Directly in front of them one of the old-fashioned schooners prepares to take on a boatload of passengers for a harbor tour. Mount Megunticook rises in the distance. Maybe it’s the dark rum talking, but the last thread of resentment Louisa has toward Aggie begins to wear thin, and then, finally, to break. “Itisnice to have a drink with a friend,” she agrees.
“I don’t have a lot of friends,” says Aggie.
Steven has said as much to Louisa, but still she has trouble believing it. “You don’t? I picture you out every night, living the high life.”
“Oh, sure, we’re out alot,” Aggie says. “When you have money you can’t throw a stone without hitting someone who wants you to attend a benefit. But those people aren’t friends. They’re benefit friends.”
“Different from friends with benefits, huh?”
Aggie’s laugh is loud and genuine—so loud that the couple at the table nearest them turns to look. “Right,” she says. “You’re really funny. Steven always talks about how funny you are. I betyouhave lots of friends.” Below them, in the harbor, a woman wobbles as she steps into the bow of a red double kayak.
“Sure,” says Louisa. “I have friends.” She thinks about Franklin, and her childhood friend Chloe, and her Brooklyn friends, and her Fordham girls.
“I bet you have tons of mom friends, and professor friends and college friends. I only have a couple of friends from college. Most people at BC except for Steven thought I was obnoxious.” She bows her head for a split second, then looks up with a wicked grin. “Iwasobnoxious, I guess. I don’t blame them. Not Steven, though. He could see through all the drinking and the throwing around of money. He’s the only one who ever could. Until I met Ernie.”
Louisa notices that this narrative conveniently leaves out the part where Steven found Aggie in bed with another man, but her Dark and Stormy is halfway gone and she’s certainly not going to bring that up now. “We sort of got in a fight, you know,” she says. “When he told me you gave him that money.”
Aggie narrows her eyes at Louisa. “I didn’tgivehim that money. It’s a loan. I expect every penny back, with interest. I had Steven give me the exact same presentation he gave any other investors. I wouldnevergive away money like that, no strings attached. Are you kidding me? My grandfather would shoot me and then truss me up like a Thanksgiving turkey. And when he was finished my father would take a turn at me. I maylooklike a trust fund baby, Louisa, but believe me, I’m a businesswoman. I see real potential in All Ears. I listen to a lot of the podcasts, and they arephenomenal.That’s why I was willing to help.” She glances behind Louisa. “Hey, babe!”
Louisa turns around. Ernie is walking toward them. He’s wearing a giant leather hat, and he’s smiling to beat the band. “Ladies,” he says, and tips his hat. Louisa can’t help grinning back at him.
“I should go,” says Louisa. “Here, Ernie, take my seat.” She’s definitely a little drunk! She’s going to have to get a sandwich at the Camden Deli and repair to her bench before she goes to the library to finally,finallyget to work. She stands to give Ernie her seat, and Aggie stands too.
Aggie reaches out and hugs Louisa, pulling her tight, boob toboob. She smells like roses and limes and freshly dried laundry while Louisa is certain she herself smells like summer sweat ineffectually masked by the crumbled dregs of the Secret deodorant she’s dropped on the floor at least a half dozen times and keeps using anyway. “All of those children of yours,” muses Aggie. “I hope you know how lucky you are.” She touches her perfectly flat stomach, unmarred by childbirth and convenience food, and says, “You take care of yourself and your brood, okay? And tell Steven to keep knocking ’em dead.”
As Louisa regains her seat on the bench and eats her sandwich she thinks about how many different levels of wealth there are. There is Aggie wealth: impenetrable, incomprehensible, never-have-to-worry-about-paying-for-anything wealth. Then there is Martin and Annie wealth: solid wealth, not showy, and apparently not bottomless. This is silver-haired, old-home-on-valuable-land, frayed-carpet wealth. But isn’t there actually another level of wealth above Aggie’s? Private plane wealth? Privateislandwealth? And then, of course, there is a level below Martin and Annie. This is Steven and Louisa wealth, which doesn’t feel like wealth at all, not to Louisa, because there are tax bills, and there are braces and glasses and clothes and college for three children, and there are houses one cannot save, and there are safety nets that turn out to have holes in them, holes big enough to fall through. But what feels like nonwealth to Louisa must look like wealth to Kristie, who works for an hourly wage. And below Kristie, there is a whole other level of people with no jobs and no homes.
