37 Peases Point Way

by Katie Winters

  Of course, Amelia cackled and said, “It’s not her fault. Don’t mess up her face, Mila. But wow. What power you have!”

  “Just don’t mess with my friends!” Mila muttered. “Or else.”

  Jennifer scrambled up a bit later to order pizza, as she’d decided that they couldn’t live on brownies and cookies alone. Amelia continued to swirl her wine around and around in its glass while her sisters turned the conversation to other things. All the while, Mila rubbed at her shoulders.

  After the pizza arrived, Amelia took one glance at the gooey, cheesy piece and popped to her feet to hustle to the bathroom. Once on the other side of the door, she keeled over the toilet and threw up. Outside, Jennifer was in the middle of telling a joke, and the other girls burst into laughter. None of them had noticed, and Amelia was grateful.

  She’d heard of tension headaches, of throwing up due to anxiety and all of that. But she’d never actually had it happen to her. She stood and brushed her teeth to get rid of the smell, then analyzed her face in the mirror. Without the promise of a work schedule in the morning and jam-packed weeks ahead, she wasn’t entirely sure who she was. She felt like a driver without GPS.

  When Amelia returned to the living room, she checked her messages from Mandy, praying that Mandy needed something from her. This, she knew, was her crutch. As long as someone needed Amelia, she was valid.

  MANDY: I want to tell Colin, I think. But what happens if he freaks?

  AMELIA: He probably will freak.

  AMELIA: You just need to ask yourself if you want this to get back to your dad before you want him to know.

  AMELIA: And again, I hate lying to Daniel about all of this.

  MANDY: I know. Thank you for doing it.

  AMELIA: Tomorrow, I’m going to make a doctor’s appointment for you, okay?

  MANDY: Ugh.

  AMELIA: It’s time to get this process started. Make sure you’re healthy.

  MANDY: Ugh.

  Amelia set her jaw and placed her phone back on the counter. Her stomach continued to swirl from throwing up, but she felt much more focused, now that she had at least one thing to do tomorrow. She reached for a slice of pizza and splayed it across her plate as Camilla began to talk about a handsome stranger she’d seen on the boardwalk earlier that day while she’d been on a run.

  “Listen to me,” Camilla said with a smile. “I think you inspired me when you went on that date with that guy, Amelia. Now, I’m like, why am I not dating? I should be meeting people. I should be getting out there.”

  “Just be careful how you talk to Andrea about it,” Mila said. “My Peter is dead, but my kids don’t want me out dating anyone. I don’t know when they’ll be ready for something like that.”

  Amelia was grateful to fall into the easy, caring banter of her dearest friends. Occasionally, one of them asked her a question or made sure she had enough water, but mostly, they just allowed her to sit in silence. This was incredibly different than her normal mode of operation when she had to offer advice or have some kind of active participation.

  Maybe she’d hit a wall.

  Maybe she couldn’t go forward the way she had been.

  There could have been any number of reasons for all of this.

  But still, she was devastated, and embarrassed, and fearful about what happened next.

  What if Zane didn’t offer her job back? What if she had to find another position on the island? She’d only ever wanted to do one thing in her life, and she’d been lucky enough to do just that since graduation.

  But now, she was just Amelia. Single. Sad. Alone. And hungry to fix other people’s problems.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Amelia’s phone alarm blared out, just as it always did, at six in the morning. Thoughts rolled around the back of her mind as she cleared the alarm and stretched her legs out toward the edge of the bed. There was a strange heaviness to the mattress. Amelia blinked left to find beautiful blonde strands splayed out across the pillow. Camilla was tucked tightly beneath the sheets; clearly, the alarm hadn’t woken her.

  But why was Camilla there?

  The memory of the previous day landed on her heart like an anvil. She pulled the blankets off her legs and stepped onto the chilly hardwood. Of course. She’d been forced to take a leave of absence. She had nowhere to go that morning. Nothing stopped her from diving back onto her mattress and sleeping the day away.

