A Curve in the Road

by Julianne MacLean

  He lets me know he’ll call as soon as he’s finished classes.

  I pass the hours by taking Winston for a walk and picking up a few groceries at the store. While I push the shopping cart, I practice what I plan to say to my son.

  Briefly, I consider making up some silly story about going on a trip down south for spring break or something. Anything other than what I know I must tell him. I flip-flop like a flounder on a wharf, tempted to throw myself back into the sea of hidden truths where I’ve been living for the past year. But I know I can’t do that. Everything is different now. Yesterday, I learned something that will affect the rest of Zack’s life, so I can’t pretend that it’s in his best interest to keep him in the dark any longer. I also know that I can’t protect him from pain. Pain is part of life, and we have to deal with it when it comes.

  But sometimes, a flicker of light can emerge from the darkest, most unexpected tragedies.

  My cell phone rings just before dinner. My mother gives me a sympathetic look because she knows what I’m about to tell my son, and she understands how difficult it is for me to destroy the memory of his perfect, fairy-tale life.

  But it wasn’t perfect. Life never is. Alan and I did our best, but occasionally we messed up. We made mistakes. It’s time I have enough faith in my son to admit that to him.

  I get up from the table to answer the phone. Winston follows me upstairs into my bedroom, where I close the door. He jumps up on the bed and lies down next to me. As he watches me with those glistening brown eyes, I know there can be no more lies.

  I take a deep breath and tell Zack everything—that his father was unfaithful to me in the last few years of our marriage and that he was having an affair with a woman from Lunenburg. I reveal how I found out—that Paula called Alan’s cell phone in the hospital, and I eventually connected the dots.

  Zack remains silent, and my heart pounds with dread.

  When he finally speaks, there’s a mixture of anger and hurt in his voice. “Mom. How could you have kept this from me?”

  My insides tremble and quake, and part of me regrets that I didn’t tell him right away. Maybe I should have trusted that he was strong enough to handle it.

  Another part of me knows that I wasn’t ready for that until now. I needed to come to terms with everything myself. The situation needed time to unfold, and I needed to understand that maybe sometimes we go through life seeing only what we want to see. With Alan, I saw a perfect husband, a gifted doctor, and a loving father. That’s what Zack saw too. But there was so much more to Alan than that. Deep down he was still that young, wounded boy who had lost his mother and all the love she once gave. He harbored deep, painful fears. He was terribly afraid of losing the people he loved most. He wasn’t perfect.

  “I’m so sorry,” I say to Zack, “but I didn’t really understand why your father did what he did, and maybe I still don’t—not completely. Either way, I had no answers for you, no explanations to offer. And I wanted to protect you. I didn’t want to cause you pain or confuse you, and the last thing I wanted was for you to grow up hating your dad. That would have been wrong because he loved you more than anything.”

  “I loved him too,” Zack shakily replies. “I thought he was the best father in the world, which is why I can’t believe he could have done that.”

  “I can’t believe it either,” I say. “Even after a year, but here we are.” Winston rolls to his side, and I stroke his belly. “Please, just remember that he was a good father, and for that I’ll always love him. I hope you can still love him too.”

  Zack is silent for a moment. “I don’t know how you’re able to forgive him.”

  “I’m not sure that I have,” I explain. “Not completely, because sometimes I still feel angry, but then I remember that he gave me you, and I’m glad I married him. I have no regrets about that.”

  It’s a monstrous statement, and it feels good to say it. To truly believe it.

  Zack says nothing, so I find myself quoting Nathan as I attempt to explain how I’ve managed to get through the past year. “Time helps, Zack. I promise it will get easier. The anger fades. So does the pain.”

  I hear Zack sniffing. “What made you decide to tell me this now, after all this time? Why not just keep it secret forever? Part of me wishes you had.”

  “Believe me, I have struggled with that over the past year. I didn’t like hiding something from you. It felt dishonest.” I clear my throat. “But things change. And now, there’s a very important reason why you need to know. I just learned about it yesterday.”

