Page 3 of Skipping Stones

Bon. We need to set a shopping date. My clothes are all terrible.

Linney laughed out loud. MJ was built for clothes. She looked good in everything and always looked chic, even in jeans and tennis shoes. Linney, on the other hand, perpetually felt a bit of a mess. She pushed away a stray bit of hair—no matter what she did with it, it was forever falling into her face—and fretted about her weight. She’d been trying to lose the same few pounds ever since she arrived in London. Mac said it gave him something to grab onto, which made her blush, but she did need to do something about it. She shoved aside the last of her scone. That’d be a good start. She turned her attention back to MJ.

Not true! But any excuse to shop, right? A bientôt!

* * *

The flight was soon in the air, and Linney reclined her seat. As usual, she told the flight attendant not to wake her for dinner, and she tucked her glasses away in her purse, replacing them with a silk sleep mask. But slumber didn’t come easily as she thought about home.

Earnest, curly-haired Derek Blake was the first person she’d met when she arrived at Silver Lake. The serious little boy, with pants just a bit too short, had knocked on Gran’s door with a plate covered in plastic wrap. Nibbling his mother’s cookies together, their legs dangling from the same wooden kitchen chairs she’d sat on this morning, Linney learned that her next-door neighbour knew many of the children who would be in her class. They waited for the yellow bus together at the end of his driveway a week later as she picked at her cuticles nervously—a habit she’d picked up in the weeks since her parents died—and when they arrived at the small elementary school, he helped her find her teacher. A year older, Derek quickly became Linney’s best friend and, encouraged by his mother, he looked out for her.

Derek introduced her to Anna and Kirsten at recess, and as she settled in, Linney smiled more and looked less forlorn. Her cuticles recovered, and in time, Silver Lake became her home, and she blossomed. She giggled with her friends, spent hours at Page Turners and scribbled stories in notebooks Gran bought. But for real-life adventures, it was Derek who Linney sought out. He’d rescued her too many times to count, from the first winter when she fell through the ice on the creek that fed the lake to the night of her junior prom when her date ditched her. In the winters, they skated and tobogganed, gleefully throwing snowballs at each other as they hiked up the trails to frozen waterfalls when they weren’t studying. And as they approached the end of their high school years, when she wasn’t poring over the latest teen magazines and practising makeup with the girls, Linney spent hours with Derek, exploring the marshes and little rocky islands in their kayaks, or on the end of her dock with their feet dangling in the water, while they sipped lemonade.

Early mornings and still evenings were for skipping stones along the shore and sharing their hopes and dreams for the future, far beyond the frustrating constraints of Silver Lake. Unlike most of their classmates, who stayed in town after high school, or attended the local college in Bridgegrove just up the road, they had big plans and chose highly respected universities in Toronto, several hours away from Silver Lake.

Even now, years later, hardly a week went by without several texts and the occasional video chat. They shared everything that was going on in their lives—celebrated the victories, shared the losses, and supported each other when things didn’t go as planned. Linney was the first to know that Derek was losing his heart to Olivia, and he had been her sounding board as she struggled with the intensity of her feelings for Mac. Linney knew that Derek would always be there for her, just as she would for him.

Shifting uncomfortably in her narrow airplane seat, Linney yawned, and as sleep continued to elude her, her thoughts turned to London. Mac was a legend in the news business, reporting over the years from war zones and bearing witness to important international events. So of course Linney had known exactly who Mac was when she saw him in the newsroom on her first day at TCN. But that hadn’t prepared her for the moment their eyes met.

Linney had read her fair share of romance novels and cynically perused descriptions of the heroine’s breath being taken away. But that was exactly what had happened when their eyes locked across the newsroom. Time stood still and every hair on the back of her arms stood up as her heart began to race. The flutter in her stomach was something she hadn’t experienced before.

Mac winked. Flushing scarlet with embarrassment at having been caught staring at the handsome star reporter, Linney tore her eyes away from his and scurried away. She was new—a nobody—and she had work to do and a reputation to build. Being caught making eyes at the senior correspondent wouldn’t help that one little bit.

Still, she knew Mac had noticed her and something had happened between them. Over the next months, it happened again and again, with the same dizzying effect. Linney stole glances at him, and he met her eyes, but just as often, it was her meeting his gaze.

It was MJ who first told her Mac was making a point of checking out her work, and one evening at the pub after work with colleagues, he asked her opinion about the latest government change. Linney, newly promoted, stammered out an answer, blushing to the tips of her ears. Mac nodded, and she inferred that she’d passed some kind of test. The next day, he approached her desk, and they chatted for a few minutes. Mac was known for spotting raw talent, and he took Linney under his wing, mentoring and guiding her.

Linney soaked it all in, celebrating little successes but equally beating herself up when Mac’s critique was less positive. Applying the lessons, she landed an on-air reporting position after just a year at TCN. As she progressed, and became more confident in her abilities and decisions, they often had professional disagreements, and their colleagues learned to ignore the raised voices from the editing suites and the heated arguments during story meetings as their opinions clashed. Because the end result was worth it. Linney’s news stories made great television and viewers responded to her.

But the more they worked together, the harder it became for Linney to keep her feelings under wraps. She often turned to Derek to work them out.

OMG, what am I going to do? Yesterday, in the editing suite, Mac reached over my shoulder to show me something in the film we shot and I could feel his breath on my neck. My knees almost buckled. Whyyyyyyyyyyy does he make me feel this way?

Get it together, Linney. He’s almost 20 years older than you—and your mentor.

I know, but …

NO!!!!

Do NOT go there! Repeat. Do NOT go there!

But they did.

* * *

“We won!” Linney bounced out of her seat and grabbed Mac’s hand, dragging him to the stage at the annual TV awards gala to collect a pair of statuettes for a story they’d collaborated on. She adjusted her glasses nervously as she thanked everyone at TeleCan News. She gestured to her co-winner. “And especially to Mac for all he’s taught me since I joined TCN two years ago.” Mac offered up his own thanks and followed Linney back to their table, his eyes trained on her shapely backside.

As their colleagues drifted out at the end of the evening, Mac suggested they have a nightcap. Linney was still riding high on the excitement of her first big win and agreed. Eyes dancing in the lights of the streetlamps, she suddenly stopped on the sidewalk. Mac almost bumped into her.

“Something wrong?”

Fuelled by the confidence brought on by a third glass of champagne, Linney reached up and kissed him. She pulled back quickly, realizing she’d probably just made the biggest mistake of her professional life. She started to offer an apology, but Mac’s hand was suddenly on the small of her back and he pulled her in roughly. Fireworks went off in Linney’s head as he kissed her back with the same passion as she felt. They never made it to the bar.

From then on, sometimes against their better judgement, they were inseparable, and whether in the newsroom or the bedroom, their relationship was a roller coaster of intense highs and lows. It was unpredictable and explosive, leaving Linney careening between exhilaration and hurt.

Mac never apologized when his words sliced into her self-confidence, but in the light of each new day, the passionate making-up more than compensated for anything he’d said. Linney found she was unable to describe it, despite her profession. Their relationship left her breathless and burning for more. Every single time.

Mac. Derek. London, Silver Lake. Linney finally slept, but her restless dreams were filled with a jumble of them all.

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