24. Ace
TWENTY-FOUR
ACE
That cottage was sold the moment I woke up to fluffy snowflakes falling from the sky and Goldie breathing lightly beside me. Sometime during the night, Morton had made himself comfortable on the foot of the bed, and the damn thing was so big that neither of us had noticed.
“Come on, Morty.” I got out of bed, pulled my jeans over my morning wood, and headed to the kitchen to make breakfast for Goldie. The malamute took one look out the window and posted himself at the door until I let him out. He dropped into the deep snow, rolled onto his back, and shimmied back and forth as though the snow was scratching an itch. “Are you done?” I interrupted. “Come on, let’s get you some breakfast.” He shook and then followed me into the kitchen.
I put an old-fashioned percolator on the gas stove and started frying up some bacon. The country playlist I’d selected played quietly in the background.
“That smells amazing.” I hadn’t even heard her get up. She was wearing my T-shirt and nothing else.
“Together, we almost have an outfit,” I joked.
Goldie took an apron from a hook and slipped it over my head. “Don’t you know you can’t cook bacon unless you have a shirt on? It’s a rule.” She tied the strings behind me, and then kissed the space between my shoulder blades.
“Careful. I might have to take you upstairs and I’d hate for this bacon to burn.” I flipped over some pieces with the tongs. “How do you like your eggs?”
“Easy over,” she replied.
“Don’t you mean over easy?” I chuckled.
She laughed. “Sorry, that’s something my mom used to say when I was little. It’s one of those things that confuses me now. I never know which is the right version.”
After breakfast, I gave Goldie the clothes I’d packed and I put on the stuff I’d worn yesterday. “Come on, I want to check out the boathouse.”
We got two steps away from the main cottage before we realized that the snow was way too deep. “I think I saw some snowshoes in the garage.” I returned with two sets of modern snowshoes. “Have you ever done this before?” I asked.
“Never,” she said.
“It’s easy.” I helped her clip the snowshoes on over her boots. “You just walk.”
We held hands and Goldie picked it up pretty quickly. Morton bounded in the deep snow next to us. “This is the boathouse?” It looked like the cottage, but just a bit smaller and over water. She tried the knob. “Do you have the keys?”
“It doesn’t have a key code?” I took my phone out of my pocket and realized we didn’t have access to the building. “I guess we’re going to have to come back and book an official showing with the real estate agent. That is, if you like it.” I held on to her mittened hand as the two of us ventured onto the frozen lake.
“Ace, it doesn’t matter if I like it. It will be your ‘cabin.’” She let go of my hands to do air quotes with her striped mitts.
“Maybe one day you’ll be spending time here too. I want to make sure I buy a place where you feel comfortable.”
Her cheeks turned pink. “We’re both reading the same book, Ace, but I think you might be a couple chapters ahead.”
I grabbed her hand. “I’m crazy about you, Goldie. I know when something is good, and this is fucking awesome.” I kissed the back of her mitt, and then picked a piece of fuzz from my lips. “Look, Morton seems right at home.” He had bounded way ahead of us.
“Do you think the ice is safe?”
There were at least ten ice huts in the bay. “Those locals wouldn’t be out here if it wasn’t. I bet some of those guys have even driven their cars out here. They did it all the time in Michigan.” I whistled for Morton anyway. “Come here, Morty,” I shouted. There would still be holes from the ice fisherman, and I had fallen for Goldie and her dog. I’d be devastated if something happened to him.
We trekked along the shoreline, admiring the neighboring cabins from the lake side. “It sure is peaceful up here.” Goldie leaned her head back and let snowflakes fall onto her tongue.
“When do you have to be at work?” I asked. We were easily two hours from the city.
“I really don’t have to be back until tomorrow.”
“Perfect.” I picked up some snow in my hands and formed it into a ball. “I still have time to snow you.”
“Does that have something to do with that ice ball in your hand?”
