The Favorite Daughter

by Patti Callahan Henry

  Colleen flipped through the book, page after page, looking for a clue that might tell her the full story, when it hit her hard, the realization like a sledgehammer on her chest. It was the beginning that was wrong. She turned back to page one and then page two. Her baby book went from day one to month two—there was nothing in between. No photos. No mentions of milestones or weight or shots, none of the details that filled the rest of the book.

  How had she failed to notice this? Eight weeks unaccounted for. It didn’t seem so big in the face of years and years of love and attention, yet also it seemed huge: a gaping hole. An empty space in which anything at all could have happened, anything at all that might change who she was. Maybe they’d been too tired to photograph or record?

  Colleen closed the book and set it on the floor with a sense of the ground moving, as though the house had been tilted slightly, set slantwise on the property so the views to her beloved river shifted.

  Without knowing how long she’d been sitting on Shane’s floor, she heard him call her name.

  “In here,” she shouted, shifting her legs and glancing at the bedside clock to see that an hour had passed. Stiffly she stood, her left foot asleep and her right leg cramped. Shane was meant to go pick up their dad, who’d been out fishing with Bob all morning. Was it that time already?

  Shane entered the room as she stood, her hand on the bedside table. “What are you doing? Cleaning out closets?”

  “I was looking for my baby book.”

  “Why?” He walked into the room and bent down to lift the pink satin book from the floor.

  “The note cards. You know, the ones on your wall. Hallie’s right—something is off. I thought maybe I could find something in there.”

  “Did you?”

  “There’s nothing about me at all for the first two months. That is a book full of every milestone; every gurgle and coo and word and movement I made until I was three years old. And yet from birth to two months there is absolutely nothing.”

  Shane sat on the bed and opened the book, glanced at the first couple pages. “Where’s mine?”

  Colleen pointed to the closet. “Top shelf.”

  Shane reached up—no chair for him—and brought out a blue suede baby book, opened it and glanced up at Colleen. “You’re right. It’s odd.” He flipped the book toward her, where there were photos labeled by age: One week. Two weeks. One month. Two months. And on and on.

  “See? Where the hell was I from the first picture to the one of me at eight weeks old?”

  “Had you never noticed that before?”

  “No. Why would I?”

  Shane sat next to her on the bed. “Well, I’m sure there’s a perfectly reasonable explanation. Like maybe Mother was exhausted from opening a pub. Learning to care for a firstborn. All kinds of reasons.”

  “It’s the ‘all kinds of reasons’ that gets me.” She smiled at her brother. “I’d like to know which kind.”

  “Yeah, I get that. Me, too.”

  “And by the way, they weren’t opening the pub yet. According to Mr. Bivins, Dad was working at the pub but didn’t own it. So someone is lying.”

  “Or confused.”

  “Or that.” Colleen stood and began to gather the boxes and bins to place back in the closet. Shane joined her.

  “It’s only two months,” he said as he shoved a box into the back corner.

  “Only two months.” Colleen set her baby book back on the top shelf and shut the closet door. “But what if they were your two months?”

  Shane nodded. “I would want to know. What will you do?” he asked as they walked back to the kitchen, where Colleen had made a makeshift office, her computer, notebooks and papers set out for a day of making phone calls and conducting interviews.

  “I don’t know. At some point, I’m going to have to ask Dad. Just ask him. Do you think it’s too late? He seems so lucid sometimes.”

  “I think it’s worth a shot, Lena. I think we have to try. Or spend forever making up stories to fill in that empty space.”

  * * *

  • • •

  The day slipped away as Colleen sat at her dad’s kitchen table and made four more calls: four more interviews with neighbors, teachers and friends about the photos that remained. These covered years she could recall herself, as it was the time from her eighth through twelfth grade years. Nothing new came to light in the conversations, just shared laughter and the usual confession of love for Dad. No one spoke of his diagnosis or his time in Ireland. This kept her mind far from the baby book; far from the unexplained spaces in the timeline.

  Beckett called in the middle of her work and asked if she’d like to go out to dinner by the river. She agreed without missing a beat and continued with the stories.

  When she’d finished, she sorted through the papers that the social worker had left behind. Hallie had divided the papers and marked them with sticky notes, assigning each of the siblings a task. Call insurance company. Call local memory care services to inquire about at-home care. Make sure all financial records have been acquired. It was a long list, an arduous list, and more than once Colleen thought about how very many people had to navigate this path alone. She was grateful—for the first time in a decade—she was grateful for her sister.

  When she’d done enough for the day, she allowed herself to mull over the offer to write a travel memoir. Ten Tips? A Life of Travel? What would this book be, if anything at all? The idea began to move inside her without her permission, growing without her even paying it much mind. The minute she allowed her consciousness to touch upon the idea of writing the book, to draw close to it, she found that the seed had sprouted already. There were ideas and quotes and moments that came to her; in her mind she was already outlining the book.

  Could she do it? Yes, it seemed she might. She had stories to tell, wisdom to impart, or at least wisdom that had to do with traveling. With her pen in hand, she began to scribble titles on a blank sheet of paper: The Traveler’s Guide. Girl Around the Globe. One More Trip. Land to Land. Sea to Sea. The World as Home.

