Chapter 77
Bella had cleaned up after dinner at top speed, loading the dishwasher, washing the knives and pots and pans, wiping the table and counters, and sweeping the floor. She was eager to be done because she had some serious thinking to do. And she knew where she had to do it.
“Don’t worry about my falling in,” she said to her grandmother with a smile. “I’ve got a flashlight on my phone. Besides, the water is pretty shallow.”
“Just don’t be out too long,” Ruby advised. “You’ve got to be up early for work tomorrow.”
“I won’t. I’ll be just as long as it takes me to think through something that’s been on my mind.” Bella waved, grabbed a sweatshirt from one of the coat pegs in the front hall, and left the house. She would take her usual path along Kinders Lane until the turn for Grove Hill Lane, and then on until she reached the Jernigans’ property. There was still light in the sky and the heat of the day had given way to evening cool, making for a pleasant journey.
As Bella walked along to the gentle sounds of a country evening, she thought about her sister’s firm belief in an afterlife. If there was such a thing as heaven, some place or state of being magical and beautiful with all the restricting rules of life on earth suspended, maybe Ariel was hanging out with people from across past centuries. Maybe she was sipping tea with Jane Austen or watching Leonardo da Vinci paint one of his masterpieces or listening to Vivaldi play the violin in some concert hall. Maybe she was zipping around the world, visiting all of the places she had wanted to visit when she was alive, Paris and London and Vienna. Maybe she was communing with life-forms on other planets. Maybe she was peering into the future and seeing that one day all war and strife would be at an end and human beings would finally be happy. Yeah, maybe it was fanciful thinking, but why not? Bella thought. Who knew what came after death? Why couldn’t it be something wonderful? Was it any more reasonable to assume a negative, miserable outcome?
Bella heard the gentle gurgling of the water before she saw it. Of course there was no sign of the gleaming white pebble she had offered on Ariel’s behalf; it might now be buried in mud and silt. Or maybe it had drifted with the gentle stream that ran across the Jernigans’ property and was by now miles away. . . .
Wherever the pebble was, it was time to make a decision. Bella knelt on the damp ground. For days now—or had it been weeks?—she had been trying to understand the notion of reciprocity in a relationship. Okay, relationships shifted through time, first one person accepting most of the burden, then the other taking charge for a while, and at other times both people accepting equal responsibilities. The thing was that Clara was such a terribly needy person, such a desperate seeker of attention, that Bella doubted she was capable, at least at this point in her life, of giving back a quarter of the time and attention she demanded.
And, Bella realized, she must have known this about Clara on a subconscious level before the truth dawned on her conscious mind. She hadn’t told Clara about the ultimatum she had given her mother regarding her relationship with Jack Tennant. She hadn’t told Clara about her change of heart and about how she and her mother had grown close again. And not for one minute had she felt the need to share Phil’s story with Clara. Not that she would ever break Phil’s trust, but the fact that she felt absolutely no urge to communicate with Clara about the important things that were currently happening in her life meant something. It meant that she didn’t consider Clara a true friend, someone who would treat a confidence with respect, someone who would appreciate the gift of her story.
Bella looked up at the darkening sky. There was a pattern of stars overhead. Ariel would have been able to recognize the constellation. Ariel had been so smart about so many things. She would have been able to negotiate the line between duty to a friend and duty to oneself. “Ariel,” Bella asked aloud, “is it okay if I walk away from Clara? Would it be wrong? I don’t think she has anyone else. If I leave her will she be all right?”
