Haven Point

by Virginia Hume

  “Yes, and I think she had begun to reconcile her feelings about Haven Point. It was mostly an existential question, when she asked why Charlie died, but she seemed to have relinquished the idea that this place was to blame. She loved it here, Skye. Until the day we lost Charlie, she truly loved Haven Point.”

  “I believed her, though,” Skye said. “About Haven Point, I mean.”

  “She was persuasive. She had to be, to convince herself. And make no mistake. Haven Point has its flaws, of course it does. But while it might not be the magic that some pretend, there was never really the rot she claimed either. You can make a case against anyone, against anything, if you choose to.”

  Skye nodded.

  “For years, it saddened me that we took such opposite lessons from Charlie’s death. Annie blamed Haven Point, while Charlie’s death helped me see this place for what it is—just a bunch of human beings with all their sins and flaws, trying to create some community. It taught me, as Auden said in that poem, ‘to love my crooked neighbors with all my crooked heart.’”

  “Do you think Mom would have eventually told me all this herself?”

  “I do. She was still trying to work through her feelings, but I feel certain she would have. The provision in her will said either of us could scatter the ashes. So, at the very least, we know she was prepared to outlive me.…” Gran stopped and closed her eyes. When she opened them, she continued, her voice shaky. “Had I died first it would have fallen to you. She was hard to understand at times, but it would not have been like her to leave some puzzle for you to decode.”

  “No, she wasn’t exactly an international woman of mystery,” Skye said with a smile. “In the end, it was left to you to tell me, though. I’m sorry. And thank you.”

  “Well, save your thanks, because there’s one more thing I’d like to say,” Gran said, a warning look in her eye.

  “What’s that?” Skye braced herself.

  “The other day, when we were discussing your job, you referred to the chaos you grew up with. I agreed with what you said, and I still do, but I do think you have conflated some things in your mind.”

  “Like what?”

  “I think, Skye, you experienced your mother’s creativity and passion, her disorganization and chaos, and her drinking as one big mess.”

  “Wasn’t it?”

  “I don’t think so. The chaos? That was garden variety Anne Demarest. Your mother always ignored what bored her. But she went after what interested her, hammer and tong. Her art was not a symptom of some pathology. It was the truest thing about her. Until that last year when she struggled so much, she never stopped learning and creating.”

  “That’s true,” Skye conceded.

  “Here’s why it’s important for you to know this.” Gran took her hand. “You got all the good, Skye. You have her humor and her intelligence. And you have her creativity, even if yours runs in another direction. But you got none of the bad. Your life will never be like hers, like what you experienced growing up.” Gran paused and looked at her closely. “That was never the danger.”

  “The danger is my overcompensating?” She stiffened a bit, but mostly as a reflex. For once she felt like she might be able to hear what Gran was saying without defensiveness.

  “Well, I don’t know if there is any danger, per se. Remember your mom’s expression? ‘Everything depends on the quality and direction of light.’”

  Skye nodded.

  “I think if you tilt the prism a little, you might find it freeing.”

  The sound of the kitchen door announced Georgie had arrived for lunch. Gran patted her hand and went inside.

  Skye stayed on the porch and considered what Gran had said. It was true that when Skye thought about her mom, especially in recent years, she had placed “Anne Demarest, the artist” in the darkest part of the picture, the occlusion shadow. If she walked around to another side and cast a warmer light on the subject, she might see the beauty again, and perhaps consider what was possible in her own life.

  Possible. Skye had always struggled to understand why people attached such positive meaning to that word. When Skye considered what was possible, it was to war-game every conceivable outcome, to get in front of the worst-case scenario.

  Could she completely exorcise her anxiety about work? Probably not, but for the first time in as long as she could remember, she felt a sense of possibility that was infused with at least as much hope as fear.

  * * *

  Haven Pointers who lived within an easy drive were pouring in to help overwhelmed caretakers. When Ben returned from Bath, he and Skye headed to the country club to lend a hand.