“This?” I pretended to be surprised at the snowball. “No, it’s for Morty, so he doesn’t see me do this to you.” I tossed the snowball towards land and Morton bounded after it. Then I pushed Goldie into the snowbank and fell on top of her. “We used to do this to girls in high school when we liked them.”
Her smile was perfect, and the dimples that dented her cheeks were adorable. She gave me both in that moment. “Did this work with the high school girls?”
“Oh yeah.” I laughed. “It was my go-to move. Is it working on you?”
“Well, I’m cold and I’m pretty sure there’s snow melting down my back, but I don’t care.” She grabbed onto the collar of my jacket and pulled my face down to hers. While Morton tried to find the snowball, Goldie and I made out like high school kids in the snowbank.
By the time we got back to the cottage, it was noon—check-out time. We loaded up the truck and headed back to the city, leaving the snowy paradise behind. “Promise me you will come with me when I look at cottages to buy.” I squeezed her hand. “I need a woman’s eye. You’ve seen my apartment; I might come up here and buy some modern piece of garbage.”
“That’s true.” Goldie pressed her fingertip to her mouth. “In that case, Ace, yes, I will come with you to make sure you don’t buy a piece of concrete.”
I laughed. What had started off as a tense trip had turned into one of the best nights of my life. The drive was quick, and before I knew it, the farmers’ fields had given way to the urban sprawl of the Greater Toronto Area.
“Goldie, how did you know I needed to do the Michigan?”
She stiffened. “Ace. I want to tell you the truth, but I also don’t want to sound crazy.”
“Try me.” I changed lanes and kept one eye on traffic, the other on Goldie.
Her hands were clasped together in her lap and she played with her thumbnails. “I don’t really know. I used to get feelings about people, you know. I could tell if someone was really good or really bad.”
I nodded. “Like a vibe check?”
“Exactly.” She smiled. “My intuition has always been good, but lately, as well as feeling things, I started seeing things.”
“Hallucinating?”
“I shouldn’t have said anything.”
She seemed unsure of herself and her voice shook. I brought her hand to my mouth and it was ice cold. I kissed her fingers. “Tell me more. I believe in intuition.”
“Do you believe in psychics?”
“Why not?” I shrugged.
“Really?” She turned to me, her brow furrowed. “You don’t think it’s crazy?”
I kissed her hand again. “You knew things you couldn’t possibly know. I don’t think you’re crazy, Marigold. I think you’re incredible. We wouldn’t have won those games without you. If you can do that a few more times, we might even make it to the finals this year.”
She sighed. “That’s the thing. I can’t control it. Sometimes, I see things; sometimes, I don’t. Last night, we did a lot of…touching, and I didn’t see one thing. I kind of liked it. I don’t see the visions as a gift.”
We had arrived in the busy Toronto traffic and I turned off the highway and headed to Goldie’s side of town. “If you’re helping people, how is that not a gift?”
“Throwing hockey games is not exactly charity. What’s next, the racetrack?”
It stung a little. The games weren’t thrown, they were played and won fair and square. “Is this what you wanted to tell me?”
“That’s one of the things.” I slowed as we reached Goldie’s street. Morton stretched and sniffed the air. He knew he was close to home. She rested her hand on my leg. “Will you come in and hang out with me at my house? We can have a drink and chat. I don’t have any of that fancy Brignac champagne, but I think I’ve got some Sauvignon Blanc that Mel left the last time she slept over.
“Does a one-legged duck swim tight circles?” I joked when I was nervous, and there was something about Goldie’s “chat” that made me worried.
“Oh my.” Goldie laughed. “That’s terrible.”
“Of course, I’ll hang out with you. There’s nowhere else I’d rather be.” The boughs of the trees hung heavy with snow as I crept along Neville Park Road.
I was going to pull into Goldie’s driveway, but there was a car in the way. “Is that your car?” It was a beat-up blue Toyota covered in stickers.
Goldie groaned. “No. That’s Fern’s car.”
“Who is Fern?” I parked the truck on the street and shut off the engine.
“Fern Lauper. My mom.”