Tilting at Windmills Read online

  I’d thought Linden Corners was far enough away to shield me from the life I’d lived in the city. But escape, it seemed, was just a frame of mind. New York City, with Maddie and Justin and the troubles of the past, had just insinuated itself into my new and humble little life.

  The results, I feared, could be disastrous.

  EIGHT

  The month of May slipped away, and June arrived, with summer. The sun rode high in the sky and temperatures gradually rose with each passing day. I now had memories of my own of those crisp spring days that are unique to Linden Corners. Foremost among them was the kiss Annie and I shared on the cedar floor of Connors’ Corners. Weeks later and in the light of day, that kiss seemed almost like a dream. We had not spoken of it since. In fact, Annie and I had barely seen each other.

  My days were filled with explorations of the valley, sometimes by car, often by way of a bicycle that George loaned me, claiming to have bought it years ago “during the wild and impetuous days of my youth.” Evenings I spent mostly helping George run the bar, as well as—all too often, it seemed—finding myself seated at the Connors’ dinner table. It was like they’d adopted me, and I guess there was no harm in that, since it presented a solution that solved a loneliness problem for three souls.

  I slept less, a sure sign that I had healed from the hepatitis that had downed me a lifetime ago. So, despite my late hours at the tavern, I found myself rising earlier and earlier the longer I stayed in this gentle farming community. As though I had to milk the cows and tend the herd, I rose with the sun and enjoyed morning bike rides along the empty, dew-laced roads, waving at my neighbors and newfound friends as they went about their daily rituals and I, mine.

  It was a late June morning when I found myself along Route 23, and before I could even think about it, the windmill emerged over the hill, catching my eye and filling my heart with that inexplicable but now familiar sense of pleasure. The windmill was my good-luck token, a constantly spinning talisman that drew me in with its power and its force and the lure of its magic. It drove my direction, as I turned the corner and headed not for the village center and my little apartment but up Crestview Road and on to Annie Sullivan’s farmhouse.

  Just a half mile up, I noticed a small yellow school bus stopped at the Sullivan driveway. Janey and Annie were skipping down the gravel path, Janey’s sweet face lit up with a big grin. She had a knapsack on her back, which I thought might topple her, but she balanced herself well and in no time had clambered aboard the bus. She didn’t see me, and the bus trundled along to pick up the next kid.

  Once the bus cleared the driveway, there was nothing, except my bike, between me and Annie. Against the backdrop of the valley’s green swaths of grass, I was hard to miss.

  “You’re still here?” she asked.

  “Do you mean I’m still here, as in in front of your driveway at seven-thirty in the morning or I’m still here, as in still in town?”

  She didn’t answer but on her face was a look of sudden contemplation. It wasn’t as though we hadn’t seen each other since our secret kiss. We had, but we hadn’t been alone, and that was the big difference. Now it was not just a two-lane stretch of highway separating us but also a sea of uncertain emotion. She was thinking something—what, I couldn’t say.

  Then I heard her ask me, “Got plans today?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “You heard me. Do you have plans for the day?”

  Yes, I had heard her, but her words had surprised me, and sometimes you like to hear things a second time, to make sure your ears really work.

  “Uh, none, really. I usually don’t make any plans. Makes the day that much more interesting—unpredictable.”

  “Must be nice,” she said, sounding slightly envious. “Tell you what, Mr. Lazy Pants—come back at ten o’clock and bring your bike with you.”

  “Can I ask why?”

  She thought about that before answering. “Actually, no, you can’t ask. But you can answer this: Do you like peaches?”

  “Peaches?”

  “Yes, Brian, peaches.”

  “I like peaches,” I said stupidly.

  “Good. And you know, Brian, you may want to clean your ears a little more regularly. You never know what you might miss.”

  “I’ll get right on it. So I may not be ready by ten.”

