Breathe

Elaine Jane Landry had lost her heart in Brooklyn.

Evelyn Renae Laurent found herself where the blue sky met the ocean crashing on a rocky shore.

Eve rolled the new name around on her tongue, it wasn’t quite hers yet, but it would grow on her. She knew this because she’d had to do it once before.

She had been born Trinity Brant. Trin or Trinie to her friends, and Trinity-Brianna when her mother was irate.

It had taken some time to set up her new id and find a place to live, time she spent closer to her first home than she’d been in a decade. It made her skin crawl. She itched to get away from the wide open plains the left her feeling vulnerable and exposed.

The prairie sky that had once basted her in sunshine now reminded her too much of the past.

She hated that he still had the power to steal her first home and leave her in knots.

He had stolen the freedom that that blue sky had promised her in her youth. And he had stolen that youthful innocence.

Ted was gone though.

Well, as gone as a life sentence could make him. Not that that did anything to bring her mother back or ease the pain of her loss.

So, she forged on, trying to build her life up from the ground for a second time.

The salt breeze caressed her cheeks, tugging on the curls that escaped from the silk wrap. The sound of ocean waves breaking against the rocky shore as gulls cried overhead embraced her as she looked back to the little cottage that would be her new home.

James would like it here.

The idea sprung unbidden to her mind, and her breath caught in her throat. She’d avoided all thoughts of him, busy with the move and the many details she’d had to look after. But now, in the stillness, he was again her first thought.

She’d been looking for peace, but she’d only found quiet.

The little village was sweet, filled with families and elderly folks eager to get to know the mainlander that had come to live among them.

“Well, hello there, what can I get you, my love?” The woman behind the counter of the coffee shop asked as she dried her hands on a towel.

“Uh, hi, I’d like, a tea, I think. And maybe a muffin, are they good?” Eve answered shyly, the familiar way people spoke to strangers here was taking a while to get used to.

“Frank baked them fresh this morning from his nan’s recipe, my husband does the baking and the books, I’m better left to the cups and the chatter. Have you got a tea in mind?”

Eve was a little taken aback at the flood of conversation and shook her head uncertainly.

“Any dietary restrictions, love?”

Eve shook her head and was ushered to the little table near the big front window.

“Alright, I’ll just bring something out for you, and if you don’t like it, it’ll be on the house.”

She sat as the matronly woman bustled back around the counter to fill the kettle, and watched the slow movements of a seaside village on a Tuesday afternoon.

Despite the change in time zones, her set schedule of walking to the library every week had prompted her to leave the little house and wander down the main street, looking into shops and enjoying the respite from the drizzle of the last several days. Her feet had carried her into the café before she’d convinced herself to enter.

A soft whistle followed by the melodic sound of hot water in a teapot interrupted her reverie. The light clinking of cups in saucers and the matron returned around the counter with a tray.

“Do you mind if I join you?” She asked, setting the tray on the table and waiting for Eve’s invitation before seating herself across the table and pouring two cups of tea. “Earl grey, for a little afternoon pick-me-up and I’ve got tea biscuits and cloudberry jam, and a banana muffin for you. Oh dear, I haven’t introduced myself, have I? Well better late than never, my mother named me Sofia, but everyone around here just calls me Sofie.”

Sofie offered her a warm hand and she accepted it.

“Evelyn, Eve, lovely to meet you, and this spread looks incredible, thank you.”

“So, you’re the lass that moved into the old Ferguson place?”

“That’s me.”

Skippers Bay wasn’t exactly a bustling center of trade of tourism, but there was a school, a town hall, a church, a couple of takeout places, a hardware store that doubled as a grocery store and gas station, the café and a bookstore.

With Sofie’s encouragement Eve made her way to see the proprietor, Jobe. An elderly widower who was entirely willing to regale her with tales of the old days when fishing was still the main industry. More than that, he was quite willing to hire her on the spot.

The bookstore had been suffering from neglect, printed books just didn’t sell the same way anymore and he didn’t have the internet savvy to make the best use of the online market for rare books.

In the mornings she would walk down the hill to the bookstore. Jobe would be waiting for her with a hot cuppa and they would spend an hour or two discussing what was needed for the shop or the website. Jobe would rabbit trail off into memories every now and again, but she didn’t mind.

Before noon she would check for orders, and prepare books to be shipped. Then it was off to the post office and the café for lunch. The afternoon was her turn in the front of the shop, dusting and arranging displays and waiting for customers.

Busy as her hands might be, he was never far from her mind. Even the books reminded her of him.

James loved The Hobbit, he’d talked about it with a surprising enthusiasm for such a stoic man, and this edition was in wonderful condition for being as old as it was.

She bought it.

She pictured James and Jobe swapping stories in the bookshop. Sofie would be relentless in trying to feed him up a bit. And in the evening, he’d sit in big chair in the corner of her little house and read as the fire crackled merrily in the grate, casting soft flickering light over his face.

But every day Jobe only told his stories to her, and Sofie only pressed one tea biscuit into her hand as she exited the bakery. And in the evening, as the fire crackled and the ocean sang its lullaby to her soul, she sat alone on the couch meant for two, and painted.

Evelyn preferred oil; watercolour was just something she could easily carry with her. But oil, the way the colour blended and moved, the way the impasto caught the light and added to the expressive nature of her art. Oil was the medium of emotion.

The first painting to hang on her walls was the view from her new home. A gently rising dirt path leading the way up a to the top of a cliff overlooking the ocean, the cliff fell sharply away on the right, where waves crashing against the rocks gave way to a pebble beach and an abandoned wharf. The sky was overcast and a lone figure stood on the highest point, bracing against the wind and rain. If Eve was honest, it had been a self portrait of her isolation.

She’d always been drawn to painting scenes, but lately more portraits had made their way into the portfolio on the walls of her home.

Two little boys carrying a lobster trap between them, their father in the background looking proud. Sofie and Frank dancing in the town hall, love and laughter in their eyes as they twirled. Reverend O’Keefe conducting the children’s choir, demonstrating the motions without shame. Anabeth from down the street, tending carefully to the beautiful flowers in her garden. Jobe’s wise old face wrinkled up in an expression of pure joy as he played the accordion was set in a place of pride on the mantel.

There were other portraits, but they were carefully tucked away, wrapped in cloth in a trunk in the guest room. She’d tried not to, but she couldn’t help taking them out from time to time, afraid that she would forget.

James on the bench, writing in his notebook.

James with his tongue stuck out, glaring at a canvas the viewer couldn’t see. Matt slouched next to him with a look of equal concentration on his own much smaller brush.

James leaning on the railing of the Manhattan bridge at night, the skyline in the distance unable to distract from the captivating light in his blue eyes, a smile lifting the corners of his mouth and crinkling around his eyes.

James looking back at her like she hung the moon just for him.