by Jean Stone
Katie lowered her gaze to the chicken soup. She no longer had an appetite. She thought about the times when she’d longed for her mother to be with them, but Cliff explained that Joleen was meant to be alone. She had not believed him then. She’d thought it was her fault.
“You don’t want us,” she said.
“I want you to have your own life. You deserve much more than being stuck here on an island.”
Katie tried to stop the tears from dropping from her eyes. She wanted to say something, but somehow she could not.
“Kathryn,” Joleen continued, “your father made me who I was. When he came along, I was just a teenager—a sales-clerk in a store in Akron that carried art supplies. I painted watercolors that no one ever saw and wrote simple poetry that no one ever read.”
Why was she talking about him, the man who had deceived them both?
“No one’s perfect, Kathryn. Not him. Not me. But your father loves you. Don’t doubt that for a minute.”
Too late, she should have said but didn’t.
“What your father did to me was painful,” Joleen continued, “but always, always, it takes two. That last summer we were together, I did not have a miscarriage. I had an abortion.”
Katie had suspected that, but had never asked.
“It was my idea, not his,” Joleen added. “I couldn’t take the thought of another child being born into the spotlight; I couldn’t take the scrutiny of my marriage, that had by then become a farce.”
Katie reached across the table and took her mother’s hand.
Joleen shook her head. “I was not the kind of wife your father wanted. I loved writing my music, but I hated the attention. You, however … you light up the stage and everything and everyone around you.”
“I can’t write music the way you do, Mother. I’ll never be as great as you.”
“We’re different people, Kathryn. I never could perform the way you do. It’s you who gives my music life. Better than I ever did or could.”
Was that true?
“But how can I go back to Daddy after what he did to you? After what he’s done to me?”
Joleen slid the envelope across the table. “Who says you need your father? These are the songs you found. And a few more, too.”
The room was filled with silence, except for the foghorn off the sound. Katie looked at the envelope but did not take it in her hands.
“When all your troubles are behind you,” Joleen said, “you can start again with these. With my music and your talent, you’ll light up the world again.”
EIGHTEEN
“As angry as I was, I don’t think I wanted McNally dead,” Hannah whispered in the darkness to her husband, who lay beside her in their bed, listening with great patience while she told the story. “In jail, maybe for a long time, but not dead. Do you know what I mean?”
It was a moment before Evan said anything. He was not what one might call an “immediate responder,” especially when the subject was as thought-provoking as this. Finally he said, “Jesus, Hannah, did you ever tell my mother?”
She frowned. She’d just told him that her mother killed a man because he’d robbed Hannah of her future and robbed them of their life. Why was his first concern about his dead mother? “I never said a word to anyone until now.” She did not add that she’d told the women of the group.
“Oh,” he said, and that was all.
“Why?”
“Because I’d like to know if she’d think that we should tell the kids.”
Hannah felt a sinking feeling. “They’re our kids, Evan. I want them to know.”
“I’m not sure I do.”
The Vineyard night was cool and damp. It drifted through the sheer, white curtains and settled in the gully between them on the bed. “What if they find out another way?” she asked.
“We live on an island, Hannah. We’re protected from the real world.”
She did not say that cancer was part of the “real world,” and they hadn’t been protected very well from that. She rested her hand against her forehead, she closed her eyes. She tried to force away a picture of her mother doing penance in the library or laundry or wherever inmates worked, dressed in an awful orange jumpsuit with numbers on the back. She wondered if, in all these years, her mother had been diagnosed with breast cancer and if she had survived.
“I’m sorry, Hannah,” Evan continued. “But try to understand that this is all news to me. I can’t believe you’ve kept it to yourself, something as serious as this.”
Hannah did not remind him she’d not known about his pot-smoking until they’d been married for ten years.
“I think the kids are too young to know,” he said. “Maybe in a few years we might tell Riley.” He rolled onto his side, his back now facing her, discussion closed.
“She’s old enough now.” Hannah did not tell him that their daughter was old enough for many things, including sex, which Hannah had learned from a bathroom wall last year at school. BEST ISLAND BLOW JOB, the crude graffiti read, RILEY JACKSON. Aghast with horror, sick with shock, she had confronted Riley. Surprisingly, her daughter laughed. “Maybe I’ll get an award at the next assembly,” she’d said. Then added, “I hope you know it’s not true.” But Hannah didn’t know, not for sure. So she tried to talk to Riley about AIDS and birth control, but Riley said she already knew about that stuff. It might have helped if Mother Jackson had been alive for some advice.
“Be reasonable, Hannah,” Evan said into the night. “The kids have too much on their minds right now. They’re worried about your cancer. This would upset them more.”
Taking a deep breath, Hannah held it for a moment. She moved her hand down to her breast and touched it through her nightgown, and thought about the lump that was buried there, would be there until the chemo was complete and her mastectomy was done. Then she realized Evan had not said, “Oh, honey, I’m so sorry,” or “God, Hannah, how strong you were to overcome all that,” or even “Have you ever thought about going to her now and trying to reconcile?” But Evan had not said those things, and Hannah was left to wonder why women married men, when their heads and hearts so rarely seemed to be in the same place.