  “Fine. I’ll expect you at ten after. Five minutes extra per ear.” At that, she waved a temporary good-bye and turned back up her driveway. She didn’t skip, but I noticed a distinct spring in her step anyway. Heck, there was one in mine, too, and I was on a bike, heading back toward town to prepare for something that involved bicycles and peaches. And a woman I had kissed but with whom I hadn’t had the guts to speak of it.

  Twenty minutes later, sweat dripping from my pores, I grabbed a slow, satisfying shower, wondering the entire time what Annie could possibly have in store for me. Maybe she had had something planned all along and was going to call me. Or maybe my presence was convenient, and she asked me along out of courtesy. And was this what I really wanted, the blossoming of another romance, if that’s indeed what it was? The two of us clearly were both afraid and shy and tentative about whatever was happening between us, both still carrying fresh scars from past relationships. Those deep wounds made us uncertain about how to proceed with our lives.

  I had to ask myself some questions: Had I run from New York City and all that Maddie had meant only to fall into the arms of another woman? Was this what I’d been searching for, or the direction that the gods were pointing me toward? Yes, I was intended for someone, and that someone was intended for me, but perhaps New York hadn’t been where I’d find that person; perhaps I’d have to go forth and find her. Happiness was possible; you just had to take a chance, leap in, and fight for what felt right. Because taking chances meant living life, and without chance, there was nothing but emptiness and darkness and solitude.

  All this during a fifteen-minute shower, and the best conclusion I could come up with was to take shorter showers. But heck, I’d needed to clean my ears. Dried, shaved, and dressed, I went across to the Five-O and had myself a light breakfast. Before too long, it was closing in on ten. I was ready for anything.

  Apparently I’d listened well, or so Annie informed me as I pulled my bicycle into her driveway at precisely 10:10, coming up beside her pickup, where I noticed she’d already stashed her own green ten-speed, along with her easel and paints and a burlap-covered canvas. And in the front of the cab was a wicker picnic basket. There was a devilish grin on Annie’s face, a look that told me she liked knowing where we were going when I did not. She had me at a complete disadvantage. Maybe not complete, because I was going as a willing participant, wherever we happened to be going. It was her secret, soon to be shared with an eager listener.

  She ushered me into the passenger side of the truck, waiting as I strapped myself in. I joked about how now I really couldn’t escape. She responded by slamming the door and then locking it. I was her captive, and a willing one at that.

  “Just sit and relax and stop asking so many questions. No wonder you and Janey get along so well—you both have the same patience level.”

  “I don’t have a patience level,” I remarked.

  “Exactly my point.”

  As she peeled the truck out of the driveway, her sudden laughter filled the cab; no doubt she was thrilled about our secret excursion. I told her how much I’d like to join her in her glee, and so finally she revealed where we were going.

  “Not counting the windmill, it’s my favorite place in the whole valley—right along the river.”

  Second only to the windmill, I thought. This must be someplace special.

  We drove for about a half hour, down narrow roads that wound their way through the hills and dips of the valley. We drove through small towns that were as beautiful as Linden Corners yet slightly different, too, and I commented how it was as though we were stuck on some endless loop of road. Finally, Annie turned off the paved
road onto a dirt one, and the tires threw up clouds of dust in our wake as the truck climbed higher and higher. We emerged through a bushy layering of leafy trees and came to an abrupt stop on the top of a ridge.

  “Is this a parking place?” I asked, noticing there were no other cars around. Or people, for that matter.

  “It is now,” she said. “Come on—help me unload the bikes.”

  I did as instructed, and we mounted our bikes, she taking the lead. Down below, the river stretched languidly, and above us, the sky seemed endless.

  “Well?” she asked.

  “Show me more,” I urged.

  And she did. For the next two hours, we wended our way both by bike and by foot through the hidden regions of the Hudson Valley, enjoying the waves of wind on our faces, basking in the sun’s rays, led on by the languorous rhythm of the river. All the while we were laughing and smiling and not thinking beyond the next turn of the path. If any awkwardness had developed between us after our unspoken kiss, it was washed away now by our mutual appreciation for this time and place, alone with the world and ourselves but pleased, too, to be sharing it with a newfound friend.

