Past Lies Page 2

  Tom had worked out his own version of sign language, a combination of some of Bert’s and a lot of what seemed logical to him. And he spoke up around the kid. Too many people mumbled.

  “Come and have a look at temp gauge on the Beaver,” Tom bellowed. “The engine’s been running high.”

  IVY WATCHED THEM LEAVE, shaking her head and grinning to herself at the fact that Captain still figured if he talked loud enough, Bert would hear him. She pushed the button to replay the messages.

  There was a request for helicopter transport from a group of Seattle skiers, and another from a German tourist for an aerial tour by floatplane. Ivy scribbled down the numbers.

  The third call was from her mother, asking if Ivy could join her for lunch at Mike’s Palace. Ivy spent a puzzled moment wondering what was up. She and Frances weren’t exactly in the habit of lunching together.

  She made the business calls first, arranging dates and deposits, recommending her aunt and uncle’s remote fishing lodge, when asked for advice on ac commodation. Usually June, July and August were the busiest tourist months, but lately there’d been increased volume in the less crowded shoulder seasons—late April, May and September. Up And Away was having the best April ever. At this rate, their dream of owning the Bell instead of leasing it would soon be a reality.

  At last Ivy dialed her mother’s number.

  “Frances Pierce.”

  Ivy was accustomed to her mother’s businesslike manner on the phone. “Hey, Mom, it’s me.”

  “Ivy, hi. Are you free for lunch? I thought Mike’s Palace, but if you’d rather go somewhere else—?”

  “No, that sounds fine. See you there in fifteen, okay?”

  Ivy hung up, wondering why she hadn’t just come right out and asked Frances what she wanted. That way maybe they could have skipped lunch altogether.

  She took a moment to wash her hands and face in the cramped bathroom. Dampening her fingers, she ran them through her hair to freshen the short curls that had been flattened under her hat. She was wearing her usual work uniform: blue jeans, sturdy Frye boots, a white button-down shirt under a navy pullover. She caught herself fussing and turned away from the mirror.

  Why was it that the only time she was even marginally aware of how she looked was when she was around her mother? It was time she got over that.

  Before she headed out the door she shrugged into the black Gore-Tex jacket with the company logo she and Tom had designed—the outline of a stylized plane with a U and an A superimposed on it. The cap had the same logo, and she plunked it on, remembering too late her efforts with her hair.

  Oh, well. Around Frances, it was a lost cause anyway.

  CHAPTER TWO

  It seems a lot longer than a week since I left Bellingham. I miss you and the sprout a lot, I keep thinking about that night he was born. I figured for sure you were going to die, Linda. I never dreamed how much pain a woman goes through having a baby.

  From letters written by Roy Nolan,

  April, 1972

  IT WAS A TYPICAL SPRING day for Valdez, sunny but chill with a sharp, brisk breeze blowing off the harbor. The huge snowbanks were gradually disappearing. Ivy drove her battered red pickup with the window down, breathing in the smell of the ocean.

  Mike’s Palace was just a short drive from the office, and Ivy pulled into a parking spot right beside her mother’s SUV and headed into the cozy little restaurant. Mike’s was popular with locals and tourists because it had the best lasagna around.

  It also had a view of the harbor. The walls were covered with old newspapers that told the story of Valdez all the way from the gold-rush days through the oil boom, including the earthquake, the disastrous oil spill and the more recent tourist boom.

  “Hey, Ivy, how ya doin’?” Mike, the proprietor, was tall, bearded and sinister-looking because of a crooked nose and a jagged scar that angled across his cheekbone and nose. He liked to let people think it was from a brawl, but Ivy knew he’d gone headfirst through the windshield of a snowmobile.

  He jerked a thumb at a table by the window. “Your mom’s over there.”

  The room was way too small to miss anyone—as if anyone with even one eye in their head would ever miss Frances. Her wild halo of long, snowy-white hair gleamed like a beacon, curling out from her skull as if it had been electrified. The brilliant turquoise sweater she wore stood out like a jewel among the drab browns and grays of the other patrons. Frances looked like a peacock trapped by a crowd of seagulls, Ivy decided, as she wound her way among the crowded tables and sank into a chair.

