Local Girls

by Jenny O'Connell

  Last year I went out with Robbie Pratt for about five months. It started in October, a few weeks after Poppy’s funeral. Mona had come and gone and all of a sudden it felt all too real, my junior year without her, the days growing shorter and darker and colder, as if I needed a reminder that my junior year was looking pretty bleak. So when Robbie asked me to the movies with him and a few others, I took him up on the offer. It was better than sitting at home watching Lexi and Bart flip through their wedding album for the four hundredth time. Or watching the wedding video, complete with the theme song from Dirty Dancing. Fast-forward four months and Robbie and I were still together. It wasn’t exactly perfect—I mean the guy got me a word-a-day calendar for Christmas—but things were good. We hung out after hockey games, and I’m not going to lie, with his hair all sweaty and matted from playing right wing on the varsity team, he was cute. So between ordering college catalogs, preparing for the SAT, and counting the weeks until daylight savings time started, I was busy.

  After four months together, I knew where we were headed. It was February, after all, and there wasn’t a whole lot to do on the weekends except drive around and find a place to park. And I liked Robbie, I really did, but when it came right down to it, I thought, this is it? A car? Did I really want to look back on my first time and remember the seat belt digging into my side and the crushed Coke can on the floor mat? No. And that’s where the glossy brochures did me in. I wanted the canopy bed. I wanted to look up and see beautifully crafted lace, not a cracked interior light that blinked when Robbie turned on the windshield wipers. It was the wrong person and the wrong time and the wrong place.

  So Robbie and I broke up, because if there was one thing I’d learned from Lexi, it was that if you find the right guy, it doesn’t matter that he leaves the cap off the Selsun Blue bottle every single morning of his life. Well, either that or I’d learned that I was way less forgiving than my sister. In any case, I was not going to lose my virginity under that cracked interior light, no matter how many times Robbie told me I should just consider it mood lighting or simply close my eyes.

  “Kendra! Are you up there?” Shelby yelled up the stairwell.

  I hopped off the bed, smoothed out the comforter, and went to the door. But not before turning around one last time to take it all in.

  “Coming!” I yelled, and then turned my back to the bed and left room 12.

  Shelby was waiting for me at the bottom of the stairwell, although I wasn’t even sure it was her. For the first time since I’d met her, I could actually see her hair. And she wasn’t wearing jeans and a T-shirt. She was wearing a khaki skirt and a white Willow Inn polo shirt.

  “Oh my God, what happened to you?” I asked when I reached her. “Where’s your bandana, you actually have hair!”

  “I swear, I’m this close to telling Wendy no more weddings.”

  I knew she was just talking crap. There was no way Wendy would turn down a bridal party, and there was no way Shelby would ever tell her to. That morning, when Shelby surprised the bride with homemade Maine blueberry sauce to go with her blueberry buttermilk pancakes, you’d have thought she’d actually traveled to Maine to get the blueberries, the way everyone acted. When she went into the dining room to see how they liked their meal, the entire wedding party applauded her. Actual applause for some pancakes and fruit. Shelby would never give that up, no matter how many bells we had to arrange on the side table.

  “Why are you dressed like that?”

  “They’re having preceremony cocktails in the garden and yours truly has been recruited to play server.”

  “I could have done it,” I told her, wondering why Wendy didn’t ask me.

  “No, you can’t. You have to be eighteen to serve alcohol and they’re having champagne.”

  Shelby looked miserable and I felt like it was my fault for being born too late.

  “I’m sorry,” I offered, even though I was sure it was no consolation to Shelby.

  “Whatever.” She glanced at her watch and let out a frustrated breath. “I have to go downstairs to the storage room and find the champagne glasses.”

  She started walking away and I watched her from behind, still thoroughly blown away by the sight of her in a khaki skirt.

  “We’re still on for Morning Glory Farm tomorrow, right?” I asked right before she took the corner toward the basement stairs.