Rita’s need to know had surpassed mere curiosity: She needed to find out if Faye was behind the new Women’s Wellness Center. Only then could Rita decide how big the stakes would be if she resigned from the group. If she left, Faye could renege on the money and the island women would lose. If Rita stayed, she’d have to face that woman every week, maybe more, because they were “sticking together,” because “that’s what real friends are for.”
It was always possible that Faye did not remember Rita, fat chance of that.
The only way to learn the benefactor’s name would be straight from Doc. Of course, he’d never tell her because of that god-awful confidentiality, but he must have something somewhere, a letter or some notes. Which meant Rita would have to break into Doc’s office, then riffle through his files.
She really had no other choice.
Six o’clock in the morning was a lousy hour to leave the house, but it should be a safe time to show up at the hospital and not run into Doc. Rita had awakened Mindy and asked her to listen for the twins. She explained that she had to check on one of the women in the group who had a minor problem—no, it wasn’t Katie—but that she’d be back before Mindy left for school.
The good part was no one was on the road, so Rita made it to the hospital and into the empty parking lot in record time.
It was dimly lit inside the corridor, the air filled with the hollow sound of nothing happening, poised on the precarious rim of a day that had not yet awakened.
Rita tiptoed down the hall on furtive feet, as if she had no business being there, which she, of course, did not. She moved past the vending machines and down the doctors’ wing, all the while her heart beating more quickly than she supposed was healthy for a heart. Was this how common thieves felt just before the heist? Their aorta pumped with adrenaline, fueli
ng each villainous step?
OBSTETRICS AND GYNECOLOGY. INTERNAL MEDICINE.
The small plaque had been screwed into the metal door decades ago, as had the strip below it that read: ROLAND W. HASTINGS, M.D.
Rita was always caught off guard when she saw the name. Somehow she had never pictured Doc as a “Roland,” just a simple “Doc.” The fact that he had a first name made him seem too ordinary, and to the people of the Vineyard, he was anything but that.
She assumed the doorknob would be locked, for which she was prepared to implement the bobby-pin-break-in method she’d perfected through the years to gain access to the cottages she’d been hired to clean—cottages that belonged to people who had lost their keys or had them stolen or who’d taken them home to Pittsburgh or Cincinnati or somewhere too far to get them, because the next renters would show up in an hour.
This door, however, wasn’t locked. The handle turned, the door pushed open, and Rita went inside.
It was dark. Faye woke up, startled from a dream, another of those dreams in which Dana called out, but Faye could not reach her.
She touched her neck; it was wet with perspiration. She wondered why the dreams had come back now. Was it an aftereffect of the radiation?
She felt the soft plop-plop, plop-plop of Mouser’s feet on the comforter, followed by the gentle nuzzling of his body against her side.
The pain eased a little and Faye remembered that R.J. would arrive that day, and she would learn where Greg was and how soon she could see him—if at all—again.
She closed her eyes and tried not to think about her children, but instead about what she would wear and if she should make lunch for R.J. and why she felt a need to bother.
Rita closed the door behind her, careful that it did not rattle but made only a quiet click.
She blinked twice, then twice again, waiting for her eyes to adjust to the darkness. She’d been in Doc’s office many times: She tried now to remember where his large wooden desk was positioned; where the sofa sat uninvitingly, its pimples of foam stuffing jutting out in many places; where the ancient file cabinets were aligned against which wall, burdened as they were with the stories of the lives and aches and pains and deaths of so many islanders.
Reaching into her bag, Rita withdrew her pocket flashlight. She stared down at the shadow of the Eveready in her hand. It had made sense when she’d thought of it last night; all she could envision now, however, was an arc of light sweeping through the dark, alerting the night watchman or the janitor or even a nurse who might be passing by, that someone was in Doc’s office and it looked like a burglary.
It was bad enough she was somewhere she did not belong. Arming herself like Jessica Fletcher or Miss Marple would only serve to call unpleasant attention.
With a snort of laughter at herself, Rita tossed the flashlight back into her bag, then fumbled against the wall until she found the switch. She flicked it on and Doc’s office quickly came to life: desk and sofa and the wall of files.
Geissel. Faye would be listed under Joe’s last name, wouldn’t she? The child had died pre-Rita, before Faye and Joe’s divorce. Most likely Geissel would have been the name of record.
She stole her way to the files and scanned the rectangles of oak tag tucked into the slots. Thank God Doc had not yet automated: He might be modern enough to see the need for a Women’s Center, but when it came to paperwork, he believed the old ways were the best.
The drawer marked F–H creaked open, its runners complaining against the weighty contents.
Gallagher.
Gardiner.
Garvey.
Rita hesitated. Julie Garvey? Would a quick peek reveal if Julie Garvey had her face lifted the way everyone suspected? Would Doc have that information in the file?
Rita Mae, she could almost hear her mother scold.
“Oh, all right,” Rita muttered, then continued.
Gates.
Geary.
Geissel. Geissel.
