The Summer I Found Myself by Colleen French

Author:Colleen French [French, Colleen]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Kensington Books
Published: 2021-02-10T00:00:00+00:00

24

Ellen grabbed a grocery bag from the passenger’s side of her car. As she closed the door, another car pulled into the driveway. A red Honda she didn’t recognize. But she knew who it was before he got out of the car. There was an American flag sticker in the corner of the windshield and a bumper sticker that read Honor Our Heroes/Thank a Veteran.

“Pine!” she called.

He was leaning into the car, talking to someone. The glare of the afternoon sun was so bright that she couldn’t see who it was. Then he stood to his full height of five-foot-three (he swore he’d once been five-four and a quarter but shrank with age) and called to her, “Ellen, you have a sec? I want you to meet my better half!”

Ellen smiled and walked down the driveway. She had liked Pine the first time they had met, but after his show-and-tell the other day she hadn’t been able to get him out of her mind. How had he been able to survive the Vietnam war as an African-American when they had been disproportionately drafted, assigned to combat units, and killed in Vietnam? How had he been able to reconcile those tragic facts and move on with his life, build a new life when he returned home? And now he had cancer? It just didn’t seem fair. And yet he always saw the glass half-full; no, no matter what the experience, he seemed to see every glass as entirely full.

The driver’s side door opened and an attractive woman in a green sundress got out. She whipped off her sunglasses to reveal striking blue eyes that were all the more noticeable against her mocha-colored skin. She had gorgeous natural hair she wore pushed back off her face with a green headband. And she was noticeably younger than Pine. Early fifties maybe? To Pine’s seventy-something.

Ellen wasn’t sure what she had expected, but this woman wasn’t it. The funny thing was, she was okay with that. In fact, for the first time in as long as she could remember, she was pleased that she had been wrong. She was pleased with the unexpected.

“Hi.” Ellen shifted the canvas bag of groceries to her left shoulder and offered her hand. “It’s nice to meet you.

“Gwen.” Pine’s wife shook her hand. It was a warm, firm handshake. “I’m so glad I finally got to meet you. I’ve been dying to come in and say hello, but someone”—she indicated Pine with a tilt of her head—“wanted his support group to be his own. I guess he spends so much time with me that he needs to get away.”

“That’s not it and you know it, Gwen.” Pine took from the car the gym bag that he always carried and came around to join them. “I thought it was a good way for you to have some time to yourself.” He turned to Ellen. “As you can tell, I’ve got a sassy one here. But I love her all the more for it.

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