The Second Mother

by Jenny Milchman

  Julie had the odd but powerful feeling that the house was moving farther off with each step she took toward it. The vast vista of the sea distorted things. She clearly remembered deciding against opening the bottle of scotch she had purchased, but began to doubt herself now. Surely this must be alcohol-induced, a hallucination of some kind? She licked her lips to see if the telltale taste lingered.

  Then Julie caught a glimpse of clapboard, white slashes against the night, and broke into a jog. But the house continued to retreat, dreamlike, for every forward move she made. She began to run, a full-on sprint across the open plane of sandy soil. She’d forgotten to turn on the outside lights, and there was no twinkle of a lamp from even a distant neighbor. Julie momentarily lost sight of the house again, hidden in folds of darkness. Smoke-colored clouds had just started to smudge the sky, a mist drifting in from the sea, when Julie came to a halt, breathing fast. Had she swerved somehow, gone off course? Maybe that pitcher of iced tea had been spiked, an extra-special welcome. For whatever reason, her own footsteps didn’t feel reliable here. She squinted to make out the shape of walls or a roof.

  Then she heard something and swiveled. Depot’s resounding bark, his loudest one, unmistakable in the hush. And another, echoing through the night. Julie ran toward the sound, Depot’s ongoing series of barks a cannonball fire of noise for her to follow. If they did have any neighbors, this would be some way to make friends.

  There was the house, open and unguarded by trees or anything else. It should’ve been visible long before now; the sea must play tricks on the eyes. Julie mounted the porch steps, each one a small summit, homesickness at bay for now, simply glad at the thought of a bed.

  When she tried the front door, it was locked.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Julie had left the door unlocked. She was even more sure of that than she was about not having cracked open her new bottle.

  She walked backward until her shoulders banged the porch pillar, keeping her from spilling down onto the grassless lawn. It was too dark to see anything in the yard. Julie went back and rattled the doorknob, causing Depot’s barks to ratchet up again.

  “It’s okay, Deep,” she said resolvedly. “I’ll be back in a sec.”

  She walked the length of the porch, squinting out into the night.

  The urge to call out a Hello, anybody there? was powerful, but generations of relatives in law enforcement had taught her better. Someone had to have been here to lock the door, and why would anyone do that? Taking another quick peek around, Julie turned her back on the night and approached a window that looked into the front hallway.

  Locked. Of course.

  This level presented ready access, and the whole house was so removed from any companions. Hadn’t Laura said that a widow lived here alone after her husband died? She would’ve wanted the protection of locks on the first floor.

  Julie descended the porch steps as if stepping into a pool of black water. A roof covered the porch below the second story. If she could get up there, she might be able to enter the house through one of the upstairs windows.

  She mounted the porch steps again, then climbed onto the railing. She got into a standing position, balancing carefully, fighting the feeling of fingers settling onto her spine. But she couldn’t hoist herself from here onto the roof; it was too high.

  Walk back to town, find somebody who could help? But Julie didn’t have a flashlight, and the thought of that uprooted stretch of forest, like the earth coming loose from its shorings, caused gooseflesh to break out on her skin. Anyway, it wasn’t as if there’d be a locksmith available at this hour. Julie was the schoolteacher. She needed to look competent, capable, not like someone who got into YouTube-style predicaments on the very first day.

  A shed stood at the back of the house. Julie had seen it during her trip to watch the sunset, which was now starting to seem more and more ill-fated. Jumping down from the railing, she landed on the scrubby lawn and left the protection of the house behind. Inside, Depot’s barks picked up again, loud and bracing. Because she hadn’t come for him yet or because he was warning her about something? Julie whirled around. She couldn’t see a soul.

  The sea’s reflective surface provided scant illumination, and Julie sped up, power walking toward the shed. She tugged on a metal hasp. The door refused to give, although upon examination, it didn’t appear to be sealed by anything. Julie pulled harder and the door screeched open, the sound a scythe through the muted silence of the night.