  She stopped and turned to face me. “Be here at noon on the dot. I’m not waiting for you.”

  “I’ll be here,” I told her. “See you tomorrow, Shelby.”

  “See you tomorrow, Kendra.”

  When I left the inn I didn’t head to the Church Street bus stop as usual. I had other plans that afternoon, and they included some research at the library. There had to be archived issues of the Vineyard Gazette there, and if Mona’s father had been in town for the regatta, then there would definitely be articles about the race in the paper, maybe some photos of the crews with their boats. It was a long shot, but I was sure I’d recognize him.

  Main Street was packed with families, kids running ahead of parents with bags of fudge from Murdick’s clenched in their little hands. Island Wheels was on my way to the library, so I thought I’d stop by and see Ryan, see if Henry had come by again. And maybe find out if Henry had mentioned anything about what happened on the ghost tour.

  As I turned the corner toward the bike shop I stopped in my tracks, so fast, in fact, the couple I was in front of walked right into me.

  They apologized, even though it was my fault, but getting plowed into by a sixty-year-old couple wasn’t what had me standing dumbstruck in the middle of the sidewalk. It was Mona, standing in front of the candy store. She was alone, and from the way she kept glancing at her watch it was obvious she was waiting for someone. Even though I obviously knew she was on the island, seeing her standing there still caught me by surprise. And the thing was I shouldn’t have been surprised. I’d seen her in front of the candy shop a million times before; we’d even meet each other there sometimes because we could get a bag of Sour Patch Kids before wandering around town. So I guess what surprised me even more than finding her there was that I realized for the first time how I’d gotten used to not seeing her around.

  Maybe she’d gone to see Robbie at Island Wheels to ask about Kevin. Maybe she’d realized that the people she’d left behind were worth holding on to. If it was this time last summer, she would have been waiting for me.

  Mona glanced out over the harbor and I wondered why she’d never put it together, the races and the sailing. Or even why she never tried harder to find her dad, instead preferring the idea of him going to the effort of finding her.

  Mona waved in my direction, and I was about to wave back when I noticed she wasn’t actually looking at me but past me. She didn’t even see me! I twisted around and saw four girls coming toward me, each of them lined up across the sidewalk, the people in their path parting like the Red Sea to let them through.

  I stepped back into the bike store’s entrance and turned to face the window, cupping my hands as if peering inside to get a better look at the offering of mountain bikes. When I heard the voices that I recognized from the beach approach, I held my breath and closed my eyes, hoping they didn’t see me. The last thing I needed was Mona’s Boston friends checking me out in my yellow and khaki with a few blueberry stains thrown in for good measure.

  It took just a few seconds for them to pass by without even noticing me, and when I looked up at where Mona had been standing, there were five girls walking together, each step in unison as they headed toward the entrance to the yacht club.

  A knock right near my forehead startled me.

  “Kendra, what are you doing here?” Ryan asked, standing on the other side of the window, his voice muted by the glass between us.

  “Just looking,” I told him, stepping back from the window and waving good-bye. Only I didn’t leave. I stood on the sidewalk watching the heavy wooden door to the yacht club close behind Mona, the M
EMBERS ONLY sign reminding me that Mona now had access to places I’d never be able to go.

  I turned away from the harbor, staring down the street toward the library, standing right in the middle of the sidewalk as shoppers tried to navigate around me, brushing me with their shoulders so I’d get the hint to move out of the way.

  Was it even worth it? I wondered. So what if I could actually spot Mona’s father in a picture, discover his name in the caption below, find out where he lived? The space between me and Mona, between the life she was moving toward and the place I was stuck, seemed to grow every day we didn’t speak. If it wasn’t for Henry, I doubted I’d even feel like she was on the island at all.

  Even if finding her dad didn’t make Mona realize I was truly the person who understood her better than anyone else, that we shared something those girls from Boston couldn’t even comprehend, at least I’d know I tried to give her the one thing she’d always wanted.

