Seeking Sara Summers Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Questions from readers

  Other Books by Susan Gabriel

  SEEKING

  SARA SUMMERS

  by

  Susan Gabriel

  Seeking Sara Summers. Copyright © 2008 Susan Gabriel. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  The author acknowledges permission to reprint the poem "Artichoke" from The Undersides of Leaves, by Joseph Hutchison, first published by Wayland Press in 1985.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2008932146

  ISBN: 978-0-615-22207-3

  Cover design by Thomjon Borges

  Wild Lily Arts

  www.SusanGabriel.com

  Also by Susan Gabriel

  Fiction

  The Secret Sense of Wildflower

  (a Best Book of 2012 – Kirkus Reviews)

  Temple Secrets

  Seeking Sara Summers

  Grace, Grits and Ghosts: Southern Short Stories

  Young adult

  Circle of the Ancestors

  Quentin & the Cave Boy

  Nonfiction

  Fearless Writing for Women:

  Extreme Encouragement & Writing Inspiration

  Available at all booksellers

  in print, ebook and audio formats.

  for Anne

  ARTICHOKE

  O heart weighed down by so many wings.

  --- Joseph Hutchison

  CHAPTER ONE

  Sara Stanton stopped at an intersection and stared at the red traffic light ahead of her. She wasn’t the type to go off driving into the night. Not without a map and her destination circled in yellow highlighter. Her grin grew into a smile. She had managed to surprise herself. What if she just kept driving? The possibility intrigued her. She could be one of those people who went into the store to get a pack of cigarettes—in her case, a quart of Rocky Road—and never be seen or heard from again.

  As her ten-year-old Volvo wagon vibrated its need for a tune-up, she adjusted the blue bandana that hid her new crop of short hair, the result of chemo. At home she wore bandanas but she wore a wig to school. Despite its similarity to her real hair she always felt that she was traveling in disguise. Doing some kind of undercover work investigating the criminally boring, of which she was a charter member.

  Sara reached up and touched the vacant lot where her right breast used to be in a kind of pledge allegiance to the past. She had become a hybrid: part woman, part girl. Surgery had removed her right breast and the chemo had been tolerable. Besides the hair loss, it had produced only a mild, yet persistent, nausea over the weeks, accompanied by exhaustion. She was now in remission. But getting rid of the cancer in her body was the least of her worries.

  She tapped the steering wheel with nails in need of another coat of polish and stared at the chip of a diamond in the engagement ring Grady had bought her twenty-five years before. He had offered to replace it on their 20th anniversary with something much bigger, much nicer. But she liked the simplicity of it and the time it represented. She could have worn Mimi’s ring if she had wanted; her grandmother’s 3-carat monstrosity. But she had saved it for her daughter, Jess. Or if Jess kept her adolescent promise to never succumb to marriage, she would give it to one of the boys for their wife-to-be.

  The driver in the pick-up truck behind her beeped his horn. Sara threw the car into gear and accelerated through the small town she had lived in her entire life. She approached the street she and Grady had lived on for the last twenty years. She slowed, as she always did. She signaled to turn, as she always did. But then she didn’t. She kept going. She drove out of town. She drove until the street lights ended and the road narrowed into a country road. Could a forty-four year old woman run away from home?

  What are you doing? the voice began in her head. This was not a voice Sara liked very much. They rarely agreed on anything. What about your responsibilities? the voice continued. It was true. She had responsibilities. She had a husband, who right about now would be wondering about his ice cream that she had gone to the store to get. She also had six classes of high school English students, who relied on her to torment them with term papers and pop quizzes; a gaggle of drama students; numerous committees she served on, albeit unwillingly; various friends, none of whom she felt particularly close to; and the children, who were technically grown and out of the house. Not to mention, Doctor Evans, the marriage and family therapist Grady and Sara went to every Friday afternoon at 4:00, who relied on their weekly visits to help put his children through college.

  Sara turned off her cell phone, anticipating Grady’s call. Would he be more concerned about her or the fate of his Rocky Road? Their marriage had hit a rocky road itself two years before. It was a classic case of infidelity: long-term marriage, someone in his office, she offered, he acquiesced. The oldest story in the book. Sara was hurt at the time. But not nearly to the extent she would have expected. After that Grady had stopped working late. He spent more time at home.

  And then she got cancer. By Grady’s reaction, the “in sickness and health” part of their 25 year marriage had not included cancer. Sara had spent the last year apologizing for getting sick, apologizing for adding stress to his already stressful day.

  In the last year Sara had taken stock of herself, as someone who takes stock of emergency supplies before a hurricane. Cancer was a shipwreck, she had decided, leaving survivors adrift at sea without drinking water, maps or oars. Every waking hour was spent in hope of rescue. Unfortunately, she had also discovered that she was ill-prepared for anything catastrophic—and was basically a coward. Not only about dying, but also about living. What did people do when they were absolutely sick of their lives?