  She stopped, chewed on the end of the pen, a horrible habit she’d had since high school. What was she doing? She no more knew how to write a book than fly like the egret roosting in the backyard. But if the book was a series of humorous, insightful essays maybe she could do it. She paused, glanced up from her papers to see the pink light that signaled evening had arrived.

  She rose feeling lighter than she had in months. Whether because of the thought of writing the book or her upcoming dinner with Beckett didn’t matter.

  THE MEMORY BOOK

  Interview with Harry Williams

  The photo that Colleen showed Harry Williams, the Donohues’ next-door neighbor, was of Gavin and Elizabeth as they stood together with Harry and his wife, Violet, at the edge of the May River, the flying egret behind them a streak of white against the blue sky. Harry owned the marina and had been close friends with Gavin since he purchased his first little johnboat.

  Each of them held a clear plastic cup with a lime slice snagged on the edge. They were smiling. To one side a bonfire blazed with a metal plate above it where oysters were roasting under brown burlap. Other blurred people filled the background, drinking and talking. It was evidently a great party and Gavin’s mouth was open in speech—telling a terrible joke, Colleen was sure.

  Mr. Williams, who still lived next door to the Donohue family on riverfront property, squinted at the photo, pushing his glasses down his nose for a better view. Colleen sat with him on his front porch, sweating glasses of sweet tea on the table between their wicker rocking chairs, the scene so picturesque she might have been in a photo op for one of her travel pieces on the South. The low tide sent the thick scent of pluff mud rising not only from the river but also from the boots Mr. Williams wore. His baseball cap, stained with black mud, was pulled low over his forehead.

&nb
sp; “Oh, yes,” he said in a thick voice that betrayed his smoking habit, “that was the oyster roast when Mickey fell into the fire pit trying to show off his fire-making skills. Quite the commotion. Good thing he was drunk enough not to feel it much. If you look now, you can still see the burn mark on his forearm. Lucky that’s all that happened.”

  “And Mother and Dad?” Colleen asked.

  Mr. Williams looked away from the photo with a wistful expression. “Oh, you know, Gavin was his usual fun-loving self. It was the second time I heard him break into Gaelic. Someone mentioned the drowning of a young boy over on Tybee Island during a riptide and he muttered a few lines before noticing he’d done so.”

  “In Gaelic?”

  Mr. Williams nodded, setting his chin wattle into motion. “Yes. Surely you’ve heard him? It’s only a few lines and he doesn’t say them very often. I think I heard him three times in all the years I’ve known him. And always when he’s had the extra whiskey. And always when something sad has up and happened.”

  “No, sir, I’ve never heard him speak in Gaelic. Are you sure?”

  “It’s quite beautiful, I’d say.” He sat back in his chair, wiped the sweat from his forehead with a stained, once-white handkerchief he pulled from his back pocket.

  “Do you have any idea what he was saying here?” Colleen took the picture back, feeling her own sweat start to trickle down her back and legs.

  “Don’t recall; sorry, my dear.” He leaned forward. “Have you heard any news from the historical society?”

  “Not yet, although I don’t know why anyone would want to deny the Lark landmark status. I’ll let you know. And thanks so much for telling me all about this party. I love hearing about the experiences Dad had when I wasn’t here.”

  “And”—the older man leaned forward, removing his glasses to show only kind eyes—“why haven’t you been here?”

  “I’m here now.” Colleen took a long sip of tea and stood. “But you know I live in New York, Mr. Williams.”

  “Well, well.” He stood also and shook her hand. “It’s so lovely to have you home. I know how terribly and deeply your dad misses you.”

  Even as that sharp knife cut to Colleen’s solar plexus, she smiled and bid Mr. Williams good-bye. She tucked one more story into the palm of her heart—Dad speaking Gaelic when he was sad—and waved good-bye. She walked across the soft grass, the border between their houses unmarked as she stopped by the tree house to lift her hand and place it on the bottom rung, glancing up and wondering if Hallie had ever heard their dad speak in Gaelic. Surely not. If Colleen hadn’t heard it, then her siblings hadn’t either. He was a different man with different people and as her image of him began to shift, Colleen felt off balance. What else didn’t she know?

  Nothing was simple, her dad had once told her. As the Irish say, what’s the use of being Irish if the world doesn’t break your heart?

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Starting here, what do you want to remember?

  William Stafford, “You Reading This, Be Ready”

  Colleen climbed into the passenger seat of Beckett’s old Audi. “This day went by so fast I barely went outside. Let’s find a place to eat with a patio.”

  “Paperwork?” Beckett asked, looking down at her with his hand on the top of the passenger door.

  “Loads of it, and diving into the past. Isn’t that odd? Diving into the past making the present go by too fast?”

  “In what way are you diving into the past?” Beckett shut the door for her and walked around to the driver’s side.

  When he’d settled into the driver’s seat she said, “You know that memory book we’re making for my dad?”

  “Yes,” he said. “Of course.”

  “Well, the situation is a little worse than I’ve let on. I thought the memory book was meant to remind him, but now I wonder if it’s really just helping us know him better.”

