Shoebox (eBook)

Chapter 1

Commitments

The wind blew Peter’s windbreaker, whipping his long white hair against his face. He clamped his cigar between his teeth as he made his way slowly across the soft sand to the lifeguard chair that stood silhouetted against the evening sky. He raised one leg at a time to pull himself up the ladder, his feet twisted with arthritis and his knees aching. At the top, he sat heavily in the chair and rested his back against the faded white wood facing the stormy bay. He sighed as he lifted his cigar and inhaled. This was what he longed for: time to himself, time to forget and time to remember.

The breeze felt different that night. He closed his eyes to the sound of waves hitting the rocks in the distance. The autumn wind blew his white hair, the chill stiffening his bones. Oh, now he could see her, young and beautiful again.

He let the smoke of his cigar linger as he thought back over his life to discover how he’d come to this place, to this moment in time. And he remembered . . .he remembered everything.

It had all begun with the shoebox.

1985

Peter stared at the architectural blueprints spread across his drafting table and rubbed his neck. He’d read in the Boston Tribune only the week before about the two types of stress: good and bad. This was supposedly the non-life threatening type. After all, how many new partners get asked to jump in the ring and bid on the city’s most-coveted project?

He flipped through the papers on his desk to reveal two buried Brides magazines with colored swatches sticking out, the pages folded to photos of china and wedding cakes. He sighed and pushed the magazines aside.

“Bad stress,” he said quietly. The phone rang as he reached for his cup of stale coffee.

Peter’s company, Rowland and Michaels Architectural Firm, occupied the top floor of Boston’s old Wentworth Building; a four-story brick edifice abandoned ten years earlier during the worst of the 1970s. Peter’s senior partner had invested in restoring the building, and now their new offices sat in the middle of the open floor enclosed in glass with miniature models lining the windowsills and the industrial ceiling high overhead, its pipes and ducts exposed. Although small, the space exuded a sense of age and grandeur even at this time of evening.

Peter sat back in his black leather chair, loosening his shoulders as he picked up the phone. “Hey, Jake!” He laughed. “Some of us are busy and don’t have time to be harassing people. What’s up?”

“You’re not fooling anyone,” Jake said. “I know what you’re doing. You’re walking circles around your desk drinking this morning’s old coffee. You haven’t had anything to eat since last night, and you’re second-guessing everything you worked so hard on, which I’m sure is perfect, brilliant, exactly what the Mayor’s Committee is looking for. Am I right? Tell me I’m right.”

“You don’t know everything.” Peter smiled. “The coffee’s not from this morning, for your information. It’s only two hours old.”

“What are you worried about, man? You know they’re going to hire you. It’s a done deal.”

“I don’t know.” Peter leaned forward and picked up a drafting pencil, rolling it nervously between his fingers. “What if I’m biting off more than I can chew? This Library Restoration Project is huge. I’m playing with the big dogs now.”

“Big dogs! Those guys are yesterday’s news. You’re the talented new blood. Famous Rob Rowland picked you up right out of grad school! Partner by the time you were forty! That’s why they approached you in the first place. You have to have a little more faith in yourself—I do.”

Peter laughed out loud. Jake’s friendship hadn’t changed in twenty years.

“Hey, Amanda told me you and Tara are listening to some band tonight for the wedding, but I thought we were watching the --”

“The band thing’s tonight?” Peter pulled uncomfortably on his collar. “When did Tara tell her that?”

“Last night at the new Michael J. Fox movie, some time-travel chick flick. Where have you been? I know more about your plans than you do.”

Peter massaged the back of his neck and the knot under his shoulder blade that hadn’t gone away in weeks. “I hate that Tara tells Amanda these things. She’s making sure you’ll remind me.”

“Sisters, dude. What’re you going to do? So go. I totally understand if you have commitments.”

“Don’t be bogus, Jake.”

“I’ll get over it.”

“That can’t be right. I put down when the band thing was.” Peter shoved the blueprints aside and thumbed through his appointment book, but found nothing about a band written in.

“And before I forget, Amanda ran across one of your boxes when she was cleaning out the basement. She told me to tell you. I’ll drop it by your office tomorrow.”

“No, don’t.” Peter glanced at the uncovered bridal magazines. “I’m coming over. I can’t deal with the band thing tonight.” He pushed himself back in his leather chair. “Tara can go with their mother or something. I just can’t.”

He sighed and threw down his pencil as he hung up. He glanced at a small photo on his desk, himself and Tara in 1985 New Year’s Eve party hats at Jake and Amanda’s house, Tara puckering her lips and pointing to her ring finger while Peter stared past the camera with his beer to his mouth.

Jake’s younger daughter, Janie, insisted on sitting on Peter’s lap, and Hope wore her fairy princess costume all throughout dinner.

“Mommy, more dessert?”

“Hope! You’ve had enough. We have to start getting you ready for bed.” Amanda lifted Janie out of Peter’s lap.

Hope made her way quickly into Janie’s place, where Peter created a chair with his arms, cradling her. “You remembered,” she whispered.

“I would never forget.”

They whispered together. “Hope’s special chair.”

“Uncle Peter, I wish you still lived here. I miss Stuart.”

“Stuart?” Amanda smiled.

“Stuart Little. She liked when I did his voice.”

Hope turned and played with Peter’s hair. “I like when you do his boice, I like when you do it. You do it.” Amanda laughed at how she said voice.

Peter blushed and, after a moment, began to talk in a tiny high-pitched voice. When Hope touched his lips, he laughed and pulled her close. Her laughter was infectious, Janie turned back toward them, and now both girls were on his lap, giggling and pulling his hair. They screamed, tickling him, when he blew into their bellies.

“Uncle Peter! How am I ever going to get these girls to settle down?”

Hope and Janie complained when Amanda pulled them out of Peter’s lap and took their pudgy hands.

“Love you girls. We’ll play more next time, I promise.” Peter blew kisses, and they blew them back.

Amanda leaned down swiftly and kissed him on the cheek. “I miss you living here too, you know.” Peter watched as Amanda turned and led the children step-by-step up the carpeted stairs. She paused and looked over her shoulder at him. “I’m glad Tara’s finally bringing you into this family.”

The dining room sat in the center of Jake and Amanda’s home, with a view of the living room and the fire that always burned in its old stone fireplace. Amanda’s oversized grandmother’s hutch stood against one wall, towering over the table and filled with china and glasses along with her antique silver tea service. The cherry wood dinner table, now covered with emptied plates and bits of macaroni and cheese on the tablecloth, stood in center of the room with matching chairs and a simple brass pendant lamp hanging above. On either side of the small room nestled deep window seats with matching cushions that Amanda had sewn herself, scattered with stuffed animals and children’s books.

Not exactly Tara’s trendy style.

“Pete, you want coffee?” Jake brought a crumb cake with plates and forks from the kitchen.

“Boy, haven’t you become Mr. Mom. I’m impressed—and slightly disturbed.”

“Shut up. Next year this time it’ll be you serving us at your place with Tara.”

Peter’s smile faded. He took a slice of the crumb cake and poured himself coffee. He stirred his cup slowly, adding milk.

“So, are you excited?” Jake sat beside him on the table.

“Yeah. Overwhelmed at the same time.”

“That’s to be expected.”

“But I only get one shot, right? I can’t mess this up. I really have to work on the details, focus, and do more research. I was thinking of going to the Mayor’s office and requesting a view of the original blueprints. I want to be as historically-correct as I can.”

“What the heck are you talking about? Your nuptials,...