  She was propelled backward by a rotten, mucky stench. It filled her nostrils like paste and coated the inside of her mouth. Clamping one hand over her nose, Julie peered into the little structure. Filled with mounds and clumps of things; she couldn’t make out exactly what. Taking a step inside, Julie crouched down and began patting around. She felt tangled ropes, netting; her fingers slid into the slimy holes of a lobster trap. A pair of splintery oars leaned against one wall, while a pile of life preservers were denuded of stuffing. Mice must’ve been in here, but the smell came from fishy things, the carapaces of sea creatures long gone. Julie fisted her hands, loath to touch anything else.

  A cone of white suddenly lit the sky, clouds parting to reveal the moon. It glinted on a stack of crinkly tarps, and wonder of wonders, an extension ladder that weighed down the pile. Dragging the ladder out of the shed, Julie headed back in the direction of the house.

  She was stopped by the high, sweet sound of laughter.

  * * *

  The ladder slipped from Julie’s grasp, landing on her foot. She sucked in a cry of pain as she yanked herself free. She bent down and felt the injury. She could wiggle her toes, nothing broken, but the metal had delivered a nasty scrape and her hand came away smeared with blood. Whatever noise she’d heard had stopped. All was quiet again.

  Julie hefted the ladder and pulled it the rest of the way to the house. From the ground, she looked up at a window, then propped the ladder against the clapboards, making sure to plant its legs securely in the sandy earth. She started to climb. Now a breeze came off the sea; it stirred the hairs on the back of her neck. Julie was on the fourth rung of the ladder when the sound of disembodied laughter started up again.

  A snicker, sly and knowing.

  The metal sides went slippery in her grasp. She clenched her toes against the rod on which she perched, feeling the wound on her foot smart, then twisted around. Forget not giving away the fact of her presence—it was obviously known—or her location. Mustering all the volume she could, Julie shouted: “Who is that? Who’s there?”

  Instantly, the laughter lightened, a breathy fading out.

  Some kind of bird or animal? Loons could sound as if they were laughing, although they were lake, not shore, birds. Panthers screamed with laughter, but big cats didn’t live on islands.

  The moon was so bright now there was no way anybody could be lurking around. Angry, both at the source of the sound and herself for getting spooked, Julie stomped up the next two rungs on the ladder, panting with exertion and nerves, then leaned to one side. She could just reach the window from here. Julie placed both hands on the sill and gave a tug. The glass slid upward with gratifying ease.

  Now to get herself off the ladder and in through the opening.

  “Nobody better laugh,” she muttered aloud.

  She knew she must look ridiculous, awkwardly placing one knee on the window ledge, then, using the foot still on a rung to give a mighty kick, allowing the ladder to clatter to the ground as she made her way over. For a second her left leg dangled, hanging free before she could swing it over the sill and slide inside.

  Julie straightened up, her body bruised and sore in places she couldn’t identify yet. Downstairs, Depot let out an escalade of barks. She heard his paws scrabbling as he mounted the stairs. Then he abruptly quit barking. He’d figured out it was her.

  Julie patted the wall, feeling around for a light
switch. Her hand came down on a piece of furniture. It had a lamp standing upon it, which Julie immediately flicked on. She was in one of the other bedrooms, smaller than the master, and crowded with objects. Cast-off furniture, boxes, crates. The evidence of a seafaring life—it had indeed been a lobsterman who used to reside here—was displayed in the overflow: weatherproof gear laid on top of a bulging carton marked Walter’s clothes; leather books that upon examination were some kind of log, prices per pound graphed over years in undulating fluctuation; assorted equipment Julie had no hope of identifying, radios or sonar or navigational devices.

  She wove through the detritus, feeling sorry for the woman who’d had to store away a lifetime’s worth of her husband’s leavings. As Julie crossed the room, she realized that at least the woman had a child, a boy from the looks of it, whose outgrown possessions had been tossed with less care into clear plastic bins: a mixed-up jumble of toys buried beneath tangles of clothes. Julie veered around the bins, heading for the door.