  “How so, Colleen?”

  “You know,” she said, “everyone around here calls me Lena.”

  “So I’ve heard.” He smiled as he stared out the windshield, guiding the car along the narrow, winding roads. They were quiet as he drove for only a few minutes; one left turn and two rights, and then he pulled into a gravel driveway shaded with a canopy of oaks. He put the car in park. “Would you like me to call you Lena?”

  “No, I like Colleen now. I’ve been using it for ten years and become used to it. I can’t get my family to switch.”

  “Why the switch at all?”

  Even a few seconds without air-conditioning in a closed car was too much in the August heat. Colleen opened the door. “It’s a long story.” She swung her legs around and then stood before leaning in again to look at Beckett in the car. “Or maybe not so long. I just don’t want to talk about it.” She stepped away and then realized she didn’t know where he’d taken her. “Where are we?”

  Beckett stepped out of the car and faced her over the top. “My parents’ house. I wanted to drop off my dad’s tackle box before we go to dinner.”

  Colleen turned to look at the modest home. “You grew up here?” If he’d been in Watersend, how had she not known him?

  He slammed shut the driver’s-side door and walked around the car to pop open the trunk and withdraw a rusted red tackle box. “No. My parents moved here a couple years after I did. So they’ve been here about five years. My dad retired and when they visited me, they fell in love with the town. They packed and moved.”

  “From?”

  “Michigan, where I grew up.” He set the box on the ground.

  “Michigan,” she said. “I’ve only been there once, and it was in the middle of January. I thought I was going to die from the cold, that it would never leave my bones. I’d have moved here, too.” Colleen fell into step with Beckett, heading toward the front door with a flagstone pathway beneath their feet. “So they moved here for you?”

  “They’d like me to think so, but they moved here for the town. So far two of my siblings have followed.”

  “How many do you have?”

  He paused on the doorstep, his hand resting on the brass knob. “Six.”

  “What?” Colleen burst out. “Six? Gosh, tell me they aren’t all inside this house waiting to meet me.”

  He grinned.

  Colleen flinched and bit her lip. “Sorry, that came out wrong. I’d love to meet your family. I’m just not prepared.”

  “I don’t believe anyone is home except my parents and you can wait out here if you’d like.”

  Colleen touched his wrist, circled her fingers around it and then took his hand in hers. “I want to meet them. Six is just a lot. I have only two and I can’t seem to manage all the drama between us.”

  Beckett kissed her cheek and then opened the door without knocking and called out, “Mom?”

  Colleen had always wondered what it would be like to say “Mom,” as it was always “Mother” in their house. The formality matched Elizabeth’s personality, but under her breath at times when no one could hear her, Colleen had called her Mommy.

  A tall woman, elegant even in jeans and a white T-shirt, came from the back of the house. She held a cell phone to her ear. “Gotta go, bug. I’ll call you later. Your brother, my favorite, is here.”

  Colleen stood stunned until Beckett burst into laughter and hugged his mom. “Nina loves when you say that.”

  “She’s fuming right now, crafting an e-mail about my horrid sense of humor.” The woman had long dark hair, a lined face free of makeup, and large blue eyes with eyelashes long enough to sweep up and almost touch her eyebrows. She hugged her son and then turned to Colleen. “Well, hello, sweetie, I’m Denise.”

  “Hi, I’m Colleen. It’s a pleasure to meet you, ma’am.”

  The woman’s smile bloomed larger and she set her gaze on her son. “Don’t you just love the South? If I’d kn
own I could be called ma’am I would have moved here long, long ago.”

  Beckett held out the box. “I brought this back for Dad. He said he wanted it for some tournament tomorrow. I’ll put it in the shed.”

  “Just leave it in the kitchen for now. Come in and say hello to Dad, and Sylvia’s here, too. Some mess with her job.”

  Colleen followed them down a narrow hallway, its walls covered in pale blue shipboard with photos of family and loads of boats, many different kinds of boats. The images were framed and lined in neat rows. They entered a small kitchen so green that Colleen almost squinted. The countertops were white, and the wooden table was painted one shade lighter. The fabric—on chairs and across the tops of the windows—was a green and white check reminiscent of the curtains in her own house. At the table sat an older man with hair to match the countertops, and a girl facing him. They were deep in conversation but turned their faces to Beckett and Colleen as they entered the room.

  “Son.” The man stood and hugged Beckett, effusive as if he hadn’t seen him in months.

  “Hey, bro.” The girl wiggled her fingers at her brother and he bent over to hug her.

  “Hey, sis. What’s going on?”

  “My boss. I hate him. Nothing new. You?”

  He placed his hand gently on Colleen’s arm and then withdrew it. “This is my pal Colleen Donohue.”

  Dad shook her hand first. “Welcome. I’m Bubba Joe.”

  “Dad!” Sylvia’s voice rang out and she stood, jostled her dad with her elbow before turning to Colleen and holding out her own hand. “Hi, I’m Sylvia. And this is my dad, Raymond.”

  “Ever since I moved south, I’ve wanted to be Bubba. Couldn’t you have let it go for a few minutes? Let me live my fantasy?”