Page 7 of Homecoming

“Did you get more traps, B?” Kara asked.

“Johnny Wistcoff retired and gave me his.”

“I can’t believe he actually retired.”

“Well, he turned ninety, and his arthritis has gotten bad.”

“Ninety and still lobster fishing,” Dan said. “You Mainers are studs.”

“We’re a hardy sort.” Bertha led the way inside. “Buster! Come say hi to Kara and Dan!”

When Buster appeared out of one of the back bedrooms, holding a bowl of soup, Kara resisted the usual urge to hug him. He didn’t like to be touched, so she only smiled at the familiar surge of love for her precious uncle.

“Hey,” he said with warmth in his blue eyes.

His dark blond hair had gotten long, and he’d begun to grow in the winter beard that kept his face warm in the cold.

“Hey back at you. This is my husband, Dan.”

Buster nodded.

“Nice to meet you, Buster.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Come in, make yourself at home, Dan.” Bertha led the way into the tiny house that was Kara’s favorite place in the world. She didn’t have to be told to make herself at home in the family room that consisted of worn furniture covered with throw blankets, wood-paneled walls, framed paintings of the coast, as well as Bertha’s boat, theBig B, the lighthouse and Acadia. Everything was exactly as it had been the last time Kara was there, which was hugely comforting. As much as everything else changed, Bertha and her home remained constant.

She sat on a love seat and patted the spot next to her, inviting Dan to join her. The gold fabric, which had once had a nubby texture, had worn smooth over decades of providing comfort to Bertha’s many visitors. Kara had slept there most weekends until she was too tall to fit and then had moved to the sofa.

As he took a seat next to her, Dan looked out of place in all his refined handsomeness, but he’d proven to her many times before that he was more than capable of fitting into her life. And he was wild about Bertha.

“How about some dinner?” Bertha asked. “I made a seafood casserole earlier, and I’ve got salad and bread.”

Dan’s stomach groaned loudly, making them laugh. “You’d never know that I feasted at a wedding just a few short hours ago.”

“That’s a yes for Dan,” Bertha said. “Kara?”

“I’m not sure I can eat yet. That flight was rough.”

“You need a little something. I can make you a grilled cheese or cinnamon toast.”

“With a little bit of sugar?” Kara asked with a hopeful smile.

“Of course. What do you take me for?”

Kara laughed at Bertha’s sassy reply. “That’d be great. Thanks, B.”

“Anything for you, love.”

Just that simply, Kara felt better. Bertha’s cinnamon-sugar toast had always hit the spot when she wasn’t feeling well. “I had a lot of stomach issues when I was a kid,” she told Dan, “and had to miss school. My mom would drop me off with Bertha so she could go to her exercise class and get her nails done. Bertha’s cinnamon-sugar toast cured everything.”

“She left you when you were sick to get her nails done?”

Kara shrugged. “I’d rather have been here. It was fine.”

Bertha set up TV trays that’d been a wedding gift more than fifty years earlier and positioned them in front of Dan and Kara.

“Those remind me of my grandmother’s house,” Dan said of the tables.

---