by Sarah Jio
“A new hairdo.”
Danielle squealed. “A perm! Give her a perm!”
Grandma smiled. “No, not a perm. Emily needs a new color.” She held my chin in her hand and then nodded. “Yes, I’ve always pictured you as a brunette.”
I numbly followed Grandma into the bathroom, where she pulled out a box of hair color and directed me to sit on a little silk dressing chair near the bathtub. “Hold still,” she said, combing my hair into sections and methodically applying a black paste that smelled of ammonia. Two hours later, my blond locks were so dark, I cried when I looked in the mirror.
I shuddered at the memory of it. “You grew up with Grandma Jane, didn’t you, Bee?”
“Yes,” she said. “And your grandfather, too. Right here on the island.”
“So what was it that you said about Grandma that drove my mom away?”
Bee looked lost in thought. “Your mother took on a very ambitious project when she was young,” she said. “When her efforts failed, she decided that she didn’t want to be a part of the family anymore, at least not in the same way she had been. She stopped coming to the island. Eight years passed before I saw her again. That was when you were born. I drove down to Portland to see you in the hospital, but your mother had changed by then.”
Bee drifted off again, retreating into her memories, but I was quick to pull her back. “What do you mean, changed?” I said.
She shrugged. “I don’t know how to describe it other than to say that it was as if the very life had been sucked out of her,” she said. “I could see it in her eyes. She had changed.”
I shook my head, confused. At that moment, I wished I could talk to my grandfather. He had been in a nursing home in Spokane for years now, and I felt a pang of regret in my heart when I realized that it had been at least two years since I’d visited him. The last time my mother had made the trip, she said he hadn’t recognized her—his own daughter. She said he kept calling her by a different name, and that he’d said something to make her cry. Even so, I was overcome with a sudden urge to see him.
“Bee,” I said cautiously, “what project did my mother take on?”
She shook her head. “After the blowup with your mother, Bill made me promise not to speak of it again, for her sake, and for all of us.”
I frowned. “So you’re not going to tell me?”
She clasped her hands together in determination. “I’m sorry, dear. It’s water under the bridge now.”
“I’m just trying to understand,” I said, feeling my frustration rise up into a flush on my cheeks. “All those years, all those summers we visited—this is why my mom hardly spoke to you?”
“I don’t really know anymore,” she said. “Nobody stays the same. But she still brought you girls here. I will always give her credit for that. She knew how much you enjoyed your summers on the island, as she once did. And no matter what resentment she has for me, I think she managed to put it aside for the sake of you and Danielle.”
I sighed and looked out the window. The sound looked angry, its waves churning and swirling and then lashing down on the cement bulkhead with such ferocity that salt water ricocheted off the windows. It didn’t seem fair that Bee could keep these secrets from me. Whether it was painful or not, didn’t I deserve to know this family story she spoke of?
“I’m sorry, dear,” she said, patting my arm.
I sighed and looked away. Bee had always been a stubborn woman, and I’d learned long ago to pay attention to her cues, and to leave some subjects well enough alone.
Bee nodded to herself, as though she was remembering something—perhaps something disturbing. I studied her face, hoping to get a glimpse of whatever she was harboring inside. The light from the window amplified the deep wrinkles that crisscrossed her forehead. I was reminded of something I often forget: Bee was getting old. Very old. And it was apparent to me, for the first time, that my aunt was carrying something heavy on her shoulders—something troubling, definitely, and, I worried, something dark.
I had told Bee that I was heading to the beach for some quiet time. What I hadn’t told her, however, was that I was bringing the diary with me. I walked along the shore until I found a log to lean against—not exactly a comfortable sofa, but there was enough beach grass growing around it to cushion my back a bit. Feeling the cool breeze hit my skin, I closed the top button on my sweater and picked up the page where I had left off, eager to dive in again, but then my phone rang. I looked at the screen and saw that it was Annabelle.
“OK,” she said, “so I figured that you have either been off having a hot island fling or that you died.”
“Alive and well,” I said. “Sorry for not calling. I guess I’m getting kind of wrapped up in things here.”
“And by ‘things,’ do you mean a member of the male species?”
I giggled. “Well, sort of.”
“Good lord, Emily, tell me everything!”
I told her about Greg and Jack.
“I love that you haven’t mentioned Joel once,” she said.
My heart sank, the way it did whenever anyone mentioned his name.
“Why did you have to say that?” I said.
“Say what?”
“Why did you have to bring him up?”
“Sorry, Em,” she said. “OK, change of subject: How are things going over there?”
I sighed. “Wonderfully. There’s just something about this place.” The seagulls were flapping and squawking overhead, and I wondered if she could hear them.
“I knew it would be better than Cancún,” she said.
“You were right. This is exactly what I needed.”
I told her about last night’s beach kiss with Greg, and she squealed. “And why did you not call me at three in the morning to tell me this news?”
“Because you would have screamed at me for waking you up.”
“Yes, I would have,” she said. “But I would have still wanted to know.”
