This Summer Will Be Different

by Carley Fortune

“Here you are…” He drifted off. “Lucy.” “Here you are, Lucy.” “Thank you…” I gestured to him. He wiped his hands on a tea towel, eyes fixed on mine like he needed to decide something before giving me his answer. “Felix,” he said after a moment.

“I’m not usually a beer drinker, Felix.” “It’s a blueberry ale, made here on the island. Try it.” I took a sip. It was ice cold and slightly tart. “Thanks.” I set the glass down. “And you were right earlier—I’m not from here. I live in Toronto,” I said, picking up an oyster. “Toronto,” he repeated, though it sounded more like Terranah. He nodded once, solemn. “Sorry about that.”

And Number 3. Don’t fall in love with my brother. “Yeah,” Felix said. “Bridget’s my sister.”

Bridget will love whatever I do. She’s my most vocal advocate, my loudest cheerleader. My only cheerleader now that my aunt is gone. She’s the one person in my life whose love and support come freely and without conditions. She believes in me more than I believe in myself.

But I won’t repeat them. Not this time. For once, this summer will be different. It has to be.

We’re halfway across the parking lot, and I’m about to ask her again why she needed me so urgently, but then I see him. Felix Clark is leaning against a black pickup truck, its tires covered in sienna dirt, reading a paperback. His dark hair falls in a swirling, gorgeous mess over his forehead.

“I think we’re safe,” he said, deadpan. “Next time, don’t leave me standing in the hall. I used our secret knock.” “We don’t have a secret knock.”

“And three’s obvious.” “Is it?” “It is.” Felix’s dimple winked. “Rule three: You’re not allowed to fall in love with me.”

Felix opens the center console. “Here,” he says, passing back a snack bar that’s mostly nuts, the kind I like best. I meet his eyes in the mirror. “Thank you.” “You just happened to have that in there?” Bridget gawks at her brother. “No,” he says. “I bought it when I stopped for gas. Just in case.” “Just in case,” she repeats. “Lucy gets carsick if she has an empty stomach.” “I know that,” Bridget says, suspicious. “But I’m surprised that you know that.”

“You look like an olden-days ghost,” he says, eyeing my nightgown, though Felix never had a problem with the nightgown.

On the seat is a paper bag with two bottles of my favorite vinho verde and an overnight bag. Felix Clark has come to stay at Summer Wind.

“They’re not cold. Do you want one in the freezer for tonight?” “No, we already got into your dad’s rye.” “And the peanuts?” “Of course.”

“You got my butter.” This feels significant, worthy of pointing out. This is why it’s so hard to keep myself in check around Felix. He’s not just handsome; he’s good. “I did. I figured you and Bridget probably spent the afternoon out walking.” “Thunder Cove. How did you know?” His gaze finds mine. It’s dark. A tropical storm charting its course across my face. “I’ve known you for five years now, Lucy. You’d pick adventure and fresh air over a grocery store run every time.”

I lean against the door, taking deep breaths. But I need more than a piece of pine on hinges between me and Felix. I need a football field. Provinces. A whole damn country. But I’m not sure that would even work. Somehow, I always find my way back.

“If there’s one thing I can teach you, Lucy,” Stacy said as I sobbed into my wine, “it’s to live your life fully, to live it for yourself and no one else.

“I don’t know what cultured butter is, but I need this in my life.” Felix extended his hand, and I placed it in his palm. “I can make that happen.”

Felix smiled. I couldn’t see the dimple, but I knew it was there, lurking beneath the beard. “I’ve got you.”

“Without question. We better get started. Think you can keep up, Lucy? Being a timer is a very important job.” He looked right at me, eyes flaring like a warning signal. “You can’t take your attention off me for a second.” I ignored the wave of heat spreading across my chest and tossed my hair over my shoulder. “You bet your shucking ass I can.” Bridget and Felix groaned. “What?” I said. “I thought that was a good one.”

“Your shucking puns are brutal, Bee. Please stop,” Bridget said, picking up the scattered cobs of corn. She tossed one at her brother’s head. “And you stop flirting with my friend.”

