His Other Life

Chapter 5

FIVE

ISLA

Present day

“Where’s the other gal?” Mr. Zuft asked, his voice rusted but pleasant.

Isla blinked several times, trying to reconcile the old man’s unusual face with his ordinary attire. Other gal? She peered down at the box of food in her hands. Oh, right. Serene. “They changed our routes,” she said, finding her voice again. “I’m here instead.”

A glint in the startlingly blue depths. “Yes, I can see that.” He opened the door wider. “Come in then. Kitchen’s through here.”

Isla trailed him through a narrow hallway where a woven runner covered the wood flooring and abundant nautical paraphernalia adorned the walls. Some of the homes she delivered to had distinct smells of aging, but not this place. Coffee and wood polish, Isla thought. It matched her initial impression of the place as tidy and clean. Not at all the kind of space where she’d have expected to find a tattooed ninety-year-old.

They entered a bright kitchen with a surprising number of thriving green plants on the windowsill, and Isla set her load down on the table.

“I like your place,” she said. “The big windows.”

“Mm.” The concurring sound rumbled from somewhere deep in the old man’s chest. “I’ve seen worse.”

“You’ve not been here long then?”

“A month or two. Say, have we met before? You look familiar.”

“I’m certain I’d remember if we had.” Isla smiled at him then craned her neck in search of a microwave. “Would you like me to heat up the food for you, Mr. Zuft?”

“ Maverick please. Or Mav if you’re so inclined.” The corners of his mouth pulled upward for a split second. “But you have the advantage here, Miss…?”

“Right. Sorry.” Isla wiped her hand on her jeans and extended it. “It’s Gallagher. Isla Gallagher.”

Mav’s lips parted, then he took her hand. “Is that so? Miss Isla Gallagher.”

Technically it was Mrs., but Isla let it slide.

“It’s very nice to meet you.” Mav pressed her hand gently in both of his once more for good measure before he let go.

On second thought, maybe Serene’s judgment was hyperbolic after all. The tattoos were startling, Isla would give her that, but Mav himself seemed pleasant enough, if a bit touched by old age, and up close like this, his gaze was nothing but friendly. Warm, even, for such a cool color. Rather than finding his “vibe” creepy, she was intrigued. How did a man with gentlemanly manners, a sense of style, and such obvious care for his home come to have a face like that? Not without adventures in his past, that was for sure.

They stared at each other for a moment, then Isla nodded toward the food again. “Do you have a microwave?”

Maverick flinched. “Oh right. Yes of course. It’s in the pantry closet over there.”

“Great.” Isla smiled at him and got to work, finding a plate in a cabinet and silverware in a drawer. The food would look more appetizing out of its plastic wrapping. “I brought a sandwich for me in case you want company,” she said over her shoulder. “Some clients don’t mind a little chat while they eat. What can I get you to drink?”

Mav had sat down in one of the French-style dining chairs, of which there were two at the small table. “Water is fine. You’re not in a hurry then?”

“I get to take a lunch.” Isla set Mav’s plate and glass down in front of him. “Napkins?”

“A paper towel is good enough.” Mav indicated a roll on the wall near the sink. “And put on the kettle if you don’t mind. Without a spot of black coffee after a meal, I’ll just nap like an old fool.”

Isla opened the tap. “I don’t mind a nap.” Early on in her relationship with Jonah, they’d loved taking naps together. She’d used to drape herself over him on the couch as the rain marked slow Sunday afternoon minutes against the windowpanes. He’d called her his “Isla-blanket.”

“You will when you reach my age. I can sleep when I’m dead and gone.”

Isla closed her eyes. Was that what Jonah was doing now? Sleeping?

The dark tendrils in her chest snaked upward but were soon cut off with a start when the kettle overflowed onto her hand. “Oh shoot.” She shook off the water and wiped her hand on her shirt. “Wasn’t paying attention,” she said, throwing a tight approximation of a smile over her shoulder before turning on the burner.

She took one more minute to unfold her sandwich and open the small baggie of popcorn she’d packed as a side, before she steeled herself and sat down across from Mav. They exchanged another polite smile, then Mav dug in. Isla nibbled at her lip as she examined her food. Maybe it had been a mistake to do social time so soon after a day like yesterday.

They ate in silence for a while, Isla intent on the waxy leaves of one of the plants to her left, Mav on his meatballs.

“You didn’t care for my little joke,” he said suddenly.

“Huh?” Isla looked back at him. He’d already finished his meal and was leaning back in his chair, watching her. She stared at the quarter-inch-wide ink column of intricate lines that ran from his forehead down past his left eye to the middle of his cheekbone.

“About sleeping when I’m dead.”

Isla blinked. “Well, I… It wasn’t…” The kettle whistled, saving her from further mumbling. “Let me get that.”

“You’ve lost someone I think,” Mav said, when Isla set two mugs down on the table.

A tremor rose through Isla’s body at his words, strong enough for the container of instant coffee she’d just picked up to slip from her hand and fall to the floor, where its contents billowed up and out—a brown cloud covering several square feet of the floor.

She froze, her hands perched in the air as if trying to capture the coffee granules. “Oh my God.” She sidestepped the mess. “I am so sorry. I’ll clean this up, I promise. I’m so clumsy.” Her face flushing hot, she backed away. She was such a screw-up. Now the old man would probably call Stan and complain. As he should. She spun in one spot, hands still shaking. Where were the cleaning supplies?

Mav pointed to the hallway. “If you’re looking for the sweeper, it’s over there. Closet on the right. And don’t worry about it,” he called after her. “It’s only coffee.”

A whole jar of it. She’d have to replace it.

“Again, I’m so sorry,” she said, lugging an old, corded canister vacuum into the room. “I can’t do anything right these days.”

