The Last Embrace

by Pam Jenoff

  I had expected the Connally house to be boarded and shuttered. The porch was freshly swept, though, and fresh flowers were in the windows. My heart skipped a beat. Had the Connallys returned? I walked to the door, nearly opening it as I once might have before I caught myself. I knocked. A large, unfamiliar woman appeared in the doorway. “Yes?”

  I stepped back. “I’m looking for the Connallys.” I prayed silently that the woman was a maid or some relative I had never met.

  But the woman shook her head. “People who used to live here? We bought this through a broker. Owners were long gone and I can’t say where.”

  I walked away deflated, the windows seeming to stare after me. I could not bear to look back at the house that now belonged to someone else. “They’re gone,” I said aloud, needing to hear the words to believe them. They had left long ago. But seeing it made it hurt more and the realness of it all seeped through me, as though I was losing them all over again.

  “I tried to go to the Connallys’ house,” I confessed to Aunt Bess later that morning as I helped her finish cleaning up. The Breakfast Club program played low from the radio on the table. “It isn’t theirs anymore.”

  She nodded, as though she already knew. “About that— Addie, there’s something I have to tell you.”

  I raised my hand. “If it’s about Charlie, I already know.”

  “Not Charlie, but Liam.”

  But my head swam, the idea of more memories too painful. “I don’t want to hear it.”

  “Another time, perhaps.” She raised her hands, retreating. “There’s something else. I want to sell the house.” I looked around in disbelief. Though I’d run so far, I had always taken for granted my aunt and uncle’s home and the fact that it would be there. “The stairs have become difficult and without Meyer, I just can’t bear to stay.” She trailed off, her eyes wet.

  “Where will you go?”

  “They’ve built some senior apartments in the Northeast. My friend Trudy moved there.” She was watching me, asking permission.

  “Of course I’ll help you. What do you need me to do?”

  “I can manage the house here, straightening things to put it up for sale. But I left so much at the shore.”

  I tensed up at the word. “I thought you didn’t go down this summer.”

  “We didn’t. We had planned to but then Meyer started feeling poorly.” I had thought his illness was sudden. Why hadn’t she written to me sooner? She continued. “But we already paid, so the owner let us keep the rooms and the shed, too. Our things there need to be retrieved. I couldn’t manage it myself.”

  Nor could I, I thought. The emptiness here was nearly unbearable—how could I stare at the memory of what had been right next door at the beach? But looking at my aunt’s face, which had been hollowed out by grief, and her pleading eyes, I could not refuse. “I’ll do it.” I regretted the words the moment I spoke them.

  “I don’t need everything. You can give away the beach things. I just want the photos—and anything that was your uncle’s.”

  “Okay.”

  “Take the car.”

  I hesitated. Uncle Meyer had taken me driving a few times during my senior year of high school in the abandoned lots down by the shipyard, but I did not have a license. It would be quicker than the train, though, and I could leave whenever I wanted.

  The weatherman came on the radio then and we grew instinctively quiet, as though Uncle Meyer might be here to shush us so he could hear the forecast. We both chuckled. Then Aunt Bess’s face grew somber. “What is it?” I asked.

  “I know you have your own life and you’ll be going back to London. But, well, I miss you.”

  “I’ll be back,” I promised, meaning it. I thought back to the letters I never received from Charlie that would have changed everything. And I wanted to ask if it was her who had kept them from me, and if so, why? But she had done what she thought was best and reopening the past would not change things now. I exhaled, letting go of the anger, and started for the car.

  So I had come, driving the route to the shore that had always meant such happiness. I stopped at a five-and-dime on the way to get a couple of changes of clothes and at a gas station in Egg Harbor, grateful that the car, which Uncle Meyer used as a traveling salesman, had an A-sticker, which exempted it from much of the gas rationing.

  Pushing down the waves that loom dark in my mind, I focus once more on the narrow strip of Sunset Avenue in front of me, the last few steps of this journey the hardest. I park in front of the house where we once rented rooms and step out of the car into the bright sunlight. Beside it, the Connally place looks as though it has been frozen in time. It has a fresh coat of blue paint the exact shade it had always been. Even the porch swing still hangs at the same angle.

  I stand motionless. If I do not move the Robbie might come running out the door at any moment, zeppelin in hand zooming high above his head.

  I exhale. Everything is not the same. There has been work done at the house: a pile of cut boards by the steps, the smell of wet paint. Another new family, undoubtedly, has bought the shore house like the one back in Philly, people who have no idea what the property meant, the things that had taken place there.

  Forcing myself to look straight ahead, I walk to the boardinghouse where we had rented rooms. I take the key that Aunt Bess had given me and open the door to the storage shed. My nose is instantly filled with the camphor smell of mothballs. I pull a damp box from the shed and brush a cobweb from it. Then I stop uncertainly. Aunt Bess had not asked me to sort the boxes, just to bring them home. I can just put them right in the car. But perhaps I can get rid of some of the things she does not need. I am curious, too, about what’s left behind after all of this time.