I stood beside Felix in the kitchen, stopwatch app at the ready. My eyes caught on the small silver scar on his wrist. “Someone distracted me,” he said, tapping his knife on the mark. I lifted my gaze to his. “It was worth it.” “She must have been cute,” Bridget quipped from behind me. He smiled at me. “The most gorgeous woman I’ve ever seen.”

He hedges. “It wasn’t bad. It just wasn’t my thing.” “You’re such a liar. You hated it.” I love that I know his taste in books better than almost anyone.

“What’s the situation with you two?” “What do you mean?” He gives me a steely-eyed stare. He knows I’m full of crap. “There’s no situation, Zach.” “That’s what Wolf says, but I don’t think that’s true. You’re single. He’s single.” I have to school my expression at this news. “How do you know I’m not seeing anyone?” “I have my ways.” I lift my eyebrows. Zach shrugs, then says, “Bridget.” Before I can interrogate him about that, he adds, “And I’ve seen the way you look at each other—you’re both so obvious.” I cannot fathom what he thinks is obvious. “There’s nothing between us,” I tell him. “Same as always.”

“The silence is slightly unsettling,” Zach says. “You think Bridget’s bleaching her crime scene?” “I’ve never heard them fight. Felix is so even-keeled. Nothing seems to bother him.” Zach looks at me. “What?” “You called him Felix. No one calls him that.” I don’t reply. “Huh,” Zach says. He squeezes his bottom lip between his thumb and index finger. And then, “He’s not as easygoing as you think, Lucy. He has feelings.” I frown. “I know that.” Zach stares at me for a long moment, but all he says is, “Good.” Felix’s voice, gruff, interrupts us. “I’m taking a walk.”

“Tell me how you’re doing,” Felix says. I peer at him. “I’m fine.” “Lucy.” His gaze travels my face, and I feel like he’s drinking me up. “Really tell me. Tell me what’s happening at the store. Tell me about Farah and what poetry she’s working on. Tell me about flowers.” He sounds a little desperate, and his words run together. “Felix Clark, are you drunk?” I don’t even think I’ve seen him tipsy before—he holds his liquor well. “Maybe a little,” he says with a half smile that’s definitely intoxicated. “But I also want to know, Lucy. Talk to me.”

“Not yet. Describe it to me, Lucy.” Felix can say my name a thousand different ways. A Lucy that vibrates in the back of his throat, gritty with desire. A Lucy that sounds like sun showers. A Lucy of smug amusement. A Lucy that’s more a sigh of relief than a name. A Lucy that’s all awe and wonder. This Lucy is a gentle command. In one breath, it all comes back to me. The thing I’ve secretly wanted for so long—a cut flower farm.

I turn my face back to the stars, smiling up at them. “A field with rich soil. Sunflowers. Salvia. Cosmos.” “Dahlias,” he says. It’s not a question. Felix knows. “Dahlias,” I repeat.

“I’m so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers,” Anne Shirley said, and now I knew why.

“I need to find myself” and “I don’t know who I am”—two things Joy told Felix when she gave him back the ring—soon became part of our lexicon. As in: “Can you take out the recycling?” “I wish I could, but I need to find myself.”

“Are you going to stand there and lord over me?” “I’m not that much taller than you. I can’t lord.”

I turned to him. “Your shoulders are like six feet wide. You’re lording.” “It’s true,” Bridget said, picking up the vegetable peeler. “You’re lording.”

“Don’t fall in love with me, Felix Clark,” I whispered. “Rule three.” “I wouldn’t dream of it.”

He leans in. “You make me a lot of things, but nervous isn’t one of them.” My jaw drops, but then Felix pulls back with a one-sided grin and says, “I do get a little anxious on competition day, though.” “So,” I say, regrouping. “I don’t make you nervous, but oysters do.” He laughs and opens his door. “Exactly. Never underestimate a bivalve.”

“Felix Clark, fashion critic—I had no idea.” “I’m full of surprises.” He motions to my foot. “Let me see it.”