  It was jarring to see what the storm had wrought beyond Fourwinds’s yard. So much gravel had washed off of Haven Point Road, it looked more like a donkey path. As they passed one of the entrances to the sanctuary, Skye peered in and saw that a huge swath down the middle was a skeleton of its former self, treetops cut clean off as if scalped, branches jagged and leafless. It looked like something from a picture in a fairy tale after a witch casts a terrible spell. When they reached the Ballantines’ house, Skye stopped and gasped.

  “Oh no.” A massive tree had crushed Mrs. Ballantine’s lovely garden gate. Almost nothing was left of the roses she had painstakingly trained over its top. The few remaining blossoms peeked pathetically from under a huge branch.

  As they walked onto the country club property, a truck full of lumber turned onto the grounds. A sign on its side read DONNELLY CONSTRUCTION.

  They got marching orders from Georgie, who was manning phones and sending people out to various houses. They spent the next few hours at Ben’s grandmother’s house and in several others, taking photographs and doing what they could to prevent further damage in advance of insurance adjusters and repairmen: mopping and sweeping, covering broken windows, and moving valuables from exposed places.

  When they were done, they walked back on the beach in the direction of Fourwinds. It was calm this evening, as if the sea were tired from the previous night’s ordeal. Before they reached the beach club, they stopped and hoisted themselves onto the sea wall to watch as the setting sun painted gold onto the water and rocks.

  “You love it here, don’t you?” Skye asked, watching Ben’s face as he took in the scene. “All the traditions, the families coming back year after year?”

  “I do. I mean, Haven Point’s ridiculously homogenous, but it’s beautiful, and I have my family and a lot of friends here.”

  “Wait, what did you just say?”

  “What? About family and friends?”

  “No, before that.”

  “Oh, that it’s homogenous?”

  “Yes.” Skye began to laugh. “So … you know that?”

  “Kind of hard not to,” Ben said, looking at her a little quizzically. “These summer communities are all still pretty Waspy. It won’t happen overnight, but I know a lot of people our age would like that to change.”

  “They would?”

  “Of course,” Ben said, as if this were obvious. “I understand, though. Haven Point isn’t for everyone. I gather your mother didn’t like it here.”

  Skye waited a moment before responding. “That’s not completely true, actually.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Gran started telling me some things this week, about my mother and this place, and I’ve learned it wasn’t quite so simple.”

  He was quiet, offering an opening, but he wouldn’t probe. Skye finally felt safe, though, loosening the reins of her story.

  She began at the beginning and told him everything—about Gran and her uncle Charlie, about her mother’s refusal to return to Fourwinds, about the request in her will about her ashes. Ben was kind, curious.

  “I’m surprised I hadn’t heard this either, with all the gossip around here,” he said, when she had finished.

  “I guess it was an unwritten rule.” Skye was amazed herself by that detail, that everyone, even Harriet, had kept to an unspoken ag
reement. “People talk to Gran about Charlie all the time. They keep the memory of his life alive, but they rarely talk about how he died.”

  “You know, my dad didn’t come here for a long time either,” Ben said.

  “Really?”

  “Yeah. My grandparents’ marriage was awful. And, well, you know my grandmother. My father hated her judgment, how she kept his sister, my aunt Polly, under her thumb. Everyone thought he was a cheerful kid, but I think he was in a lot of pain.”

  As Skye listened, she was struck by how much her own perspective had been warped by shame. She had been shocked to hear that Steven Barrows had a drug problem, astonished to discover she had hurt Ben when they were teenagers, and was again surprised to learn about his father’s painful childhood. She had been so busy feeling ashamed, trying to get out in front of other people’s assumptions about her, she never stopped to think she might be making assumptions about them.

  “When did he start coming back here?”

  “When he and my mom started dating. He said it took him by surprise, but he suddenly realized how much he wanted to show her Haven Point. It held so much of his history; not just his or his parents’, but his grandparents’ and great-grandparents’. I guess I feel the same way, even after all this stuff with Steven. Good and bad, it’s part of my history, too,” Ben said.