  Where the path had taken us, I couldn’t say, but Annie was in complete control and she magically guided us back to the truck, where we put away the bikes and grabbed her supplies from the back and the picnic basket from the front. She led me to a rocky bluff, high above the river, where I proceeded to spread a blanket on the ground. Inside the picnic basket was a bottle of seltzer; the fizzy water was refreshing after the long ride.

  So it was there, up on our very own Mount Olympus, where we ate Annie’s version of ambrosia, fried chicken and macaroni salad, and for dessert, peach pie.

  “You folks sure do know your pies,” I said. “Where I grew up, the choices were limited to apple, cherry, or mincemeat, whatever that was. Here in Linden Corners, you’ve got your strawberry and your peach and whatever else you and Gerta and Martha can get your hands on.”

  “Pie is serious business in Linden Corners. There’s little debate about that. And you see why I asked if you liked peaches.”

  “If I didn’t this morning, I do now,” I said, taking another slice from the tin.

  We finished our feast, and Annie poured a glass of white wine into a plastic tumbler and then settled comfortably on the blanket, staring out at the river’s soothing waters.

  “I started coming here for the view,” she said, “and ended up coming back for the tranquillity. You know, when you leave a place behind and it lives only in your mind and your memories, it begins to take on a life of its own, and the potential exists for you to make too much of it. To increase its importance. But sitting here, seeing this, Brian, it’s like meeting an old friend and picking up right where you left off.” She paused, then looked over at me. “Sounds silly, doesn’t it?”

  I shook my head. “Not at all. But I don’t understand one thing—you speak of this location as though you haven’t been here in years. It’s only a short ride from the farmhouse.”

  “I used to come here a lot, it’s true, before . . .”

  “Your husband died?”

  She nodded. “Yeah, but before Dan and I married, too. Actually, up here is where I went to think after he proposed to me. I was twenty and I’d just finished my junior year of college over at Bennington, and I was having financial troubles and was thinking about taking a year off. My aunt, before she passed away, lived in the valley, over in Malden Bridge, and so I went to stay with her, maybe get a job somewhere. I found this big rock one day as I rode around, and it gave me space to think, no pressure from anyone or anything, just me and the sky and the river. So I guess you can think of this place as my thinking pad.”

  “Annie’s Bluff,” I said.

  She grew silent, and I thought I detected tears in her eyes. “Brian, that’s really sweet. I never gave this place a name, never thought to. It was just a place to come to. But now . . . now, I’ll always remember it as Annie’s Bluff, and I’ll always remember who named it.”

  “Shucks, ma’am,” I said, trying to stave off a growing sense of embarrassment. “So, did Dan propose to you up here?”

  “No, Dan never came here. Sure, he knew I had this secret place, but he never pressured me to share it with him. Two people can share so much of each other, but not everything. You can’t help but keep a part of yourself hidden away; it’s human nature.”

  “Then how come you’re showing it to me?”

  “Frankly, I wasn’t sure I could come back here, by myself or with someone else; I wasn’t sure I was brave enough. Brian, those were such happy, glorious, wonderful days, with my life stretched out before me, my choices limitless. So much, though, has changed. I was afraid maybe this place had, too.” Then she hesitated. “Thanks—for coming with me.” She paused, took a drink from her tumbler. “You probably think I’m nuts or something, the way I dragged you here, not telling you anything about where we were going.”

  “I’ve had fun.”

  “Had?”

  “Having. I’m having lots of fun,” I assured her. “So, you never did tell me—how did the windmill come into the picture?”

  “Didn’t I say I’d save that for a rainy day?” she asked.

  I looked up at the bright blue sky and pretended to catch a raindrop in my palm. “We’ll have to improvise.”