  I lug one of the boxes to our rooms upstairs. My eyes travel through the screened window, down to the patch of grass between the houses where the boys once played. Swallowing over the lump in my throat, I force myself to look away. The smell of musty cardboard rises as I open the box. There is a framed photograph of Aunt Bess and Uncle Meyer standing in front of a car, an older model than the one I drove down here, dressed for some sort of excursion. They are smiling in a way I had never seen and even though he was wearing a hat, I can see that my uncle had a full head of hair. Younger people, with their own hopes and dreams.

  I cough to clear the dust from my throat, then continue sorting. They are mostly vacation things, like the old woven blanket Aunt Bess used for the beach, the now-cracked bucket and shovel she had gotten me with the best of intentions, not realizing I was too old for such things.

  Sometime later, I look up. Outside the sun has dipped low behind the houses along the bay. There are no lamps here and soon it will be impossible to see what I am doing. It is later than I thought and I should head back before dark. But I have only made it through one box and there are still four more to go. Some part of me, too, is not ready to leave yet. I could stay the night and finish up in the morning. Why not? I pull a musty blanket from one of the boxes and curl up on the empty bed on the sunporch. Through the open screen I can almost hear the boys’ voices, mixed in with the crashing of the surf. The salt air fills my lungs like a lullaby and despite my closeness to the sea, I do not dream at all.

  I awaken early, bright sunlight shining through curtainless windows. My body is stiff from sleeping on the thin mattress in a way it hadn’t been a few years earlier. I lie motionless, assaulted by the familiar brackish smell, rolling back through the years. I am caught up in a cyclone of memories, taking me back to places I don’t want to go. I sit up. I need to finish the boxes and go. There is noise below, different than the cars on the street, a low, repetitive swishing. Someone must be working on the Connally house next door. My heart aches as I think of the changes they are making, heedless of all that came before. I sit up and crane my neck out the window, but can see nothing. My soul c
ries out for coffee. I put on my shoes and make my way down to the street.

  I start in the direction of the coffee shop at the corner of Winchester Avenue. The counter looks unchanged and I half expect to see the boys at the counter, ordering milk shakes. I buy coffee, then go to the phone booth in the back, put in some coins and dial.

  “Addie, thank goodness.” Aunt Bess’s voice floods the line with relief.

  “I’m sorry I worried you. I got caught up sorting and decided to stay. I should finish up later today.”

  We talk for a few more minutes before ringing off. I finish my coffee, then start back toward the house. As I near the Connally house, the swishing sound comes again and curious, I stop and turn back.

  I follow the noises, rounding the corner to the back of the house next door. A tall, thin man stands upon a ladder, his back turned, moving boards. His wide shoulders and narrow hips are familiar. Charlie. My heart lifts. But of course this time, it cannot be; he is in England recuperating. With Grace. Pushing down the hurt, I take a step forward. Closer now I can see that the man’s hair is a darker shade, his build thinner.

  There, repairing the house, is Liam.

  I take a deep breath, finding my voice. “What’s a nice boy like you doing in a place like this?”

  Liam freezes, but does not turn. “I heard this is where all of the cool kids hang out,” he replies slowly. He spins, his expression disbelieving. He jumps off the ladder and starts toward me.

  “Liam!” I yelp, running forward. Surprise and then delight flood his face as I fling myself at him. He catches me in his arms, warm and tight, and I draw close to him like a dry plant to water. I rest my head on his chest and he cradles it, fingers entwined in my hair.

  “It’s really you.” He lifts me off my feet and spins me around.

  Once I would have protested for him to stop. But now I just allow myself to melt in his arms. A moment later, he sets me down. I step back and an awkwardness crystalizes between us. He is leaner now, jawline carved in a way I hadn’t quite remembered. But his eyes are unmistakably the same.

  “I was looking for coffee,” I blurt abruptly, mindful that I am still wearing yesterday’s clothes. Suddenly I am sixteen again and sounding stupid. “You’re here. That is, I didn’t know.”

  “I drove back down this morning. Had to get more supplies from the city.”

  “I wasn’t planning to stay,” I confess. I might have picked up the boxes and gone last night. If I had, we would have missed each other completely. But something had kept me here.

  “Your aunt isn’t renting next door,” he observes.

  “My uncle died.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry.” But his voice is level, the neutral response of one who has known deep suffering and almost grown immune.

  “I just came to pack up some things for my aunt.”

  “Well, I’ve got coffee. Come on in and see what I’m doing.”

  I hesitate, starting to tell him that I’ve already had some. Though I had gone by the Connallys’ house in Philadelphia hoping someone might have returned, I find myself now not wanting to step inside, to cross the threshold of a door I had closed forever. But he looks so hopeful, I cannot refuse.

  Inside the house is a wreck in a way that would have driven Mrs. Connally mad. The furniture that remains has been pushed to one side and covered with a tarp. Thick smells of paint and turpentine fill the air. “The house had really fallen to pieces with the storms and being empty.”

  I am puzzled: it has been less than two years since we had summered here. Could things really have fallen to pieces so quickly? But there were cracks and damage, undetected through the years, that had been amplified during the time we were gone. Liam is trying to bring it back, restoring it and making everything just as it had been before, only fresh and new. But there are improvements, too, like the window he cut between the living and dining areas to give it a more airy, modern feel.