“Fine,” I said. “After my next kiss, if there is a next kiss, I will ring you. Satisfied?”
“Yes,” she replied. “And I’m going to want details.”
“I can do details.”
“You have about three more weeks there, right?”
It seemed too short. And instantly I felt like the child who panics when she starts seeing back-to-school ads on TV in July: Don’t they know that school doesn’t start for two whole months? “I have a lot to figure out before I come home,” I said.
“You’ll piece it together, Em,” she said. “I know you will.”
“I don’t know, I guess I get the feeling that there’s something bigger going on here—something about my aunt and my family. A family secret. And, oh, there’s this diary I found in the guest room.”
“A diary?” She sounded intrigued.
“It’s an old diary that someone kept, from 1943, or maybe the start of a novel. I’m not really sure. Honestly, I feel a little strange reading it. But I have this haunting feeling that I’m supposed to be reading it—that I found it for a reason. Is that weird?”
“No,” Annabelle answered quickly. “Not weird at all. I once found my mother’s diary from high school and read the whole thing cover to cover. I learned more about my mom in those hours reading under the covers with a flashlight than I have in the thirty-three years I’ve known her.” She paused. “Who did you say wrote it? Bee?”
“That’s just it,” I said, “I don’t know. But I haven’t been this engaged in a book in years.”
“Maybe you are meant to read it, then,” Annabelle said. “Wait, didn’t you say you had a date with what’s-his-name tomorrow night?”
“Yes—well, I’m having dinner with Jack, at his house,” I replied. “So, yeah, I guess you could call it a date.”
“Emily, if a man cooks for a woman, that, my dear, is a date.”
“OK, I guess when you put it that way. And what about you? Any progress with Evan?”
“Nothing,” she said. “
I think it’s sunk. I will just wait patiently for my Edward.”
We both knew that according to Annabelle’s research, Edward is the name of the most reliable and longest-lasting husband.
“Oh, by the way, Annabelle,” I said, “just curious—what does your research say about the name Elliot?”
“Why? Is this mystery bachelor number three?”
I laughed. “No, no, I, um, know someone with the name here, and I was just wondering.”
I could hear her fumbling around at her desk. “Ah, here it is,” she said. “Elliot, yes—wow, it’s a very good name. Average length of marriage for Elliots is forty-two years. It still doesn’t beat Edward at forty-four, but Elliot is about as good as you can get.”
“Thanks,” I said, smiling. When I hung up the phone, I realized that I had forgotten to ask her about the names Jack and Greg. But for some reason, that didn’t matter to me as much as Elliot’s name did. I wanted to know, on Esther’s behalf. And I was certain that she’d be pleased with the answer.
Bobby came home at ten to nine, just as he said he would. Bobby was always on time. He took off his blue suit jacket and hung it up in the closet, then walked to the kitchen and greeted me with a kiss.
“I missed you,” he said.
This was what he always said.
Then I rewarmed his dinner and sat down with him at the table, watching him spoon the food into his mouth and listening to him recount the details of his day.
This was how our evenings always went.
And then we went to bed, and because it was Wednesday, Bobby rolled over and tugged at the bodice of my nightgown. Bobby always wanted to make love on Wednesdays. But tonight I didn’t tense up. I didn’t count to sixty and pray for it to be over. Instead, I closed my eyes and imagined that I was with Elliot.
Three years before I married Bobby, I was engaged to Elliot, and for a while, all was right with the world. I remember the chill in the air the day of the clambake. I didn’t know it then, but it signaled the beginning of the end.
Frances, one of my best friends, suggested I wear gloves. But my other best friend, Rose, came to my defense: “And hide that ring?” she said. “Nonsense. You can’t cover up a ring like that. It would be sacrilegious.”
We laughed and primped and powdered our noses. An hour later, we made our way, arm in arm, to the event of the season, the one that drew every man, woman, baby, and child to the beach in Eagle Harbor. Picnic tables and campfires dotted the shore, where freshly harvested butter clams and Dungeness crab roasted near pots of fresh chowder.
On the beach, little strands of white globe lights crisscrossed overhead, and as was the tradition of the island clambake, there was music and dancing. The three of us cheered when “Moonlight Serenade,” our favorite recording by Glenn Miller, sounded over the loudspeakers. I started to sway to the music, and as I did I felt Elliot’s strong arms behind me. He kissed me on the neck. “Hi, my love,” he whispered, leading me to the dance floor. Our bodies moved in unison as the moon shone down on us.
When the song ended, we walked to the bench where Frances was sitting alone. “Where’s Rose?” I asked.
Frances shrugged. “Probably off looking for Will.”
I detected hurt in her voice, so I let go of Elliot’s hand and reached for hers.
“Let’s go have some fun, shall we, girls?” Elliot said. He offered us each an arm, and we obliged. Frances perked up immediately.
Will and Rose joined us on a blanket that Elliot had spread out on the beach. We drank beer and ate clams out of tin bowls and reveled in the beauty of the crisp, star-filled night.
