Page 26 of The Quiet Rebuild

Taylor thought for a moment before the answer spilled out of her. “I wanted to make my parents proud. Isn’t that stupid?”

Winona flinched the slightest bit. Maybe she was thinking of her own children, or maybe she was thinking of her own parents, or maybe she was thinking of the futility of that wish.

She said, “It’s something we can’t escape, I guess.”

Taylor agreed.

“Would you consider coming to LA with me?” Taylor asked then, surprising herself. “I’ll only be gone about a week, maybe. But I’m anxious about it. Fidgety. I’d prefer not to face all those people alone.”

Winona sucked in her cheeks and let her eyes drop.

“It’s okay…” Taylor said before Winona could say no.

“It’s not that I don’t want to,” Winona said gently. “It’s just that, ever since the fire, I haven’t been able to go to big cities. I’m genuinely frightened. It’s a phobia thing. I would freeze up and have endless panic attacks and…yeah.”

Taylor was stricken. She couldn’t believe she’d asked. “I’m sorry. Really.”

“Don’t be,” Winona said. “I want to get over this. But I have to be here at the Harbor House to make it happen.”

Taylor went over to her new friend and wrapped her arms around her. Outside, rain splattered across the sands, and darkness shrouded the ocean. It was hard to believe that summer was around the corner. It was even harder to believe that only tomorrow, Taylor would be home in Los Angeles—where the sun shone all year long.

Around one that afternoon, Taylor went to the dining room to grab lunch with the other women, feeling bright-faced and eager, now that she had a plan. At the sight of her, all the women got to their feet and hugged her, saying again how sorry they were—about Casey’s photograph, about her mother.

The staff members who worked in the dining room soon came out to serve them plates of pasta and homemade bread and roasted vegetables. Taylor sat between Winona and Michelle, listening to everyone’s stories and feeling her heart grow full.

There seemed no end to the ways these women could uplift one another. There was no end to their incredible stories.

And then, she spotted Lindsey Vanberg across the dining hall.

Taylor got to her feet at once. Yesterday, Stella’s younger daughter, Lindsey, and her funny, golden retriever-like boyfriend came out of the woodwork and helped Taylor through a truly difficult day. The kindness in their eyes was not something Taylor would soon forget. In them, she’d sensed more potential friendships. She’d sensed more conversations, waiting to be had.

Abandoning her pasta, Taylor got up and traced a path to Lindsey, who was studying the menu. Sensing her, Lindsey turned, then smiled. “Taylor, hey!” she said. “Are you heading out West soon?”

“Back to LA tomorrow,” Taylor explained. “But maybe not forever.”

“I really hope you make it back to us,” Lindsey said.

“Me too.” Taylor’s chest ached with surprise. “I wanted to thank you again for yesterday. What you and Jake did for me, I’ll never forget.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Lindsey said. She shifted her weight onto her left foot. “It was a funny way to spend a first date, though. He showed me who he really was. I’ll never forget that either.”

“First date! You’re kidding.”

“Okay. I guess I don’t know what it was, or what label to put on it, or whatever,” Lindsey admitted. “I was dying to kiss him at the end, but I couldn’t bring myself to. I used to be so daring. I don’t know what happened to me.”

“I can understand that. Time takes its toll on all of us.” Taylor offered a smile.

Taylor went back to the table to finish her pasta, but Lindsey joined them shortly thereafter, sliding into the seat that Michelle had vacated. Almost immediately, she got to chatting with Winona about scuba diving. Taylor listened quietly, fascinated. Apparently, in a long-ago life, both Winona and Lindsey had been scuba diving instructors.

“What are the chances?” Taylor asked, rolling her pasta around her fork.

Lindsey looked pleased. “You know, I only just started telling people on Nantucket about my scuba diving past.”

“Are you ashamed of it?” Taylor asked.

Lindsey sighed. “It isn’t that, of course. There’s just a lot of my story that I can’t, um, face yet. And it’s all wrapped up in my time as a scuba diving instructor. Things happened.”

Winona and Taylor listened quietly. Taylor sensed a darkness behind Lindsey’s words. She knew Lindsey had a bruised and damaged soul, just like the rest of them.