CHA PTE R 14
HE TRIP OUT OF THE cave is less frightening, but I accept hisT hand because, frankly, I do like the oxytocin. Giving over to the dark and trusting someone else to find the way is a completely new experience for me. I’ve traveled through wind and darkness, and standing at the opening of the cave, having just swum in a secret grotto, something about me feels brand-new.
We find Clay and Gus back on the beach, eating sliders.
Gus has used his T-shirt to collect clams, and without a doubt, there will be two rounds of soaking before that thing gets washed.
When they’re done eating, Stewart takes them up the rocks to the opening of the cave. He doesn’t go inside with them because he says having a guide will ruin the fun, but based on my recent experience, I could not disagree more.
We’re lying on towels now in our bathing suits, both leaning back on our elbows and sharing a beer.
“Audrey was in thePost again yesterday,” he says. “She and her sister behind home plate.”
“I’m sorry,” I say. “I don’t know if I said that before.”
“Thanks.” He shrugs.
“Better you know now, right? Are you heartbroken?”
“It stings, but I’m not heartbroken,” he says. “At least I don’t think I am. I never have been before, so I don’t know what that would feel like.”
“Then you’re not.”
“Why are we sharing a beer?” he asks. He pulls two more out of the tote bag, opens them, and hands me one.
“I kinda liked sharing,” I say. “Felt like we were pals.”
Pals. I like the way it sounds, and I like the distance it puts between me and whoever I was back in the grotto, longing to run my hands along the waist of his swim trunks.
He smiles at the waves, and I watch his profile.
“I think we’re doing a great job getting to know each other,” I say. “The trust walk into the cave was a good icebreaker. So tell me some more about our love story. We met in Boston Common, illegally riding bikes.” I roll my eyes.
“What was I wearing?”
“Denim shorts,” he says. No hesitation. “I liked the way your legs looked while you changed the tire.”
I turn to him. “You fixedmy tire.”
“Right. I was thinking about when I actually met you. It’s good when a lie is close to the truth.” My face goes hot. I was in my too-short jean shorts that day. And he noticed my legs. This is the second mention of my legs today, and it flusters me again. “When we fake met, you were on the ground next to your broken bike. Also in shorts, also with nice legs.”
“Okay, stop,” I say, and pull my knees closer to my chest.
“It’s okay to have nice legs, Dolly.” He takes a sip of his beer and grins at me before looking back out at the ocean.
“I thought you were dashing, the way you swiftly mastered the bike repairs.”
He shoots me a look. “So much for staying close to the truth,” he says.
I lie down flat and he does too. I say to the sky, “Oldest son. Maybe some control issues. Taurus. Leg man.” I turn to
him and he’s smiling. “On some strange level I think I get you.”
“Not so much to get. Workaholic with a panic-inducing fear of failure. Dr. Meyers got it on the first day.”
“Who’s Dr. Meyers?” I ask.
“My therapist.”
“Ah.” I try to think of something to ask him about his therapist, though I think the whole point of therapy is that it’s private. We lie there as the waves come closer and closer, and when they get to our feet we don’t move. The cool water laps my ankles, and it feels as luxurious as that yacht in the distance.
“Can I ask about Christopher?” he asks after a while.
“Car accident when he was little. The official diagnosis is schizophrenia secondary to a head injury. He’s all over the
place, but so good-hearted.”
“Seems like.”
“He may be why I like being around kindergarteners.
The way you always know where you stand and how they feel, a room full of Christophers.”
“And that’s always what you wanted to do?”
“I wanted to take over the fish house. You’re not the only scion of industry.” I smile at him. He’s watching me. “But my dad hates all my ideas, so I gave up.”
“And where is your mom?” he asks, such a simple question.
“Virginia,” I say. He turns onto his side to give me his full attention, and I know there’s no way around this. “She left
when I was twelve.”
“She just left?”
“She didn’t just leave. It took a while.” I am at a conversational crossroads—go forward or retreat. I could shut this down and change the subject, or I could let him in.
It’s no secret in Whitfield that Georgia Brick split. I could just tell him and maybe after all this is over, Stewart could actually end up being a friend. I shield my eyes from the sun with the back of my hand and turn my head toward him.
“When I was twelve, she went to visit an old friend in Virginia. She said she’d be back Monday.” I laugh, and he’s looking at me like I need to explain the laugh. “My sister, Patsy, and I have a joke about this. That our mom didn’t specify which Monday, so maybe she really is coming back.