  History. His story.

  Skye had never felt she had any claim to Haven Point. With her genetic mystery dad, alcoholic mom, and offbeat childhood, she thought she didn’t belong among these shiny, perfect people.

  But they weren’t shiny and perfect. She didn’t know exactly what it meant to her, but for the first time, she saw that Haven Point was part of her history, her story, too.

  “What’s the plan for your mother’s ashes?” Ben asked.

  “I’m not sure,” Skye said. “Gran said we could figure something out tomorrow.”

  “I’ve got our little outboard on a trailer. I can put it back in the water,” Ben said. “You all might want this to be private, but if it would help, I could take you all out.”

  “Actually, that would be nice, thank you.”

  They didn’t speak for a while. The only sound was Ben’s foot gently kicking the sea wall. A pleasant tension hung between them.

  “I don’t mean to jump the gun here, Skye,” he said finally. “But I hope this works, you and me.”

  “Me, too,” Skye said. She suddenly felt a little shy.

  Ben hopped off the wall, lifted her down, and kissed her, a kiss unlike any before, one that felt like a promise. Then they continued down the beach as the sun began to set and the sea grew copper.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  MAREN

  As Ben navigated around the point, Maren looked up and remembered her first impression of Haven Point, how the houses appeared to be standing guard. And there was Fourwinds, a grizzled old soldier: its foundation uneven and shingles faded, but still standing strong.

  Maren had not told Skye that Fourwinds would be hers someday. She had decided it was not necessary. It was lovely, of course, imagining Skye holding on to the house, carrying on the Demarest tradition. For now, though, it was enough that Skye knew the truth about her mother and Haven Point. Once she had more time to reconcile her past, she could decide whether Fourwinds had a place in her future.

  Ben continued around the point until the beach club was in view. Though they were well offshore, they could see figures moving in and out of the houses—cleaning, clearing, making things right again.

  Maren widened her focus and took in the broader view, the older homes to the south of the rocks, the Donnelly complex to the north. The contrast was stark, like a “before and after” picture. Haven Pointers saw it as a cautionary tale. If we are not vigilant, see what we will become? But in the big world, where people weren’t so hidebound, the juxtaposition of old to new might tell a story of progress, success.

  Maren considered how Annie would have seen things from this vantage point. Her eyes would not have lingered on the contrast between the homes. They would have gone straight to the rocks themselves, symbols of separation and injustice. And, ultimately, of terrible loss.

  She and Skye exchanged a glance. When Skye shook her head, Maren knew she had come to the same conclusion: Annie’s ashes did not belong here.

  “Can we go around Gunnison Island?” Maren asked.

  Ben nodded, calm and unhurried. When they got behind the island and the coastline was no longer in view, Maren asked him to cut the engine.

  She looked up at the island’s rocky shore. She had hoped she would somehow just know when they had found the right spot, but she supposed that was just silly superstition. And this was as auspicious a location as any. It was back here, out of view of the spectators on the shore, that Annie and Charlie overtook Fritz’s boat, leading to their victory in the Stinneford Cup. She recalled what a good sport Fritz had been on the occasion of his defeat. There was some poetry in Fritz’s son being the one to bring them here today.

  A flash of motion caught her eye, and Maren looked up to see that a bird had landed on a little ledge.

  “Ben, do you think you could get a little closer to the island?”

  Ben restarted the engine and moved the boat closer. The bird seemed to be watching them, but it stayed put. When they were near enough, she could see its yellow feet, and the back of its head, with the curly tufts that looked more like hair than feathers. It was a snowy egret, the bird her mother-in-law had so loved.

  Thank you, Pauline, Maren thought.

  “Skye, what do you think? Can we do this here?”

  Ben cut the engine, and Skye pulled the box from the canvas bag.

  “Go ahead, love. I don’t have anything particular I want to say,” Maren said.

