Lakeside Cottage Read Online Free Page B

thought, moving the cart to the checkout line. She didn’t give a hoot about what this Carhartt-wearing, mullet-sporting local yokel thought of her. He looked like the kind of guy who didn’t have a birth certificate.
    “Aaron,” she said, “time to go.” She turned away to avoid eye contact with the stranger, and pretended to browse the magazine racks. This was pretty much the extent of her involvement with the news media. It was shameful, really, as she considered herself a journalist. She didn’t watch TV, didn’t read the papers, didn’t act like the thing she said she was. This was yet another personal failing. Thanks to her late unlamented job, her work had consisted of nothing more challenging than observing Seattle’s fashion scene.
    People magazine touted a retrospective: “Reality TV Stars—Where Are They Now?”
    “A burning issue in my life, for sure,” Kate murmured.
    “Let’s get this one about the two-headed baby.” Aaron indicated one of the tabloids. Kate shook her head, although her eye was caught by a small inset photo of a guywith chiseled cheeks and piercing eyes, a military-style haircut and dashing mustache. American Hero Captured by Terrorist Cult, proclaimed the headline.
    “Let’s get a TV Guide, ” Aaron suggested.
    “We don’t have a TV.”
    “So I can see what I’m missing. Wait, look, Mom.” He snatched a newspaper from the rack. “Your paper.” He handed it over.
    Kate’s hands felt suddenly and unaccountably cold, nerveless. She hated the pounding in her throat, hated the tremor of her fingers as she took it from him. It was just a stupid paper, she told herself. It was the Seattle News, a dumb little weekly crammed with items about local bands and poetry slams, film reviews and fluffy culture articles. In addition to production and layout, her specialty for the past five years had been fashion. She had generated miles of ink about Seattleites’ tendency to wear socks with Birkenstocks, or the relative merits of body piercing versus tattooing as a fashion statement.
    Apparently not quite enough miles, according to Sylvia, her editor. Instead of a five-year pin for distinguished service, Kate had received a pink slip.
    The paper rattled as she turned to page B1 above the fold. There, where her column had been since its debut, was a stranger’s face, grinning smugly out over the shout line. “Style Grrl,” the byline called her, the self-important trendiness of it setting Kate’s teeth on edge. Style Grrl, who called herself Wendy Norwich, was really Elsie Crump, who had only recently moved up from the mail room. Today’s topic was an urgent rundown of local spray-on tanning salons.
    At the very bottom of the page, in tiny italic print, was the reminder, “Kate’s Fashion Statement is on hiatus.”
    That was it. Her entire professional life summed up in six little words.
    “What’s on hiya-tus mean?” Aaron asked.
    “Kind of like on vacation,” she said, hating the thick lump she felt in her throat. She stuffed the paper back in the rack. Only I’m never coming back.
    “Can I have this gum?” Aaron asked, clearly unaware of her inner turmoil. “It’s sugar free.” He showed her a flat package containing more baseball cards than bubble gum.
    “Sure, bud,” she said, bending to unload her groceries onto the conveyor belt.
    An older couple got in line behind her. It took no more than a glance for Kate to surmise that they’d been together forever. They had the sort of ease that came from years of familiarity and caring, that special bond that let them communicate with a look or gesture.
    A terrible yearning rose up in Kate. She was twenty-nine years old and she felt as though one of the most essential joys of life was passing her by. She had never heard a man declare he loved her and mean what he said. She had no idea what it felt like to have a true partner, a best friend, someone to stay by her side no matter what. Yes, she had a son she adored and