CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
he whisper of my parents’ voices.T Beams of sunlight slanting through the window.
The crunch of Darwin’s truck’s tires on the driveway.
I put the pillow over my head and try to fall back to sleep. But my brother’s booming voice carries up to the bedroom. My eyes feel as though they’ve been rolled in granules of glass.
It was after midnight when Dad picked me up at the airport last night. He knew something was wrong as soon as he saw me, but it wasn’t until we were pulling onto the highway that he asked if I wanted to talk about it. I didn’t.
My brain was too woolly. I slept the entire two-hour drive to Old Stone Road.
Mom was waiting in her nightgown at the door. She pulled me into her arms, and I began to cry. Suddenly, I was six years old, and there was nothing better in the world than being enveloped by my mother’s soft body.
“Come on,” she said. “Let’s get you to bed.”
Not bothering to get undressed, I flopped onto the mattress, my mother watching from the hall.
“Sleep well, honey.” She began to shut the door.
“Mom?”
“Mm-hmm?”
“Do you remember the story you used to tell me at bedtime?”
“I do,” she said softly.
“I used to love that,” I murmured, shutting my eyes.
Moments later, her voice whispered through the dark. I smiled when she got to my favorite part.
When the girl got tired, the whale would carry her on her back.
When the girl was sad, the whale would call upon the seals, who would bark and chirp and show off for the girl and always made her laugh.
When it was time for the girl to go home for dinner, the whale said
goodbye with a wave of her tail.
And then I fell asleep.
Throwing off the sheets now, I cross to the window. Outside, reality stares back at me. Not rainforest. Not beach. Not mountains nor mist. There’s my brother’s truck. There’s my father’s blue-sided workshop, and the field beyond. There’s the cedar hedge and the apple tree.
The week I spent with George almost seems like a dream. I didn’t speak to him on our drive to the airport, but when we said goodbye, I let him hug me while I cried.
“I love you,” he told me. “I love you. I love you. I love you.”
There’s a quiet thud of boots on the stairs, followed by a soft knock on
the door.
“Frankie, you up?”
Darwin, the traitor. He and Moby were there when George spilled his guts
to Nate. They could have told me.
I glare at the door. “Go away.”
“Frankie, open up.”
“I don’t want to talk to you.”
He knocks again.
“You know I can take the door off its hinges. Or pick the lock. Or kick it down.” All things he’s done. “I also know how George climbs up to the roof and goes through the window. But it’ll be less embarrassing for both of us if you open the door.”
I cross the room, prepared to yell at my brother, but when I open the door, he pulls me into his great big chest.
“How did you know?” I ask, tears falling anew.
“George texted me. What happened?”
“He told me why Nate left.”
Darwin releases me, his face turning pale. “About that…”
I’m too ravaged for anger. I feel shaved down to nothing, like the fields in late summer after the hay has been cut back.
“I’m sorry it happened the way it did,” Darwin says. “I’m sorry for how much pain it caused you. But marrying Nate would have been a mistake.”
I take a deep breath. “I know.”
Darwin blinks at me, surprised. “So what’s the problem?”
I don’t have the energy to dissect my feelings, so I simply say, “George lied to me.”
“Frankie,” he says with pity. “You’re too stubborn for your own good.
Give George a chance. You know him. You know why it might be hard for him to tell you how he feels. He thought he’d have more time.”
“Wait a sec. How do you know that?”
“We’re friends, too. Not in the way you two are, but yeah, I care about him. We talk. Moby and I have given him shit for being into you for as long
as we’ve known him.”
“You both suck.”
“But he didn’t cop to it until you guys were living together. He had no clue what to do about it.”
“And did you ever think to suggest that he tell me?”
“Sure. All the fucking time. But George was adamant there’d be a perfect moment, and he made a good case. He thought you’d be angry if he told you at the wrong time.” He smirks. “Which you would have been. You would have thought he was endangering your friendship or your independence or some shit. But then you got engaged to someone you’d just met.”
“And he let me think Nate left because of something I did,” I say, my voice rising. “You let me think that, too.”
“Nate left because he realized you’d never been yourself with him. He saw what you were too obstinate to admit.”
“And what’s that?”
“That you and George are meant to be together,” Darwin continues, lowering his voice. “I get it. We don’t talk about when Mom went away, but it impacted all of us. I mean, Moby’s a complete fool.”
I huff out a reluctant laugh. “Total weirdo.”
“I used to have nightmares about Mom leaving again,” Darwin says.
“Now I dream about Anh vanishing in the middle of the night.”
My throat aches. I didn’t know that. “Anh would never.”
“I know. It’s not rational. But it’s there—that fear of being left. I bet you
have it, too.”
Tears spring to my eyes, and I nod.
Darwin’s gaze softens.
“And I’m afraid of hurting the people I love,” I whisper.
“Frankie. You’d never harm George.”
“But I already have,” I tell him. “I was so caught up in my own bullshit that I missed what even you and Moby could see.”
“I’m not going to disagree. You can be obtuse when you want to be. But I bet there’s not a single time in the decades you’ve been friends that you intentionally hurt George. You guarded him like a little gremlin when you were kids, and you haven’t changed. You love him.”