  “What is it?”

  As Winston lies beside me, I stroke his silky coat and gather my resolve. “The woman your father was seeing . . . she . . .” My heart races, but I force myself to continue. “She had a baby. A son. Which means you have a half brother.”

  There is nothing but silence on the other end of the line, and my chest feels like it’s going to explode.

  “I have a brother?” Zack finally asks. “A baby brother?”

  “Yes,” I reply. “I saw a picture of him, and he looks exactly like you when you were a baby.”

  Zack pauses, and I’m not sure what he’s going to say. When he finally speaks, it’s in a breathless, husky voice. “I can’t believe it. I have a brother. It’s unbelievable.”

  “A miracle, really.”

  Zack laughs softly. “A miracle.” I listen to the sound of him breathing. “Can I meet him?”

  I close my eyes and feel a tremendous wave of relief to have shared the truth with him at last. Somehow, I know that he’s going to be okay. We both are. There are no more secrets between us.

  And I feel absolutely certain—without a doubt—that I did the right thing today. I feel as if I’ve finally emerged from the darkness into the light.

  After I end the call with Zack, I sit for a moment, basking in a welcome sense of calm. I relish it for a little while. Then I pick up my phone again and call Nathan.

  “Hi,” I say. “I don’t suppose you’re free right now.”

  “I can be,” he replies. “I’m all done in the clinic for the day, just tidying up a few files, and my parents are making supper for the girls. What’s up?”

  “Would you like to meet me on the wharf? I have something I’d love to share with you. It’s about Zack and that impossible conversation I’ve been avoiding all year.”

  Nathan knows everything about it, of course. He’s been my sounding board since the beginning. “Wow. I can be there in fifteen minutes.”

  “Great. I’ll bring Winston. You can bring Dorothy and the girls if you want to.”

  “No, I think I’ll just bring myself tonight, if it’s all the same to you.”

  Secretly, I’m pleased to hear it because there’s so much to talk about, and on top of that, I’ve been fantasizing about being alone with Nathan ever since that sweet, teasing kiss on my mother’s porch last week.

  “Okay. I’ll see you on the boardwalk. I’ll be waiting in front of the museum.”

  “I’m on my way.”

  I see Nathan from a distance, walking toward me in faded blue jeans, a black turtleneck sweater, and a brown leather jacket. The setting sun illuminates his face, and anticipation bubbles up inside me, because I’ve been imagining this moment and so many other scenarios with the two of us together. Now, here we are.

  “Hi,” he says as he reaches me and bends to pat Winston on the head. “Hi to you too, big guy. How’s it going?”

  Winston wags his tail, and Nathan straightens to meet my gaze. I feel a rush of excitement in my blood.

  “Thanks for coming. Should we walk?” I gesture toward the other end of the boardwalk.

  “Sure.”

  We start off at a leisurely pace together, side by side, while Winston trots out front.

  “I hope you didn’t mind my calling,” I say, “but I felt so good about my conversation with Zack I couldn’t keep it in.”

  “What happened? The suspense is killing me.”


  I glance up at the sky, then give Nathan a full recap of everything Zack and I talked about. It takes me a while to get through it all, and by the time I’m done, Nathan and I have taken a seat on a bench overlooking the water.

  “It sounds like he took it well,” Nathan says, relaxing his arm along the back of the bench. “You must feel so good about that, Abbie. It must be a huge relief.”

  “It is.” I tilt my head to the side to rest it on his shoulder. He rubs the back of my neck and kisses the top of my head. I remain there for a moment with my eyes closed, relishing his calm, comforting presence.

  I inhale deeply and sit up straight again. “I’m glad he took it well, but it’s probably going to take some time for him to fully process it. He was disappointed in his dad, which makes me feel proud, actually—that he has a sense of honor and knows how important it is to be faithful in a marriage.”

  “He sounds like a great kid, Abbie.”

  “He definitely is.”