  Seagulls, and now one woodpecker. The comparison amused her.

  “Hello, Ivy.” Frances’s voice suited her. It was husky and dramatic, with a refined sensuality and a faint hint of the Midwest in the consonants. “Glad you could make it.” She smiled, her wide, voluptuous mouth revealing perfect white teeth. As usual, Ivy felt diminished by her mother’s beauty.

  “Slow day,” Ivy said, taking a long, thirsty drink from the water glass beside her plate. “I took a group up the mountain early this morning, they’re skiing down and then I’ll fly them back to Uncle Theo’s.”

  Frances nodded. “I talked to Caitlin the other day. She said Sage and Ben were due back today from that wildlife conference in Montana.”

  Ben was Ivy’s cousin, Sage his wife. Caitlin and Theo had twin sons, Ben and Logan, ten years older than Ivy. Growing up, she’d idolized both of them and, during her teen years, she’d had a massive crush on Ben, the more charismatic of the two. Thank God maturity cured things like that.

  Maturity and the realization that her handsome cousin’s actions didn’t always live up to his charm. His second wife was Ivy’s best friend, and there were times when she felt Ben didn’t deserve Sage.

  “Dad’s going over to the lodge for supper tonight.” Ivy watched her mother’s green eyes, wondering if Frances knew or even cared where Tom was spending the evening.

  Frances nodded. “Yes, he told me.” She glanced up and smiled again at the plump waitress. “Hi, Sally. I’ll have the lasagna, spinach salad and a glass of chardonnay.”

  “Same for me.” About the only thing she and Frances had ever agreed on was food. Ivy had inherited her mother’s metabolism as well as her appetite, which meant they both enjoyed staggering quantities of food without gaining an ounce.

  Conversation faltered as Sally poured their wine—one glass wouldn’t impair her ability to pilot—and then brought a basket of hot bread and, a few moments later, their salads.

  After she left, the silence stretched painfully. Had there ever been a time when talking to her mother was spontaneous and easy? If there had, Ivy didn’t remember it.

  Frances sipped her wine and Ivy wondered if her mother was also searching for a common interest. “How’s Bert making out with his flying lessons, Ivy?”

  Good one, Mom. Neutral, uncomplicated.

  “Dad says he’s a natural.” And how come you’re asking me? Don’t you ever talk to Dad about anything besides the plumbing and the bank balance?

  “His younger sister, Becky, is taking my class. She wants to be a model.”

  Ivy’s instinctive reaction was to shake her head. She fought to control her reaction, saying in a neutral tone, “You think she’s got what it takes?”

  Frances tipped her head to one side, considering. “She’ll have to lose a lot of weight. She does have the height, and that unusual ethnic look is hot right now.”

  “So what look was hot when you were in the business?” Ivy didn’t really care, but it seemed a pretty safe thing to ask. Touchy areas with her mother were any discussions involving Tom, the need for makeup, a decent wardrobe or dicey situations encountered during flights. And Frances’s childhood—now there was a real no-go zone.

  “Exotic All-American farm girl?” Frances gave her characteristic little Gaelic shrug. “I really don’t know. I was lucky, because whatever it was, I seemed to have it.”

  “You sure did.” Ivy thought of the s
tacks of fashion magazines carefully filed away in protective plastic, each featuring her mother on the cover. The incomparable Francesca, one photographer had labeled her. She’d been one of the first fashion models to become so famous they were recognized by just one name—and their beauty, of course. Francesca was one of the first supermodels.

  Sally served their lasagna, and they ate hungrily for a few moments.

  “You ever miss it, Mom? The…the glamour, the excitement?” It was something Ivy had often wondered but never dared ask, which was ridiculous. Her mother had made it clear early on that she didn’t want to discuss certain aspects of her life, and Ivy was never sure what they were.

  And when she was younger, Ivy had been scared that questions like this one would send Frances spiraling back into the depression that had ruled their household during Ivy’s childhood. Frances was better now, but the painful memories were still there for Ivy.