  Her arms felt strange and heavy as she walked toward the bathroom. She felt as though she walked through an endless fog. When she reached the kitchen, she prepared a pot of coffee and watched as the black liquid dribbled into the glass container. Her stomach shifted strangely, and she burst back down the hallway to vomit, yet again, into the toilet. She tapped at her lips with a piece of toilet paper and glared at herself in the mirror. When she reached her bed again, she Googled “anxiety and vomiting,” and about a million results popped up. “Try meditation,” she muttered to herself. But when she closed her eyes to try to “clear her mind,” she felt nothing but fear.

  Where was her life going? What was any of this? How could she keep going?

  One way or another, Amelia drifted off again. When she awoke, just after nine-thirty in the morning, Camilla was gone. She’d left a note on her pillow, which read: Had to get to the hospital. Call me or the others if you need anything. Love forever. C.

  When Amelia reached the kitchen again, she poured herself a glass of water and blinked out the window. A bright red cardinal glared at her from his stance on her bird feeder, his eyes black as night and his expression stern. In just a week or two, more and more springtime birds would parade their beautiful songs from that very bird feeder. Amelia supposed she would have plenty of time to see them.

  Amelia wasn’t the sort of woman to just sit around and let life happen to her. There, in the kitchen, with a full stretch of time before her, she reasoned that she could finally do all the things she had neglected all these years. This meant: deep-clean the kitchen and the bathroom, rearrange her bookshelves, prepare healthy meals for the week ahead, and all that jazz. She would read every “be a better YOU” blog on the Internet, and she would, ultimately, become a better Amelia. She would be thinner, more beautiful, stronger, more organized — the kind of woman you could count on. The kind of woman who didn’t just have to take a “leave of absence” due to her “personality problems.”

  It did her no use to blame Zane, although, of course, she wanted to so desperately. She wanted to fall into bed, eat a bag of chips, and scream her anger toward Zane to the heavens.

  The clean-up, organization, alphabetization, and general ‘personal betterment’ lasted only a day or two. During that time, Jennifer, Olivia, Mila, and Camilla stopped by several times to keep tabs and check-in. Amelia’s heart ached every time they had to return to their own lives and families. More and more, she felt the dramatic hollowness of her own life.

  Three days after her leave of absence, her mother called. Without thinking, Amelia answered.

  “Hey there!” her mother said. “I’m surprised I caught you. Figured you’d be in one meeting or another.”

  Amelia’s throat constricted. In fact, she sat on her couch as a daytime talk show blared on the television in front of her. A half-eaten piece of peanut butter toast sat on a plate beside her.

  “Yeah! Kind of a slow morning, I guess,” Amelia said. She righted her posture on the couch as though her mother could see her.

  “Well, good. You work yourself too hard,” her mother said. “Listen. I wondered if you’d want to pop by for dinner tonight? Apparently, Mandy and Jake don’t have anything planned, and even Daniel managed to get the night off from the museum. I would love your help making something delicious. You just have a better sense in the kitchen than I do.”

  “I don’t think that’s true,” Amelia said. “But your flattery is welcome.”

  “When can you come?” her mother asked.

  Amelia’s shoulders felt heavy with loneliness. After a stran
ge pause, she said, “Why don’t I come by a little early? I can clear up my schedule later on. I could even be there by three or so?”

  Her mother’s voice was bright with surprise. “You don’t say! Well, what made us so lucky?”

  AMELIA STAGGERED THROUGH her closet to find an appropriate outfit. At first, she donned a business suit, something she would have worn to the office; this way, her parents wouldn’t sense anything out of the ordinary. But as she stared at her reflection in the mirror, she felt the severity of her lie. This was a small island and everyone knew everyone else. If she kept up this lie or simply omitted the truth, it was bound to bite her in the butt.

  Ultimately, she donned a sweater and a pair of jeans, added just a touch of makeup, then headed out into the bright light of a mid-afternoon in late March. It was a funny thing, not being in a rush; she felt she’d had to dart across Martha’s Vineyard in her vehicle non-stop for the previous twenty years. Now, she could just walk at a gentle pace toward her parents’ place. Nobody cared where she was or when she arrived.