“I do.”
“So what’s the problem?” Darwin asks again.
“That is the problem. I love him, but I’m a mess.” I wave my arm at my bedroom. “This is probably the worst possible time to begin a relationship.
This thing with George…it’s too important to risk screwing up. I need to get it right.”
“Funny,” he says. “That’s what George used to say.”
• • •
I GO BACK to bed until the warm scent of vanilla and sugar wakes me in the middle of the afternoon. There are a few missed calls from Aurora and a long text message.
Nate called me yesterday, and he seemed sort of shaken about George. I wasn’t sure what to say. I mean, he left you. HE LEFT YOU! But I didn’t want to sound heartless, either. I told him he should
be relieved you’re moving on. I hope he can move on, too. I want you both to be happy!
Nate could have been honest with me. He didn’t have to leave me with only a note and my own insecurities. I frown at the screen and then I call her.
“Nate can go fuck himself,” I say when Aurora answers. Although, in the back of my mind, I know he did me a favor.
“Hello to you, too.”
“I’m so confused. I don’t know what to do or what I’m supposed to think.”
“What happened?” I hear her worry in the pitch of her voice.
I tell Aurora about the glorious last few days and their cataclysmic conclusion. “George kept this huge thing from me for years. I was going to marry Nate, and he would have drifted further and further away. He wasn’t planning on telling me when we were in Tofino, either. I was the one who pushed things.”
“Well, yeah. George couldn’t own up to his feelings when you were
getting over Nate.”
“I am over Nate.”
“George didn’t know that. He let you take the lead.” She sighs. “It’s pretty romantic when you think about it.”
She’s such a sap. I tell her so.
Aurora ignores me. “We’re always so caught up in our own experiences and interpretations of our partner. But they’re telling themselves a different story. Try to see things from George’s point of view. Think about the rejection George has faced with his dad. Maybe he couldn’t believe you’d ever see him as anything but a friend.”
I sigh. It’s exactly what I’ve been thinking about since my conversation with Darwin. “But I’ve seen George naked now. There’s no going back.”
She laughs. “Onward, then.”
• • •
DOWNSTAIRS, MY MOM is taking cookies out of the oven.
“Chocolate-chip,” she says, setting the tray on the stovetop. “Nothing fancy. Those should be ready to eat.” She points to the batch that’s cooling on a wire rack.
Mom professes her love with sugar, butter, and eggs. I sit on the stool across from her at the counter and bite into a cookie. The chocolate is still gooey. The cookie is warm and soft, with just the right amount of salt.
“How are they?” she asks as I’m chewing.
I answer with a full mouth. “Five stars.”
“I doubled the recipe so I can send some home with Darwin for the girls.
And I thought I’d make that lemon loaf you like. Want to help?”
I slide off the stool, find a second apron in the drawer, and tie it around my waist.
We work in quiet synchronicity, my mom measuring ingredients, me zesting and juicing a lemon. This is where we are most aligned, working in tandem in the kitchen.
“Do you want to tell me what happened?” she asks as I put the pan in the oven.
“No. I think I’d like a break.” I need a George breather.
When we’re done, Mom fills the sink to wash the mixing bowls, and I pick up a tea towel and stand by her side.
“I think this would be a good time to tell me about your whales,” I say as we’re finishing. “I could use a distraction.”
“Is there anything in particular you want to know?” She looks at me with
violet eyes, just like my own.
“I want to know why you love them.”
I want to know why you left.
“Why do I love whales?” She considers the question as she piles cookies onto a plate. “Let’s go sit outside.”
We head to the porch swing with the cookies. I gaze out at the long grass rustling in the field.
“When you were really little,” my mom begins, “maybe two or three, you loved balls.”
I laugh. “Excuse me?”
“You did! You really, really loved balls. Any kind. Soccer balls, tennis balls, spiky balls, golf balls, footballs. I made you a scrapbook with pictures of all the different types of balls, and you could name every one. Darwin had a dinosaur phase. Moby was into puzzles. You loved balls. When I was little, it was whales. The first one I can remember seeing was in the Bay of Fundy.
I was probably three or four, and I was entranced.”
I remember this from the stories she used to tell. “A humpback, right?”
“That’s right.” She smiles. “We were out in my uncle’s boat. The way the whale leapt out of the water was like a ballet. I wanted to be that whale. I imagined living in the ocean with mermaids and dolphins and belugas.”
“Like in the bedtime story.”
She smiles wistfully. “Yes. And I never stopped loving whales. I did a school project on the whales that migrated through the bay when I was in the sixth grade.”
It sounds familiar, but it’s been more than two decades since I’ve heard this.
“When I was thirteen, I begged your grandparents to send me to a marine mammal summer camp run by the Canadian Whale Institute. I cried when they said yes. It’s where I learned about right whales, and how close to extinction they are. It solidified my calling. The problem with right whales, as you know, is that they aren’t reproducing at a fast-enough rate to compensate for how many are killed each year by vessel strikes and fishing line entanglements. I didn’t quite know how I wanted to help, but I knew I needed to.” She pauses. “And then life happened.”
I listen to Mom tell me her version of that life.