Sometimes Patsy texts ‘Happy Monday!’ and I reply with the fingers-crossed emoji, and then we laugh.” It’s been years since we’ve done this. It’s been years since we’ve joked around about anything. Our conversations are largely fact based: Everything okay? Yes, everything’s fine.
“Is that the end of the story? She went away for a weekend and never came back?”
“No, not at all. The weekend led to a week and then another week. And I think she got a taste of what it was like not to be worried about the fish house and a disabled son.
And Patsy and me. Eventually she met a guy named Bob and remarried. Bob didn’t want kids either, so it’s been good.”
“That’s heartbreaking,” he says.
“Yes,” I say. The word comes out a little ragged because it was, at the time, heartbreaking. I sit up and rest my arms on my knees and steady my beer bottle in the wet sand between my feet. “It was sort of like quiet quitting,” I say, and try for a smile. “She was ahead of her time.”
I turn to him, still lying on his side with his swimmer’s body. He’s watching me, brow furrowed. “Is that the end of the story? You never heard from her again?”
“Oh no,” I say. “She sends a holiday card with a lot ofx’s ando’s. It’s like she’s our mom but she works remotely.” I laugh at this and wonder if I’m tipsy off a single beer.
“Where’s your sister?”
“Patsy lives outside of Boston, married, with two kids.
Very nice husband. Works in marketing. She’s just a year
younger than me.”
“So you’re close?”
“Sort of,” I say. “I mean, we check in on each other. She wants to know how Dad’s doing, and I’m the one who knows.
I kind of watch over them.”
“Huh,” he says. “That’s all so fucked up.”
“It’s fine,” I say to the water.
He sits up next to me. “Gus’s dad left you to handle things on your own. And your mom did the same thing. It’s fucked up, Dolly.”
I look out at the water and nod. “Okay, it is,” I say. I give him the best smile I can because I do want him to know I’m over it. He gives me that steady look back, like he’s made of the same limestone they used to build Eight Oaks, like he can handle it. So I just tell him. “It was kind of fun at first. Dad gave us money for groceries, and we bought junk food. We let the dishes sit in the sink, sort of an experiment to see what would happen, how bad it would get before someone actually did something.” I look at him to see if I should go on.
He’s turned his whole body toward me like he’s listening with every part of himself. “And one day, when she’d been gone for about three weeks, Patsy and I rode our bikes home from school, walked into the house, and she started to cry.
There was a smell. I can still smell it, actually. It was the smell of garbage and decay and giving up. The smell that
tells you no one’s coming back.”
“What did you do?” he asks.
“Well I took Patsy into my arms, but she wouldn’t stop crying. And I was kind of freaking out because Christopher’s bus was coming in an hour. My dad would be home an hour
after that. I couldn’t let them see Patsy that way, know how bad she felt. So I brought her over to the couch and covered her up with our grandmother’s heavy crocheted blanket. I remember I kissed her on the forehead, something I’d never done before. And I cleaned the house.”
That was probably the day I de facto became Patsy’s mother. In small ways, like bringing the blanket, and in bigger ways, like taking her shifts at the fish house so she could run around and have a childhood. When she was Gus’s age, she’d roll in after school and soccer practice, and I’d be pulling a chicken out of the oven and asking about her geometry test. I’d become a lot more than fourteen months older than her.
“I’ve been that person in my family ever since,” I say, and
brush some sand off my leg.
“Fending off the chaos,” he says.
“Exactly,” I say. We’re just looking at each other as the breeze tousles our hair. We’re not so different. “I think I was having more fun when we were talking about your heartbreak.”
“Audrey?” He’s quiet for a bit. “There’s not much to say. I miss some things, like she picked great restaurants and made me order things I’d never try. But I’m not totally sure that makes a marriage.”
“Niles used to buy seltzer water and put it in my fridge,”
I say. “Gus’s father. He did stuff like that, and I felt taken care of. I thought that meant forever, a lifetime of sodas appearing because someone was thinking I might be thirsty.
He used to text me and ask if I needed anything from the store before he came over. Just because someone’s thoughtful doesn’t mean they love you, I later learned.”
“Audrey would never come to the hospital with me, said sick kids made her feel uncomfortable.”
I laugh though I know I shouldn’t. “Sorry,” I say. “But kind of a red flag for a guy who desperately wants kids?”
“I am not desperate,” he says.
“You are, it’s all over you. You reek of baby lust.”
