Lakeside Cottage by Susan Wiggs Page B

in her life had she not been disappointed by a man?
    The kettle rattled on the burner, and she turned off the flame before the whistle blew. A few minutes later she settled down with her tea and opened her laptop at the old-fashioned desk in the corner. Yesterday she’d composed a note to an old friend. Tanya Blair was a friend from college, a resounding success story from the UW’s School of Communications. She worked as an editor at Smithsonian Magazine, and she was Kate’s first and best prospect. It was quite a leap from local weekly to a national magazine, but Kate decided to think big. In the past, she’d tried thinking small, aiming low, and look where that had landed her.
    She read over the note, and when she was satisfied with it, she printed out the letter, folded it and put it in an envelope. She felt a vague sense of dissatisfaction. Though she’d told Tanya her pen was for hire, she had no material to offer. Not yet, anyway. She needed to write, that was true, but she wasn’t sure what to write.
    A few minutes later, Callie came shuffling out, dressed for the day in her customary sweats. Her face was puffy from sleep. “Morning,” she said, stifling a yawn.
    “Hi,” said Kate. “Tea?”
    “I think I’ll go straight for breakfast,” Callie said, helping herself to a bowl of Total. She held out the box to Kate, who shook her head.
    “I’ll wait for Aaron,” Kate said.
    Callie indicated the window. “He’s been waiting for you.” On the lawn, he and Bandit were playing tug-of-war with what she hoped was an old towel.
    “I didn’t even hear him get up.” Kate shook her head. “So what’s on your agenda for today?”
    “Yolanda is picking me up. We’ve got three houses todo on Lake Sutherland.” She grimaced. “I so don’t feel like working.”
    She looked a bit peaked, Kate observed, though there was nothing wrong with her appetite. Teenagers, Kate thought. They stayed up too late, no matter what time they had to get going in the morning. Kate had no complaints about the girl, though. She helped around the house, Aaron adored her and she seemed to be behaving herself.
    She poured a second helping of Total and noticed Kate watching her. “I shouldn’t,” she said. “I’m getting fat as a pig.” But she added milk and sugar anyway. “What about you? Do you have plans today?”
    “I might take Aaron hiking up to Marymere Falls. Have you seen it?”
    “No. I’ve heard it’s pretty up there. Maybe I could go on my day off.”
    “I should also get some work done,” Kate said, glancing at the silent black rectangle of the laptop.
    “Have you figured out what you’re going to write yet?”
    “I’ve got a few ideas.”
    “I still think you should do Walden Livingston,” Callie said. “He’s like, this totally famous cult guy.”
    “I know. He still gets mail from some of his fans,” Kate said. “Just a few, every year.”
    “He’s the reason I picked this house to stay in, you know,” Callie said. “When I saw the Annie Leibovitz photo of him and figured out that this was his place, I was totally blown away. His books are, like, sacred to people who care about the earth.”
    Kate never failed to be startled by this girl. She was a combination of streetwise runaway and naive idealist, incredibly well read in some areas and completelyignorant in others. “Not many young people are aware of Walden Livingston. How did you hear of him?”
    “I was placed with a couple who made environmentalism, like, their whole life, and old Walden was their number one man. They had a signed copy of the book he wrote and a book of his collected quotations. You know, ‘Leave no trail for a future traveler, let him find his own way’ and all that. Did he really talk like that?”
    Kate rested her chin in her hand and studied the Leibovitz portrait, which hung on the wall by the door. The picture captured the twinkle in his eye, the dramatic sweep of his snowy hair, which he’d told her