“No, no, no.” Mav leaned forward in his seat. “Accidents happen.”

“When I’m around.”

“To all of us.”

Her hand tightened on the pipe. He wouldn’t say that if he knew. “I’m just going to get this taken care of.” She plugged in the machine and turned it on.

The loud whirr was a blessing, blocking out some of the voices in her head screaming about being a liability, a terrible person, leaving destruction in her wake. It was a pity the vacuum was such an efficient old thing.

The coffee granules gone, Isla wiped the floor with a damp rag then returned the cleaning supplies to their closet. She’d pick up a new jar of coffee tomorrow. Maybe she should offer to have the rug cleaned too for good measure. Only one corner of it had fallen victim to the spill, and it seemed clean enough, but…

Mav was waiting for her when she reentered the kitchen. “Come sit down,” he said, patting the table.

Not wanting to cause more tension, she complied.

Mav’s eyes narrowed as she did, three rudimentary birds below his temple twitching with the creasing skin. “You’re very hard on yourself,” he said, resting his hands over his belly. “Why is that?”

Isla shrugged. Was she?

“Hm.” Mav tapped four fingers against the table. “Do you know that I’m ninety years old?” he asked.

“I saw it in your file.”

He nodded. “And how many jars of spilled coffee do you think I’ve accumulated over those ninety years? Let me tell you—too many to count.” He made a point to seek out her gaze, a gleam of amusement livening his expression. “I may even have burned some bridges and sunk a few ships.”

He had her attention now, but Isla still wanted to object. She understood what he was doing. Coffee was nothing—a trivial, everyday slip. Except when the opposite was true. Because what Isla knew, and Mav didn’t, was that spilled coffee could be an aftershock of a mistake so enormous it suggested a fault line at the very core of the culprit. A mistake that still, two years later, she had no explanation for and no way to make right. Isla dug her nails into her palms and focused on her breathing. She would not add crying to her list of unprofessionalism today.

“You’re sitting now, so tell me. Who did you lose?”

Isla’s head jerked up. She had denial at the tip of her tongue, adrenaline in her thighs to spring up, but as she was about to, she spotted something in the shadow beneath Mav’s ear. A tiny hummingbird in faded ink.

“That tattoo,” she said, touching her own skin in the same spot. “The bird. Does it have a story?”

Mav tipped his head as if considering whether to let her avoidance of his question slide. Then he nodded once, decision made. “This one?” He pointed. “Funny, no one’s ever asked about the birdie what with all of this going on.” He indicated his adorned face.

“I collect them,” Isla said. “Hummingbirds. Have since I was a little girl. My grandparents had a painting in their house where they were depicted as guardian angels around a little boy leaning over a stream. ‘Hummingbirds appear when angels are near,’ Nana used to say. I’ve loved them ever since. Here, look.” She pulled out her phone and opened the auction site before even making a conscious decision to let Mav in on this part of her life. “I’m trying to get this one. See the details? Handmade. My grandma had one just like it.”

Mav took her phone and held it away slightly to see better. “Ah yes. Wonderful.” He gave her back the phone. “Mine’s also handmade,” he joked. “Talented sergeant in my company when I was stationed in Korea. He had a book of drawings, and I liked the look of this one.”

“I didn’t know you’re a veteran. Thank you for your service.”

Mav’s eyes crinkled. “There are a lot of things we don’t know about each other.”

Isla regarded him across the table. There was nothing challenging about him, no demands or judgments. The next move was up to her.

She folded her hands. Paused at the sight of the gold band still on her left ring finger.

The day they had picked out their rings, nothing had run smoothly. The jeweler’s daughter had gone into labor, so they’d been assigned a junior clerk instead who’d insisted gold bands were out of fashion before proceeding to show them all the other bands against their wishes. Someone else might have lost their cool, but not Jonah. He’d found a way to turn it into a joke, whispering increasingly exaggerated sales pitches in Isla’s ear about the magical properties of this ring or that whenever the salesclerk disappeared into the back for another tray. Toward the end of it, Isla’s sides had hurt from laughing so hard. And they had eventually walked out with what they wanted, three hours later, leaving a disillusioned clerk behind.

“My husband,” she said. “I lost my husband two years ago. His name was Jonah.”

“Jonah.” Mav nodded solemnly. “I’m very sorry to hear that. Life is hardly fair, one would think, that I’m still here after all this time and others get half that.”

“If it was fair, he’d still be here and I’d be gone.” Isla pushed at the handle of her cup of hot water so it turned forty-five degrees.

Unlike others before him, Mav didn’t protest her morose statement. “Why is that?” he asked instead.

“It was a car accident,” Isla said. “I was driving.”

“I see.”

“So I’m the reason he’s dead.” Her throat tightened, but she forced herself to not look down.

“Hm.” Mav pulled his lower lip up, setting his jaw in a bulldoggish underbite. “And you’re unscathed, are you?” he asked finally.

“I broke my back and my right arm. Punctured a lung. I was…” Dead. You were dead. Three minutes. But Nana sent you back. “Everything is healed now though.”

“Not all wounds leave visible scars.”

She smiled a little at that. Maybe he was right. Then she stood. Time to go.

“I still have more meals to deliver,” she said. “And I’m sorry again about the coffee. I’ll bring a new jar tomorrow.”

Mav’s face lit up. “Ah, so I’ll see you again after all. For a while there I thought you might flee.” He followed her into the hallway and held out her coat like a gentleman so she could slide her arms into the sleeves.

“Thanks.”

“Can I ask, if you don’t mind…” Mav paused as he opened the door for her. “How did the accident happen?”

Isla shoved her hands into her pockets. “Well, that’s just it,” she said. “I don’t remember.”