He laughs. “Maybe a little.” He looks out at the waves. “I just want to have something to leave behind. If that doesn’t end up being a family, I still have my work. This restoration project in San Francisco with Kramer Corp, if we can get it done, it’ll last forever. So…” He trails off and shrugs.
I want to explain to him that a building isn’t the same as a child, but I have a feeling he understands that very well.
“It’s probably for the best,” he says. “I don’t think I’d want to be married to someone who’s always looking for a better deal.”
“Do you really think that guy is a better deal? All that chewing tobacco.” I make a face and he laughs.
“I hope she’ll be happy, really. And I’m not just saying that. I’ve known her for a long time. But I never felt that feeling you’re supposed to feel. Like I never thought about her when we were apart. And I never got excited when she called.”
On cue, theRocky theme song trills. “I know the feeling,”
I say, and put my finger up. “Good Sports. This is a recorded line. How can I help you?”
WE’RE BACK ON the boat and Stewart unpacks the warmer.
Underneath more sliders there’s roasted corn and macaroni and cheese. Inside a cooler there’s a watermelon-and-feta salad, figs wrapped in prosciutto, pineapple wedges. A
second cooler has water and a bottle of chardonnay. Gus’s eyes grow bigger with every item pulled out.
“Gladys is a goddess,” Stewart says, laying it all out in front of us. He’s put on a white cap with MAR IAN embroidered in green across the front. It shades his eyes and makes him seem younger.
I put some of everything on my plate. This might be the most delicious meal I’ve ever eaten—better than any twenty- five-thousand-dollar steak—and it’s just been served out of valet-transported vessels at the perfect temperature. I look up and catch Stewart watching me eat. He might be smiling at the way I’m shoving figs into my mouth like they’ll save my life, but also something’s different between us.
“This is amazing,” Clay says, opening a slider and piling macaroni and cheese on top.
“Gladys is a great cook, all around,” Stewart says. “But there’s nothing she loves more than making a picnic.” He pulls a thermos from the cooler. “Iced coffee?” he asks me.
My mouth is full, so Gus answers for me. “She hates coffee.”
“But thank you,” I add, shooting Gus a look. “And I think I’ve had plenty of everything.”
“Do you do this a lot?” Gus asks between bites.
“Actually, never,” he says. “But maybe I should.” His face is soft, and I think the day off did him good.
“Do you have any cruise ships?” Clay asks.
“Like for people? No,” he says. “Cargo ships, but mostly office buildings now. A bunch of malls that were a mistake.”
He stops as if he’s overanswered. “I’d like to simplify things.”
Gus and I share a smile. Gus says, “My mom and I are trying to do that. That was our Valentine’s resolution.”
“New Year’s Day is a bad time to be committing to things,” I say. “We wait.”
“We cleaned out our apartment. Made a bunch of new routines. I have to clean up after Sunday baking,” Gus says,
and rolls his eyes.
“You bake?” Stewart asks Gus.
“No, Mom does,” he says. “Only on Sundays at home, but all the time when we’re here. I make pancakes when it’s my turn to make dinner.”
“That’s impressive. I don’t know how to make pancakes,”
Stewart says.
I look up at him from my second slider and laugh. “You don’t know how to make anything. Gus can teach you.”
He smiles and looks away to the right so I can see that dimple. “I know how to tie a lot of knots,” he says. “Want to try?”
He leans back to grab the end of the rope that’s around the winch and ties something called a reef knot. I look away from the spectacle of those hands deftly tying knots and distract myself with the watermelon salad.Where are the seeds, Gladys? Where are the seeds? But Gus and Clay want to see how he did it. Stewart goes below and gets ropes for each of them, and I watch them try.
It must be second nature to Stewart, but he breaks it down into little steps. I’m surprised by his patience as they follow his exact instructions and watch the knot fall away again and again. I miss my kindergarteners. This usually happens about now, late June, when the ringing in my ears stops from all that yelling. “Ms. Brick! Ms. Brick!” I miss their little hands working so hard to make a pencil do what it should. I miss the way their hearts break over playground things and then heal up so quickly. There are always a few who crack the code and bring me a book they discovered
they can read. It’s a miracle to teach a kid to do something new, and I’m watching Stewart experience it now.
“That’s it!” Stewart shouts. Gus has tied his rope in an elaborate pretzel shape around the railing. He offers Stewart a fist bump like he does to my dad and then immediately undoes the knot and starts again.