Bella listened and, though she heard nothing with her ears, she thought she sensed something with her heart. It was Ariel, pointing her in the direction of a true friend. Kerri, someone Bella had known since fourth grade when the Woods family had moved to Warden from New Jersey. Kerri had been a bit shy on her first day at school, so Bella had invited Kerri to sit with her at lunch. By the end of the first term they were inseparable. By the time they reached seventh grade they were the nucleus of a group of eight girls who practically lived and breathed as one. In high school a few boys were gradually included in the group of friends. Bella ran her hand gently through a tall clump of grass and thought about Annie and Janet and Connie, all of whom had been her fellow soccer stars. She thought about Justin and Theo and Bryce, always forming a band, breaking up, and re-forming. She thought about the cousins, Chrissy and Tanya, who had lived next door to each other all their lives. She thought about Grace, a seriously good artist. She thought about Kerri, the most honest and kind person in the world next to Ariel. “And me?” Bella whispered. “Can I belong again?”
And right then, kneeling by the spring that her sister had loved so much, Bella decided that she would break all ties with Clara. It would be a difficult thing to do, but it would be for the best. For her best and maybe even for Clara’s; either way, Clara could no longer be her top priority. Her top priority now was to show respect for Life with a capital letter by showing respect for herself.
“Thank you, Ariel,” Bella whispered. “And thank you, spirit of the spring.” Then she got up, brushed the dirt from her knees, and with a lighter heart headed home to her grandmother.
Chapter 78
While Bella was paying a visit to the Jernigans’ spring (they were awfully nice about letting their neighbors trespass) and while Frieda was with Jack at the Pine Hill Tavern, Ruby settled in one of the comfortable chairs before the fireplace with a copy of The Egyptologist by Arthur Phillips. A cup of tea sat next to the phone on the little round table at her side. But before she could open the cover of one of her favorite books—she had read it twice already—the phone rang. Ruby reached for the receiver. “Hello?” she said.
“It’s Steve. I was hoping to reach you.”
“Hi. You usually don’t call in the evening.”
“You’re right,” he said. “Am I interrupting anything?”
“No. Just my thoughts, and they could use some interrupting. I was about to try a dose of therapeutic reading when you called.”
“What’s wrong?” Steve asked.
“Nothing really,” Ruby demurred.
“Is it that fellow George? Has he been a jerk?”
Ruby laughed. “God, no! Anything but.”
“Are you trying to decide whether or not to marry him?”
“What has Frieda been telling you?” Ruby demanded.
“Nothing, but now I have my answer.”
“Okay,” Ruby said. “Yes, he asked me to marry him. And I haven’t given him an answer.”
“Ruby, you deserve to be happy and if you think that marrying this guy will make you happy, even for a little while, then you should do it. Though I suppose it’s none of my business.”
“But for the love you once bore me,” Ruby said.
“For the love I still bear you, Ruby,” her former husband corrected. “You’re the mother of my only child. You were my one and only wife. You never entirely shut me out, even when I richly deserved to be shut out. How can I not love you?”
Ruby felt herself smiling. His one and only wife. “Are you sure it’s not just gratitude you feel?”
“Both,” Steve said firmly. “Love and gratitude. Anyway, you’ll make the right choice about this fellow. I know you will.”
How can anyone know what kind of choice another person will make? Ruby thought, but what she said was: “Thanks, Steve. I know Frieda wants me to accept. As does Phil. I don’t know what’s stopping me.”
“I do,” Steve said. “And I’m sorry for my part in all this. If it weren’t for me you wouldn’t h
ave such a—is ‘distaste’ the right word?—for the state of marriage.”
“Don’t blame yourself, Steve,” Ruby said after a moment. “I’m responsible for my feelings. No one else.”
“Well . . .” Steve cleared his throat before going on. “How is Frieda? And Bella?”
“Both are out at the moment,” Ruby told him. “And both are doing much better than they were a few weeks ago.”
“No doubt due to your nurturing presence, Ruby.”
“Now, Steve . . .”
“Well, I should let you get back to your book. Be well, Ruby.”
“You, too, Steve,” Ruby said sincerely, replacing the receiver.
Ruby’s tea had grown cold while she had been on the phone, so she brought the cup into the kitchen to heat it up. Moments later, Bella returned. “See?” she announced, arriving in the kitchen through the mudroom. “I didn’t fall in. Dry as a bone. Well, except for slightly muddy knees.”
