The Carpenter & the Queen (4 page)

Dropping her backpack to the ground, she
pulled out a blanket and spread it on the grass behind a wild
lilac. The bush would provide her enough cover that no one could
see her easily from the house or road but would allow her a good
view of her subject. She pulled out her sketchpad and pastels and
started drawing.

She blocked in the two stories and peaked
roof first, then the covered porch that spanned the front of the
house, dropping down three steps to ground level. The addition
jutted off the front to the right with a big fireplace at the end.
The second floor had two windows together above the porch, then a
single window on the section over the addition. With the major
shapes in place, she filled in the front door centered under the
porch with the single window on either side and the porch swing
hanging by only one chain on the left. All the windows were closed
and the shades pulled. Claire had never seen inside, but mystery
surrounded the house and its inhabitants—if there were any. Once
she had seen a truck pull into the driveway and disappear below and
behind. She knew from earlier visits when she had walked up the
road that the driveway dropped and circled around to the basement
garage which opened up behind.

No one had landscaped the yard. What little
grass existed was brown and tufted. She pulled out her pastels and
began filling in the details she had drawn. The wooden siding was
gray and cracking, the porch missing a few boards, but there was
something romantic about the place.

Claire’s aunt and uncle had traveled to
Great Britain when she was a child, returning with hundreds of
slides of castle ruins. Claire vividly remembered studying a photo
of Raglan Castle in Wales as her aunt described their visit on a
windy and rainy spring day.

“There was an aura of sadness about the
place,” her aunt had said, “as though it had seen happy days long
ago and was in continual mourning.”

The rest of the family had laughed. Claire’s
father had teased his sister-in-law about her feelings toward a
“bunch of old rocks,” but Claire understood. She had always wished
for her own castle, but since castles didn’t exist in America, she
had to create them in her imagination. A stand of birch trees could
be the remnants of towers from a white fortress. A single chimney
standing alone in a field became the remnants of a great hall.

This house she sketched gave her the same
feeling, as though something grand had once occurred there, and now
the place was in continual mourning. Who lived in this house? What
had their lives been like? What had changed in their fortunes to
turn it into this old, magnificent ruin?

She imagined the building was at least a
hundred years old, much older than the pre-fabricated dwelling her
parents had just moved the family into. Someday, she would own a
house just like this and fix it up. She would make it her castle.
Claire wanted a place with history where she could recreate a
romantic past and build an even more romantic future.

She had been drawing for almost an hour when
she heard the backdoor open and a dog bark. Excited at the prospect
of seeing the inhabitants, she set down her pad and watched. On the
lawn space to the left of the house, a tall boy with sandy brown
hair emerged, carrying a hay bale. A caramel-colored dog trotted
behind him. The boy set the bale down about fifty yards back from
the road then went back behind the house again and soon returned
carrying another bale. She guessed he was older than Garrett, but
not by much. He disappeared behind the house a third time, now
carrying a bow, a quiver of arrows, and a paper target. After
securing the target to the bales, he carried his equipment to the
edge of the dirt road.

Now Claire could get a good look at him. He
wore jeans and hiking boots with a brown Billabong T-shirt. As he
waxed his bow string, she could see his Roman nose, square chin,
and sandy brown hair falling across his forehead. His shoulders
were wide, his biceps thick, his skin tan. He was beautiful.

He ordered the dog to sit beside him, out of
firing range. He strung an arrow, pulled back, and released. Claire
knew nothing about proper form for archery, but whatever this guy
was doing looked good. His neck was thick, and she admired the way
the muscles in his arms stood out when he drew the bow. Now here
was an advantage to spending the summer in the country that she had
not considered. How many of her girlfriends working the counter at
McDonalds were watching a handsome guy shoot arrows in his
backyard? None, she was sure. Was this exquisite creature the only
inhabitant of this romantic dwelling? Suddenly, the house she had
always felt a special attachment to became even more magical.