  Why her mother had chosen to leave her modeling life to marry Tom and live in Alaska had always been a mystery to Ivy, and probably to most of the inhabitants of Valdez as well. It was a small town, and nobody’s private issues were usually sacred. That one, however, seemed to be.

  Frances didn’t respond right away, and Ivy figured she probably wasn’t going to. Her mother had turned her head and was staring out the window. Her wide eyes were unfocussed, so she probably wasn’t seeing the dozens of fishing boats in the harbor or the spectacular peaks of the icy glaciers that cradled the town.

  Ivy buttered a chunk of sourdough bread and chewed stoically. One small misstep on my part, one giant silence on hers.

  And then Frances actually answered. “It’s not the glamour or excitement I miss—they’re highly over-rated in the world of high fashion,” she said slowly. “A lot of it’s grueling hard work, freezing your butt off modeling swimsuits in January, roasting to death wearing layers of winter clothes in July.”

  Ivy had always suspected as much, but Frances had never explained it before.

  Frances’s voice was thoughtful. “I think what I miss sometimes is the sense of being at the epicenter of everything—fashion, publishing, knowing ahead of time what a certain designer is going to feature in his next show, who the current darling of the art world is, what’s happening to hemlines, shoulders, what era is in vogue. I get lonely for things like that, for haute couture.” Frances glanced around the crowded room before leaning in. “And also for a suitable place to wear it.”

  Even Ivy, style challenged as she was, knew that Valdez wasn’t the fashion capital of the western world. She didn’t know one designer from another, and she certainly didn’t care about hemlines or shoulders. In her opinion, the Alaskan environment provided art for free—glaciers, northern lights, mountain lakes in the summer dawn. As for clothing, well, she did have more clothes than the average woman, only because Frances had always insisted on Ivy having what she called a basic wardrobe.

  That always included a black dress, a classic wool coat, well-cut pants and matching jacket, several lined wool skirts, a stack of cashmere sweaters and various silk, cotton and linen pieces for summer.

  For years, Frances had consistently given Ivy one or two such useless items every birthday and Christmas, even when what Ivy really wanted were leather jackets, heavy boots and billed caps.

  The clothing, expensive and timeless, took up space in the back of Ivy’s closet and filled several dresser drawers, ignored for the most part. She only yanked them out when she needed something to wear to a wedding, a funeral or a christening—one of those rare events in Valdez when jeans and a T-shirt or flannel shirt just wouldn’t cut it.

  Frances must have recognized the bemused expression on Ivy’s face, because she laughed, a low, rich sound that made several people turn their way and smile in appreciation.

  “Sure, I miss New York,” Frances confessed. “The sophistication, the mistaken but pervasive belief that it’s the hub of the world. Attitude, I guess you’d call it. I miss New York attitude.”

  Ivy drawled, “So, you figure we ain’t got attitude up here in the 49th?”

  “Plenty of it. Just not the same type.” They ate for several moments and then Frances said, “What would you miss if you moved away from Valdez, Ivy?”

  Ivy thought about it for a moment. She also thought what a strange conversation this was turning out to be. Normally she and Frances talked about the weather, food, recipes, the latest news item. Which was pretty limited and meant that they quickly ran out of things to say.

  “I can’t even imagine moving away. Oh, from Valdez, maybe, but not ever from Alaska. It’s where I belong, it’s in my blood.” Curiosity got the better of Ivy. “Is that how you felt about New York, Mom? That it was in your blood?”

  “No.” This time Frances didn’t hesitate. “I’ve never had that feeling about anywhere I’ve lived.”

  “Not…not even your hometown?” Frances had grown up in a small town in southern Ohio, but that was about all Ivy knew. Frances never spoke of her childhood, except to say that her parents were dead and she had no relatives she wished to contact. “Didn’t you miss Brigham Falls when you left?” As soon as the words were out, Ivy realized she’d gone too far.

  “Never.” Frances bit off the word as if it burned her lips. She pushed her plate away even though she wasn’t finished. “Now, are we going to have dessert?” Without waiting for a reply, she motioned Sally over.

