout the Northeast—Williams, Wesleyan, Colby and Penn—and I hadn’t seen much of them lately. It was just as well. My head was muddled enough without me dwelling on the fact that my sister’s ex-husband embodied all the qualities I’d wished on Joe.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
DR. WHITAKER GAVE ME the chance to snap out of my funk.
“Millie,” he said over the phone one day toward the end of September, “I’d like to discuss the partnership with you, now that the clinic will be closing…when exactly is that?”
My breath caught. “We close the week after Columbus Day,” I answered calmly.
“Right. At any rate, you’ve done very well at the senior center, and I’m very pleased with your work at the clinic. If you’re still interested in joining me, we should work out the details, don’t you agree?”
I bolted upright. At last. At last! “I’m absolutely still interested, Dr.—George. Thank you. I’m honored,” I smiled.
“Excellent. Why don’t we meet next Thursday for dinner here at my house?”
“That would be lovely,” I answered.
“There’s something else I’d like you to do, more of a favor, actually,” the doctor went on.
“Of course! What is it?”
“The high school has a career day for the seniors. Professionals from the community come in and talk about what they do, how they got interested in their work and the like. I’ve been doing it for years, and I thought it would be beneficial for you to tag along.”
“Sure,” I said. “I’d love to come. My nephew’s a senior this year.”
“That’s right,” Dr. Whitaker replied. “Such a fine boy, young Daniel. We’ll attend Career Day, I’ll give my little presentation, and then later in the week we can nail out the details of our partnership. How does that sound?”