Page 7 of It’s You

D arcy’s entire body froze except for her heart, which did somersaults like she was fifteen again.

He started walking, taking the lead, and after a moment, Darcy trailed behind him. They continued past the last of the grassy park to the right of the church, where no one at the wedding in the back meadow could see them, and headed into the woods.

Proctor Woods had always held a special place in Darcy’s heart. When she was a child, her father would take her and Amory for long hikes in the woods, showing them how various weather patterns affected the world around them.

Darcy knew every inch of the thirty-acre woods, the trails, the three ponds, meadows, falls, and the lake in the middle.

She thoroughly credited summers spent in the rambles with her current profession, Adjunct Professor of Botany at Dartmouth University.

For most of her life, Proctor Woods had served as a place of study, reflection, and comfort for Darcy, although at present there was very little in the woods to capture her attention.

From her vantage point, traipsing behind him, she could check out the man that Jack had grown into.

He had been a muscular teenager, but his body radiated fully matured strength now, muscles flexing and relaxing in his back like a machine with every step he took.

Her eyes drifted lower to his waist, and before she knew it, they had walked at least a tenth of a mile with her eyes trained on his backside, which, she determined with a grudging sigh, was a thing of extreme perfection.

She swallowed nervously, wondering if he could hear what she was thinking. If he could, he didn’t let on.

Nor did he look back at her as they walked in silence and Darcy tried not to think about his words, but the harder she tried not to, the more they danced in her mind, taunting her, teasing her, reminding her of the desperate, terrible longing she felt when she had disavowed them in the girls’ bathroom.

Because you belong to me. And I belong to you.

How could it be true? What did it mean? And hmm…how come he wasn’t answering her?

“Can’t you hear me?” she finally asked.

“I’m not looking at you.”

“You’re not—Ahhh…” she murmured. “The sunglasses.”

He nodded his head in front of her, but didn’t look back.

“So you did know about this telepathy.”

“I didn’t know,” he insisted, “for sure.”

Her emotions were all over the place. Darcy was a scientist. She didn’t believe in things like telepathy, and yet she’d just used the word to describe the strange, intimate communication between them.

“You’re angry with me,” he muttered.

She didn’t respond. They had entered a clearing and Beaver Pond, surrounded by pine trees, lay before them, sparkling in the sunlight.

Off to the right, Darcy looked at the low peak of Magalloway Mountain, still white on top, and gestured to the small weather-beaten bench sitting in a clump of weeds a few feet from the pond.

Jack dusted it off with his hand before she sat down, which made her lips twitch with a slight smile.

“Thanks,” she said.

“You didn’t answer me.”

“You didn’t ask me a question.”

“You’re an exasperating woman.”

“Says the man who appears in my life out of nowhere after twenty years, following me around my cousin’s wedding!”

“Darcy. Are. You. Angry. With. Me?”

She shifted her body to look at him. He stared straight ahead at the water, and she realized he was probably fighting the urge to catch her eyes and take a look inside her head. She admired him for it. It made her smile. Again.

“I’m incredibly confused,” she admitted. “And I’m a little nervous I’m going crazy.”

He breathed in deeply, and she saw him smile down at his clasped hands. “You’re not going crazy.”

“How do you know? This isn’t normal.”

“Let’s play a game of quid pro quo,” he said, glancing at her.

“How?”

“You ask a question, and I’ll answer the best I can. Then it’s my turn.”

“Okay.” Anything to get some answers.

She leaned her head on the back of the bench and unbuttoned the top two buttons of her sweater, closing her eyes and basking in the warmth of the midday sun.

“Can you button back up?”

She opened her eyes slowly, squinting at him through the sunlight. He tore his eyes away from her breasts, but not before Darcy got a look at his face, which had flushed with full-blooded interest. Watching his profile, she saw him clench his jaw once as he stared at the pond.

“Sure.” She buttoned up and turned to him, smiling merrily. “My turn.”

“Wait a minute…”

“That was a question, and I answered it. I didn’t make the rules. I’m just following them. My turn.”

His nostrils flared in frustration, but he nodded.

“Did that kiss mean anything to you?”

He turned to her, his eyes soft and naked. Tenderness.

“Everything. You have no idea. It changed my entire life.”

Tears sprang unbidden into her eyes. Leftover tears from the depths of her soul where the tiniest sliver of hope had rested its battered self, hidden and silent for all of these years.