On our way out, we walk past a display of small white cards with messages from visitors, standing in metal holders. English. French. Japanese. German. Childish scribbles. I pause when I come to the one that reads, I am here now, and everything is okay. It feels like it’s written just for me.

“It’s nice to meet you,” he said. “Lucy was giving me the tour. It’s incredible.” Stacy assessed him. “It is,” she agreed. “Though I can’t take credit for it. This is all Lucy.” He nodded. “It feels like Lucy.”

“Lucy, I very much doubt that it’s over. There was enough tension between the two of you to bounce a coin off. That gorgeous creature is smitten, and from the way you’re blushing, I’d say you’re also taken with him.”

I don’t believe in one true love. For me. We have so much in common, but I don’t think we’re the same this way. You crave people, taking care of others, and being taken care of.” “That doesn’t mean I need a man.” “Of course not.” She thought for a moment before she spoke. “I think you’d like having a partner. But you’ve chosen to date someone you’ll never fall in love with. Carter is a waste of your time.”

“See, it is silly.” “It’s not,” he said. “It’s perfect. I can picture it: you on a farm, surrounded by flowers.” “It’s just a dream.” “It’s a good dream,” he said, then walked toward the cash register. He passed the clerk the book. “You don’t have to do that. I don’t have a garden, and my balcony doesn’t get enough light for me to grow much of anything on it.” “Dream big with me, Lucy.”

The first packet of seeds arrived the following week in a yellow envelope. My name was on the outside, but there was no note, only a paper sleeve with a picture of dahlias on the front. I brought it to the office and pulled the book Felix bought me off the shelf. I studied the woman on the cover of Floret Farm’s Cut Flower Garden and the bouquet of orange dahlias flung over her shoulder.

After we closed that evening, I walked to the bookstore. I wandered around, not sure what I was looking for. But then I saw a beautiful clothbound edition of Wide Sargasso Sea. I mailed it to Prince Edward Island the next day. I didn’t write a note. I didn’t need to. My gift said, I’m thinking of you, all on its own. Just as his did.

“We know,” Bridget says. “It’s your thing. Your only thing.” “Not true,” Zach says. “He has two things: oysters and books.” “I have more than two things.” “Name them,” Bridget says.

“Get lost.” He turns to me, laughing. His gaze is warm—it feels like swimming in paradise. “Anything you want to add?” “Try not to stab yourself.” He winks. “No promises.”

“What about an oyster-shucking event in a community arena suggested not-casual?”

I hadn’t seen Felix since his visit to Toronto last fall, but every month, a yellow envelope of seeds arrived at the store. I had ten packets now. Zinnias and snap dragons and daisies. And every month, I sent him a book back. A self-help about becoming a hotel magnate as a joke. An illustrated children’s book called Felix After the Rain that turned out to be more emotional than I’d anticipated.

I turned back to the first page, reading the paragraph that welcomed the reader to the island and to Felix’s favorite spots on it—recommendations he’d collected over his twenty-seven years of living on PEI. I glanced at him. “Told you,” he said, smug. “I still don’t buy it that you weren’t trying to pick up dozens of tourists a season.” He smirked. “Only one or two.”

His mouth turned down at the corners. “I can stay if you want. Keep you company.” “Felix, you don’t have to babysit me. I don’t want to be any more of a burden than I’ve already been.” “You’re not a burden, Lucy.” My eyes began to sting. I was too raw for his kindness. “Thanks,” I whispered. “Plus my sister threatened bodily harm if I didn’t take care of you.”

“I think I might be broken.” “Lucy.” That’s all Felix said. Only my name, but I felt it everywhere.

I chose Happy Place in May because the idea of Felix holding that bright pink book delighted me to no end

“I loved her against reason, against promise, against peace, against hope, against happiness, against all discouragement that could be.”

out of his mouth. I knew Felix at twenty-three—brokenhearted, putting his life back together—and I knew him now, at twenty-seven—determined, solid, the kindest man I knew.