  A draped and shadowed piece of furniture stood in front of it.

  As if it had been dragged there, placed as an obstacle to prevent her getting out, Julie bumped into the slatted side of a crib.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Julie felt the wooden slats through the sheet that covered the crib. This object she knew even blind, there could be no doubt about what it was, but just in case, she drew the sheet aside. Her hand began moving up and down without conscious volition, patting the plasticky surface of the mattress as if by rote. It was dim here, far away from the lamp, and the crib was filled with cold, gray air. Julie kept patting, trying to impart some warmth. The slats of the crib were as hard as bone when she finally withdrew her hand.

  Come back.

  A sinister murmur.

  Had the laughter Julie heard earlier not been real either? Nor the optical illusion of the retreating house?

  She turned and yanked the door open so hard that her shoulder rattled in its socket. Depot was waiting for her in the hall, and Julie sank down, burying her face in his fur. She was never prepared for this grasping grief, no matter how many times its suffocating shroud was bestowed, sinking her body without so much as a tug. The hideous paradox of mourning was how utterly, inarguably final it was while at the same time never ending. Julie laid her cheek upon her dog, a trickle of tears worming around her nose and soaking into his coat. At last, she sat up. She got to her feet slowly, breaking the move into parts.

  Julie turned on the lights and checked each of the rooms, in case anybody was there, although the mystery of the front door felt less pressing now. Whoever the voice belonged to had probably locked it. That conclusion contained the plausibility of the best drunk reasoning, making Julie realize what her next step should be. She located her suitcase and unzipped it roughly, an angry buzzing in the quiet of the house. The bottle she’d picked up en route to Lambert Point was nestled within a stack of shirts. A full, untouched bottle, golden like the sun.

  Depot came padding up beside her.

  “Don’t judge,” Julie told him.

  The dog accompanied her to the kitchen. Julie took a tumbler from one of the pristine, well-organized cupboards, and poured herself a drink, draining the glass at one go. Depot stood panting at her side.

  “You thirsty too?” Julie asked. She walked over to the sink and filled his bowl. Water sloshed over the rim as she placed the bowl on the floor.

  Depot began to lap in fast, flicking splashes.

  “I’ll join you in another,” Julie said. Her fingers felt thick and clumsy as she refilled her glass, once, then twice.

  Depot ignored her.

  Julie crossed to the wall of windows at the rear of the house, bottle swinging loosely in her grasp. She tilted it to her lips—Why bother with a glass?—shielding her eyes at a glint of moonlight. Julie hiccupped, a jarring, painful heave of her chest. At home, David would’ve paced her, if not slowed her down. But David wasn’t here to serve drinks, nor share any other part of her life.

  She didn’t exactly miss him, even with an endless, empty night laid out before her. In fact, Julie was surprised by how simple it felt to excavate herself from the state of marriage. Maybe David was right, and the two of them really had been over for years.

  She headed to the couch in a weaving shamble, tripping at one point and completing the voyage on her hands and knees. Curled into a ball, taking up as small a portion of sofa as possible, she let aloneness submerge her. She rolled toward the back of the couch, arms wrapped around her spinning head. Tears began to leak from her eyes, and she used a cushion to blot them.

  She might not miss David, but with him out of her life, another of her roles had been stripped away. For a long time, she hadn’t been anyone’s daughter. Hedley was gone, so the word mother no longer applied. Julie had been a mother for such a short time. Barely one at all. Now she wasn’t a wife either.

  Teacher. In less than a week, she would be a teacher again.

  * * *

  Julie awoke when the wall of glass turned the room into a solarium, her tongue as thick and floppy as a pillow. Not enough moisture to break up the foul-tasting crust on her lips. Depot slept somewhere nearby; Julie could smell his dank odor. He still needed a bath. She looked around, and the motion drove a spike through her head. She snapped just the tips of her fingers, muted and quiet, until the big dog stirred. Julie lifted her hand slowly, the air a mass too dense to move through, then let her palm fall, deadweight, upon Depot’s back. Pushing herself off the couch, she leaned against his bulk, and the two of them made their way to the bathroom, where Julie peed, long and scorching.

