“Absolutely,” Mackenzie said with feeling, though she was thinking it might not be a problem if she didn’t get them there in the first place.
“I love you, Mommy.”
“I love you, too, baby.”
“Mommy?”
“What, hon?”
“I have to go to the bathroom.”
“We’re almost there, almost there.”
According to the map screen, they were nearing the crossroad. Hoping to get her bearings there, perhaps see a sign or regain her cell signal, at the very least have room for a turnaround, she zoomed in to identify it, to bring the name into view, leaning closer to catch it.
Too late, she remembered that the GPS display of her current position trailed reality by a number of seconds. Too late, she realized that the momentum built climbing another hill would have her barreling down the far side without knowing how close the intersection was.
She never saw theSTOPsign hidden by leaves of the same color, neversaw the van speeding at her from the right. She felt the terrifying jolt of impact, heard a high-pitched scream from the back seat and would have blindly reached for Lily if the SUV hadn’t hurtled into a spin that defied gravity.
She felt another impact, then nothing.
1
The trouble with waking up in the morning is that you look like who you are. That’s great if you like who you are, but not so great if you don’t.
I don’t. My face is pale and my eyes haunted. Five years have passed since the accident, but after a night with my head on the same plane as my heart, the scar on my forehead is a bright red. At least, it looks that way to me. When I touch it, I find a smooth ridge, but my fingertips remember the earlier roughness. And then there’s the picture taped inside the medicine chest, where I’m sure to see it when I reach for toothpaste.
Mug shots are never pretty. Heartache is written all over mine. Size-wise, the print is small enough, but that doesn’t dilute its impact. It’s a reminder of what I did, a little dose of daily punishment.
Duly tweaked this Thursday morning, I closed the medicine chest and leaned into the mirror. I dabbed a long-wearing concealer over the scar and under my eyes once, twice, then a third time because last night was a bad one. After setting it with a breath of powder, I applied foundation,then a blusher. Both were creams, applied with a sponge. Moving up, I turned haunted eyes into stylishly smoky ones by skimming a gel pencil along both waterlines, smudging shadow into the corners, and separating my lashes with mascara.
Satisfied, I straightened and stood back, brushed my hair, fluffed my bangs. Then, as I did each day, I turned away from the mirror wearing my new face and tried to forget the old one. Was this honest? No. But it was the only way I could survive, and survival was key.
***
This day, the rising March sun was paper thin but promising. I felt no threat, no premonition, not the slightest sense of unease as I coasted down Pepin Hill over frozen ruts and cruised toward the center of town. After crossing the river, I passed the elegant Federal-style homes of the town founders and turned left where the road I was on ended and South Main began.
The usual string of cars lined the block fronting Rasher and Yolk. Some were pickups with mudstained skirts that labeled them locals. Others were clean SUVs with New York plates, but with the state line only thirty miles away, I thought nothing of it. Rasher and Yolk served the best breakfasts around. Every New Yorker who knew Devon knew that.
Warmed by omelet thoughts, I continued south for two more blocks before turning left toward the river again. The pottery studio was in a cavernous mill that had straddled it for a century. Like the Inn upstream, the mill had endured its share of Vermont blizzards and the ensuing spring floods. The fact that the old mill was built of wood, rather than the Inn’s stone, made its survival all the more magical. Not even the hurricane that had washed out so much else on the river two Septembers before had harmed the mill’s ancient oak.
I found this inspiring. To live through trauma and thrive? That was my goal.
The pottery studio did thrive. I was one of a dozen sculptors here today, and it was barely eight in the morning. Half were students, in townfor a week of clay immersion that was offered by the studio’s owner in partnership with the Inn. The rest were experienced artists, drawn to Devon for its appreciation of fine craft. Some were throwing pitchers and pots to be sold at the studio store in town. Since moving to Devon four years ago, I had sold things there myself. None were billed as Mackenzie Cooper art, and I deliberately tried not to replicate that style. Little bits slipped; I couldn’t fully escape myself. But my current work was more subtle than spirited, and I never sculpted the family groups for which I had been known. Understatement was what my life in Devon was about. I was happy to fly under the radar.
Devon was a perfect place for that. A small town in south-central Vermont, it was known for upscale art galleries, VIP sightings, and the Spa’s signature hot stone massage. Though the best-worn path to town was from Manhattan, more distant visitors came to rub shoulders with the rich and famous. All were welcome. Guests kept the town afloat.
How to tell a guest from a predator? Should a clean SUV outside Rasher and Yolk have caused suspicion? Or a lone tourist wandering on South Main taking pictures with his phone have raised a red flag?
Not in Devon. We were definitely used to strangers coming and going.
Buy a house in our midst, though, and we were cautious. It had been months before the wariness that met me when I first came faded—and that quickly, only because I had done repeated makeup applications for the library trustee chair, the Town Manager, and the head of the Garden Club. These people had bonded with me. The fact of my bare hands on their skin was conducive to that, but the emotional clinched it. A makeup artist was like a therapist, listening quietly to a client who arrived barefaced, with defenses down and a need to vent.
I knew about venting to a therapist, and I could certainly relate to wanting to feel better about oneself. What I loved most about my job was that I could make it happen for others, if only until bedtime, when the new face washed off.
So I listened. I didn’t offer opinions beyond whether to use corrector or concealer, blusher or bronzer, matte shadow or glitter, and I nevergroaned, sighed, or frowned in response to what was shared with me. Hell, who was I to judge?
I also understood vanity. As far from the mainstream as Devon was, there were occasions when a woman wanted to look her best. Most of us had spent time in the city. We appreciated fine makeup, right along with craft beer, high-tech down jackets, and good cell phone reception.