  Sara was driving too fast for the deserted country road but she didn’t care. The head lights illuminated a dense layer of fog. Trees lined the road, creating a double layer of silvery darkness. Sara’s giddiness took on a dark quality. She fantasized briefly about purposely losing control of the car and crashing into the trees. Death would probably be instantaneous. A sacrificial return to nature because she had failed at the one life given her. Well, maybe not failed, she thought, I just haven’t shown up yet. Sara winced. When had she become so disappointed in herself?

  Her death would go widely unnoticed. A small article in the local newspaper would relay the details of an ordinary life: the mother of three, teacher at the local high school, Girl Scout troop leader. . . Blah, blah, blah, went the voice in her head. Was that what a life came down to? A paragraph in the local paper?

  What happened those days when she never gave life a thought? Her angst hidden benea
th a flurry of endless activity. All three children had played soccer, resulting in countless hours spent on cold, hard school bleachers cheering them on. Not to mention a decade of school band concerts, music lessons and annual fund-raisers for their various activities that resulted in boxes of rotting citrus in their garage almost every Christmas. To this day, the sight of oranges and grapefruit made Sara slightly nauseous. Those years were a blur. A blur that now seemed blissfully void of self-examination.

  Life had to be more than the day-to-day maintenance of a husband, kids and a community, she thought. Sure there were moments of joy but most were quickly erased by the drudgery and hard work of life. Had there ever been any passion? Was her life ever really fun? Ever anything other than routine?

  She accelerated again and rocked the steering wheel, swerving closer and closer to the trees on the edge of the road. She played at death the same way she played at life: afraid to commit. The tires suddenly grabbed at the shoulder. Dirt and gravel spewed from behind. Sara braked. She lost control of the car and desperately jerked it back onto the road. She missed one tree by inches. The second tree claimed the side mirror and scraped the side of the door. The car stopped. Adrenalin coursed through her body, accelerating her heartbeat and sending fireworks of hot tingles to her face.

  Ice cream melted on the front seat. She took a deep breath; then another. A slight breeze dissipated the fog. The night became clearer. You’ve got to be kidding me, Sara thought. She laughed a brief, haunting laugh. The car had settled about a hundred feet away from a crossroads. Was the universe shoving the obvious in her face?

  In the middle of the dark, deserted, New England countryside, she had suddenly found herself within the pages of a self-help book. She was at a crossroads in her life. Something had to change. She needed to go in a totally different direction. If she didn’t, she feared for what would happen. The result felt as life-threatening as cancer.

  Leaves clung to the wiper blades. It was fall in New England, the most beautiful time of the year, and she had hardly noticed. She chewed thoughtfully on a thumb nail. It would have been easier to crash into the trees. She didn’t know how to start a new life. Especially if it involved giving up the old one.

  Sara got out of the car and retrieved a flashlight from the trunk. The side mirror lay crushed at the base of a tree. She aimed the light toward the car. A deep silver scrape extended from where the side mirror used to be to the tail light. She wondered how Grady would react. She had never even had a fender-bender in twenty-five years of marriage.

  A set of headlights appeared in the distance. Sara got back in the car and revved the engine. She made a three-quarter turn driving slowly back toward town, tailpipe between her legs. Tears blurred the dark countryside. So much for running away, she thought. Like her youngest son, Sam, who at four years of age ran away from home and ended up in the tree house in the backyard, she had only gotten ten miles out of town.

  The next morning students poured into her homeroom to beat the tardy bell. Sara’s friend, Maggie, whose classroom was at the end of the hall, maneuvered her way across the room like a woman shopping the bargain basement intent on securing the best buys. Maggie’s red hair, compliments of Clairol, set her apart from the crowd. She always wore green on some part of her body, as though every day was St. Patrick’s Day and she might be pinched if found lacking.

  “You look awful,” she said.

  “Gee, thanks,” Sara said, her sarcasm giving her an odd satisfaction. “I didn’t get much sleep,” she added. Sara secured a loose strand of hair from her wig behind her ear; the same strand that always broke away from the rest. Was this intentional? she wondered. To make the wig seem more realistic?

  “What happened to your car?” Maggie asked. “I saw it in the parking lot.”

  “I side-swiped a tree. Don’t worry, the tree is fine.”

  “And Grady didn’t kill you?”

  “I haven’t exactly told him yet.” Sara raised her voice over the growing chaos in the room. She didn’t mention the crossroads she had approached the night before. Or her disappointment in herself that she wasn’t somewhere in Nova Scotia by now.

  Sara turned an irritated gaze to her students, who could still be intimidated in their first year of high school. The volume of chatter decreased.

  Maggie leaned against the edge of Sara’s desk. “What’s going on, Sara? Is the cancer back?”