Before she gets back in the car she texts Steven.Ran into Aggie, she says. She almost stops there, but she continues.And I get it now. About her investment. It’s the right thing.
You don’t have to be a history professor to know that this might lead to a détente.
31.
Kristie
Tonight, Kristie will tell Danny about the baby. She’ll tell him about the bill collectors, too. If he doesn’t want to stick around once he knows the whole story, well, that’s his choice, and she’s prepared for it, and she won’t blame him. She’ll call upon her inner reserves of strength, the ones she built watching Sheila strong-arm her way through hard times, and she’ll be okay. She really will.
When Elaine offers her a ride home Kristie asks if she can drop her off at the corner of Park and Main. She hooks a left on Main and walks to Main Street Markets, where she picks up two baguettes, good salami, a jar of the spicy mustard Danny likes, two kinds of cheese (Gruyère and cheddar), and a package of chocolate cookies for dessert. It’s an extravagant purchase, but it’s a special night. On the way home she hugs the trail by the water and breathes the harbor smell. It’s just past six o’clock and there are two hours to gountil sunset, but the color of the water is beginning to shift in that subtle twilight-y way she has come to love.
The lobsterman’s daughters are playing hopscotch in the street, tossing a little key onto the squares. Tatiana waves at her and the other one keeps her gaze mostly down, peering up just a little bit through her bangs.
Kristie knows something is off as soon as she opens the door. Danny is home, but he doesn’t greet her. He’s sitting on the couch with his chin in his hands, and he barely looks up. She sets down her Main Street Markets bag. “Babe?” she says. “What’s wrong? I brought dinner.”
Then she sees it.
Her Ships View collection is spread out on the rickety coffee table. Here is the printout of Louisa’s bio from the New York University website. Here is the press release from the court, announcing Martin Fitzgerald’s retirement. Here are the directions to the house from downtown Rockland, and the Google Earth printout of the aerial view, and the Zillow page. Here is the photo of Matty McLean winning a cross-country race. Here is the check for one thousand dollars, made out to Kristie Turner from Annie Fitzgerald.
“I was going to bring our laundry to the Laundromat,” says Danny. “I looked in your backpack for some quarters. I didn’t think you’d mind—” Kristie’s heart is beating so hard she feels like it’s going to jump out of her rib cage. “And then I found all of this. So I’ve been sitting here, trying to figure it out.”
There is nothing to tell him, after all, but the truth.
So she tells him everything. She tells him about her mother, and the letter, and her bus trip from Altoona, and how the day they met she’d ridden her bike there, just to get a sense of things. Just to see. She tells him that she didn’t expect to meet Danny. How even after she met him she didn’t expect to fall for him. And how no way did she expect him to fall for her in return. The whole time she’s talking she’s watching a muscle move in Danny’s cheek. In, out.In, out. It’s so pronounced that she wants to reach out and touch it. When she does, he pulls away.
“You can stop talking,” he says. “I get it.” He rises from the sofa.
“No, Danny. That’s what I’m telling you. You don’t get it. You’re misunderstanding me. I’m just telling you how all of this started.”
“I don’t think I am misunderstanding. You’ve been using me, Kristie. All of this—” He makes a gesture that takes in her and the apartment together. “All of this was just a way to get close to the Fitzgeralds. It was nothing to do with me.” And then he’s packing his things into his own backpack—his toothbrush, the extra pairs of boxers he keeps in the dresser, the beer mug from the 2011 Lobster Festival. His sneakers by the front door, his razor. “All those questions you had about the family,” he says. “I get it now. That time you said you came to tell me about your new job, when you were standing by the garden. You weren’t there to see me, were you? Don’t answer that. I know you weren’t. You were there for them.” He chews on his bottom lip and considers her. “I knew this was too good to be true.”
