Page 46 of The Holiday

At that point I was definitely on the verge of tears, and somehow hearing all of this from Tilly meant even more than the words of affirmation from Harlow and Athena. Hearing that she'd been a beacon of light in a young girl's life just about squeezed the breath out of me.

"Thank you so much for taking the time to visit with me while you're here. And for letting me record this and use it in the book."

"Oh, God--anything for Ruby. And for her memory," she added. "Truly. I think of her often, and she is, quite literally, in my prayers. As are you, Dexter. You made her so happy." She smiled at me. "And if you want more material for the book, you should really visit Vanessa."

"Yeah?"

"Definitely. I'll let her tell her own stories, but go see her."

As luck would have it, I had already set a time to talk to Vanessa, Ruby's other bookstore assistant, so I gave Tilly a tight hug and then walked over to Marooned with a Book, which was remarkably unchanged by time.

"Busy morning, Mr. North?" Vanessa asked with a huge grin as I walked through the front door. We embraced immediately, and I stepped back to look at her. Vanessa was always slightly plump and full of good cheer, and now she was just pleasantly middle-aged, with deep dimples, a wide smile, and the kind of warm, comforting presence that made her entirely likable. She'd worked for Ruby for almost twenty years, and then, without warning, Ruby left her the bookstore in her will. It was perfect, and I supported that choice entirely.

“It’s been a good morning,” I replied.

“I know why you’re here—word gets around.” Vanessa walked behind the front counter and leaned both elbows on it, looking comfortable and at home there in the bookstore.

“Oh?” This made me laugh; gossip in any small town is on a fast track, and Shipwreck Key is no exception. “People have been talking?”

“Of course. And the fact that you’re writing about Ruby is not shocking. It would have been weird if youdidn’twrite about her.”

I nodded, standing there in the open area of the store, which hadn’t changed much over the years. “I guess I’m a foregone conclusion.”

“Most people are.” Vanessa pushed herself up to standing again and walked back out from behind the front counter. “Want to see something?” She lifted an eyebrow and waited for my response.

“Yeah. Okay.” I was game. This whole adventure meant I had to give myself over to the whims of the people I was talking to. It wasn’t my job to guide what they shared with me, and I’d been pleasantly surprised at every turn.

Vanessa led me up the narrow staircase, and we passed the spots where Ruby had hung or displayed her trinkets and treasures gathered as First Lady. Plates from the wives of foreign ministers, vases from presidents of other countries, framed art work by the children of a politician from another part of the world. All of the ephemera that, in its way, detailed Ruby’s own life.

At the top of the stairs, Vanessa opened the door to the small office that Ruby had used to keep the books, send emails, and to do the business part of running a bookstore. It looked fairly unchanged: desk and chair facing a small, stained glass window beneath the eaves; low bookshelf running along the wall of the sloped roof; filing cabinet in one corner with a potted plant atop it. Frankly, it looked like a time capsule and I fully expected to blink and see Ruby sitting at that desk, pencil tucked into a bun on top of her head, smile on her face.

“Ah, Ruby’s office,” I said with a sad smile. “She really loved running this bookstore. It brought her a lot of joy to be able to open this place during such a transitional time of her life.”

“She did love it,” Vanessa confirmed. “She was very careful with the things, and the people, she loved.”

I waited, unsure as to why we were up there exactly. Not that I minded being in Ruby’s office—I loved it—but I needed more.

“Anyhow,” Vanessa said, patting the doorframe. “I’ll leave you up here. The filing cabinet is where you want to start.”

Once I was alone, I felt uncertain. Going through another person’s office had always seemed like a no-no, kind of like rifling through a woman’s purse. This was private territory, and I wasn’t even sure how the receipts for bookmarks embossed with the store’s name and logo, or a cup full of pencils and pens, might give me any insider info. Still, Vanessa had brought me up there, so I walked all the way in.

The chair creaked when I sat in it, and I looked around the small space from its vantage point, seeing what Ruby saw. I tried to imagine her there in her late forties, new to Shipwreck Key, recently widowed, with the rest of her life ahead of her. What must she have felt? Freedom from Washington D.C.’s prying eyes and expectations? Terrified because she was in a new place with a bunch of people she didn’t yet know? Excitement because she was just starting the time of her life that was truly her own—kids raised, Jack gone, no more obligations to the political machine? I wasn’t sure, but I imagined it was some combination of all of it.

I spun around in the chair and placed a hand on the cold metal handle of the filing cabinet, clicking the button and then sliding it open. Everything inside was neat and tidy: rows of folders, bits of paper and printed pages filed away neatly inside. I slid out the very first folder and turned back to the desk, putting it flat on the ink blotter.

Inside was an organized collection of printed pages. They were copies of articles I’d written. Things I’d forgotten about entirely. There were stories about the homeless population of New York City. Profiles of Congressional aides who felt that their off-duty time was reasonably spent living a life of debauchery. Persuasive pieces about elections. I pulled the next folder: articles I’d written on assignment to war-torn countries. Pieces on extreme poverty filed from places where I’d had to track down “internet cafes,” which most of us think of as relics of the 90s, but which many poor countries rely on as hotspots to connect them to the rest of the world. She’d printed everything that ran online and carefully saved it with little sticky notes that had the dates and publications written in her neat hand.

The rest of the files contained a chronological history of my work as well as the press we’d gotten together—some good, some bad. Ruby had never been one to see things only through rose-colored glasses, so she’d printed the articles questioning our age difference, the ones musing that a widowed First Lady’s only real option was to fade into the scenery and live a life of solitude, and even the ones that poked fun at her clothing choices post-White House. I leafed through them, smiling at her casual jeans and sweatshirts, at the candid shots people had snapped of her on Shipwreck Key years ago, photos they’d clearly sent in to news organizations in hopes of publication. They were silly though, because Ruby looked gorgeous. She was happy, and easy, and free in the pictures, her hair wavy or pinned up on her head, a relaxed smile on her face as she walked down Seadog Lane with a coffee in hand. Sure, she wasn’t headed to a White House event or to a formal public function, but she looked real. She looked like the Ruby I knew.

I spent the better part of three hours up there in her office, flipping through articles and pieces I’d forgotten about writing, and taking my own personal stroll down memory lane as I skimmed the pictures that ran in magazines of us doing what felt like mundane things to me: sitting outside a cafe in London about ten years ago, each of us reading a section of a newspaper over breakfast; standing side by side on Shipwreck Key, looking out at the water and holding hands; and Christmas shopping together at FAO Schwarz in Manhattan as Ruby laughed hysterically over a toy we were considering buying for one of Sunday’s boys when they were younger.

When I got to the end of the last folder, I organized everything again and put it back into the filing cabinet in order. This was clearly my property now, my memories with Ruby, my wife’s belongings, but I sort of liked the idea of it sitting here, above her bookstore, undisturbed for the time being. I’d deal with it all—box it up and store it in our house somewhere, or maybe send it all to her girls when I got a bit older and had no need for tangible memories like this—but for now, if Vanessa was amenable to it, I wanted to leave it where Ruby had left it.

I got to the bottom of the stairs in time to see Vanessa talking to a mom with three little girls. She pointed them to the children’s books in the back room of the store, and then turned to me.

“You’re done?” she asked.

“I’m done.”

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