Elliot reached into his dark green knapsack and pulled out his camera, fiddling with the flash for a second before gesturing at me to look up. “I don’t want to ever forget the way you look tonight,” he said, making one, then two, then three snaps with his finger. Elliot was never more than a few feet away from his camera. He could capture a scene in black and white with such poignancy that it almost made you weak.
Looking back, I wish I had prevented Elliot from leaving that night. I wish I could have made time stand still. But shortly before ten p.m., he turned to me and said, “I have to go to Seattle tonight. There’s some business I have to attend to. Can I see you tomorrow night?”
I didn’t want him to go, but I nodded and kissed him. “I love you,” I said, lingering in the moment a few seconds longer before he stood up, brushed the sand off his legs, and began walking to the ferry dock, whistling, as he always did.
The next morning, Frances, Rose, and I caught an early ferry to Seattle to do some shopping. Rose wanted to go to Frederick & Nelson to get a dress she’d seen in the latest issue of “Vogue.” Frances needed new shoes. I was just happy to get off the island. I liked being in the city. I must have told Elliot a hundred times how I dreamed of a big apartment downtown with windows overlooking the sound. I’d paint the walls mauve, and the drapes would be cream with little sashes holding them back from the windows, just like in the magazines.
And then, walking out onto the sidewalk on Marion Street in front of the Landon Park Hotel—a big brick building with two enormous columns in front—was Elliot. He was with someone, but it wasn’t until the traffic cleared a few seconds later that I could see whom. She was blond and tall, nearly as tall as Elliot. I watched as he wrapped his arms around her in an embrace that lasted an eternity. I was close enough to hear their conversation—well, just bits and pieces of it, but that’s all I needed to hear.
“Here’s the key to the apartment,” the woman said, handing him something, which he immediately put in his pocket.
He winked at her, which sent a chill through my body. I knew that wink. “Will I see you tonight?” he asked.
The noise of a passing truck muffled her response. Then he helped her into a cab and waved as it drove away.
“Will I see you tonight?” My mind suddenly turned to a novel I’d read years prior. Never before had a heroine in a book spoken to me in the way Jane had in “Years of Grace.”
My eyes widened. Years of Grace! I shook my head in wonderment before turning back to the page.
The fact that Jane, married to Stephen, had pined for another man, going so far as to let herself feel the passions of love, a certain betrayal of her marriage vows, prompted my mother to call the book “rubbish.” I told her it had won the Pulitzer Prize and that my high school English literature teacher had recommended it to me, but it was no use. Novels like these, she said, were filled with fanciful, dangerous ideas for a young woman, so I was forced to keep it hidden under my mattress.
As I stood there on the sidewalk that day, it all came rushing back: Jane’s story, now so painfully intertwined with mine. There was tenderness in Elliot’s voice when he spoke to this woman. I thought of the ties that bind us together, the vows we make, and break. If Jane could give her hand to Stephen and still love another, Elliot could give his word to me and still pine for someone else. It was possible. It seemed poetic in the story—Jane’s love for Andre, and for Jimmy, a midlife love—but now, seeing it played out before my eyes, as an outsider, it only felt wrong. Could one not love one person for eternity? Could one not keep his or her promise? Elliot could have any woman he wanted, and until that moment, I’d believed he wanted only me. I’d never been so wrong.
The letter. I remembered the perplexing letter Jane had received from Andre years after their declaration of love. It was all in the story, all tragically detailed. He had broken her heart with his decision to go to Italy instead of returning to Chicago for her. It is why she agreed to marry Stephen, an action that forever changed the trajectory of their lives. It is why she wrote him that cold, blunt letter shortly before the war broke out, snuffing out any further possibility of their love, even if that love still smoldered in her heart for years to come. “When you killed things,” Jane had said, responding with decisiveness to Andre’s actions, “you killed them quickly.” And I knew, at that moment, what needed to be done.
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br /> Rose and Frances stood by me in silence, each holding one of my arms, to steady me or to prevent me from darting across the street, or both. But I broke free from their grasp and ran, without caring if I’d be hit, across the street to where Elliot was standing in front of a newspaper vending machine.
I pried the ring, the one Elliot had given me last month, with its enormous pear-shaped diamond nestled between two red rubies, off of my left hand. It was way too extravagant, and I had told him so, but he wanted me to have the best, he had said, even if it meant going into debt for the rest of his life, which I think is what he did. None of that mattered now, though, not after seeing him here with another woman and hearing him say those incriminating words.
“Hello, Elliot,” I said coldly, once I’d made my way to the other side of Marion Street.
He looked at once startled and at ease, as though he had everything and nothing to hide. My face felt hot. “How could you?”
A confused expression clouded his face, and then he shook his head. “No, no, you have the wrong impression,” he said. “She’s just a friend.”
“A friend?” I said. “So why did you lie and say you had business to attend to? This is clearly not business.”