  She attempted to lean over the sink, but was stopped by her throbbing head and had to make do with turning on the faucet and slapping handfuls of water up toward her mouth. The few drops she managed to imbibe tasted like the nectar of Eden. A hair of the dog had never worked for Julie—in fact, for a few precious hours following one of the binges whose number had steepened sharply over the past year, the idea of her substance of choice prompted nothing but repulsion.

  Julie shuffled into the kitchen and located coffee in one of the cabinets. Some sort of upmarket, Maine-roasted brew, strong and bracing. The first cup provided a jolt of clarity; the second cleared the final shreds of last night from her head.

  She needed to do this now, while the mere thought of alcohol caused a physical backlash. Holding the bottle as far away from her as she could get it, trying not to inhale, Julie tilted the contents over the sink. It wouldn’t be simple to purchase scotch on the island. Everyone knew everything and everybody; the parents of her students would learn she was a drinker and at what rate. Julie watched the last trickle swirl down the drain, then rinsed out the empty and stowed it on the counter till she could figure out recycling.

  She turned to look at Depot. “Happy?”

  He was tussling with a chew toy she’d unearthed from the duffel, spitting it out before sinking his teeth back in with relish.

  “I’ll take that as a yes,” Julie said. “Let’s give you a bath.”

  * * *

  She had just toweled Depot off and was mopping the bathroom floor to a Zamboni-like shine when the front door banged open and a voice called out, “Hello?”

  Depot let out his sharp, stranger bark; then again, everybody was a stranger on this island. Julie gave him a stern look of warning. “Hey, at least they’re announcing themselves this time,” she said in an undertone. She started to descend the stairs, peering into the hall.

  “I’m sorry!” a woman said. “I knocked, but you must not have heard me.”

  She looked to be about Julie’s age, petite and narrowly built, with a tousled cap of hair. Her skin was lightly freckled, and her eyes a gray so light, they were nearly colorless. A big, open smile made clear the mood you couldn’t read in her eyes.

  Julie found herself smiling back. “No worries. I was bathing my
dog.”

  Depot had continued his loud barking, attempting to come up beside Julie on the stairs. There wasn’t room for the two of them, and from long experience, Julie knew who the loser would be in such a contest. Depot didn’t realize no one else was a match for his muscle. She hushed the dog’s barks, then gripped the railing so she wouldn’t slip, letting Depot squeeze past and proceed her down the steps.

  “Oh my,” the woman breathed. “What a beaut. Is he friendly?”

  “Totally,” Julie replied. “He just has to check you out before becoming lifelong pals.”

  The woman did everything right, staying still, offering Depot her fingers to sniff, waiting for the intangible signs the dog gave once he’d accepted a person: a settling of his huge shoulders, a snuffle and ducking of his head.

  Crouching down, the woman ruffled the fur on Depot’s throat.

  Julie liked her instantly.

  The woman rose to her feet. “I’m sorry,” she said again. “First I barge in here like the place is mine, then I lay claim to your dog.”

  Julie laughed. “Not at all. You clearly have a way. You a dog person?”

  The woman looked down at Depot. “Isn’t everyone?” Her tone was a little off, though, her friendly manner momentarily receding before she reached out to touch Julie on the arm. “Well, come on, we have a lot to do today.”

  Julie lifted her brows, and the woman frowned. “You were expecting me, right?”

  At Julie’s blank look, the woman let out a groan. “Oh no. Oh my goodness—I really did barge in! I only opened the door because I was late. We were scheduled to meet at ten, and I was afraid you might’ve thought I bailed on you.”

  It was Julie’s turn to apologize. “I probably just forgot in the tumult—”