  When she arrived, her mother’s face performed a number of actions. At first, it was bright with excitement. Then, her eyes shifted down Amelia’s sweater toward her jeans as she said, “Darling, is this what you wore to work today?” She said it so doubtfully.

  “Of course not, Mom.” Amelia stepped into the foyer, hugged her mother, then sauntered back toward the kitchen, where she found her father nibbling on an oatmeal cookie. She took one from the bowl, suddenly conscious that she hadn’t bothered to eat anything that morning. The anxiety-vomit reflex was too strong.

  “There she is. My little worker bee,” her dad said with a smile.

  “How are you doing, Dad?”

  “Not bad,” he said as he took another bite of raisin and oat. “Tell you the truth. I’m hankering to get out to see Olivia’s new boutique hotel. There was a write-up in the paper about it today. I can’t believe she hasn’t asked us for more help. We only spent forty years as architects.”

  “I think Olivia and Anthony have their own vision for the place,” Amelia said. She finished off her cookie and then surprised herself as she took another.

  She could feel the judgmental eyes of her mother, the first woman who had ever taught her how to “diet” properly. What did she care, now? Nobody saw her, anyway.

  “Still, it would have been polite of Olivia to ask,” her father said.

  “Amelia, I wanted to ask you something,” her mother said, nearly speaking over her father. She shifted toward the oven and then drew out several pots and pans. On the counter sat a mass of various vegetables, tomatoes and onions, peppers and potatoes — all things Amelia and her mother would spend the next half-hour or so peeling and slicing.

  Amelia sidled up next to her mother and washed her hands in the sink as her mother placed two paring knives on the counter between them. “What’s up?”

  “Well, we happened to see Mandy last night,” her mother said. “Your dad wanted to stop by to borrow Daniel’s drill, and Mandy was on the couch when we came in. The girl looked absolutely listless, Amelia. I’ve never seen her like that before.”

  Amelia arched her eyebrow.

  “I know how close you girls are,” her mother continued. “And I wondered if maybe you know what’s going on? I know she was running around with some boy for a while, but maybe he broke her heart? Oh, but really, she should be focused on what comes next. Hasn’t she decided on a college? Isn’t she making plans?”

  Amelia lifted an onion from the pile of veggies and chopped off the stubby end. Immediately, the stench of it wafted over her eyes and tears sprung up.

  “I think she’s under a lot of pressure right now,” Amelia said finally.

  “Of course. But that’s where we come in, isn’t it?” her mother said.

  “It does us no good to push her too far,” Amelia offered.

  “Oh, but these children, you sometimes have to push them,” Anita offered as she scrubbed a red pepper beneath the sink. “I remember when you were a teenager. We never really had to guide you. You were always so driven. You always had a million plans. And look where it’s taken you!”

  Amelia grimaced.

  “I just don’t feel that Mandy has the same strength that you do.”

  “I don’t think that’s true at all,” Amelia offered. She slid several finely-sliced pieces of onion into a large bowl and placed it off to the side, then dropped another onion onto the cutting board. Her heart performed a strange thud in her stomach.

  “And I hate to say this, but I think she’s gaining weight,” her mother continued.

  Amelia bristled and then chopped through another side of the onion. “I don’t think that’s true at all.”

  “When she stood up last night, I noticed it. Especially in her face,” her mother continued. “And then, I watched her reach into the pantry and grab a huge box of Cheez-Its. She’s going to have to learn that that teenage metabolism doesn’t stick around for long.”

  Annoyed, Amelia stepped toward the bowl of cookies and took yet another — her third of the afternoon. Her mother’s eyes flashed. Amelia could feel it: how much her mother wanted to scold her for over-eating sweets. But she held back.

  “All we can do right now is support Mandy in all things,” Amelia said, between bites of her oatmeal cookie. “I remember being a teenager. It was a rough time. And I’m sure it’s gotten even stranger as the years have gone by.”

  “This social media stuff. It must rot their brains,” Anita said with finality. “I just hope this is all only a memory by this time next year, when Mandy’s off preparing to take over the world.”

