One Year in Coal Harbor Read Free Page A

rare as rare could be and the only kind for her. She was looking for someone who could do that, forsake all else. And Uncle Jack might not think he was courting Miss Bowzer, but something in his manner said he was. I think we have all kinds of different parts of ourselves stored away and waiting and sometimes some of them get unleashed on us without us even knowing. I could tell he wasn’t being disingenuous or simply lying when he said he wasn’t courting her; he really didn’t seem to be aware that the courting part of him was unleashed and on the loose. Maybe he thought he flirted with her just the same as he did with everyone. He couldn’t help being charming. I thought the flirting he did with her was of a different sort but in case this was just wishful thinking, I asked my mother what she thought.
    “Of course he’s in love with her,” said my mother. “Do you know what they’re like, Primrose? They’re like those magnets that push each other away when they get closer.”
    Jack was her half brother and didn’t look like her. She has a fox face and he has a pig face but in a nice way. He’s tall and blond, broad-shouldered and ruddy. My mother has sandy hair. I have red hair and freckles. None of uslook like each other. If you saw us lined up you would never guess we were family. My mother didn’t even meet Uncle Jack until she was older. He was a drifter and was always flitting about developing and doing deals and in the military and in general not available to family. But when my mother got herself lost at sea, the town council looked for a relative for me, and by a fluke Jack showed up in Coal Harbor and solved everyone’s problem. Ever since, my mother had felt an indebtedness to her brother. Part of this was manifested in a determination to figure out a more stable life for him, and I could see that this conversation had started wheels turning in her brain.
    “We should do something to help this along,” she said as she bustled about making dinner.
    “I wouldn’t,” said my father, who was seated on the couch with his newspaper. “Jack always seems to me more than capable of paddling his own canoe.”
    “Well, we can have them both to dinner, can’t we? That’s just civilized.”
    “Uh-huh,” said my dad, not sounding convinced in the least.
    “He’s my brother. There’s nothing more natural than having him for dinner. It’s just that I’ve been so busy at the B and B. We never
have
had Miss Bowzer for dinner and shame on us for that, the way she lets Primrose hang out in that restaurant.”
    “I help her!” I protested.
    “And was one of the people who watched over herwhen we disappeared,” my mother went on as if she hadn’t heard me. “I suppose we should plan on Sunday when I’m not working.”
    “But Miss Bowzer works Sunday,” I said.
    “Oh, of course,” said my mother.
    “The only night she has off is Monday and she said the other day that she might have to start keeping the restaurant open then too because she barely kept body and soul together this winter.”
    My mom and dad looked at each other over the top of my head and my mother nodded.
    “You know it’s hard to survive in a small town on one income,” said my mother. “Much better to be married.”
    “Although she seems to have done okay so far,” said my dad, rustling his paper and pulling it up over his face again as if this were his last comment on the topic.
    “So far,” said my mother, pursing her lips. “Monday it is. I’ll just tell Miss Clarice that I must leave early and that is that. Now, let’s think of a menu.”
    “You don’t even know yet if they’ll come,” I said.
    “Well, that’s your job, Primrose. You invite her. Jack just eats TV dinners every night anyway. Why
wouldn’t
he come for supper? We ought to have him more often. TV dinners have no nutrition.”
    “He likes TV dinners!” I said. “Especially the chicken ones.”
    “Those chicken TV dinners always remind me of