How difficult it was to move to Ontario from the East Coast in the ninth grade. How she dated my father against her better judgment. She was the one to end their relationship before she went away to university, knowing she’d one day move back to the sea. She had her sights set on the whales, and nothing was going to stand in her way. She stayed friends with Dad, but she couldn’t get him off her mind, and after years of trying to deny her feelings, she gave in to them.
“When I found out I was pregnant, I was hopelessly in love with your father,” she tells me. “I knew I wanted to have a family with him, even though the timing was less than ideal.”
She was weeks away from starting a field internship with the New England Aquarium, where she’d be studying and tracking North Atlantic right whales.
“I thought I might be able to do that early in my pregnancy, but I had terrible nausea. I couldn’t even look at the sea without my stomach turning.
The idea of stepping foot on a boat was repellent. I threw up constantly. I
couldn’t keep any food down.”
“I didn’t know that,” I say softly.
“It’s called hyperemesis gravidarum. Extreme morning sickness, except mine lasted all day. It felt like my body had betrayed me. I couldn’t do anything but lie in bed. They didn’t say it, but my roommates were annoyed with all the puking. And”—she turns to me—“I missed your dad. I missed my family. I needed my mom. When I left the East Coast, I knew I’d be going home for good. I was being practical—your dad had a business and a steady income. There were two sets of grandparents-to-be ready to help.”
We watch a pair of rabbits hop across the field.
“I thought about whales a lot during those first few months after Darwin
was born,” she says.
I smile. “Of course you did.”
“Right whales are exceptional mothers. They starve themselves to nurse their calves, and they nurse for up to two years, traveling thousands of miles with their baby, ensuring its protection and teaching it how to communicate and feed.”
I take her hand in mine, saying gently, “You do know you aren’t a whale, right?”
Her voice is tight. “But I tried. I tried to be a whale mother. I loved you all so, so much. But as the years passed, I started to become angry. Angry at myself for giving up a chance at a career. Angry with your father for letting me. It was a quiet sort of seething that ate away at me. That wasn’t who I
wanted to be—for you or for myself. So your father and I agreed that I should give it a shot.”
Her eyes fill with tears. “I know you haven’t been able to forgive me. But I think I might have withered up if I’d stayed.”
“Why didn’t you and Dad sit us down and explain it together?”
“I couldn’t,” she says. “I just couldn’t. I knew the only way I’d go was if I walked out the door while you were sleeping.”
“I hated you,” I admit, my voice breaking as I blink back tears. “I hated how you gave us up for whales and then came home and baked cakes and
never talked about them again.”
“You didn’t want me to.”
“I did. Of course I did. I felt like you weren’t the same anymore. I felt like
I’d lost my mom all over again.”
She strokes my cheek.
“It’s the female right whales who are more likely to die from being hit by a boat,” she says. “One theory is that it’s because the mother whales stay near the surface while their calves nurse, but that’s where they’re most vulnerable to marine traffic. I wish I could have been strong like that. I shouldn’t have gone,” she says, her voice breaking. “I should have stayed near the surface with you. I should have protected you.”
I wrap my arms around my mother, wanting to protect her, too.
“What made you come back here?” I ask. “Why didn’t we move out east so you could work?”
She takes a moment to collect herself. “Your father would have. We’d talked about it. A few days before I decided to come home, I watched a rescue crew try to free a whale from the thick line that was caught around her neck and back. Her injuries were already deep, but the whale was fighting.
It’s difficult, dangerous work trying to free an entangled whale. And as I watched that whale thrash around, I thought about how lucky I was.” Her eyes are still glassy. “We’re all entangled in our own way, but I, at least, had chosen my bonds. I was tethered to you, your brothers, and your father, and I had pulled as far on that line as I could have. I knew I needed to find my way back.
“But also,” she says, “I threw up every time I was on a boat.”
“What?” I choke on a laugh.
“I have no sea legs,” she confesses, looking out at the field. “I thought I’d develop them, but no. The number of times I vomited overboard was disgusting and embarrassing, but it also felt like a sign.”
I take in my mother, this woman who’s far more complicated than I’ve allowed her to be.
“I know I was horrible, but I was happy you came home.”
“Me too.”
“And what about Francesca?” I ask. “When was she last seen?”
Grief fills her eyes. “Honey, I don’t know how to tell you.” She takes my hands in hers. “Francesca died two years ago.”
This catches me off guard. I put a hand on my chest. “How?”
“It was a vessel strike.”
“A boating accident?”
My mom nods. “They found her body floating off the coast of Virginia.
Her spine was dislocated. There were fractures to her vertebrae and lower
back.”
“Oh.” It’s all I can manage.
“I didn’t think you’d want to know,” my mom says. “And it really was so sad. Before she was killed, she’d been spotted with a calf near Florida. The whale was too young to survive without her mother.”
“So they’re both dead?” I wipe away my tears.
“I’m so sorry.”
“I didn’t really hate her, you know?” I’d always assumed she was still out there, my sister whale.
My mom kisses my temple. “I know you didn’t.”
We sit there for a long time, staring out over the field. When the wind ripples through the grass, it moves just like the ocean.
