2. Blaze
Blaze
The phone rings as I’m grabbing my truck keys from the cluttered kitchen table.
I reach across the detritus and pick up the receiver of the old-fashioned telephone that perches on the end of the scarred butcher block counter.
There’s no cell service on Sanctuary Lake, so I keep the relic of yesteryear, complete with black coiled cord, even though I do have a cellphone that works with Wi-Fi when I’m at home.
“Yep?” I answer, juggling my keys and Misty's lead. My six-year-old gray and white Australian Shepherd comes running over at the sight of her lead. She knows it means she’ll be my sidekick at work today.
“We’ve got a new arrival,” Marika Morse, my boss, says on the other end of the line. “Kind of last minute. A referral from Josh. ETA is three PM. He’s an athlete, so you should be prepared for anything.”
“Anything. Got it.” I snap on Misty’s lead and scratch under her chin. “By the way, I’m going to bring in the floating dock later. Nights are getting chillier.”
Marika agrees. The lake won’t start freezing over for at least a couple of months, but no one’s going to brave the water for swimming now that our last late summer heat wave is over.
“Who’s the guest?” We normally get couples and families who need to unplug, with the occasional burned-out celebrity thrown in for spice.
There’s a pause. “Shawn Camden.” She probably had to pull the name up on her computer, but I recognized it right away. “Former player for the—”
“Hartford Laurels. Yeah, I know the name.” Good shortstop, decent batter. A utility player with his best seasons in the rearview.
“He’ll be here for at least a week. Josh requested we keep him busy.”
“Sounds good.” I’m sure I can think of ways to occupy our newest guest. “I’m going to stop by the construction site and then come in.”
Marika perks up at the mention of the house I’m building. “Is the foundation finished?”
“Yeah, looks great. They’re working on the frame next.”
“Gotta get that roof on before winter,” she says, as if it’s not on my mind every day.
“We’ll make it,” I say, hoping I’m not being my usual overly optimistic self. “See you later.”
I hang up as Brooke stumbles in, still in her pajamas. The front of the house is one long space, two-thirds living room, the rest kitchen, which is where she heads next.
“Who was on the phone?” She yawns and brushes the long, straight brown hair she inherited from our mom behind her delicate ears.
I got our dad’s wavy black mop, square chin, and barrel chest. We share hazel eyes, which I remember Mom telling me were the same as her own mother’s.
Both sets of our grandparents were gone by the time I was twelve and Brooke was eight.
“Just Marika. The phone wake you up?”
“Yeah, but I need to get going, anyway.” She goes to the fridge and takes out a premade green smoothie.
“If you hurry, you can come with me to check out the progress at the construction site.”
She wrinkles her nose at the smoothie and puts it back. Staring into the fridge, she twirls a lock of hair around a finger. “I can’t today.”
“Okay, but you’re going to want to see the foundation. They did a fantastic job.”
“Maybe this weekend,” she says, closing the fridge without taking anything out.
“Is everything okay?” I ask my sister. She gives me a look over her shoulder, half annoyed, half indulgent.
“I’m good. Just sleepy and I have a big day. Two root canals on the books.”
Brooke is a dental assistant in Naples, a town almost an hour from Sanctuary Lake.
“Well, good luck root canaling.” I have no idea what that even is, but I know Brooke will crush it. “Love you, B.”
“Love you, B,” she says back, and I pat my leg to get Misty to follow me outside.
My pup jumps into the cab of my truck, and we pull away from the house I’ve shared with my sister since our parents died a decade ago.
It’s barely bigger than a double-wide, but at least it has two bathrooms. That probably saved our sanity back when nothing else made sense.
That and the fact that we’re a team. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for her—the decision to become her guardian after our parents were gone was the easiest one I ever made.
Our closest family is in Iowa, but Brooke and me, we’re Mainers through and through.
After she graduated from USM and got a job with Dr. McCallum, it occurred to me that my baby sister was growing up, and living with her brother forever wasn’t a real plan.
So I decided to build her a house.
I had plans drawn up over the winter, then got a construction loan with help from Marika’s bank this spring.
Permits next, then clearing the land—an acre of lakefront property a quarter of a mile from where my parents chose to build this place in the ’80s.
Luis, my contractor, and his crew are moving as fast as they can, but everything takes longer than you think.
Now we’re in a race against time to finish the framing, walls, windows, and roof by winter.
There may be some plumbing and electrical work that can be done over the coldest months, but the house won’t be finished until next summer.
I’ve enjoyed the process, as frustrating as it can be sometimes. But Brooke hasn’t been as into it as I thought she would be.
“I don’t need a house,” she’d said when I first brought it up.
“Come on, eventually you’re going to want to move out of here,” I’d said, gesturing around the kitchen that always felt crowded with two people and a dog, “and this way we can enjoy the lake more.”
When our parents built, they decided to do it on the far side of the dirt access road.
It was probably cheaper at the time, and when we wanted to get down to the rocky edge of the lake, we’d just hack our way along a deer trail.
But eventually, once Brooke’s house is built, I’ll put in a real path to the lake, add a dock.
There’s no beach, but we just need a jumping-off point for swimming in summer, kayaking in fall, skating in winter, and fishing almost year-round.
Brooke let me take the lead with the project, and I’ve been enthusiastic enough for both of us.
It’s a short drive to the site, where I pull my truck behind the contractor’s.
I thought my jet-black Ford F-250 was impressive, but Luis’s Ram with the extended cab and 22-inch tires is even more dick-swinging.