Ruby smiled. “I’m glad you’re back safe and sound.”
Bella opened the fridge and reached for the carton of orange juice. “That place is so beautiful at night,” she said. “Magical. I half expected to see fairies or sprites dancing around. Do you ever go to the spring, Grandma?”
“Sometimes, yes,” Ruby told her. “Though not at night, not since my leg got broken. I’m wary of uneven ground. So, did you get your thinking done?”
“I did. What were you up to while I was out? Anything wild and crazy?”
Ruby considered the question for a moment. Was it wild and crazy to have a warm conversational exchange with your ex-husband, the man who had virtually abandoned you and your child? Maybe. But so what? Ruby thought. “I was talking to your grandfather,” she told Bella.
“Yeah? Grandma, why did you keep his name after he left?”
“Because it was your mother’s name, too,” Ruby explained. “I wanted us to be recognized as a family in whatever way we could be, especially once Steve left.”
“I guess that makes sense. But I think I’ll probably always keep my last name. In memory of Dad, if that makes sense.”
“It only needs to make sense to you, Bella, no one else. So, are you going to tell me what was so important you had to think about it all on your own at the spring?”
Bella shook her head and put her empty glass into the sink. “Not yet,” she said. “After I actually do what I decided to do, then I’ll tell you. And Mom. Sorry, Grandma. It’s nothing bad. It’s just . . . private.”
Private, Ruby wondered, or secret? There could be a big difference. She remembered the frightening dream of the other night, the sense of a loved one in danger. “Bella,” she said. “You’ll always be careful, won’t you? I don’t only mean not crossing the street against the light sort of careful. I mean . . .”
“I know what you mean, Grandma. And yes, I promise I’ll always be careful. I won’t fall into springs or cross against the light and I won’t waste my life doing stupid things.”
Ruby opened her arms and Bella came to her for a hug.
“Put those jeans in the laundry hamper,” Ruby said when they had drawn apart.
Bella rolled her eyes and gave a mighty mock sigh. “Yes, Grandma.”
Chapter 79
“Phil?” Bella said. “Can I tell you something awful? I mean, something I feel awful about.”
Phil looked up from the notebook in which he had been writing and nodded. “Sure.”
The two were preparing to open the shop the following morning. Bella had slept more soundly than she had in weeks and she felt an energy she hadn’t felt in months. She had no doubt that the decision to cut ties with Clara was behind these positive developments.
“You promise you won’t hate me or anything?”
“As I’ve told your grandmother on many an occasion,” Phil said, “hate is not in my repertoire.”
“Okay. Here goes. When Dad and Ariel came back from Jamaica—their bodies, I mean—a few weeks after the accident I felt angry. I felt like Mom and I were being forced to go through the trauma all over again. I thought, Why couldn’t they have been buried in Jamaica so there wouldn’t have to be a funeral? I felt resentful of them.” Bella shook her head. “It was horrible of me to be thinking those thoughts, wasn’t it?”
“What we experience when we grieve can sometimes feel embarrassing afterward,” Phil said gently. “Anger toward the victim for causing all the trouble. Anger for his messing up our plans for a nice, neat life. Your favorite Netflix shows don’t have the same appeal as they once had and it’s all so-and-so’s fault for dying and making you sad. You can’t enjoy loaded nachos anymore because you always used to share them with so-and-so and he had to go and die. You can’t look at a beautiful sunset without thinking that it might be the very last sunset you see because so-and-so had died and you would die, too, and it’s all her fault for reminding you of something so depressing.” Phil sighed. “Ridiculous, of course, but perfectly normal. You can’t beat yourself up for your feelings, good or bad. You just have to acknowledge them, try not to act on the worst ones, and move on.”
“I guess,” Bella said. “Did you ever feel angry at Tony for dying?”
“Not at Tony, exactly,” Phil said after a moment. “I felt absolute rage toward the horrible plague that was decimating so many of my friends and colleagues. And I used to think: What are you supposed to do with anger that’s fundamentally directionless? What are you supposed to do with the intense frustration when there’s no easy target to absorb it? The danger is that the anger and frustration can morph into depression or reckless behavior. Or it can even take the form of aggression toward an innocent target.”