  Maybe showing Mona who her dad was would make her remember where she came from, maybe even make her realize that even though she lived in Malcolm’s house on Atlantic Drive, she was still just the girl from Dover Lane. And if that’s all it did, I’d probably believe it was worth every minute I spent inhaling musty old newsprint.

  I’d been hoping there would be something online, which is why I’d tried to avoid coming down to the library by using our computer at home. But the Gazette’s online archives only went back a few months, which obviously didn’t do me any good. I’d Googled a few terms—twenty meter, Martha’s Vineyard, regatta—and dates, but I couldn’t find anything even remotely helpful. There was no photo of a guy who looked similar to Mona or Henry.

  Which is why the reference desk was sort of my last hope.

  “Can I help you?” the librarian asked.

  “Yes, I’d like to see the archives for the Vineyard Gazette.”

  “How far back do you need to go?” she asked, coming out from behind the desk.

  “Seventeen years,” I answered, and followed her to the reference section, where she pulled out neatly folded papers placed inside clear plastic binders.

  “Is that it?” she asked before leaving me alone with the binders.

  “I think so, thanks.”

  It was instantly apparent I was the only person interested in seventeen-year-old news. The paper had become yellow and almost translucent over time, the ink bleeding through the pages so that the words appeared again, only backward, when I peeled the sheets apart. I wasn’t interested in the articles so much as I was the pictures, and for the most part, they were still pretty clear.

  I started with the issue from the first week of August and worked my way through the entire month. There were plenty of articles about local politics and fishing contests and activities for visitors, even an article on the regatta, but the photo that accompanied it showed six boats sailing out of the harbor, their canvas sails billowing out in the wind.

  I started to realize it was probably useless, after an hour spent reading my horoscope from every week that year. Even if I did recognize him, some young guy on the deck of a sailboat, the spitting image of Henry standing on the dock, or a boy with dark hair and light coloring hoisting a silver cup over his head, what would I really prove to Mona? That I had excellent research skills? That I’d managed to do something she couldn’t because she spent her Saturday afternoons at the yacht club while I looked through yellowed newspapers and inhaled seventeen-year-old dust? That my need to remind Mona of who she was had become more important than Mona’s desire to discover who she is?

  I stacked the old papers into a pile, slipped them into the plastic binders, and hoisted them back onto the archive shelves. But before I gave up there was one more thing I could do, one more place to try. And it required getting past that MEMBERS ONLY sign.

  Chapter 14

  The next day, at twelve o’clock on the dot, I was sitting on the steps of the Willow waiting for Shelby. It was weird to be there without actually going inside, putting on my apron and getting down to work. Most of the time when I was serving I forgot that there was a whole other world outside the inn, that while we were making lunches and delivering newspapers to rooms and fulfilling special requests for extra-firm pillows, people were walking by the Willow thinking it was just some sweet bed-and-breakfast with a great porch. And it was a great porch, but there was way more to running the inn than just making sure the rocking chairs didn’t have any bird crap on them and that the front flowers were watered.

  At ten after twelve Shelby still hadn’t arrived and I wondered if she’d forgotten about me. I’d used my afternoon with Shelby as an excuse when I told Lexi I couldn’t come by the deli today. That morning she’d tried to guilt me into visiting, maybe even getting behind the counter to help out around lunchtime, which was going on as I sat there on the porch on my butt, not doing anything remotely resembling strenuous.

  Sure, I was curious about the deli, how my mom’s curtains had finally turned out after she decided to ditch the coordinated tiebacks and go with the simple denim valences Lexi and my dad preferred. Bart didn’t have an opinion about the window treatments, and I’d noticed that for the most part he deferred to Lexi and my dad on most matters. But when Bart did speak up they listened to him, like when Lexi suggested they start serving smoothies and Bart was dead set against it, saying the last thing they needed during the lunch crush was to be standing over a blender while the line of hungry customers continued to grow. Because apparently that’s what had been happening during peak hours, the line extending out the front door until it snaked along the sidewalk, people pressing their noses up to the window as they tried to read the large blackboard Lexi had the construction crew hang on the back wall, the sandwich descriptions written in colored chalk.