  “I’m sure it will be,” Amelia said, even as the truth crawled around in her stomach.

  Mandy, Daniel, and Jake arrived for dinner just past five-thirty. Daniel grabbed a beer from the fridge and said, “I’m surprised you’re already here! Don’t you normally have meetings till six-thirty or seven?”

  “Yep,” Amelia said. “But not today.”

  “Our girl’s been here since three!” Anita said.

  “Wow,” Daniel said. “Did the great and powerful Amelia Taylor finally learn how to take a break?”

  “Something like that,” Amelia said.

  Mandy and Jake hovered on the other end of the counter. Amelia caught Mandy’s eye for only a moment before Mandy dropped her gaze to the counter and reached for a cookie.

  “You should wait till after dinner, honey,” Anita said. “We’ve cooked up a big feast.”

  Mandy gave a light shrug. “I’m starving.”

  “The cookies are great,” Amelia said. “Your grandpa and I have eaten our weight in them today.”

  “Ain’t that the truth,” Jason said.

  Anita’s eyes flashed from Amelia and back to Mandy, as though she wanted to reprimand both of them but wasn’t quite sure how.

  “Can you girls set the table for me?” Anita asked. “The chicken’s almost ready.”

  Mandy and Amelia gathered up the plates and salad bowls, the forks, spoons, knives, and glasses, and headed out to the dining room, which Anita and Jason liked to use for special occasions and big family dinners. As Mandy placed a plate delicately at the head of the table, Amelia muttered under her breath.

  “You doing okay today, Mandy?”

  Mandy shrugged. “I tried to corner Colin to explain. But he told me he’d heard I was flirting with Paul, this football player, and that he didn’t want anything to do with me anymore. He told me he was headed off to Yale, and he would try his best not to remember me.”

  Amelia’s heart felt squeezed. “That’s awful.”

  Mandy shrugged. “I should have known, I guess.”

  “But he still doesn’t know. About the... You know.”

  “No,” Mandy said. “But I can’t figure out how to tell him about it, especially when he’s so angry with me.”

  “Were you? Flirting with Paul, the football player?”

  “Maybe. Probably. Paul’s
super cute, and I have to do something to keep my mind off of things.”

  Amelia nodded. This was something she understood — the personal distraction. Even now, this dinner with her family was something of a distraction from the horrors of her own life.

  The family gathered around the table and dug into the meal: lemon chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy, a beautiful salad with bright spinach leaves in the base, speckled with blue cheese. In the distance, Anita played a Beethoven symphony on the speaker system, and for a while, the Taylor family was able to pretend that everything wasn’t falling apart.

  But very soon, Anita removed her talons and dug them directly into Mandy, yet again.

  “You know, Mandy, I had a conversation with your friend Colin’s grandmother recently.”

  Mandy’s eyes filled with fire. It was almost impressive how horrible this topic of conversation was. Anita Taylor had really stepped in it.

  “And apparently, he’s off to Yale!” Anita said.

  “He sure is,” Mandy said. Her voice sizzled with sarcasm.

  “Did you happen to apply to any Ivy League schools?” Anita asked.

  Mandy shook her head. She then shoved her half-eaten plate forward and crossed her arms over her chest. “Nope.”

  “But you did apply to several good schools, didn’t you?” Anita demanded. “Back when Amelia was looking into schools, she already had a pretty clear career trajectory ahead of her, so it didn’t matter as much. But I know with kids your age, it’s important to head out into the world and make something of yourself off the island. Don’t you think so, Amelia?”

  Amelia couldn’t speak.

  “Oh, Mandy, you really are so lucky to have your Aunt Amelia here for you through all this. She has such a sense of business. The people of this island trust her to get things done. Any question you have, you make sure to ask her. Isn’t that right, Amelia?”

  Mandy glared at her grandmother. Amelia’s tongue turned to sandpaper. Jake, Grandpa Jason, and Daniel all seemed at a total loss of words. This was a battle between the women and the men knew better than to jump in.