She watched him shoot for a while, already
imagining how he would look in a tuxedo at their wedding. He rarely
hit the bull’s eye, but the arrows burrowed in the hay bales most
of the time. One skidded over and embedded itself in the ground
somewhere in the yard behind. He called the dog over to help him
look, and Claire lost sight of them in the backyard. Glancing at
her watch, she saw she should go back soon if she wanted to stop at
the library before it closed. She suddenly had an interest in
archery and hoped to find a book or two about it.

The boy reappeared a few moments later,
holding a tennis ball and working the dog up to a frenzy as he
pretended to throw it. Laughing, he tossed the ball back behind the
bales where the dog retrieved it eagerly. After repeating this
process a few times, the boy looked up and down the dirt road,
then, to Claire’s dismay, threw the ball in her direction. He
couldn’t see her, could he? The ball bounced about ten feet beyond
her down the trail. She kept still, hoping the dog would just go
after the ball and leave her alone.

Intent on its mission, the dog didn’t see
her immediately, but on its way back to its master, it picked up
her scent, dropped the ball, and barked repeatedly.

“What is it, Toby? Found a squirrel?”

Claire tried to shush the dog, but it just
kept barking. She saw the boy coming across the street and
panicked. She rose to her feet, causing the dog to bark even
more.

The boy reached the dog, followed its gaze,
then jumped when he spotted Claire.

“Hi.” Claire tried to smile.

He looked as startled as she did. They
stared at each other for several awkward seconds as Toby continued
to bark. Finally, the boy broke his gaze and called the dog
off.

Now that he was closer, Claire could see he
was even cuter than she had thought from a distance.

“Sorry I scared you,” he said.

“No, no. My fault.”

He glanced at her blanket where her box of
pastels and the drawing of the house were clearly visible. Feeling
an explanation was necessary, Claire spoke.

“I was drawing, and your house is really
interesting. I didn’t mean to spy . . .”

“Can I see?”

With a shrug, she picked up the notebook and
handed it to him.

“I didn’t know you lived here—who lived
here,” Claire stammered. “I just wanted to draw it, so I was out
here when you came out and I . . . well, I . . .”

“You’re good.”

“Thanks.”

“I’m Will.” He stuck out his hand.

“Claire.”

She pulled her hand back shyly after the
shake and tucked her hair behind her ear.

“Do you live around here?” Will asked.

“I’m staying with my grandma for the
summer.” Then, fearful this made her sound too young, she added, “I
work for her around the house to earn money for the school year.
I’m from Farmington Hills.”

“Where’s that?”

“Outside of Detroit.”

“I’m from Toledo. I’m just visiting my dad
before I head off to college.”

“That’s cool.”

She bit her lip as several awkward seconds
passed.

“I should get going.” She knelt to gather
her stuff.

“More work?”

“No, I’ve got to get to the library before
it closes and pick up a book.”

Will knelt down beside her, put the box top
on her pastels, and handed them to her as she shoved her supplies
into her backpack. Having him so close made her blush.

“Maybe I’ll see you around sometime,
then.”

“Yeah.” She smiled. “Maybe.”

She slung the backpack over her shoulder.
“Nice to meet you, Will.” She raised a hand in farewell, and
started down the path walking sideways, unwilling to turn her back
on him completely.

“See you, Claire.”

She gave him one last smile as he grinned
and crossed the road back to his house.

Her grandma didn’t ask her about her
afternoon, and Claire didn’t tell her. She went to bed early,
allowing her grandma to believe she was tired, but once the guest
room door was shut, Claire stayed up late sketching a boy shooting
arrows in the courtyard of a medieval castle.

5

January 2005, Lindberg, Michigan

“I can come next weekend if you want me to,”
Garrett said as he climbed into his truck Monday afternoon. Claire
stood on the sidewalk holding her unzipped coat closed.

“I’ll be fine, Garrett. Sam and I just have
to get our bearings.”

“Say the word, and I’ll be here with boxes
and the trailer to move you back.”

“I’m where I want to be.”