  Ivy felt heat rise in her face at the rebuff. She felt like a child being reprimanded. Smack. End of discussion.

  You’d think by now she’d know better than to ask Frances anything really personal. But for a few minutes there she’d been seduced into thinking that she and her mother were communicating.

  The hurt was nothing new. Except now Frances no longer retreated to the bedroom for days or sometimes weeks, while Ivy berated herself for making her mother sick.

  “I’m having lemon meringue pie and coffee, please, Sally. What would you like, Ivy?”

  “I have to take off. I have to do some stuff at the office and then I need to pick up my clients.” Ivy pulled her wallet out and tossed several bills on the table beside her plate. She avoided looking at her mother.

  “Please, Ivy, lunch is my treat.” Frances tried to hand the money back. “I invited you.”

  “Next time.” Which might be when the Columbia Glacier melted away to nothing. Ivy got up and shrugged on her jacket. “See you, Mom.”

  She hurried out the door without a backward glance, drawing in a shaky lungful of fresh, cool air as she headed to her truck.

  More often than not, being around her mother left her resentful, shut out and confused. There was a line by Kipling, “and never the twain shall meet.” It could have been written with her and Frances in mind.

  CHAPTER THREE

  If Alaska’s all they claim it is, maybe you and I and the sprout could homestead up there, make a claim on a piece of land. This guy on the boat who’s going up there to do that says land’s still cheap in Alaska. I’ll know better after I get there.

  From letters written by Roy Nolan,

  April, 1972

  BACK IN THE RESTAURANT Frances’s shoulders slumped in defeat. She’d thought that things were going well for once, that she and Ivy were actually connecting. And then, without warning, her daughter did that closing down thing she’d perfected as a young teen, eyes shuttered, mouth set, face like a thunderbolt.

  Frances hadn’t even had a chance to hint at what she really wanted to discuss with her daughter. She’d asked Tom if he’d break the news to Ivy, but she couldn’t fathom what had ever made her think he’d take the initiative. When it came to emotional issues, avoidance was Tom’s only coping technique. That, and projection. He found fault with other things to avoid looking at himself. She’d only realized that recently.

  It was always easier to see the mistakes someone else was making. Several years of good therapy had at least given her some insight into herself, but it was still difficult not to blame Tom
for the gaping holes in their marriage.

  Sally appeared, setting down the lemon meringue pie and pouring coffee.

  “Thanks.” Frances forced a smile to her lips. “Your hair looks wonderful, by the way.”

  The girl had attended one of Frances’s night-school classes, and her plain face lit up at the compliment. “Oh, thank you, Ms. Pierce. I had it cut in Anchorage. There’s a new salon there, it’s called Suki’s.” Sally’s smile made her beautiful. “Enjoy your pie.”

  Frances had no appetite for the dessert now, or coffee, either. When Sally moved away, she messed up the pie with her fork, stirred cream into the coffee, and gazed blindly out the window, not seeing the Norman Rockwell harbor.

  After years of depression, which at times left her inert, she was finally taking control of her life. She had a chance at a job in New York, teaching aspiring models. She was leaving Valdez. Leaving Tom, leaving her marriage. The decision had been a long time coming, but once she’d made up her mind, she couldn’t believe she’d stayed here so long.

  But she knew why she had. Fear. Depression. The conviction that all she’d ever had to offer was youth and beauty. And for years, she’d thought that she and Tom might still resolve their differences, recapture the connection they’d once shared. It had been powerful in the beginning.

  Outside the window, a couple walked past with a small blond girl holding their hands. Every couple of steps, she drew her legs up, and the man and woman laughed and swung her between them like a pendulum.

  Had she and Tom ever swung Ivy that way? She doubted it.

  She’d been ill when Ivy was that age—it was only now, years after the worst of it, that she recognized depression as an illness. Before, she’d seen it as shameful weakness. Tom had taken over Ivy’s care. And she’d become her father’s girl, devoted to him, fierce in his defense.