  Above us and around us, seagulls call out to one another as they soar over the fishing boats moored at the docks. I breathe in the salty scent of the harbor and want desperately to reach for Nathan’s hand and hold it, because I feel joyful and enraptured, but something holds me back. Shyness, I suppose. It’s been a long time since I’ve been with a man like this. Life with Alan was so comfortable for so many years. There were never any feelings of nervousness between us physically.

  I realize it’s been ages since I’ve been touched.

  “So what will you do now?” Nathan asks.

  I let out a deep breath. “Somehow, I’ll have to figure out how to take the next step, because Zack wants to meet Paula’s son, but he’s back at school now. I’ll have to contact her, I suppose, and arrange a time. Zack has midterms coming up, but he said he didn’t want to wait until Christmas. I told him I’d be happy to fly him home on points for the long weekend in November, if he wants.”

  Nathan does the very thing I was tempted to do just now. He reaches for my hand, turns it over in his, and studies my open palm. “I think you’re doing the right thing, Abbie.”

  I feel a warm glow inside me. “Yes, I think so too. It feels good to finally have everything out in the open with Zack. I feel closer to him now—like he knows the real me, not just the perfect parent I always tried to be in his eyes.”

  Except that I haven’t shared everything with Zack. He knows nothing about what’s happening here at this moment, between Nathan and me.

  One step at a time, I tell myself.

  “I’m glad you called me,” Nathan says, raising my hand to his lips and kissing the back of it.

  Light from the setting sun reflects in the blue of his eyes, and I feel an intense wave of happiness. I sense that he feels it too, and we lean toward each other. Our foreheads touch. We sit like that for a blissful moment, eyes closed, our hands entwined. My heart swells with yearning.

  There is a tremor inside me, the beginnings of a sea change that I am more than ready to welcome into my life. I know, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that this will be an exciting and satisfying new journey.

  Nathan’s lips touch mine in a deep and sultry kiss, and I melt at the sensation of his hand gently cupping the rim of my jaw. All my senses begin to hum. I feel as if I’ve known this man forever and I’ve been waiting for him. For this day.

  We slowly draw back. The corner of his mouth curls up in a small grin that fills me with delight.

  “I’ve been wanting to do that for a very long time,” he says.

  “Me too,” I reply breathlessly.

  “Really? I wasn’t sure.”

  I nod my head with exaggeration. “Oh, you can be sure, Nathan. Very sure.”

  He gives me that dazzling smile I love. It makes me feel like a schoolgirl again.

  “Okay then,” he says, still grinning.

  We sit back and hold hands like a couple of teenagers, until Winston gets restless on the end of his leash.

  “I think he wants to go forth and sniff something.” I laugh as I allow him to pull me to my feet.

  Nathan stands up as well and walks with us. The sun is just setting, and the pink-and-blue sky is spectacular over the western horizon. The air is fragrant with the saltiness of the sea mixed with the scent of fallen leaves, and I breathe it all in, every last gorgeous bit of it.

  A few weeks later, I meet Zack at the airport at noon on a Saturday because he has an important dinner engagement that evening—at the home of Paula Sheridan and her mother.

  I called to let Paula know that Zack was interested in meeting her son. She was overjoyed to hear it, so I paid them a visit to meet the boy myself and discuss when Zack should come.

  What a surprise it was to meet Paula’s son and feel such joy when I held him in my arms. He was a sweet baby, and he reminded me of Zack at that age. But why wouldn’t he? They were half brothers.

  And yet their lives would be so very different. Zack grew up with a father who loved him deeply from the moment he took his first breath.

  Adam would never know his father.

  And Alan would never get to meet this beautiful child of his.

  I bounced gently at the knees and listened to Adam coo. Then it all came rushing back—the tremendous delights and challenges of motherhood—and I couldn’t help but feel happy for Paula, despite everything.

  Now I am with Zack, driving home from the airport along the picturesque Lighthouse Route, past countless coves and inlets and sandy beaches where the ocean plays upon the rugged coastline. Winston is riding in the back seat, and I’m listening to Zack speak passionately about his classes and potential career plans. I notice that he’s wearing his father’s watch, which makes me happy.

