Susan Wiggs - Return to Willow Lake

Zach Alger. Surely not, thought Sonnet, practically leaning out the open window. This couldn’t be the Zach Alger she’d grown up with, the whiter-shade-of-pale boy who lived down the street, with his big goofy ears and braces on his teeth. Her best friend in high school, the freakishly skinny kid who worked at the Sky River Bakery. This couldn’t be the college geek working his way through school, obsessed with cameras and all things video.

Zach Alger, she thought. Well, well. Since high school, he and Sonnet had gone in different directions, and she hadn’t seen him in ages. Now she couldn’t take her eyes off him.

After helping Daisy’s grandmother to her seat, he pulled a flask from his tux pocket and took a swig. All right, thought Sonnet. That was the Zach she knew—a guy with more talent than ambition, a guy with a troubled background he couldn’t seem to shake, a guy who was part of her past, but had no possible place in her future.

Movement in the next room reminded her she had an important job to do today. She peered through the doorway at Daisy, who was surrounded by the hairstylist, makeup artist, wedding planner, her mom Sophie, the photographer and several people Sonnet didn’t recognize. “What do you say?” she asked her mother. “Shall we go help Daisy get married?’

Nina grinned. “She wouldn’t dare make a move without you.”

“Or you. Honestly, when you married Daisy’s dad, she hit the stepmom jackpot.”

Nina’s grin turned to a soft smile, and her dark eyes took on an expression that pulled Sonnet into days gone by, when it had just been the two of them, making their way in the world. Nina had turned a teenage pregnancy into a small but lovely life for herself and Sonnet. Yes, she was married now—unexpectedly, in the middle of her life—but their two-against-the-world time together belonged solely to Nina and Sonnet.

“You’re going all mushy on me, aren’t you?” Sonnet said.

“Yeah, baby. I am. Just wait until you’re the bride. I’ll need CPR.” The shadows in the room were just starting to deepen; evening was coming on.

“No, you won’t, Mom,” Sonnet assured her. “You’ll rise to the occasion. You always do.”

Nina took her hand again, and together they stepped through the door.

Chapter Two

The wedding wound down like a noisy parade fading into the distance. In its wake was the curious mellow quiet of a just-passed storm. Sonnet stood on the broad lawn by the pavilion at Camp Kioga, surveying the petal-strewn aftermath and holding onto a well-earned sense of accomplishment.

As maid of honor, she’d been intimately involved with every aspect of the event, from coordinating Daisy’s bachelorette party to picking the colors of the table linens. But today hadn’t been about table decorations or small appliances. It had been about friends and family and a celebration so joyous she could still feel its echo deep inside her.

Rather than feeling exhausted after the long, emotional day, she was chased by a feeling of restlessness. It was strange, coming back to the place she’d once called home, seeing people who looked her over and remarked, “I remember when you were this tall” or “Why hasn’t some guy snatched you up by now?” as if being twenty-eight and unmarried was taboo in a town like this.

She smiled a little, pretending she didn’t feel the tiniest dig of impatience with her personal life. No. She wasn’t impatient. It was hard, caught up in the wedding whirlwind, to ignore the fact that nearly everyone in sight was coupled up.

Taking a deep breath, she went back to savoring the success of the day. The bride and groom had just departed. Her maid of honor duties were done. In the glow of twinkling fairy lights, the band was breaking down its set. The catering crew got going on the cleanup. The last of the wedding guests were slowly melting into the darkness of the perfect fall evening, the air redolent of crisp leaves and ripe apples. There had been a bonfire at the lakeshore, but it had burned to glowing embers by now. Some of the visitors headed for the parking lot, while the out-of-towners wended their way to the storybook pretty lakefront bungalows of the Camp Kioga, which through the years had been transformed from a family camp to a kids’ camp to its present iteration, a gathering place for celebrating life’s events. A good number of the guests were, like Sonnet, pleasantly tipsy.

A bright moon peeked over the dark hills surrounding Willow Lake, throwing silvery shadows across the still water and trampled grass. Childish laughter streamed from somewhere close by, and three little kids chased each other between the banquet tables. In the low light, Sonnet couldn’t tell whose kids they were, but their joyous abandon lifted her heart. She adored children; she always had. In a place deep down in the center of her, she felt a soft tug of yearning, but it was a yearning that would likely go unfulfilled for a very long time. Maybe forever. She had big plans for her future, but at the moment, those plans did not include settling down and having kids of her own.

In the first place, there was no one to settle down with. Unlike Daisy, who had found the love of her life and was going forward with clear-eyed certainty, Sonnet had no vision of who might be that person for her, that one adored man who would become her whole world. In all honesty, she wasn’t a hundred percent sure such a person existed. There was nothing missing from her life, nothing at all. It wasn’t as if she needed to add someone like the final piece of a puzzle.

Greg Bellamy, Sonnet’s stepfather, came walking across the now-trampled lawn, heading for the gazebo to shell out extra tips for the band. As father of the bride, he was all smiles. Sonnet went over to him, teasingly holding out her hand, palm up. “Hey, where’s the tip for the maid of honor?”

Greg chuckled, looking handsome but tired and slightly disheveled in his tux, the black silk bow tie undone and hanging on either side of his unbuttoned collar. “Here’s a tip for you. Take a couple of aspirin before you go to bed tonight. It’ll counteract those Jell-O shots you did at the reception.”

“You saw that?” She grinned. “Whoops.”

“It’s okay. You’ve earned it, kiddo. Great job today. You looked like a million, and that toast you made at the reception—hilarious. Everybody loved it. You’re a born public speaker.”

“Yeah? Aw, thanks. You’re not so bad yourself, for an evil stepfather.” Sonnet loved her mom’s husband. Through the years, he’d been a great mentor and friend to her. But he wasn’t her dad. Sonnet’s father, General Laurence Jeffries, played that role, although he had been virtually absent from her childhood, making a career for himself far from the bucolic charm of Avalon. When Sonnet went off to college at American University and then graduate school at Georgetown, however, she and Laurence had reconnected; she had dived into his world of public service and strategy and diplomacy, eagerly soaking up his knowledge and expertise.

She was the first to admit that hero worship made for a much more complicated relationship with Laurence than she had with Greg.

Nina came over to join them, her heeled pumps dangling from one hand. “What’s this I hear about Jell-O shots? You were doing them without me?”

“Trust me,” said Greg, “the champagne cocktails were a lot more fun.”

“I trust you. And you were an amazing father of the bride,” she said to Greg, smiling up at him.

“I cried like a baby girl.” He offered a sheepish grin.

“We all did,” Sonnet assured him. “Weddings seem to have that effect on people. Daisy’s even more so, because of all the trouble she’s had.”

“Speaking of trouble, I need to go make sure we’ve settled up with everybody else,” Greg said.