Misty leaps out of the cab and goes to investigate whatever new smells have accumulated since our last visit.
I greet Luis, who’s bigger than me and probably twenty years older, with a smile he doesn’t return.
He’s not the most cheerful guy, but he doesn’t cut corners and he’s good to his crew.
He shows me the delivery of lumber they’re prepping to start framing out the house this week.
“Unfortunately, one of my guys hurt his back on another job, so we’re short on manpower.
Could take a little longer than we thought. ”
“Who was it? Seriously hurt?”
“Hopefully not. Gabe goes to the doctor today. I’ve got some calls out, but it’s a fight to find people right now.”
I glance at the small cluster of men marking up the lumber with grease pencils and looking at the plans, wishing I’d inherited any of my dad’s carpentry skills. About the only thing I can do with a piece of wood is make a fire. “Well, do the best you can. And I hope Gabe’s okay.”
“Don’t worry, Blaze, we still have time to get that roof on for you.” We walk around the site for a few minutes, confirming the next steps, then I call Misty and we head back the way we came, passing the house on our way to Sanctuary Lake Retreat.
My parents were the only holdouts when Marika Morse arrived about fifteen years ago and started buying up every parcel along the lake.
When they died a few weeks before the end of my freshman year of college, Marika approached me.
I thought she was going to offer to buy our land, and it would have been hard to say no to cash money.
Instead, she gave me options. She’d buy it for well over market value, or she’d pay an annual fee for access through our property so she could put in a road around the perimeter of the lake.
On top of that, she offered me a job. She was opening a retreat, and she wanted to offer outdoor activities.
She knew I spent a lot of time in the woods, and she’d pay for me to become a registered Maine guide.
Long story short, we kept the property. I dropped out of college and went to work for Marika.
It allowed me to be there for Brooke while she finished high school, then help her go to college in Portland debt-free.
Leaving school wasn’t a hardship, but when I broke up with my college boyfriend—my first boyfriend—I didn’t know he’d end up being my only boyfriend.
I like my privacy, love where I live. But the area around Sanctuary Lake is sparsely populated; the opportunities for dating are few and far between.
I make do with trips to Portland every few months for casual hook-ups.
So far, I haven’t met anyone who I’d want to invite back home, even if they were interested in shacking up in our remote little piece of paradise.
I drive past the main lodge, wave to my co-worker Nita, who’s clipping late-blooming asters from the flower garden out front. She’ll be making bouquets for the guest rooms. It’s those kinds of touches that make the retreat something special.
When Marika first told me about what she wanted to do, I was envisioning some ugly hotel for rich, snooty people that would mar the lake’s natural beauty.
But she surprised me and kept it simple.
Quiet luxury is the idea. The main lodge building practically blends into the trees with its forest green stain and natural wood accents.
It’s two stories, but the main feature is the big open room that Marika calls the ballroom.
It faces the lake with dramatic floor-to-ceiling windows and can host anything from community pancake breakfasts to small concerts.
There’s a full restaurant-style kitchen where the retreat’s chef prepares three bespoke meals a day.
Marika lives on the second floor in a full suite of rooms. The rest of the resort is made up of small, sturdy cabins set back from the lake at the edge of the trees.
Some are for guests; tiny houses complete with kitchenettes.
One houses the spa—literally a hot tub, sauna, and massage therapy space.
Another is home to The Snug, basically a library made for reading on rainy days.
The structure closest to the water is my domain: the boathouse.
The most surprising thing about the retreat is the fact that Marika does no marketing for it—nothing.
Most people find us through word of mouth—someone who knows someone who’s been here and thinks it’s what the doctor ordered.
And I’m pretty sure she barely charges some of the guests—the ones who arrive in older model cars, usually families, people who need a place to rest or recuperate.
Of course, the people who can afford it pay an arm and a leg, and they barely blink at the bill.
They’re the ones who show up in cars that cost more than what I make in a year, or who get dropped off by private drivers.
Rich people need to get away, too, but I’m glad they’re not the only ones the retreat’s available to.
I pull into my usual parking spot and let Misty out before I unlock the boathouse door and hit the lights to illuminate every kind of outdoor equipment you can think of: kayaks, canoes, backpacking gear, cross-country skis, snowshoes, badminton rackets, cornhole, and wiffle ball, too.
If you can play it or take it on the lake, I’m in charge of it.
As I go through my morning routine, checking on today’s schedule and making notes about what kind of equipment I’ll need to pull out for the guests, I count my lucky stars that I stumbled into my dream job.
I get to spend most of my time outdoors, my favorite place.
The people who come to Sanctuary Lake Retreat are sometimes the snotty rich assholes I was expecting, but more often than not they’re regular folks, overworked and stressed out by their lives.
I see it as my mission to get them to remember what it feels like to have their feet on dirt or to swim in water that’s not full of chemicals.
It took me a while to appreciate that’s what Marika was going for when she built this place.
It’s a literal retreat from the stressors of modern life.
It’s not like she confiscates people’s phones on arrival—though the lack of cell service helps.
It defeats the purpose of getting away if you’re attached to all that bullshit by the invisible chain we call a Wi-Fi signal.
Anyway, I know how lucky I am. I don’t have to travel to rural Maine to get away from life. This is my life. I’m living the dream.
And if my price of admission is living the dream alone, well… I’ve got my sister. I’ve got my dog. Asking for anything else would be greedy.