  “No, no,” she said. “Nothing like that. I was just looking for a nail file to break out of this joint.” When was it, she wondered, that she started hating her job?

  The tardy bell rang. Maggie apologized. “I’ve got to go before my little angels start a Civil War.” Maggie taught American History. She squeezed Sara’s arm. “Don’t worry, honey. You’ll get through this.”

  Would she?

  The door closed, leaving Sara as the only adult in a room full of twenty-four teenagers. Never let them see your fear, a mentor teacher had told Sara her first year of teaching. She squared her shoulders, retrieved her red pen from her satchel and opened the classroom roll book. For a few seconds she studied the captives in front of her. Was she ever like them?

  A mixture of bravado and insecurity seeped out of their attitudes, speech, and their very pores, accentuated by piercings, tattoos, and fake hair colors to hide their middle-class roots. Following homeroom, several of these same captives would stay for her honors Freshman English class.

  Sara raised her voice, “Settle down!” The roar of laughter and conversation subsided as if they instantly understood that today was not a day to challenge her. She enjoyed the power she had at first. But by the end of the first semester they had usually started to see through her.

  Sara glanced out the windows that lined the entire wall. It was one of those schools built in the 50s that still had large, panel windows framed in dark wood, making the room freezing in winter and boiling in summer.

  Ironically, as a teenager Sara had sat in this same classroom, a student of Mrs. McGregor’s English literature class. She and her best friend Julia always sat together in the back of the room next to the windows. Day after day, they secretly made fun of Mrs. McGregor, a woman they considered older than Methuselah. When bored, they entertained themselves by keeping tally of Mrs. McGregor’s wrinkles, making comic faces when they hit double digits. One day Sara’s laughter had accidentally escaped into the room. A loud, honking footnote to Mrs. McGregor’s lecture on Beowulf. Everyone turned to look at her as she ducked her chin to her chest and wished to disappear. Her face still turned hot just thinking about it all these years later.

  Whatever happened to Julia? she wondered.

  “Mrs. Stanton?”

  Molly Decker slouched toward her, dressed entirely in black. Her black lipstick was in sharp contrast to the ivory makeup that covered a crop of pimples on her chin. Would she find out some day that she wanted to run away from her life?

  “Yes?” Sara answered.

  “Do we have drama after school today?”

  “No, not today. I have to cancel,” she said. Sara never cancelled anything. Not even in the throes of chemo. But the combination of really bad Shakespeare and her current angst seemed too much drama to bear today.

  Insomnia robbed Sara of another night’s sleep, as if a nightclub sign flashed the words GET A LIFE outside her window. She slipped from under the covers and stepped over Luke, their youngest son Sam’s golden retriever—abandoned when Sam went away to college, never to be retrieved.

  Moonlight came through the blinds and helped her find her way to her office downstairs, a home improvement project that had distracted them for months. An endless stack of papers to grade filled the extra chair in the room, a faded wingback beauty that Sara had found at a garage sale a decade before.

  Bookshelves covered an entire wall where aging classics fought for space among the stacks of self-help books. She was always buying books that she never had time to read.

  Sara searched the bottom desk drawer for a framed
photograph of Julia and Sara as girls. After she found it she ran a finger along the glass to remove a layer dust. Sara stared into the past. At the time of the photo Julia’s family was getting ready to move to England. Julia’s eyes sparkled anticipating a new adventure, her arm around Sara’s waist. Julia wore a pair of blue-jean overalls and red high-top sneakers. Julia had said once she wanted to be buried in that outfit, she loved it so much. And Sara had loved her.

  Over the years Sara had wondered about Julia. But losing touch with people had become as habitual as losing touch with herself. She turned on the computer. Could she track Julia down on the internet? She had no idea if her childhood friend had married and used a different name. But what could it hurt? She typed Julia David into the search engine and waited for the response. How easy it was to check on people these days, she thought. She had typed in her own name on more than one occasion but there was nothing. Sara Stanton from Northampton, Mass didn’t exist, as far as the world wide web could surmise.

  Several references came up for Julia David. A few press releases about promotions, an article in an alumni magazine. Sara clicked on each reference. Evidently Julia had been an attorney in England for several years, specializing in high profile corporate cases. But the latest entries were of an artist in Florence. Was that Julia, too?

  Sara smiled. She liked thinking of Julia in Italy. As a girl, Sara would have given anything to go to Italy. She had even written to the Italian Tourist Bureau and requested pamphlets, maps, anything Italian. Instead of teen posters of the heart throbs of the day, Sara had a map of Italy on her wall and a poster of the Duomo in Florence.

  Sara continued her research, finally finding an email address for the Julia David in Florence. She started a new email and paused. What do you say to someone you haven’t seen or talked to in almost thirty years?