“Yeah,” Bella said. “I think I understand. No one likes to think of her life as out of control. No one likes to admit she had absolutely no power over a situation, like a car crash or AIDS. So instead of blaming chance for the bad thing that happened—which is the only smart thing to do even though it doesn’t feel very satisfying—a person can decide to blame herself.” Bella frowned. “It’s weird. Blaming yourself gives you a sort of false sense of power for a while. It’s like you were actually responsible for something big and terrible happening. You were powerful, like God. But in the end blaming yourself for the tragedy can’t give it a meaning. Or something like that.”
“Exactly like that,” Phil agreed.
“Ariel comes to my grandmother in her dreams. You probably know that.”
“I do,” Phil told her. “The first time it happened she was a bit freaked out, not because it was scary but because the encounter was so utterly normal. There’s never been anything spooky about the visitations.”
“Did Tony ever come back to you?” Bella asked.
“Yes, he did. It went on for about a year.”
“How?” Bella asked. “What happened? Were you frightened? How could you be sure it was Tony and not some, I don’t know, some trickster spirit or something?”
Phil smiled. “One question at a time! No, I wasn’t frightened, just a little startled at first.”
“So, did you see him?” Bella pressed. “Did he talk to you?”
“Tony’s favorite flower was hyacinth,” Phil explained. “What happened was I’d smell hyacinth in the strangest places, like in a hardware store or when I was walking along the beach in the middle of winter. At first I thought I was imagining it; you know how that can happen, you think about a particular food you haven’t had in a while and suddenly you can smell and taste it. But then I realized that these experiences were different. Don’t ask me how I knew, but I knew it was Tony, not just my own brain toying with me.”
“Wow,” Bella said. “That’s pretty cool. So it was a good thing that Tony made contact with you?”
Phil nodded. “Absolutely. It helped to know he wanted to be with me, that he wasn’t angry with me for being alive and well. It helped me to believe that there’s something good for us after we die, that Tony and every other being who has passed is safe and content somewhere
, not wandering the universe cold and alone and scared.”
“The person who died might be okay,” Bella said, “but what about those of us left behind? We’re the ones who are cold and alone and scared.”
“But not forever. Trust me.”
“So when Tony stopped coming to you were you sad?” Bella asked. “Did you miss him?”
“For a while, yes,” Phil told her. “I felt as if I’d lost him all over again. But before long I came to believe that Tony had moved on to an even better place. I felt happy for him and I felt a sort of contentment. I still wished he hadn’t died, but I was better able to accept the fact that he had. And as everyone comes to learn, acceptance of what has happened or of what is currently happening is a key to survival.”
Bella shook her head. “Acceptance is a weird thing, isn’t it? It can be sort of like giving up, like saying okay, even though I hate this I won’t argue it anymore because I’m wiped out. Or it can be doing the mature thing and saying okay, I hate this, but you can give this to me and I’ll agree to take it and, what’s more, I’ll try to understand it.” Bella smiled. “Ariel would know how to put it better.”
“You didn’t do too bad a job, Bella. I hope you give yourself credit for how far you’ve come since the accident.”
“I do,” Bella assured him. “But honestly? Sometimes I wonder if I’ll ever be able to look at the news without worrying I’ll see a story about a car crash and have an anxiety attack or something because all the memories of that horrible day Dad and Ariel died will come storming back.” Bella shrugged. “But I guess that’s something I’ll just have to live with, not knowing when or if or how I’ll remember. And maybe I will get well enough to view bad stuff with some healthy detachment. That’s one of the terms I learned in counseling. I used to think all those terms were stupid, but now not so much.”
Phil laughed. “Some of the lingo is stupid, but not the ideas behind it. On a lighter note, how’s that friend of yours, Clara? You haven’t mentioned her in a while.”
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