“Sam…” I start.
“You know, don’t you?” he says flatly. “Kelly told you.”
I shake my head. “I know something happened, something happenedto you.”
Sam takes a too-long drink and then corrects me, “Imadesomething happen.”
I touch his arm again, and this time, he lets me.
“I’m going to tell you because you’ll find out anyway. That’s inevitable even though I pretended it wasn’t. Then, you’re going to hate me, the way most people in this town do.”
“Sam, I could never hate you.”
“Yes, you will.”
Now, he angles his face, and I can see how pained his expression is.
“For about ten minutes, I got to feel good again, good with you, and that’s going to end.Of course. And I can’t fucking stand that, Stella, because you are a relief in this fucking insane world. I felt it the second I saw you, and it scared the hell out of me. But it was there, as clear as day.”
His eyes are red, and I’m not convinced it’s from the booze.
“For reasons I can’t begin to understand, I am whole again with you. After everything, I get to feel whole. And now, it’s all going to blow up. Another bomb detonating in my life.” He laughs, but it’s filled with anguish. “My fucking life.”
The slight slur in his words tells me that he’s had more than enough to drink, so I take the bottle from his hand. Sam must know he’s had enough, too, because he doesn’t stop me.
But he does begin telling me his story, “I used to have a best friend, Costa. We grew up together, here in Watermark. We were practically brothers, especially because his parents were complete dirtbags. It was that classic shitty situation with abusive parents, neither of who gave a shit about him. My parents loved him though, and he slept over all the time and ate dinner at our house most nights. The whole nine yards. He was so awesome. Charismatic and funny and all”—Sam waves a hand around—“hero-like, you know? I looked up to him. Costa became sort of stupidly iconic in my head. I mean, his energy, his constant need to push limits, to be the life of the party…he always was, too. Everybody worshiped him, including me.
“When he was nineteen, and I was off in college, he was still living here and working on the lobster boats. He got his girlfriend, Britney, pregnant. She took off after the baby was born, which was probably for the best.” He leans in and whispers, the drunken edge evident, “I didn’t like her much.”
Sam lies back on the dock and squints into the glare of the setting sun. “He had a little boy, Toby. He was the cutest damn kid ever, and Costa was so crazy about him. Toby had Costa’s eyes, the same deep, deep blue. Like little storms. Little storms of mischief.
“Costa had an apartment right near the inn, and my parents and Kelly helped him out a bunch. Costa took that kid everywhere he could. He even drove up to see me at school once. Who brings a baby to a college dorm, right? But Costa did.
“I loved Costa, and I loved Toby. When I was home from college on a short February break, I took them up to this cabin that my parents have a few hours from here, in Willow, just to get Costa out of town, take some time to be together with him and Toby. It was supposed to be a weekend that brought us back together. But there was an accident.”
Sam throws an arm over his eyes, maybe because of the sun and maybe to protect himself from his words. “Toby was a little over a year old. Just a tiny guy. He used to run everywhere all the time. We were always chasing that kid around, and he never tired out. One morning, I was supposed to get up with Toby because Costa…because Costa wanted to do an early ski run. He woke me up before he left, but I passed out after that. I’d been up drinking hard the night before, and I just…I just crashed.
“Costa came back…and I can still hear him screaming. I can still hear him screaming because Toby was gone. I was supposed to be watching him, but instead, he got out of the house, probably looking for his dad. When Costa and I were running around outside, both of us frantic and calling Toby’s name, we saw his little footprints in the snow, going down toward the lake. That kid could walk and climb over everything. He was so smart. The lake…it was iced over…or it looked iced over. At about ten yards out, there was…a hole in the ice. A little…kid-sized hole.”
“Oh God, Sam.”
“We broke through more ice, and we went into the water, trying to find him. We did everything. Stella, we did everything, and he was gone.”
Sam rubs his arm over his eyes, and my heart breaks for him.
“It was a weak spot in the ice, but the rest was too thick, and they couldn’t dredge the lake then. And in the spring…even then, they couldn’t find his body. There could have been bears or…other animals. God, he was so little…” Sam’s voice cracks and sounds increasingly ragged.
“Costa left Watermark soon after. I can’t say that he hated me or that he didn’t love me anymore even though he should have, but he certainly couldn’t stand to look at me. I was his best friend and the person who should have been comforting him, but that was obviously impossible. I don’t know. Maybe he did hate me. Maybe he just hated the world then.
“I stayed here because my family couldn’t stand for me to leave when I was such a mess. So, I drank my way through it and slept with too many tourists who floated through town, which just kept making it worse. And that’s it. I lost everything.”
Without hesitation, I rest my head on his chest and hold him. There are no words to make his story any easier, so I say the only thing I can, “I told you I couldn’t hate you.”
It takes a moment, but then he says, “You must. Everyone else here does.”
“The window at Kelly’s? That can’t be how everyone feels. Sam, you never wanted this to happen. It was a horrible accident.”
“What I wanted to happen, who I loved, and what I tried to do? That doesn’t matter. It only matters that my best friend’s son is dead. And everyone knows it. I’m not allowed to be sad. I’m only allowed to be hated. But Costa will always have it worse. Always,” Sam speaks so softly now that I can barely hear him. “It’s wave after wave of pain. Just when I almost forget, for even a short time, I am hit in the face with what happened. I stay in town because my parents and Kelly want me to They try to make me forget. When you came, you brought me to life. But you’ll go away, too.”