  “Okay—the windmill,” she said, thinking. “Let’s see . . . where to begin? Well, like you, I’d never heard of Linden Corners, and why would I? It’s just one of dozens of small villages in the river valley. But I had heard about the windmill when my aunt mentioned it one day. She showed me an article in the paper about its maybe being torn down. ‘What a shame,’ she said. Me, I stared at the photograph of the windmill, and for days, my curiosity was piqued; I couldn’t get the image out of my mind. I decided I had to see it before it was destroyed. So I drove to Linden Corners and found the windmill, and oh, Brian, as run down as it was, the sight of those giant sails, gently turning with the shifts in the air, I was transfixed.”

  “I know the feeling.”

  “There was a county meeting a few days later, where they were to discuss a referendum to tear it down. I went. I couldn’t believe it—I spoke up against these leaders, me, a nineteen-year-old girl who’d lived in the region all of two months. What I discovered was that I wasn’t alone in wanting to save the windmill, and I became fast friends with some of the locals, among them Gerta Connors. She’s the one who took me to the farmhouse, and that’s where I met Dan.”

  Her story came to an abrupt close, as though she’d been reading a chapter from a book and it had come to an end and she was afraid to turn the page. She gazed down on the river and somehow found her strength. “Dan was a conflicted man, desperately trying to hold on to his family’s farm but also be his own independent and modern man, trying to help his elderly parents as much as he could. But he was twenty-five and had a job himself, working, ironically, for the state legislature in Albany. As for the windmill, I guess he didn’t give it any thought one way or the other. You see, the Sullivans were going to sell that piece of land back to the county, and the money would help keep the rest of the farm going.”

  “So what happened?”

  “The beauty of small-town America. Turns out the bank’s loan manager’s wife had sided with the preservationists, and so she convinced her husband to give the Sullivans an extension on their loan. And then I and some others volunteered our time and energy and some money, too, and we restored the windmill.”

  “And in the process, you and Dan Sullivan . . .”

  She cut me off with a quick nod of her head. “Yeah.”

  A momentary silence enveloped us, somehow drawing us closer. Hers was a wonderful, inspiring story of determination, and I told her so. “And so that was how you became known as the woman who loved the windmill.”

  “More like ‘saved.’ Except in Linden Corners, we speak from the heart.”

  “This Linden Corners, it’s a speci
al place. A throwback to a time when being neighbors meant being friends,” I said. “I can’t help but feel spoiled by it. This is a world far beyond the one I knew, a city pulsing with a life of its own, while here I am surrounded by nature’s riches—the trees, the river, the sky, not to mention the beautiful woman at my side.”

  The compliment simply slipped out. I hadn’t had time to think about it; I just said the words, and there they were, right on the table (or blanket, as it were), my acknowledgment of Annie’s beauty. And she didn’t press me on it; she seemed to favor simply letting it sink in and warm her insides. My words produced a glow that emanated from her smile. She then changed the subject altogether and my words evaporated into the air.

  “Brian, tell me why you left New York City.”

  “Wow—where’d that come from?”

  “Actually, from Gerta.”

  “George’s wife?”

  “Brian, do you know any other women named Gerta?”

  “Good point.”

  “And good try at deflecting the question. Eventually you’re going to have to tell someone—whether it’s me or George or somebody else. We’re a curious people, we Linden Corners folk, and when we welcome a new friend, we like to know all about them. And so far, as wonderful as you’ve been to all of us—”

  “And all of you to me.”

  “Stop trying to change the subject,” she said again, her tone playful but stern at the same time. She didn’t want to offend me, but she still wanted her question answered.

  “Okay, okay, you win,” I said, trying to compose my thoughts, letting my mind drift down the river to where it might find the world I’d left just a few short months ago. “Well, I gave you the shorthand version previously, but I guess that wasn’t enough. The story starts and ends in New York City, where for close to fourteen years I worked and lived and even loved, and then one day it all came crashing down. And I decided, then and there, with little regard for all I’d established and also with little regret, to pack up my stuff and split.”