“I just don’t want you to think that you
have
to be here. The will didn’t say you had to keep
it.”

“I know. I want to keep it.”

Garrett eyed the house with a frown.
“There’s a lot of work to be done. You know I’ll help with
whatever—“

“I know.” She smiled.

Why couldn’t men understand what a woman
wanted without her having to spell it out? She wasn’t opposed to
dropping hints in order to help a guy a long, but clueless men
exasperated Claire, her brother most of all.

* * * * *

“We’re registering you for school today,”
Claire told Sam. Garrett had just left, and they were unpacking
Sam’s books and putting them on the shelves in his room.

“Aw, man!” Sam wrinkled his nose.

“You don’t want to repeat the third grade
because you missed something.”

“I know all the third grade stuff already. I
was the smartest kid in my class.”

“Well, this is a new school and the rules
are different.”

“Mom,” Sam’s voice dripped with disdain,
“all schools have the same rules. Don’t run in the hallways. Obey
the teacher. Keep your hands to yourself. Stuff like that.”

“True, but the way the kids behave will be
different. You’re the new kid, so you’ll have to learn the way they
do things here and fit in.”

Sam shrugged. Claire could tell he had heard
all he was going to hear, so there wasn’t much point in continuing
her lecture. She changed the subject instead.

“Have you decided what color you want to
paint your room?”

“I can’t decide if it should be green or
blue.”

“We could do both. Maybe blue down below,
then a light green up top.”

Sam grunted his approval.

“We’ll get paint while we’re out today,
then, and some wallpaper remover.”

She glanced at the yellowed wallpaper with
faded vines and shuddered. No wonder the kid was having trouble
sleeping.

“Can I play now?”

He had just put the last book into the shelf
and looked at her expectantly.

“Go toss the box in the garage and then you
may.”

“I don’t like to go down there. It’s
creepy.” Seeing that Claire didn’t look convinced, Sam added,
“There are spiders down there.”

Claire rolled her eyes. “Fine. I’ll take
it.”

“I’m going to have a battle. Will you play
with me?”

“In a while. I need to look through the
boxes in my room and figure out what to do with them. Set up my
side for me, OK?”

Sam grinned mischievously. “I’m going to
plant spies in your fort.”

“I’m sure you will.”

She left his room while he was still pulling
his plastic green army men and Legos out of the closet.

Of the six boxes sitting in her room, Claire
already knew two she wouldn’t unpack—the box of special baby
clothes she had saved from Sam’s first year and her wedding dress
wrapped in tissue paper. Another three boxes were books that would
go on the shelves of her library wall upstairs. Using the open
blade of her scissors, she cut through the tape of one box to look
inside. She smiled at what she found—her collection of books on the
Middle Ages, from Robin Hood to jousting, castles to cottages,
fairy tales to guidebooks she and Will had bought in their travels.
All these had to come back out. She shoved the boxes off to the
side, prepared to carry them upstairs later.

When she popped open the last box, Claire
felt like it was Christmas again. The box held all her souvenirs,
the things she had packed for the move back to Michigan and never
had room for. She unrolled a taped bundle of tissue paper to reveal
eighteen pewter soldiers.

“Hey, Sam? Come here for a second.”

She heard the thump-thump-thump of Sam’s
feet as he ran into her room.

“Look at these.” She laid the pewter
soldiers on the bed. “Your daddy used to collect these when we were
traveling around Europe.”

Sam leaned in to examine them more closely.
“Those are cool.”

“Yeah, I know. He’s got soldiers from
Germany, England, Wales, and France, I think.” Claire put her hand
on Sam’s back and rubbed it. “He always intended for you to have
them when you were old enough. You can play with them, if you
want.”

“Really?”

“Sure. Though maybe when you aren’t using
them, we can put them out to look at. What do you think?”

Sam scooped the soldiers into his hands and
said, “My side just got reinforcements.”

He raised his eyebrows repeatedly, Groucho
Marx style, making Claire laugh.

“Are you gonna come, Mom?”