  Then he brings up a girl he has just started dating. “You’d like her, Mom. She’s gorgeous and smart and confident, and she loves dogs.”

  I glance across at him and can see how smitten he is. It’s written all over his face. “I hope I’ll get to meet her sometime.”

  Zack never had much time for girls in high school. For the most part, he thought they were silly and frivolous, but he tells me there’s something different about this girl. Her name is Sarah, and his eyes light up when he talks about her.

  Soon we approach Hubbards Beach, and I flick the blinker.

  “Where are we going?” Zack asks, confused by this unexpected detour.

  I keep my eyes focused on the turn. “There’s someone I’d like you to say hello to. A friend of mine.”

  “Who is it?”

  “Do you remember Dr. Payne? The veterinarian who took care of Winston last year?”

  “Of course.”

  I follow the narrow road to the beach entrance and continue to explain. “Well, he’s here today with his family and their new golden retriever, Dorothy. Although she’s not really new. She’s a senior dog they adopted. She and Winston have become great pals.”

  I pull to a halt in the empty parking lot, and we get out of the vehicle. Zack lets Winston out of the back seat, and I lead the way down to the sandy beach, where Nathan is picnicking on this chilly November afternoon with his parents and daughters, and Dorothy of course, who is galloping down the beach, chasing a tennis ball.

  Zack and I approach their blanket, and Zack recognizes Nathan as he gets up and walks to meet us.

  “Dr. Payne, it’s nice to see you again,” Zack says. “It’s been a while. How have you been?”

  They shake hands. “Good, thanks. How about you?”

  “Can’t complain.”

  Nathan nods. “Your mom tells me you’re at Western this year. How has that been so far?”

  “Great. Loving every minute.” Zack gestures toward Dorothy, who’s chasing the ball again. “Mom was just telling me about your new dog.”

  Nathan turns to watch her too. “Yes, her name is Dorothy. She’s old but still young at heart, as you can see.”

  We all watch Dorothy kick up sand as she fetches the ball. Then she and Winston greet each other with gust
o.

  Soon, Zack, Nathan, and I are walking together to the water’s edge, where Jen and Marie are making a big fuss over Winston.

  “These are my two daughters,” Nathan says to Zack. “Jen and Marie, say hello to Abbie’s son, Zack. He just flew in from Ontario. He’s going to school there.”

  Zack kneels down. “Hey. I love your dog. She looks just like mine.”

  “They could be twins, right?” Marie replies.

  The three of them pat and stroke Dorothy and Winston, and they laugh as Winston flops over and rolls in the sand like a big show-off.

  Without saying a word, Nathan reaches for my hand. Love courses through me as I turn my head to gaze into his eyes.

  Then I glance back at Zack, and I realize he’s watching us as he scratches behind Dorothy’s ears.

  I’m uncertain for a second, but my grown-up son smiles and nods his head at me, as if to say, It’s all good, Mom. I’m glad you’re happy.

  In that moment, I believe with all my heart that everything is going to be okay for all of us. Just like the waves that keep rolling onto the beach, happiness may recede sometimes, but then it comes back. It always comes back.

  BOOK CLUB DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

  The novel opens with the following passage: “Intuition is a funny thing. Sometimes it’s a gut feeling, and you look around and just know something bad is about to happen. Other times, it’s elusive, and later you find yourself looking back on certain events and wondering how in the world you missed all the signals.” Discuss Abbie’s state of denial in the first chapter, before she is run off the road. How effective, or ineffective, was her intuition?

  In chapter 12, do you feel that Abbie should have taken Zack’s phone away from him to shield him from the news coverage about his father’s accident? What would you have done in that situation? Discuss how this approach differs from her later approach, when she wants to shield him from his father’s extramarital affair. Why is this different? Or is it? If you were in Abbie’s shoes, would you have told your son about your husband’s infidelity? Why or why not?