She held her breath, as if this were a great surprise and not the reason that she’d come. Stuffing her hand between the jam-packed manila folders, she began to lift out the Geissel folder. Just then, the office door opened and someone sucked the air out of the room.
“Rita?”
Well, of course it was Rita. Who else on the damn Vineyard had hair the color of overripe tomatoes?
“It’s me, Doc,” she replied, turning, half-relieved that it was him and not a guard who had a gun. The other half of her was quickly racing to sort out her thoughts, trying to remember what she’d figured she could say if she got caught, which it appeared she had. “I didn’t expect to see you here so early.” Which went without saying, as Doc probably knew.
“What are you doing in my files?”
Would forty-nine years of knowing someone help cushion the indiscretion of a single act? “Doc,” she said, closing the file drawer, cursing herself for coming at six o’clock and not five-forty-five, “I had a crisis with one of the women in the group.”
“Those files are confidential, Rita.” He moved toward her and insinuated himself between Rita and the filing cabinet—his filing cabinet—and his confidential files. “You should have called me,” he added. “You shouldn’t be sneaking into my office.”
“I didn’t exactly sneak, Doc. The door was open. I turned the light on.” Thank God he could not dispute either of those things. She hoisted her bag onto her shoulder. “I thought it was too early to call you.” She laughed a short laugh meant to sound caring. “It’s Faye,” she said. “I don’t know what to do.”
Apparently convinced that she was not up to no good, Doc relaxed his eyebrows to their normal place above his eyes and not scrunched into his nose. “Faye Geissel?” He said the name as if there were more than one Faye on the island who had breast cancer, just as if there might be more than one Rita with red hair.
“Yes, well, I know her as Faye Randolph.” Rita breathed again, glad that she’d averted his thoughts from her dastardly deed. “Apparently she had a child that died.” She said a quick prayer to Kyle, asking for forgiveness for exploiting him again, and added, “like my Kyle. Well, not the same way, of course. But one who died.”
Doc stared at Rita. He leaned protectively against the cabinets. “Rita, you know I can’t talk about my patients.”
“But Doc, I’m only trying to help. She can’t seem to open up about the tragedy. I think I can help her because I’ve been through it, too.”
He sighed. “Rita, you’re not a professional. Just try to be their friend. If you’re concerned about any of them, tell me. I’ll talk with them directly. It’s not up to you.”
She wanted to say that she knew she was not a professional. She wanted to remind him she’d been doing him a favor to facilitate the group because he’d been hard up and she had trouble saying no. Then she figured she’d be better off to leave well enough the hell alone. But as Rita turned to leave, she could not stop herself from saying, “Doc, one question. Is Faye the one who’s putting up the money for the Women’s Center?”
He laughed. “Rita Blair,” Doc said, because to him, she’d always be Rita Blair, “I swear you are as incorrigible as your mother.”
Coming from Doc, Rita took that as a compliment and left Doc’s office, grateful that her heart had found it’s way out of her throat.
Riley wasn’t in her room when Hannah went to wake her. Her books were gone; her bag was gone. It wouldn’t be the first time her daughter left for school too early, to meet her friends and hang out on the corner, as if this were a real city and not one where her parents could possibly see her.
It doesn’t matter, Hannah repeated to herself as she went downstairs to make breakfast for Evan, Casey, and Denise.
The only thing that matters is what’s right for you, Faye had said when they were in New York, before the funeral turned all attention once again onto Katie.
She supposed that Faye was right, but it was easier said than done. Still, it was nice that none of
them berated her for abandoning her mother.
Write down your feelings in your journal, Rita had suggested. Hannah doubted she should include lingering fantasies about John Arthur, which resurfaced whenever she was angry with her husband, or the fact that she was trying to ignore that the road race was this week.
Don’t forget the other stuff, Katie added, like pictures of your kids when they were babies, or, if you have one of you as a baby.
Rita had laughed. All Katie thinks about these days are babies.
Hannah didn’t know what happened to the photos of herself as a child, let alone a baby. There only was the picture in her high school yearbook …
Popping two slices of homemade bread into the toaster, Hannah thought about the yearbook that she’d saved from San Antonio and hidden at the bottom of Mother Jackson’s trunk. Perhaps now was a good time to look at it again.
GUILTY. MURDER TWO.
The front page of the newspaper had yellowed. It cracked along the edge where it had been folded; the ink had chipped from some of the bold black headline.
Yet the words were unmistakable.
SAN ANTONIO—A local rancher and mother was found guilty yesterday for the brutal killing of her foreman, Edward McNally. Elizabeth Barnes was sentenced to twenty years to life after pleading no contest to a charge of second degree murder
… and on and on the article continued. Hannah read every word as if she’d never seen the clipping, as if she’d not spent the first year after the trial reading and rereading the newspaper every night until she could read no more, and then she put it in her yearbook and promised herself she’d never look at it again.
She’d kept her word until now. Even when Mother Jackson died and Hannah found the false bottom of the trunk, she hadn’t looked either at the yearbook or the clipping. She’d simply transferred them with her birth certificate and old biology book from her bureau drawer to the place where they’d be safer, far from unknowing eyes. She should have thrown them out back then.