He raised his hand gently toward her head, reaching to sweep an errant strand of blonde hair out of her face. “Darcy, please let me touch you.”

She shook her head no, sniffling and swiping at her eyes as he lowered his hand without touching her. “Then why didn’t you?—”

He leaned his elbow on the back of the bench and interrupted her softly. “My turn. Why didn’t you ever get married?”

She used the sleeve of her sweater to swipe at the last of her tears and took a deep, shaky breath.

“It’s not that I haven’t dated. I mean, I have.

Of course I have. I was very serious with one man while I was in grad school.

Phillip…Proctor. We dated for several years, but in the end, we wanted different things from life.

” She shivered lightly, thinking about Phillip’s heavy drinking and mysterious departure.

He’d left Boston one day and never came back.

She’d learned of his hasty relocation via a scrawled postcard hastily left in her mailbox, which had clued her in to the total of her worth to him.

She didn’t want to think about Phillip, but with the exception of a few professors at Dartmouth, she really hadn’t dated very much, and no one had ever felt right.

“Are these Phillip’s woods?” Jack’s voice interrupted her thoughts, dripping with disdain.

“Proctor’s an old Carlisle name. Can’t throw a pebble down Main Street without hitting a Proctor.”

“Continue.”

“About Phillip? Nothing much to tell. He was a few years older than me in high school, but we both grew up here. My folks’ve known his family forever.

We started dating in Boston while I was in grad school and he was working at a bank in Cambridge.

” She took a breath, banishing painful old memories. “Didn’t work out.”

“Why not?”

“My turn. How do you know Amory?”

“He’s been helping me renovate my house.

My folks signed over some land to me. Had a building on it, but it needed a lot of work.

When I went looking for a builder around Carlisle last fall, I recognized the name Turner.

I didn’t remember Amory from my short time here, but I emailed him, and he agreed to do some work for me.

Helped refurbish the main building and built a new garage from my plans. ”

“Oh! You’re the big project he’s been working on. Did you say house? From what I’ve heard, it’s more of a great lodge. On the north border of the woods.”

“That’s right.” Jack furrowed his brow, watching her. “You haven’t…you haven’t seen it, have you?

“No,” she answered. “Amory’s been cagey about it.”

“I appreciate my privacy. Don’t need any Proctors coming around snooping.”

“So you’ve been here for a while. Why have you?—”

“My turn, Darcy, but I’ll give it to you if you let me hold your hand.”

She couldn’t help cracking a small smile at his wiliness. “You think you’re clever.”

“Oh, I’m very clever.”

“And very modest.”

He chuckled, then looked at her, cocking his head to the side. The sunlight made the grays in his hair and beard sparkle like silver. It gave him an otherworldly glow, like something mythic and impossible.

Not yet.

Okay. He looked away.

“How come I can hear your thoughts, and you can hear mine?” she asked.

She looked at his bowed head and saw him clench his jaw again. Saw it flex under his cheek as Jack took a deep breath through his nose, then he rubbed his chin with his thumb and forefinger.

“I’m not totally sure.”

“Come on! That’s not fair. You were nowhere near as surprised as I was. You have to answer, Jack.”

He looked at her, capturing her eyes.

Stop yelling at me, and I’ll answer you. I’m not totally sure. But some of the…um…married couples in my family can do this. It’s a weird family thing that we don’t talk about that much.

We’re not married, Jack.

I know that, Darcy.

“That’s why I’m not sure,” he finished.

“Sounds like a half-truth to me. I think you know more than you’re saying.”

“It’d never happened to me until an hour ago when I looked at you. I don’t have all the answers. I promise.”

She searched his eyes, but couldn’t shake the feeling that he was holding back something significant. She felt like she was looking at the tip of a very large iceberg.

He smiled at her.

“Stop listening!”

His eyes danced merrily. “Are we on the Titanic ?”

“Seriously. Quit it.” Then something occurred to her, and she clapped her hands triumphantly. “No! We are not on the Titanic . My turn!”

He stood up. “I think I should quit while I’m behind.”

“One more question. If you answer it, you can touch me.”

He turned and faced her, hands on his hips, eyes narrowed. Because he had just faced the sun or because he was suspicious, she couldn’t tell. He wet his lips with his tongue and nodded curtly.