Longfellow At The Cabin

Longfellow Darke spends some time at the Adirondack cabin to unwind

He stood on the back desk, holding a mug of hot chocolate, and looked out on the lake. The early morning fog had burned off, giving him a view of the entire hidden lake and the changing maples and ashes. Longfellow enjoyed this time of year; early autumn’s cooling temperatures inspired him to write. However, it caused him to remember her.

Someone on his side of Echo Lake had a fire going, hints of hardwood mixed with dried leaves and pine needles that were on both sides of the cabin. He closed his eyes and remembered how she loved this time of year as well, loving the smells of fireplaces, fallen leaves, and what the breezes brought, the conifers. He finished the liquid and returned inside. This was his sanctuary, the place where he retreated to when the stresses of his double life started to become more than he could manage. He closed the sliding door and put the mug in the sink.

In the distance, he finally heard the call of a loon. He always wondered why they would call this late in the season, and this late in the morning. Longtime residents said that they called only in the morning and in the spring. No, here at the lake he’s heard them all summer, or at least every day he visited. Longfellow looked out the sink window and smiled. These were the days that reinvigorated him.

A widower at 24, he never thought he could find love again. That feeling lasted only two years when his past revisited him, not only his first love, but five from his college years. No one blamed him for returning to those days, those before he met his bride. He walked into the makeshift study, turned on the stereo, and sat in the deep, black leather office chair, a present from his father and others at the bank upon his college graduation. The rude sounds it made caused an immature chuckle no one heard. He rolled to the large, old desk and picked up the pen. He clicked it, felt how good it was in hand, and wrote a quick note on the yellow pad.

An hour later, after filling up four-page fronts, he clicked it once more and pushed away. Longfellow stood, moved his tight back muscles before looking out the window. He had hoped that she was there, out on the beach, wrapped in one of her plush brown-tan-and-black sweaters that seemed to have collected, starting when they first met during her final year of law school.

He shrugged and made his way to one of the three bookcases in the room. He grabbed a large, thick photobook, one that should have been on a coffee table. It opened, a round cutout shown, a gold coin within the hole. He smiled, nodded, and removed it.

“This is what started it all,” he whispered. He placed the book on the desk, flipped the coin, and caught it. Heads. He put it back in the book and walked out of the cabin.

He inhaled deeply, loving the aromas that this time of year in the Adirondacks had, and continued to the lake. These walks helped clear his head. She had come to him, in his mind, while he was writing, and he didn’t need it.

He missed Vanessa.