  The blackboard menu was Lexi’s idea, and even I had to admit it made sense. First of all, if the deli ran out of something or decided to try a new sandwich, all Lexi had to do was write it on the board or erase it with the gray flannel eraser she’d ordered from a school supply company. Second of all, Lexi had great even, round handwriting, something she inherited from my mom, whereas my handwriting was more like my dad’s, sort of lopsided and narrow and scratchy. In eighth grade Lexi almost ran for class secretary, thinking the position simply required neat handwriting, because that’s what a secretary did, right? Take notes on a legal pad. She decided to withdraw her candidacy when she discovered the position required attending meetings, hitting deadlines, and pretty much taking orders from the president, who eventually ended up being a girl Lexi couldn’t stand, so it was probably for the best.

  Lexi had a track record of big ideas and little follow-through, which included the paper route she started but never managed to finish (I guess the Gazette didn’t remember all the customer complaints when, four years later, Lexi applied for the receptionist position), the bedroom that remained half pink, half yellow after Lexi decided maybe repainting her room wasn’t such a great idea after all (my mom ended up finishing it while she was at school one day), and the Christmas she decided to knit us all gifts, only to discover knitting wasn’t exactly her forte (she ended up giving me a king-size Snickers bar instead). But even I had to admit that, after almost three weeks, the deli seemed to be going okay so far.

  Right before the deli finally opened, I overheard my mom talking to my dad in their bedroom. Her voice was hushed and serious and my dad was silent as he listened to her suggest that, maybe, it might make sense for him to go back to the post office. My dad didn’t answer right away, probably considering the odds of the deli ever succeeding without him and my mom there to help Lexi and Bart. Obviously they decided to table the option, because as far as I knew it was never brought up to Lexi, and my dad never put on his U.S. Postal Service–issued navy blue pants and light blue shirt with his name embroidered on the front pocket. Standing there outside their room, though, holding my breath so they couldn’t hear me during the stretch of silence while my mom and I waited for his answer, I realized
for the first time that maybe I wasn’t the only one who doubted the Pot Belly Deli would get off the ground. Or that if it did, it wouldn’t end up like so many other Vineyard businesses, with a FOR LEASE sign taped in the window at the end of the season. Maybe that’s why my parents didn’t pressure me to work at the deli or visit on my days off, like Lexi did. Maybe they were trying to insulate me from the possibility that my entire family had made a huge, disastrous decision.

  If Shelby didn’t show up I could always walk over to Winter Street and surprise them all. Lexi would be so thrilled she’d probably name a sandwich after me (her new thing was to give each sandwich its own special name, so a warm tuna wrap with cheddar, red onions, and tomato was now a Hot Tuna Meltdown). The night before, Lexi was debating whether her own namesake sandwich should be served on a whole wheat bialy or stuffed into a pita pocket. This had become the level of conversation in my house.

  God, I hoped Shelby showed up.

  Thankfully, before I was forced to decide between the deli and going home to an empty house, a car pulled up to the curb and beeped its horn.

  I got up off the step and went to meet Shelby.

  “So what were you planning to forget for tomorrow?” I asked, getting into the car.

  “I don’t know,” she answered, putting the car into drive. “You’ll just have to wait and see, won’t you.”

  It was a quick ride to Morning Glory Farm and in less than ten minutes Shelby and I were browsing the baskets of fresh fruit, looking for just the right berries for the coming week’s crepes. You’d have thought she was a food inspector the way Shelby picked up each basket, checked to make sure the good berries on top weren’t merely masquerading a bunch of smushed brown ones on the bottom, and then made a mental note of the contents’ condition before moving on.

  “I went to the library yesterday to look up old issues of the Gazette,” I told her after she’d passed up four baskets in a row.