I look up at that, because it’s clearly addressed to me, but before I can fully take in what he’s said, he has refocused on Joy.
“Maybe they just don’t know the truth,” she says.
“Or don’t want to know.”
“How could someone not want to know that cruelty is bad?”
“They don’t define it that way,” I put in, playing devil’s advocate. “They don’t call it cruelty. They call it discipline. Or punishment.”
“Which is a lie,” Jack says, and his voice is tight again. “Some people just can’t be honest. They can’t see that they’re being driven by anger. Or revenge.” He holds my gaze now, and I know we’re not talking about dogs. Last time he and I talked face-to-face, there had been anger on both sides. His mother was gone. We didn’t know if she was dead, involuntarily missing, or willfully absent. All we knew was that my father was driving the boat from which she disappeared. The police investigation was done; the district attorney deemed the incident an accident. My father was cleared, but Elizabeth MacKay remained gone.
Jack was angry at me for being an Aldiss. I was angry at him for blaming me for that.
So I understand anger. But the idea of revenge appalls me. “Revenge forwhat?”
His eyes are dark and do not blink. “Things that go wrong with their own lives.”
“Revenge on adog?” asks Joy.
He darts her a quick glance before returning to me, like he’s right back where we were twenty years ago, just the two of us. “Sometimes people dream things up. They come up with bizarre theories to excuse their own failure.”
“Failure inwhat?” I asked more sharply than I should have withJoy right there, but I didn’t see failure in my father. He had been frantic when he returned to shore that night. He had sped to the dock and barely tied the boat before he was out and running along the shore, searching for Elizabeth. He was shouting for the rest of us to come, desperate to get as many people looking as possible. He had been so upset that, of course, my mother and sister had assumed the wrong thing.
“Failure in life,” he accuses. “Failure in love.”
Joy is looking back and forth, confused.”What is he talking about, Mom?”
I suck in a deep breath, needing a moment and trying to make it look casual. I can’t believe how quickly this has surfaced. But then, I’m not the one living in Elizabeth MacKay’s house with the detritus of the life she left behind. She was troubled. We all knew that. It was one of the few memories on which we agreed.
Chapter 5
Jack Sabathian has his mind set. I can see it in the lines between his eyes, which could as well be carved in stone. I won’t win this argument. The best I can do is to extricate my daughter and me from what will only grow more contentious the longer we stay.
That said, I might have glanced at my watch in feigned surprise and made a polite excuse about needing to see to my father or help Anne or unpack. But I refuse to feign anything in front of this man—refuse to be the apologist, especially since it wasmypeaceful reunion with the water thathedisturbed.
Instead, I sing a definitive, “Oooo-kay, this is going nowhere.” Grabbing a handful of Joy’s sweatshirt, I pull her toward the stairs.
We’ve barely taken two steps, though, when she pulls free and turns back. “You’re a vet, right?” she asks Jack, just to let him know she knows, because she doesn’t wait for an answer. “Can I work for you?”
“Joy!” I cry, beside her again. “Let’sgo.” I hook an arm in hers, but she won’t budge, simply turns wounded green eyes on me.
“I’m serious, Mom? If I was in New York, I’d be working at the shelter. What’s the difference?”
“The difference—es,” I say in a low, close voice that I hope stresses my own seriousness, since I am very much so. Seeing this man on the beach—fighting a tangle of memories—is exactly why I haven’t been here for twenty years. Well, one of the reasons. The rest are up at the house. I came down here first, actually stopped at the square first to superimpose good thoughts on bad. And look what happened. I agreed to this trip because my daughter wanted it, but she needs to be a little sensitive tomyneeds. “The differences,” I say, “are that we came here to spend time together on the beach and to spend time with your grandfather and your aunt,andwe’re only here for a week, andheisn’t ashelter.”
“What kind of work?” comes Jack’s low voice.
“Thanks, but she’s not interested,” I say without looking his way. My eyes are on Joy, trying to drill in all that I can’t say.
But the ocean must be drowning it out—either that, or stubbornness has turned her momentarily deaf, because my daughter doesn’t hear a word I’m not saying. “Iaminterested,” she insists and, breaking eye contact with me, tells Jack, “I’ll do anything you need done? I can play with animals or feed them or change their water or scoop their poop—and I don’t want pay, this istotallyvolunteer.”
“Joy—”
“Volunteer, Mom,” she assures me, “so it can be two hours a day for the next five days. I mean, you’ll be busy cleaning Papa’s house, trust me, there are piles of thingseverywhereand someone has to go through them, and just now? When I tried to move one book,onebook off the sofa so he could sit, he told me not to touch anything and went to the only uncluttered chair in the place. So there’s lots of sorting out to do, which takes someone who knows what’s good and what isn’tandwho can deal with Papa—and can I really dothat?”
“No,”I hiss. I can’t believe that she’s raised all of this in front of Jack, toward whom I hitch my head. “Buthedoesn’t need an intern.”
“I do,” Jack asserts.
