Gail Bowen - The Last Good Day

Zack had reserved a table for us on the deck overlooking the lake, and as soon as we’d placed our orders, the girls hit us up for loonies to play the jukebox and gravitated towards the dance floor. Taylor seemed to have left her existential angst in the boat, so there was nothing to do but relax, listen to Jan and Dean sing “Dead Man’s Curve,” and enjoy the sunset and the Japanese lanterns.

When Blake excused himself to talk to friends he’d spotted across the deck, Zack gave me an opening I couldn’t ignore. “So what have you been up to, Joanne? I know you were out of town, because I knocked at your door.”

“I was in Saskatoon tracking down a former employee of yours,” I said.

Zack raised an eyebrow. “And who would that be?”

“Clare Mackey,” I said.

I watched his face carefully for a reaction. There was none. “You didn’t have to drive to Saskatoon to find out where Clare was,” he said evenly. “I could have told you.”

“Good,” I said. “So where is she?”

“Clare is in feminist heaven. She landed a job with an all-female law firm in Vancouver.”

“What’s the name of the firm?”

Zack shrugged. “I haven’t a clue.”

“Yet you’re still comfortable with the official explanation,” I said.

Zack rested his forearms on the table and leaned towards me. Like everything else he did, the move seemed calculated. His upper body was powerful, and braced against the table he had the controlled energy of an animal about to pounce. “What makes you think the official explanation isn’t the truth?” he said.

“For one thing, no one seems to have heard from Clare. Her friends are getting anxious.”

“Clare’s an adult,” Zack said. “She was offered a good job in an exciting city. She moved along. Do you have any more questions?”

“Not at the moment,” I said.

“Then let’s put that eager young server hovering behind you out of his misery and eat our onion rings.”

“Perfect timing,” I said.

“Perfect world,” Zack said as the server placed the platter between us. “Take a bite.”

Conversation during dinner was minimal. We were all hungry, and Magoo’s food made talk a fool’s option. The menu noted that the burgers were made on-site and sizzled on the kitchen grill; the oversized Kaiser buns were baked by the owner’s mother; the lettuce and tomatoes on the condiment tray had been picked from the garden out back; the fries were hand-cut shoestrings; the milkshakes were so thick they were guaranteed to clog a straw.

We munched to the beat of the Shangri-Las, Sam Cooke, Gene Pitney, and Brenda Lee. Finally, Taylor pushed away her plate.

“Finished?” I said.

“I have to pee,” she mouthed.

I waited a moment, assessed the situation, and followed her.

She’d been quiet during dinner, but Taylor had always been serious about food. That said, she was not a morbid child, and the fact that she’d talked about a legacy worried me. She was already in the stall when I got there.

“Everything okay?” I asked.

“I just had to pee,” she said.

“Fine,” I said. “I’ll wait. We can go back together.”

“As if I was two years old,” she said.

“Taylor, one of these days you’ll be a woman, and that means you’ll be going to the powder room with other women for the rest of your life. Consider tonight your rite of passage.”

Taylor was grinning when she came out of the stall. “ Powder room.” She rolled the words around in her mouth. “Who calls it that?”

In a photo above her, the cartoon Mr. Magoo peered nearsightedly at the spectacular cleavage of a life-sized Marilyn Monroe. “Women who need a place to talk privately about how their evening’s going,” I said.

“Cool,” Taylor said. Her eyes held mine. “About that ‘leaving behind’ thing. Maddy’s book about the Inuksuit said that once people all over the world built things like Inuksuit and left them behind to help the people who came after. I was just wondering what I was going to leave.”

“I imagine you’ll be like your mother and leave behind a lot of amazing art.”

“But what if I’m like my father?” Taylor said. “He didn’t leave anything behind.”

“That’s not true, Taylor,” I said. “We all leave something.”

“But what did my father leave?”

I put my hands on her shoulders and turned her towards the mirror. “He left you.”

After we left the ladies’ room, Taylor went back to the dance floor to rock around the clock with Bill Haley, and I returned to our table on the deck and a fait accompli. Zack was alone, his fingers tapping out the beat on the Formica tabletop and his eyes fixed on the progress of a red canoe moving towards shore.

When I sat down, he gave me a satyr’s smile. “Change in plans,” he said. “Blake caught a ride to Lawyers’ Bay with those people he was talking to before dinner. He’s decided to drive back to the city tonight.”

“So he can look for Lily?” I said.

“I imagine Blake can make an educated guess about his wife’s whereabouts.”

“Can you?” I asked.

He shrugged. “Anybody can make a guess, but Lily’s wandering ways are Blake’s concern. I never assume another man’s burdens.”

“Unless he pays you a retainer,” I said.

“Good one,” Zack said, raising his metal milkshake container to me. “But back to the situation at hand. I didn’t see any reason to end the evening. The girls and I are having a good time, and you looked as if you could use a little fun.”

“You’re very perceptive,” I said.

“When it matters to me, I am. And since you matter to me, I’ll do what I can to lighten your spirits. Would you care to dance?”

Taken aback by what sounded suspiciously like a pass, I hesitated a beat too long before answering. Zack picked up on my uncertainty.

“I can dance, you know.”

I stood and extended my hand. “In that case, let’s dance.”

Zack took it. “A woman who leads,” he said. “I like that.”

The spectators around the dance floor were closer to Taylor’s age than to mine, and they were agape. True to his promise, Zack really could dance. He manoeuvred his chair with skill and finesse, and he led me through the Twist, the Stroll, the Jerk, the Monkey, and the Swim before, sweaty and breathless, I raised my hand.

“I have to sit the next one out,” I said. “It’s either that or coronary care.”

Zack was sweaty and breathless too. “Thank God,” he said. “I was afraid you’d never give up.”

“I didn’t know it was a contest,” I said.

“Everything’s a contest, but I also wanted you to have a good time. You seemed preoccupied.”

“Sorry,” I said. “Just parent stuff. In the boat coming over, Taylor said something that bothered me.”

“Fill me in,” Zack said. “I’m a good listener.”

“Is this going to be a billable hour?” I asked.

He grinned. “Nope. This hour’s free. This is where I suck you in. Get you to like me.”

“I already like you,” I said.

“So the pressure’s off. Let’s talk about Taylor.”

“There’s not much to say. On the ride over, Taylor seemed a little down. I offered her a penny for her thoughts and she told me she was wondering what she’d leave behind after she died. That’s why I followed her into the bathroom. But she assured me her concern about a legacy was no big deal – it was just a question she was mulling over.”

In the candlelight, Zack’s eyes were lustrous. “You don’t believe her?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “Taylor has a complicated history. She was the daughter of a friend of mine – the artist Sally Love.”