  As he walks to the kitchen to pour coffee from his mom’s old percolator, I look around, trying to grasp the scope of his undertaking. He is, quite literally, rebuilding the house from the outside in. “You’re doing all of this yourself?”

  He nods as he hands me a too-warm cup. “I’ve still got to finish most of the bedrooms and the deck. Need to get the major outside work done before the weather changes.”

  “It’s going to be swell,” I say, meaning it. I take a cautious sip. I had feared I might find the house unbearable, see ghosts everywhere. But the memories of Robbie playing and ducking under the table are merry ones, warming me.

  “I thought...” His voice cracks. He turns away abruptly. “I’ve got to get this done before dark,” he apologizes, starting for the back door.

  Is that my cue to leave? I can go back to the boardinghouse and load up the boxes, be gone for good in an hour. But my feet remain planted. “Let me help.” I follow him to the back door. He hesitates, relying on others still unfamiliar to him. “I’m not much with tools,” I say, “but I can paint for you.”

  “Your clothes are going to get ruined.”

  “I don’t mind.”

  “Wait here,” he instructs. I stand alone in the house I had once known so well, the walls seeming to whisper to me. A minute later he returns with one of his old T-shirts. “Put this on.” I pull it on over my clothes and the too-large fabric envelops me in his familiar scent, as it had the night I tried to talk to him on Chelsea Beach. I walk outside and pick up a brush.

  We work alongside one another without speaking. There are so many things I’d like to ask him about the time since I’d last seen him and how he had come to be here. But I fear if I press, he might pull away, as he had when we were younger. The silence broken by the humming of the saw and the gulls overhead. I look over at him as he sands the wood, fingers dexterous. Watching him work I am reminded of the boy who seemed to dance on the waves, agile and carefree in that moment, unheld back by anger and fear. How had I forgotten that part of him?

  His shoulders are broad, tapering to a narrow waist and long legs. I see him for the first time as a man, fully grown into himself, reminiscent and at the same time not at all like Charlie. Warmth rises, confusing me. I force my eyes back to my work. I fall into an easy rhythm painting, the repetitive up and down motion somehow soothing. The work is simple and the ache in my shoulders satisfying in a way I had not anticipated.

  From around the house comes the sound of sandals slapping against pavement. I turn toward the sound, glimpsing a flash of brown hair out of the corner of my eye. My breath catches and I half expect to see Robbie, still eleven years old, carrying a bucket of sand crabs he’d caught off one of the docks in Chelsea Harbor, water sloshing over the sides and leaving dark streaks on the street. But it is an unfamiliar boy and he walks into one of the rented houses down the row, the screen door slamming behind him. My eyes burn as I remember exactly how hard this is. Blinking, I force myself to focus on the painting once more.

  “Let’s take a break,” Liam says a while later when the morning sun has climbed late in the sky. Gratefully, I set down my paintbrush and drop to the porch steps. He goes inside and returns with two glasses of iced tea. A fine perspiration coats his upper lip and wets the ends of his hair. We sit beside each other, not speaking, the silence growing more awkward by the second. I want to jump up and grab the paintbrush again.

  “So what have you been doing these many years?” he asks.

  A year and a half, I want to say. But I know that it feels like more. There are so many levels on which I could answer his question. I decide to take the simplest. “I was in Washington, then in London, working for the paper.”

  I wait for him to chastise me for going to a place as dangerous as London. But he is not Charlie. “Did you go all the way back to Italy?”

  I shake my head. “It wasn’t possible with the fighting. But I was ab
le to confirm what had happened to my parents.” A burning rises in my throat and I stop short of sharing the whole of the awful truth.

  He does not press. “So you came home?”

  “Just to help my aunt for a bit,” I reply quickly.

  “My folks are down in Florida,” he offers. I start to tell him that I already know. But I am not ready to mention Charlie. “I’ve got a boat now, docked over at the marina.” He is speaking in all directions, trying to fill the space between us. “I’m planning to start a small business. Fishing trips and that sort of thing.”

  The Liam I had known was not one to fish. “So you’re going to stay down here year-round?”

  “Yeah. There’s nothing left for me back in the city. I’m more whole here. The seawater,” he says. “It’s in my bones, you know?”

  I nod, understanding. There’s a part of me that still cannot breathe deeply unless the air has salt in it. “Liam Connally, settling down,” I muse, half-chiding. “A house. A business. Next thing you know you’ll be getting married.”

  “Who would want me? I’m so broken.” He tries to make his voice lighthearted, but a note of sad truth rings through.

  “Not at all.” My heart twists as I remember the boy he was, before all of this. I want to reach out and put my arm around him, but somehow I can’t. “You’ve started over.” The easiest thing for him to have done would have been to move far away where no one had ever heard of the Connallys or the accident at the bridge. But he had returned. The house is a second chance for Liam—a chance at redemption. “I would have imagined Jack settling down first, though,” I offer, then instantly regret it.

  “My brother’s a queer.”

  “Liam, don’t.” For a minute I take his comment as mean-spirited, the Liam of old. But his tone is neutral, non-judging.