I’m about to return the phone to my pocket when I think of Chrissie. I could text her, too. Or call. But I’m not ready for either. As hopeful as I’m feeling about other players in this drama, I’m still in the dark about her. Though family ties may fray, they never completely break, but friendship is different. We pick our friends. We can unpick them. Her lack of forthrightness gnaws at me. Granted,I’m super sensitive right now. It’s possible she’s a scapegoat for my upset.
But overthinking won’t help that, either. I need time.
If the goal is creating new memories, a cookout on the beach works. Everyone chips in carrying things down from the house, cooking at the firepit, spreading blankets, and passing food around, but the real fun begins when the burgers and dogs are gone, the live dog is banished to Jack’s, and Margo’s boys take up with a soccer ball. Joy, who is no athlete, insists on joining in, and, taking pity on her, I do as well. Before long, we’re all playing. We tell ourselves that it’s a tribute to Dad, but it’s a way of letting off steam for sure.
Naturally, we end up in the water. It was often that way, this progression from sand and sweat to relief. Also, as it often was, by the time we’re toweled off back on the beach, the sun is nearly gone. The sky is orange-pink on the bluff behind and purplish on the horizon ahead, with finger-clouds of every shade in between. We sit comfortably around the fire, which has died to embers that are perfect for toasting marshmallows. When we were kids, this was one of our favorite things to do.
It’s different with Tom no longer the director. The fact of his fresh burial is just beneath the surface of our smiles, but the kids are faster to rebound. Given the eagerness with which Joy makes s’mores for every adult who wants one, I know she won’t forget this night.
Nor will I. It’s a moment out of time, one for updating the past in favor of the future. It’ll stand us in good stead once we’ve gone our separate ways again.
Once we’ve gone our separate ways again.Funny, how the subconscious can repress a single thought and then, when it pops up for half a second, not be able to push it back down. I have to be on the roadback to New York by Friday evening if I hope to work on Saturday morning. That leaves only two more days here.
“Can’t we stay longer?” Joy asks that night. She has taken over Jack’s guestroom, which would have looked as sterile as so much of the rest of the house, if, within minutes of her retreat there, she hadn’t scattered her belongings around. It’s deliberate. She’s already told me that she hates Jack’s ex-wife’s taste.
“I have to work,” I say, clearing the bed enough so that I can pull back the duvet. “This job has been on the books since before we left.”
“But I like it here, and Teddy and Jeff aren’t leaving ’til Sunday. Can’t you put the job off until Monday?”
“Nope.” Propping up the pillows, I wave her in. “The client runs a business out of her townhouse, so a weekday won’t work.” I rummage around for the Lois Lowry.
“Then leave me here for the weekend and come back Monday.” When I dart her a doubtful look, she says, “Or Margo can drive me back?” As I snag the book from the easy chair, she suggests other options. “Or she can put me on the train in Providence and you can meet me at Penn Station, or I can take—”
“You are not taking an Uber or anything else.” Sidestepping Guy, who looks to be asleep on the bath towel Joy dropped on the hardwood floor, I climb onto the bed.
“Well, then,” she tries sweetly, green eyes wide with possibility, “I can stay here until youdocome back. Wouldn’t that work? I mean, we discussed the possibility when we first decided to come—”
“You discussed it,” I remind her, but gently. Despite the dread I felt before we came and the angst we’ve experienced here, a tiny part of me doesn’t want to leave. Sensing that a stiff upper lip is needed for both of our sakes, I say, “I gave you the week, which was more than I wanted.” Had we left last Sunday as I initially planned, I wouldn’t have had a chance to reconnect with Jack. Life would have been simpler then.
Joy sits cross-legged with her hair in a mess around her face and,taking my hands, positively beams. “But aren’t you glad you stayed? Think about it, Mom. If we’d left last Sunday, we’d only have had to come back for the funeral, and then you’d have missed those last days with Papa.” Her smile fades. “And with everyone else.” She grows worried. “What happened with Chrissie?”
“We, uh, had a misunderstanding. We’ll work it out.”
“It has to do with Paul, doesn’t it.” She isn’t asking, isn’t even letting her voice rise at the end.
“Indirectly,” I say but leave it at that.
When my silence drags on, her expression darkens. “Are you ever going to tell me?”
Suddenly, it seems silly not to. She isn’t a baby. She heard what Anne said Sunday night on the dock. The fact that she’s waited this long to ask speaks of a respect for my needs that is actually quite mature. How can I make her wait longer?
Without elaborating on what was wrong with my parents’ marriage, I give her a short, cleaned up version of the story of my conception and Chrissie’smisconception of it. Joy is far less interested in the Chrissie part than the other.
“Paul?” she asks with a curious smile. “That’s so nice.”
Her calmness startles me. I might question her loyalty to the man she so recently called Papa. But I know my daughter. Her way of dealing with loss is to fill the hole. Besides, parentage has always been a vague concept to her, given that she knows nothing of her own biological dad.
But I don’t have time to dwell on that, with her bolting onward. “And there’sanotherreason for my staying here. If he is my grandfather, shouldn’t I spend time with him?”
“Joy—”
“Hecan drive me home.” She pauses, eyes suddenly keen. “Or Jack, what about Jack?”
“What about him?” I ask, though my heart knocks. I know where she’s headed with this one.
“I mean, here we are in his house, and in an hour, there you’llbe in his room. Are you seriously going to pack up and leave in two days?”
“Are you seriously going to pack up and leave in two days?” Jack asks so identically that I wonder if he and Joy discussed it earlier.