  Skye looked thoughtful for a moment. In the end, she seemed to decide that the truest thing was enough.

  “I love you, Mom,” Skye said as she tipped the ashes into the water.

  Maren saw another flash of motion and looked up as the egret took flight, wings beating against the backdrop of the sky—no longer a delicate ornament adorning the shore, but a creature of strength and power, certain of its destination.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  The writer Anne Lamott says “help” is a prayer that is always answered. That was certainly true with this novel. I was astonished at how the right person materialized, at the right time, with just the right kind of support. It took a battalion of helpers to get this to the finish line, and I’m indebted to all of them.

  First, my everlasting thanks to my editor at St. Martin’s Press, Sarah Cantin, who is simply magic. Sarah loved and understood this story from the first, and she saw what it could be. This novel is much better for her extraordinary vision and gentle editorial guidance.

  Thanks, too, to my agent, the unflappable Susanna Einstein—an excellent editor in her own right, and every bit as smart as her name would suggest.

  I worked with a world-class team at St. Martin’s Press, led by Jennifer Enderlin, Sally Richardson, Lisa Senz, and Anne Marie Tallberg. Many thanks to Tracey Guest and Jessica Zimmerman in publicity; Brant Janeway and Erica Martirano in marketing; Olga Grlic, who created Haven Point ’s gorgeous cover; audio producer Katy Robitzsky; Tom Thompson, Kim Ludlam, Dylan Helstein, Michelle McMillan, and Anne Marie Tallberg in creative services; and the always kind (and patient) Sallie Lotz.

  I’m grateful to early readers, who had the dubious distinction of reviewing the original “extended disco version” of the manuscript. Christine Pride’s incisive suggestions made the story much better (and shorter!) Jennifer Entwistle and Ginny Wydler offered valuable feedback and encouragement. Caroline Teasdale Walker was not only a helpful reader, but also a chief recruiter for my army of angels. She introduced me to the brilliant poet Kristina Bicher, who gave so generously of her time and talent; and Emi Battaglia, without whom I would probably still be looking for an agent. Many thanks, too, to Page Robinson, who made sure I didn’t acciden
tally profile anyone.

  I’m obliged to writer friends, new and old, who graciously shared their wisdom: Beth Brophy, Eric Dezenhall, Sarah Pekkanen, Jim Wareck, Beatriz Williams, and especially Kathy Murray Lynch, who cheered me on (and up) over countless coffees and croissants.

  I made at least one good decision during my freshman year of college: I found a friend who was fearless enough for both of us. In one way or another, Beth Rives Chesterton is on every page of this novel. How wonderful to discover that Beth’s uncanny insights about people could be applied to fictional characters. (And since I basically flunked sailing at camp, I’m grateful, too, to her husband, Paul Chesterton, who helped me with the Stinneford Cup).

  Many thanks to Jo-Anne Goldman Chase, with whom I have clocked so much phone time over the years; she can still imitate the receptionist from the office where I worked in my early twenties. (“Hud-on.”) Jo-Anne has listened to all my trials and tribulations over the years, and she also listened over several evenings at her house, as I read the entire manuscript out loud, start to finish.

  I’m grateful to Caroline, Lisa, Ann, and other friends and relatives who spent childhood summers in places like Haven Point. Their anecdotes, impressions, and memories were a wonderful help. Thanks to my friends in Maine, who will recognize traditions, some descriptions, and the universal summer community challenges. Any similarity to real people is entirely coincidental, however. Their kind welcome has made for lovely summers, but would not make a very interesting novel. Thanks, too, to the two Harriets in my life, who are so lovely I could use their name for a character without anyone thinking they had inspired it.

  My family and home would have descended into chaos without the many wonderful women who have helped me over the years: Gladys Rubio, Rosa Aquino, Antonia Surco, Meghan Montecinos, and Meghan’s late mother, Luly Salinas. I appreciate their help and advice, and for not laughing at the made-up language I pretend is Spanish.